Netflix’s Top 10 most popular original movies

Netflix — normally very secretive when it comes to any kind of ratings information — has allowed us a glimpse behind the curtain and revealed its biggest hit movies of all time (as ranked by number of views in the first month of release). Review the surprising list counting down from 10th to first place, and let us know whether this makes you want to check out more of these titles. Here are the 10 most popular original Netflix movies, for the first time ever.

10: The Platform

A violent Spanish sci-fi horror film about a prison where people are driven to cannibalism. It’s a cinematic metaphor for the evils of capitalism, like the recent hits Parasite, Knives Out, and Snowpiercer.

David Spade and Lauren Lapkus

9: The Wrong Missy

The biggest surprise on the hit list features big-eyed Orange Is the New Black star Lauren Lapkus as the accidental date of bank exec David Spade on a nightmare trip to Hawaii. A comedy from Adam Sandler’s company.

8: Triple Frontier

Ben Affleck leads a team of retired special-forces guys trying to rob a Colombian drug lord; written by the Oscar-winning writer of Zero Dark Thirty and directed by Oscar-nominated J.C. Chandor (Margin Call).

7: The Irishman

The most prestigious movie on Netflix’s new-hits list, and maybe ever, stars Robert De Niro as the hit man who kills Jimmy Hoffa (Al Pacino), with Joe Pesci stealing the show as his soft-spoken mentor. Martin Scorsese at his finest.

6: The Old Guard

Netflix’s latest hit stars Charlize Theron as the leader of a pack of immortal warriors battling a baddie who wants to harvest their DNA for his evil plans. It’s not on the level of Mad Max: Fury Road, but fun.

Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston

5: Murder Mystery

Can’t visit Italy this summer? Try this ultra-light, Agatha Christie-like comedy about Gotham cop Adam Sandler whisking his missus (Jennifer Aniston) off to Europe, where they wind up on a zillionaire’s yacht packed with murder suspects — including them.

4: 6 Underground

If you like exuberantly dumb, over-the-top Michael Bay movies (TransformersBad Boys), this lesser Bay flick may click for you. Ryan Reynolds leads a band of vigilantes who fake their deaths, go underground and attack the Middle East dictator of Turgistan.

3: Spenser Confidential

Boston’s own Mark Wahlberg plays the wiseacre detective from Robert B. Parker’s thriller novels and the ABC show Spenser: For Hire in a buddy-cop flick that audiences liked better than critics did. Entertainment Weekly called it “an episodic John Wick for all the classic-rock dads patiently waiting for their own small corner of the streaming universe to be served.” Sounds OK to us.

2: Bird Box

Netflix’s first-ever massive hit remains popular two years after release. Sandra Bullock and her family don blindfolds to flee sci-fi monsters that destroy you if you so much as dare to peek at them.

Chris Hemsworth

1: Extraction

Chris Hemsworth, everyone’s favorite hammer thrower (Thor) in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, joins fellow Avengers filmmakers to power Netflix’s No. 1 hit, a summer blockbuster about a two-fisted mercenary sent to save a drug lord’s kidnapped kid in Bangladesh. — Tim Appelo, AARP



Leave a Reply

%d bloggers like this: