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If You Loved Obsession, Watch These 15 Movies Next

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Ignacio Weil

Entertainment - October 31st 2026, 00:00 GMT+1

Vertigo 1958 — 1. Vertigo (1958)

The most disturbing makeover in cinema involves a gray suit and a very particular hairstyle. James Stewart’s Scottie becomes fixated on recreating a lost woman, while Kim Novak makes the emotional cost of that project painfully visible. Alfred Hitchcock surrounds them with seductive color and Bernard Herrmann’s aching music, letting us feel the attraction before confronting its cruelty. Watch how quickly a supposedly romantic gesture becomes an instruction. | © Paramount Pictures

2. Audition (1999)

Running fake auditions to find a girlfriend ought to disqualify a man from dating altogether. In *Audition*, a widower accepts precisely that arrangement, picking out a soft-spoken young woman whose apparent vulnerability appeals to him. Takashi Miike allows the deception to unfold with unnerving patience; Eihi Shiina barely needs to move to hold your attention. The eventual violence is notorious, but the assumptions behind this courtship are troubling long before anyone reaches for a weapon. | © Omega Project

Obsession 1976 — 3. Obsession (1976)

A familiar face offers a grieving businessman an impossible bargain: perhaps the past can be recovered after all. Brian De Palma’s *Obsession* follows Cliff Robertson to Florence, where he encounters a woman resembling his dead wife. Geneviève Bujold gives the resemblance an unsettling charge, and the dreamy photography makes his judgment seem increasingly unreliable. De Palma understands how willingly someone might walk into trouble if it promises to undo their worst mistake. | © Columbia Pictures

The Skin I Live In 2011 — 4. The Skin I Live In (2011)

Behind the immaculate surfaces of a surgeon’s home, a woman lives under surveillance and against her will. *The Skin I Live In* makes that imbalance frightening before revealing how it came about. Antonio Banderas brings unnerving composure to Pedro Almodóvar’s story of medical experimentation and revenge, while Elena Anaya gives the captive Vera a watchful resilience. Avoid detailed plot summaries: the film repeatedly changes what you understand about the bodies and relationships on screen. | © El Deseo

Cropped possession 1981 — 5. Possession (1981)

Isabelle Adjani’s performance in *Possession* looks physically exhausting even from the safety of a sofa. Opposite Sam Neill, she turns a disintegrating marriage into something ferocious, with arguments that seem capable of damaging the building around them. Andrzej Żuławski uses divided Berlin as the setting for this escalating rupture, then introduces horrors no marriage counselor could reasonably handle. Expect bodily revulsion, emotional volatility, and very little interest in explaining everything neatly. | © Gaumont

Cropped phantom thread 2017 — 6. Phantom Thread (2017)

Breakfast etiquette becomes a relationship crisis in *Phantom Thread*, and somehow the person making toast seems perfectly reasonable. Daniel Day-Lewis plays a dressmaker accustomed to having women accommodate his habits; Vicky Krieps’ Alma has other plans. Their negotiations over attention, work, and dependence give Paul Thomas Anderson’s romance its wicked humor. The gorgeous dresses might attract your eye first, but the pleasure comes from watching two stubborn people discover just how strange their compatibility is. | © Focus Features

Ruby Sparks 2012 1 — 7. Ruby Sparks (2012)

Imagine discovering that every sentence you write about your partner becomes true. Would you really leave the manuscript alone? That temptation drives *Ruby Sparks*, with Paul Dano as a novelist whose invented girlfriend suddenly exists. Writer and star Zoe Kazan lets Ruby’s personality outgrow his convenient fantasy, exposing how poorly he handles someone with independent desires. Beneath the romantic-comedy charm sits a remarkably uncomfortable question about what he actually wants from being loved. | © Fox Searchlight Pictures

Cropped fatal attraction 1987 — 8. Fatal Attraction (1987)

Glenn Close gives *Fatal Attraction* an emotional force that its reputation for outrageous escalation can obscure. Her Alex Forrest refuses to treat an affair as the disposable diversion Michael Douglas’ married Dan intended, and the resulting thriller keeps tightening its grip on his domestic life. Close allows hurt and anger to register alongside the menace. That complexity makes the film more compelling—and more uncomfortable—than a straightforward cautionary tale about a weekend of infidelity. | © Paramount Pictures

The Collector 1965 — 9. The Collector (1965)

Freddie collects butterflies, then applies the same possessive logic to a young art student. William Wyler’s *The Collector* traps Terence Stamp and Samantha Eggar in a deeply unequal contest, with her survival depending partly on managing his fantasies. His polite manner makes the situation more frightening: he expects gratitude for comforts provided inside a prison. The film is particularly sharp about the difference between admiring someone and allowing them an existence beyond your own needs. | © Columbia Pictures

He Loves Me He Loves Me Not 2002 — 10. He Loves Me… He Loves Me Not (2002)

Audrey Tautou’s warmth is put to mischievous use in *He Loves Me… He Loves Me Not*. As an art student devoted to a married cardiologist, she makes romantic optimism look persuasive enough to accept without much questioning. Director Laetitia Colombani then revisits events from another perspective, forcing apparently familiar details into a different arrangement. Go in knowing as little as possible; the satisfaction lies in recognizing how readily you supplied connections the film never actually confirmed. | © UGC Images

Single White Female 1992 — 11. Single White Female (1992)

Finding an affordable roommate is stressful enough without discovering she has begun borrowing your identity. Bridget Fonda and Jennifer Jason Leigh make *Single White Female* work through the uneasy intimacy of shared space: clothes, confidences, and personal boundaries gradually become contested territory. Leigh gives Hedy’s neediness an unpredictable edge, while the apartment stops feeling like a refuge. Its most effective scares begin with behavior you could almost explain away, provided you ignored your instincts enthusiastically enough. | © Columbia Pictures

Rebecca 1940 — 12. Rebecca (1940)

Manderley would be a magnificent place to live if the household permitted its new mistress to feel welcome. In *Rebecca*, Joan Fontaine’s young bride finds herself measured against her husband’s deceased first wife, whose influence lingers in rooms, possessions, and conversation. Judith Anderson’s Mrs. Danvers makes maintaining that influence feel like a vocation. Hitchcock builds suspense from the heroine’s uncertainty about where she belongs, turning domestic luxury into an elaborate source of humiliation and dread. | © United Artists

May 2002 — 13. May (2002)

A cherished doll is poor preparation for the disappointments of adult friendship. Angela Bettis makes the lonely veterinary assistant at the center of *May* both painfully awkward and unexpectedly funny, especially when her enthusiasm unsettles potential companions. Lucky McKee lets us spend time with her longing before taking it somewhere grotesque. Her habit of admiring individual physical features becomes increasingly ominous, but the sadness survives the bloodshed. Sympathy turns out to be a difficult thing to switch off. | © Lions Gate Films

Cropped perfect blue — 14. Perfect Blue (1997)

Who gets to decide when a pop idol is allowed to grow up? *Perfect Blue* follows Mima’s move into acting as threatening attention and an invasive website destabilize her sense of privacy and self. Satoshi Kon cuts between performance, memory, and apparent reality so deftly that even ordinary transitions become suspicious. The animation offers no protective distance from the ugliness. Instead, it makes the struggle over Mima’s public image frighteningly immediate, right down to her own reflection. | © Madhouse

Laura 1944 — 15. Laura (1944)

Detective Mark McPherson is supposed to investigate a woman’s murder, which makes his growing attraction to her a considerable professional complication. Otto Preminger’s *Laura* feeds that fascination through a portrait and the recollections of people with decidedly competing interests. Dana Andrews supplies the detective’s guarded intensity, while Clifton Webb makes possessiveness sound exquisitely articulate. Listen closely to the supposed admirers: their descriptions reveal how much of Laura they have invented for their own benefit. | © 20th Century Fox

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Having your crush love you back sounds wonderful until a horror filmmaker gets involved. Obsession gives that fantasy a nasty sting, turning a wish for romance into an excellent argument for staying single. If you left wanting more movies like Obsession, there’s plenty of trouble waiting in stories of dangerous desire, disastrous wishes, and affection that becomes downright frightening. These 15 films should help fill your watchlist—and make an unanswered text seem considerably less tragic.

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Having your crush love you back sounds wonderful until a horror filmmaker gets involved. Obsession gives that fantasy a nasty sting, turning a wish for romance into an excellent argument for staying single. If you left wanting more movies like Obsession, there’s plenty of trouble waiting in stories of dangerous desire, disastrous wishes, and affection that becomes downright frightening. These 15 films should help fill your watchlist—and make an unanswered text seem considerably less tragic.