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This series-spawning smash is a gloriously inventive stew of dystopian future sci-fi, Hong Kong-style “gun fu,” turn-of-the-century paranoia and jaw-dropping special effects. Its big action set pieces have been imitated to death, but rarely with the visceral energy and giddy enthusiasm brought by the Wachowskis, two independent filmmakers who were given the tools and budget of a big studio picture and had an absolute blast. Our critic called it “a furious special-effects tornado.”

Ethan Hawke creates one of his finest performances as Father Toller, a country priest with a small parish in upstate New York, in this critically acclaimed drama. Paul Schrader, the writer and director, continues to explore the themes of earlier works like “Taxi Driver” and “Hardcore” while simultaneously seizing on the austerity of Toller’s world: The film is quiet and contemplative, which makes its apocalyptic, shattering conclusion all the more impactful. Our critic called it “rigorously conceived and meticulously executed.” (Also recommended: the small but powerful indie drama “We Need to Talk About Kevin.”)

The director Terry Gilliam crafted one of his most distinctive and idiosyncratic pictures with this 1985 vision of a dystopian future, in which bureaucracy and red tape rule the day — and ruin the life of Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce), a mild-mannered desk clerk who inadvertently becomes an enemy of the state. Gilliam’s influences are voluminous (Franz Kafka, Jacques Tati, Orson Welles, George Orwell, German Expressionist cinema), yet he somehow synthesizes them into a style and approach that’s all his own. Our critic called it “a jaunty, wittily observed vision.” (Co-star Michael Palin also shines in “A Fish Called Wanda,” from another Monty Python alum, John Cleese.)

Two jazz musicians (Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis) disguise themselves in drag to escape some gangsters, but one of them falls for a seductive singer (Marilyn Monroe, in one of her best performances), while the other becomes the object of a millionaire’s desire. Both uproariously funny and tight as a drum, “Some Like It Hot” works through every complication of its farcical set-up, landing not only on a picture-perfect conclusion but also on one of the best closing lines in all of cinema. Our critic dubbed it “a rare, rib-tickling lampoon.” (Wilder and Lemmon re-teamed the next year for the marvelous “The Apartment” and again in 1966 for “The Fortune Cookie”; both are also on Prime.)

The three-decade journey of the psychedelic rock band the Grateful Dead is brought to vivid life in this six-part, four-hour documentary from director Amir Bar-Lev (“The Tillman Story”). And while the archival materials and rarities will please Deadheads, the film has even more to offer to casual admirers and even newcomers, who will come away with a better understanding of what made this band (and the misfits they attracted) so special. Our critic called it “ambitiously assembled and elegantly directed.” (Music-minded documentary fans will also want to check out the peerless concert docs “Stop Making Sense” and “The Last Waltz.”)

The director Susan Seidelman was just trying to make a small New York comedy when she cast a somewhat popular club performer in the title role of this 1985 comedy; by the time it came out, that actress, Madonna, had become one of the biggest stars on the planet. Yet her persona doesn’t eclipse Seidelman’s screwball-tinged presentation; “Susan” is energetic and engaging, while simultaneously capturing a distinct moment in the city’s subculture. Our critic called it “a terrifically genial New York City farce.” (For more modern screwball fun, stream “The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert” or “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels” on Prime.)

The director Frank Capra and the actor Jimmy Stewart took a marvelously simple premise — a suicidal man is given the opportunity to see what his world would have been like without him — and turned it into a holiday perennial. But “It’s a Wonderful Life” is too rich and complex to brand with a label as simple as “Christmas movie”; it is ultimately a story about overcoming darkness and finding light around you, a tricky transition achieved primarily through the peerless work of Stewart as a good man with big dreams who can’t walk away from the place where he’s needed most. Our critic dubbed it a “quaint and engaging modern parable.”

Harrison Ford stars as John Book, a Philadelphia police detective investigating a murder whose only witness is a young Amish boy, so he follows the boy and his mother (Kelly McGillis) back to their insular community to protect them. The director Peter Weir (“Picnic at Hanging Rock,” “Dead Poets Society”) deftly intermingles this suspenseful mystery story with an affecting human drama, in which Book finds himself drawn not only to the small Amish town but also to the young mother — which raises the stakes considerably. (For another look at off-the-grid living, try “Leave No Trace” on Prime.)

Roman Polanski’s brings a 1970s sensibility to a classic 1940s private eye movie, and explores the tension between those two eras — between what we were traditionally shown and the sex, drugs and moral rot that production codes kept off-screen. Jack Nicholson crafts one of his finest performances as J.J. Gittes, a laid-back Los Angeles gumshoe who gets in way over his head, while Faye Dunaway takes the conventions of the slinky femme fatale and turns them into a portrait of genuine pain and abuse. A.O. Scott says the film “pushes beyond the conventions of the genre.” (The stark, disturbing Dunaway vehicle “Eyes of Laura Mars” is also currently streaming on Prime, as is another terrific ‘70s action flick, “The Taking of Pelham 123.”)

Nearly 30 years before Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez’s “Grindhouse,” the director Stanley Donen and the screenwriter Larry Gelbart perfected the fake double-feature with this affectionate send-up of classic Hollywood. “Movie Movie” gives us two films for the price of one, a black-and-white boxing melodrama and a color musical spectacular (with a fake trailer for a World War II flying-ace picture between them), with shared casts including George C. Scott, Trish Van Devere, Red Buttons and Eli Wallach. Our critic called it “Hollywood flimflamming at its elegant best.”

In profiling leaders of the Indonesian death squads of the mid-1960s, documentarian Joshua Oppenheimer invites them to stage elaborate and surreal recreations of their crimes in the cinematic style of their choosing (musical, gangster, Western, etc.). In doing so, Oppenheimer directs his subjects to craft an upsetting but telling statement on self-deception and the toxicity of power, and on the lies we tell ourselves in order to sleep at night. Our critic deemed it “dogged, inventive, profoundly upsetting and dismayingly funny.”

Greta Gerwig made her solo feature directorial debut with this funny and piercing coming-of-age story, set in her hometown, Sacramento, Calif. Saoirse Ronan dazzles in the titular role as a quietly rebellious high-school senior whose quests for love and popularity bring her long-simmering resentments toward her mother (Laurie Metcalf, magnificent) to a boil. Parent-child conflicts are nothing new in teen stories, but Gerwig’s perceptive screenplay slashes through the familiar types and tropes, daring to create characters that are complicated and flawed, yet deeply sympathetic. A.O. Scott praised the film’s “freshness and surprise.” (Also recommended: “The Squid and the Whale,” another wise and witty coming-of-age dramedy, from Gerwig’s frequent collaborator Noah Baumbach.)

When people say, “They don’t make’ em like they used to,” this is the kind of movie they’re usually talking about: a sparkling literary adaptation, handsomely mounted and elegantly acted by an all-star cast (including Sean Connery, Lauren Bacall, John Gielgud, Anthony Perkins, Vanessa Redgrave and Ingrid Bergman, who won an Oscar for her role). Albert Finney stars as Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot, who is called upon to figure out which passenger on the title train killed a man whom, it seems, they all had a motive to murder. Our critic called it “superb fun.” (Lumet’s first film, “12 Angry Men,” is also on Prime.)

The director of “Tangerine,” Sean Baker, returns with another warm and funny portrait of life on the fringes, melding a cast of nonactors and newcomers with an Oscar-nominated Willem Dafoe as the manager of a cheap Orlando motel populated by confused tourists and barely-managing families. The script (by Baker and Chris Bergoch) captures, with startling verisimilitude, the anxieties of living paycheck-to-paycheck (particularly when the next paycheck’s very existence is uncertain) while also borrowing the devil-may-care playfulness of the children at the story’s center. Our critic called it “risky and revelatory.” (Fans of unpredictable indie fare may also enjoy “You Were Never Really Here.”)

The 2017 Academy Award winner for best picture, this triptych about a young, gay African-American man’s coming of age in Miami is a quietly revelatory piece of work, exploring and challenging modern perceptions of masculinity, family, power and love. Director Barry Jenkins (adapting a play by Tarell Alvin McCraney) creates a world so dense with detail and rich with humanity that every character gets a chance to shine; the themes and ideas are all above board, but conveyed with subtlety and understatement. Our critic described it as “a poem written in light, music and vivid human faces.” (“Eighth Grade” and “It Felt Like Love” are similarly complicated coming-of-age stories on Prime.)

Robert De Niro won his second Academy Award for his fiercely physical and psychologically punishing performance in this searing adaptation of the autobiography of the middleweight champion Jake LaMotta. It’s a relentlessly downbeat piece of work, but the force of De Niro’s performance and the energy of Martin Scorsese’s direction are hard to overstate, or to forget. Our critic called it Scorsese’s “most ambitious film as well as his finest.” (De Niro and Scorsese’s later collaboration “The King of Comedy” is also on Prime.)

An unexplained and unstoppable zombie uprising forces a group of strangers to join forces for a common goal in this 1968 horror classic from director George A. Romero. In the half-century since its release, it’s been justifiably praised for its pseudo-documentary, newsreel aesthetic, as well as the adjacent social commentary and political subtext (particularly with regards to its African-American lead, and the unexpected payoff of its grim final scene). But it also remains, after all these years, scary as hell. (If you’re looking for a newer chiller, try out “Hereditary.”)

This riff on the hit 1959 television series could have been just another in the endless series of color-by-number TV-to-movie adaptations, but the personnel involved made it something special. Directed with stylishness and wit by Brian De Palma, written with toughness by David Mamet and scored with operatic intensity by Ennio Morricone, “The Untouchables” transcends its spin-off roots to become one of the snazziest, sharpest crime pictures of the 1980s. Our critic called “vulgar, violent, funny and sometimes breathtakingly beautiful.”

South Korean master Park Chan-wook (“Oldboy”) takes the stylistic trappings of a period romance and gooses them with scorching eroticism and one of the most ingenious con-artist plots this side of “The Sting.” Working from the Sarah Waters novel “Fingersmith,” Park begins with the story of a young woman who, as part of a seemingly straightforward swindle, goes to work as a Japanese heiress’s handmaiden, occasionally pausing the plot to slyly reveal new information, reframing what we’ve seen and where we think he might go next. Manohla Dargis dubbed it an “amusingly slippery entertainment.” (For a more classically flavored story of women on the take, try “Love & Friendship.”)

Directed by Howard Hawks, this 1940 film wasn’t the first cinematic adaptation of the popular play “The Front Page,” but it cooked up a twist the 1931 version hadn’t: What if Hildy Johnson, the superstar reporter whom the ruthless editor Walter Burns will keep on his staff at any cost, wasn’t his drinking buddy but his ex-wife? It’s a movie that talks fast and moves faster, and the passage of nearly 80 years hasn’t slowed it down a bit. Our critic called it “a bold-faced reprint of what was once—and still remains—the maddest newspaper comedy of our times.” (For more classic romance, check out “Royal Wedding” or “My Man Godfrey.”)

Reeling from the costly disaster of his ill-fated “Dune” adaptation, director David Lynch retreated to his roots— a low-budget independent production, based on nothing more than the odd notions rattling around his own head — and came up with a masterpiece. This twisted mystery thriller follows a naïve young man (Lynch’s frequent lead, Kyle MacLachlan) as he peers under the rocks of his seemingly idyllic small town and discovers the monsters scurrying beneath. Our critic deemed it “as fascinating as it is freakish.” (For a female perspective on the secrets of suburbia, check out Sofia Coppola’s “The Virgin Suicides.”)

Three years after reinventing the crime movie with “Bonnie and Clyde,” director Arthur Penn worked similar magic on the Western, adapting Thomas Berger’s novel about a very old man (Dustin Hoffman) who tells the tale of his exploits in the Old West, where he was raised by Native Americans. The film’s attitudes toward indigenous people were boldy progressive at the time of its release, in 1970, coming as it did during a period when most Westerns still teemed with racist images of “merciless Indian savages.” (Source: The Declaration of Independence.) Our critic called it a “tough testament to the contrariness of the American experience.” (Hoffman admirers will also want to seek out “Marathon Man” and “Rain Man.”)

Between the first two “Godfather” epics, Francis Ford Coppola wrote and directed this modest character study, in which a proudly impersonal surveillance expert (Gene Hackman) becomes unexpectedly invested in the subjects of his work and then decides he must step in to save their lives. Like its protagonist, “The Conversation” is most riveting in its quietest moments, though its bold opening sequence — in which Caul attempts to eavesdrop on a whispered conversation in a crowded park — is both brilliant filmmaking and a riveting snapshot of Watergate-era America. Our critic praised Hackman’s “superb performance.” (Like paranoid thrillers? Try David Fincher’s “The Game.”)

Asghar Farhadi writes and directs this lucid and contemplative morality play, in which a married couple must grapple with the fallout of an assault on the wife in their home, particularly when the husband’s desire for vengeance surpasses her own. Farhadi’s brilliance at capturing the complexities of his native Iran’s culture is as astonishing as ever — particularly when coupled with insights into victimhood, justice, poverty and intimacy that know no borders. A.O. Scott praised the picture’s “rich and resonant ideas.” (Foreign film fans may also enjoy “Embrace of the Serpent.”)

Martin Scorsese is best known for kinetic gangster movies like “Goodfellas,” “The Departed,” and “Casino,” but sometimes another Scorsese surfaces, the director of quiet, austere meditations on religious faith like “The Last Temptation of Christ,” “Kundun” and this 2016 adaptation of the novel by Shusaku Endo. Scorsese sheds his customary stylistic flourishes and explores the central theological problem with humble solemnity, resulting in one of his riskiest films, and one of his most rewarding. Our critic praised its “haunting tableaus and performances.” (Scorsese’s “Hugo” is also on Prime.)

So much of contemporary science fiction is merely action in sci-fi clothing (the “Independence Day” effect, 22 years on) that it’s refreshing to encounter a film that uses its big budget, name actors and special effects to imagine not how we would battle extraterrestrials, but how we would try to embrace and understand them. Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner star as a linguist and a mathematician who attempt to establish a common language with the inhabitants of an alien ship — all while an impatient world and trigger-happy military clamor for answers and bend to paranoia. Our critic admired how it works in a “more idealistic hopeful key than most movies in this genre.” (For a more action-oriented sci-fi flick, try Paul Verhoeven’s “Total Recall.”)

This stunning documentary concerns the life and writings of James Baldwin, but it’s less focused on tracing the arc of its subject’s life than on the potency of his words. Director Raoul Peck uses as his framework the notes of Baldwin’s unfinished book “Remember This House,” in which Baldwin was attempting to reckon with the legacies of Martin Luther King, Malcolm X and Medgar Evers; guided by Baldwin’s passages, Peck constructs an urgent and audacious essay about our past and our present. Our critic called it “a concise, roughly 90-minute movie with the scope and impact of a 10-hour mini-series.” (Documentary lovers should also seek out “Grizzly Man” and “Nuts!”)

One of the most enduring images of the great Buster Keaton comes from this 1928 classic, in which a clueless Keaton, wandering the streets of his hometown during a cyclone, pauses for a moment in front of a building — which collapses around him, his life saved only by his accidental position in the landing place of an open window. Our critic called it “one of the most astonishing sight gags ever filmed,” and good news: The rest of the movie is wonderful too. (For more of Mr. Keaton, stream “College” on Prime.)

This vibrant and playful 2017 exploration of the life of Emily Dickinson comes from the fertile mind of the great British writer and director Terence Davies (“The Deep Blue Sea”), who so frequently and masterfully unearths the raw desires and emotional truths of the periods he explores. This time, he has the good fortune of partnering up with Cynthia Nixon in the leading role; she adroitly dramatizes Dickinson’s journey, emphasizing the humor and happiness of her earlier years, and how that joy gradually dissipated. “Though ‘A Quiet Passion’ is small,” our critic wrote, “it contains multitudes.”

Joel and Ethan Coen’s story of a struggling folk singer in Greenwich Village in 1961 cheerfully intertwines fact and fiction; they faithfully reproduce that period, and incorporate many of its key figures into a week in the life of the title character (played by Oscar Isaac). But this is not just a museum piece, or a “music movie.” It’s about the feeling of knowing that success is overdue, and yet may never arrive. A.O. Scott called it an “intoxicating ramble.” (For a more traditional musical drama, check out “Fiddler on the Roof.”)

Kenneth Lonergan makes films about people in turmoil, roiled by bottomless sadness, dysfunction and guilt. Casey Affleck won an Oscar for his nuanced portrayal of Lee Chandler, a Boston plumber who, for all practical purposes, is broken; Lucas Hedges is prickly and funny as the nephew who needs him to put himself together again. Keenly observed, emotionally fraught and surprisingly funny, it’s a tear-jerker in the best sense, never stooping to cheap manipulation. Our critic called it “a finely shaded portrait.” (For more indie drama, try “Mystic Pizza.”)

Meryl Streep won her second Oscar for this elegiac adaptation of the William Styron novel, directed by Alan J. Pakula (“All the President’s Men”). What begins as a folksy story of a would-be writer and his friendship with the couple upstairs grows into something far more traumatic, as the naïve, young Stingo (Peter MacNicol) discovers exactly what led Sophie (Streep), a Polish immigrant, to lose her two children before immigrating to the United States. Our critic wrote, “It's a film that casts a powerful, uninterrupted spell.” (For a somewhat lighter literary adaptation, queue up “Wonder Boys.”)

“Fences,” August Wilson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play about an African-American family’s struggles in 1950s Pittsburgh, was first performed on Broadway in 1987; after Denzel Washington starred in its 2010 revival, he retained much of the original cast for this film adaptation, which he directed himself. The familiarity with the material and the cast’s familiarity with one another is clear: The characters have the offhand intimacy of family and longtime friends, and the psychological minefields of Wilson’s text are navigated with subtle dexterity. Our critic called it “much more than a filmed reading.” (Also recommended: “Ordinary People,” another tricky family drama, from Robert Redford, another actor turned director.)

A young man’s coming of age becomes a group project when his single mother (Annette Bening) reaches out to their housemates and friends for help, resulting in a slightly more complicated education than she envisioned. This touching and personal dramedy from the writer-director Mike Mills (“Beginners”) deftly conveys the period without relying on caricature, and resists resorting to cheap villainy or soapboxing. Every character is brought to life with humor and sensitivity, and Bening’s work is among her very best. Manohla Dargis deemed it “a funny, emotionally piercing story.”

We’ve seen countless stories of nasty, selfish people who go on a voyage of self-discovery and come out the other side as better, wiser souls. This acidic comedy-drama asks: What if that journey didn’t take? Mavis Gary (Charlize Theron, in take-no-prisoners mode), a bitter young-adult author who returns to her hometown in hopes of reuniting with her high-school boyfriend, his picture-perfect married life be damned. A film that zigs when you’re certain it will zag, “Young Adult” tells a satisfying story that is also a sly critique of the conventions of modern moviemaking. Our critic praised its “brilliant, brave and breathtakingly cynical heart.”

In 1989, the country was shocked by the sexual assault and near-death of a young white jogger in Central Park. Five black and Latino youths were quickly charged, tried, sentenced and imprisoned — until a serial rapist confessed over a decade later, his claim borne out by DNA evidence. This informative and infuriating documentary by Ken Burns, Sarah Burns and David McMahon meticulously details the charged atmosphere in which the five teenagers were accused and convicted, as well as the tremendous personal toll taken by this miscarriage of justice. Our critic called it “emotionally stirring.”

The director David Cronenberg rarely made traditional horror films, and this 1983 adaptation of the best-seller by Stephen King is no exception. It’s as much science-fiction as horror, focusing on a regular Joe (Christopher Walken, muted and effective) who comes out of a five-year coma with the ability to see the futures of those he touches. This thoughtful and tricky picture is as interested in moral dilemmas and historical ramifications as it is in thrills and chills; our critic found it “unsettling” and “quietly forceful.”

Over the course of this wistful and lovely low-key dramedy from Jim Jarmusch, the bus-driving poet named Paterson (Adam Driver) does not seek success, discovery or even publication. That’s not why he writes — it’s about routine and release. Intoxicatingly lived-in, “Paterson” is a valentine to all of those who create art not to make a living, but to sustain their souls in the meantime. Our critic praised its “visual precision and emotional restraint.”

Set at a group home for troubled teens, this 2013 indie drama from director Destin Daniel Cretton casts aside the after school-special conventions typical of such stories and digs out the dramatic truths buried within. Cretton offsets the inherently downbeat subject matter with an exuberant directorial hand and coaxes gutsy performances from his ace cast, including “before they were stars” turns by Brie Larson, Lakeith Stanfield, Stephanie Beatriz and Rami Malek. Our critic noted, “Mr. Cretton manages to earn your tears honestly.” (Admirers of indie coming-of-age dramas should also check out “Mud” and “Precious.”)

Charles Chaplin’s first feature-length comedy — “six reels of joy,” according to the original advertisements — was informed by his suspicion that audiences would grow restless if subjected to an hour-plus of gags and slapstick. So he went all-in on pathos, creating a story in which his iconic Little Tramp character discovers an abandoned baby, raises the child as his own and must then summon all his ingenuity to keep their makeshift family intact. Even this first time out, Chaplin juggles the seemingly incongruent tones with ease. Our critic praised Chaplin’s “inimitable pantomime.” (Silent movie fanatics will also want to stream the Amazon original “Wonderstruck.”)

Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani based their first screenplay on their own, unconventional love story — a courtship that was paused, then oddly amplified by an unexpected illness and a medically induced coma. This isn’t typical rom-com fodder, but it’s written and played with such honesty and heart that it somehow lands. Nanjiani and Zoe Kazan (standing in for Gordon) generate easy, lived-in chemistry and a rooting interest in the relationship, while a second-act appearance by Holly Hunter and Ray Romano as her parents creates a prickly tension that gives way to hard-won affection. Our critic deemed it “a joyous, generous-hearted romantic comedy.” (If you like your comedies with a dash of heartfelt drama, we recommend “Moonstruck” and“Jeff, Who Lives at Home.”)

As director of the “Ocean’s” trilogy, Steven Soderbergh honored the classic heist movie aesthetic: sleek, classy and star-studded. And then he set out to subvert all of those conventions with this working-class heist comedy, in which a minor character describes its central job as “Ocean’s 7-11.” The key players are familiar (the safecracker, the computer whiz, the sexy girl, the brains of the operation), but they’re done with salty fun and earthy humor. You’ll never say “cauliflower” the same way again. Our critic dubbed it “gravity-defying” and “ridiculously entertaining.” (Caper movie fans may also enjoy the somewhat grittier “A Simple Plan” and “Good Time.”)

Osgood Perkins — son of the “Psycho” star Anthony Perkins — writes and directs this unnerving and disturbing story of creepy goings-on at a near-empty girls’ boarding school. The performances (from Kiernan Shipka, Lucy Boynton, and Emma Roberts) are sharp and the scares are genuine, while Perkins’ orchestration of mood and atmosphere is chillingly effective. Our critic called it “perfectly acted and gorgeously filmed.”

Kevin Costner, Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins were all propelled to the next level of stardom by this 1988 sleeper hit from the writer-director Ron Shelton, and it’s not hard to see why. It’s a laid-back charmer, endlessly funny and casually sexy, and it gives all of them the opportunity to do what they do best: it features Costner shooting straight, Sarandon smoldering, and Robbins playing an amiable goofball. Our critic praised its “spirit and sex appeal.” (Sarandon also stars in “Thelma and Louise,” currently streaming on Prime.)

The first two collaborations between Clint Eastwood and director Sergio Leone, “A Fistful of Dollars” and “A Few Dollars More,” did nothing less than reinvent a genre, diverting popular attention from the increasingly stodgy traditional Western to the so-called “Spaghetti Western,” which ramped up the bloodshed, self-awareness and stylistic exuberance. Those films were modest, low-budget affairs, but Leone and Eastwood broke the mold with this trilogy-ending masterpiece in 1966, which runs nearly three hours and elevates its antiheroes to near-mythic status. Our critic called it “luridly intoxicating.” (Fans of more traditional Westerns may enjoy the John Wayne classics “Red River” and “True Grit.”)

An exhilaratingly strange and hauntingly beautiful mixture of sci-fi, horror and high-school drama, this cult classicconcerns a young outcast whose visions of plane crashes and giant rabbits hint at either an approaching suburban apocalypse or his own madness — or both. Filled with nightmarish images, dark humor and mind-bending time travel conundrums, “Darko” was a breakout role for the young star Jake Gyllenhaal; our critic praised the performance, in which “his every state of mind bleeds onto the screen.” (Fans of trippy thrillers will also enjoy “Always Shine”.)

The esteemed character actor Charles Laughton made his one and only trip behind the camera for this haunting small-town thriller. Robert Mitchum crafts a chilling, unforgettable performance as Harry Powell, a mysterious stranger who romances a widowed mother (a superb Shelley Winters) whose children seem to be the only ones capable of seeing the evil within him. Our critic called it “clever and exceptionally effective.” (Classic movie fans will also want to stream David Lean’s 1946 adaptation of “Great Expectations.”)

John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd kicked off the tradition of translating “Saturday Night Live” characters to the big screen with this outsized musical-action-comedy from the director John Landis (“Animal House”). The plot is old hat: The title characters try to put their old band back together in order to save their childhood orphanage. But it proves to be an ingenious clothesline upon which Aykroyd and Landis’s script can hang a serious of rousing musical numbers and car-crunching chase scenes. Our critic called those sequences “dazzling.” (For more irreverent musical comedy, check out “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.”)

The director John Schlesinger captures the sights and sounds (and practically the smells) of Times Square in the late 1960s with this absorbing winner of the Oscar for Best Picture — the first and only X-rated movie to capture that prize. Jon Voight was propelled to stardom by his charming performance as Joe Buck, a naïve Texas boy who comes to New York City with visions of rich women in his head; Dustin Hoffman created another memorable character as the street-wise native who shows him the ropes. (“I’m walkin’ here!”) Our critic called it “a moving experiencethat captures the quality of a time and a place.”

Ernest Borgnine won an academy award for his indelible performance as the title character, a melancholy Bronx butcher who looks in vain for love at a singles’ dance hall. He finally finds it — or something like it — in Clara (Betsy Blair), a similarly lonely schoolteacher, if only he can look past the sniping of his friends and overbearing mother. The film also won Oscars for best picture, director (Delbert Mann) and screenwriter (Paddy Chayefsky). Our critic called it “a warm and winning film.” (For more classic drama, check out “The Miracle Worker” on Prime.)

Oliver Stone graduated from a respected screenwriter to a top-flight filmmaker with this harrowing Vietnam War drama, which won Oscars for best Picture and director. Stone based the film on his own experiences in Vietnam, with Charlie Sheen as his avatar, a clean-cut kid from a privileged background whose eyes are opened to the horrors of combat and conflict. Willem Dafoe and Tom Berenger singe the screen as his sergeants, one free-spirited and open, the other hard-edged and cruel. Our critic called it a “vivid, terse, exceptionally moving” film.