This weekend, Netflix is unleashing all sorts of fearsome creatures, from vampires and boogeymen to the scariest of them all — a politician. Ahhhhhhhh!
The Watch With Us team is a big fan of the streamer, which is why we put together a quick guide to some of the best new movies you should watch this weekend.
Netflix just dropped Animals, Ben Affleck’s new thriller about a mayoral candidate who is willing to do anything to get his kidnapped son back.
We also recommend streaming two horror flicks: the spooky Stephen King adaptation The Boogeyman and a 1970s adaptation of Dracula.
‘Animals’ (2026)
Political campaigns are often taxing, tense affairs, but there’s never been one quite like Mark Kimball’s (Ben Affleck). He’s in the middle of a brutal campaign to be L.A.’s next mayor, and his patience and energy are as low as his bank account. When his son is kidnapped and held for ransom, he and his wife, Abigail (Kerry Washington), have to decide how far they’re willing to go to get him back. They don’t have much time to do so, as the kidnappers want their money in just a few hours. Is Mark willing to break the law he’s campaigning to uphold?
Co-written and directed by Affleck, Animals is a lot like Akira Kurosawa’s 1962 classic, High and Low, which also told a similar story about a kidnapped child and the moral dilemma his father experiences as a result. Told in a compact amount of time, Animals amps up suspense without sacrificing character development or realism. Best known for his acting, Affleck is also a talented director, and Animals is his best movie since 2010’s The Town.
‘The Boogeyman’ (2023)
After one of his patients kills himself in his home, therapist Will Harper (Chris Messina) is understandably worried about how it’s affecting his two daughters, Sadie (Sophie Thatcher) and Sawyer (Vivien Lyra Blair). He’s not surprised when Sawyer says she sees the Boogeyman at night, even though he doesn’t believe what she’s seeing is real. But Sadie knows what her little sister is seeing isn’t a figment of her imagination — there really is a supernatural entity lurking in their house, and it wants to destroy every living thing it encounters.
Based on a short story by Stephen King, The Boogeyman is just creepy enough to pass the scare test. The best part of the film is when the two sisters try to figure out just who the Boogeyman is and what it wants from their family. Drained of almost all color, the film conjures a cold dread that only a handful of horror films, like the 1973 classic The Exorcist, have achieved. It’s not as great as that landmark film, but The Boogeyman is a high-quality horror film that will make you look under your bed at night and wonder if you’re really alone.
‘Dracula’ (1979)
When a ship mysteriously crashes on the shores of Yorkshire, best friends Mina (Jan Francis) and Lucy (Kate Nelligan) rescue its sole survivor, Count Dracula (Frank Langella). Handsome and otherworldly, the Count charms the two women and their guests when he attends a dinner held in his honor. After Mina mysteriously dies, Lucy’s father, Jack (Donald Pleasance), suspects Dracula might have caused her death. Lucy, however, blames herself, and like Mina before her, falls under Dracula’s spell. Is the Count innocent? Or is he really what Jack and his good friend, Dr. Van Helsing (Laurence Olivier), suspect he truly is — a blood-sucking vampire?
Based on Bram Stoker’s famous Gothic novel, this Dracula mixes things up a bit. Lucy, not Mina, is the main female protagonist, and Langella’s Count is more of a romantic anti-hero than a fearsome creature of the night. While most of the film’s narrative is overly familiar, it’s different enough to feel like you’re experiencing a new story. Even though it’s set in the early 20th century, the film has the look and feel of the late ‘70s, making it the world’s only Dracula film that gives off sex, drugs and disco vibes.
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