Best Thriller Movies with a Sapphic Twist

One of David Lynch’s finest works, Mulholland Drive unfolds like a vivid fever dream. Every time I’ve watched it, it feels like a puzzle just about to be parsed, yet it makes sense in a dream logic sort of way.

The film follows an actress new to L.A. who befriends the amnesiac victim of a car crash through a surreal, non-linear neo-noir storyline.

Starring Naomi Watts and Laura Harring in the lead, the sapphic twist in the movie’s latter half is a pretty satisfying one, even as the film eludes a fixed meaning or explanation.

Perfect for arthouse lovers.

A very sweaty, very thirsty film, Love Lies Bleeding has Kristen Stewart play Lou, a reclusive gym manager who falls hard for Jackie (Katy O’Brian), an aspiring body builder.

Lou helps Jackie train for a competition while also sleeping with her, and navigating a messy relationship with her father who has some criminal ties.

The film explores lust and violence in various forms, while delivering a solid, action-packed love story with plenty of family drama.

Overall, a really fun and enjoyable ride.

While this isn’t an explicitly sapphic film, the queer subtext in Thelma and Louise is really, really loud.

Released in the 90s, Thelma and Louise was directed by Ridley Scott, based on an excellent screenplay by Callie Khouri, and was way ahead of its time, continuing to introduce generations of cinephiles to feminist theory.

At its heart, it’s the story of two women who embark on a road trip together and discover what it means to be free—for the very first time.

Of course, that sense of exhilarating freedom is short-lived, as their every step is dogged by abusive husbands, cops, and other terrible men.

But it’s the journey that teaches both women the value of friendship, solidarity, and what it means to live on one’s own terms—and the cost the patriarchy exacts for it.

Grand and entertaining, Thelma and Louise ends with a poetic finale.

Directed by Park Chan-Wook, The Handmaiden is a Korean erotic historical psychological thriller packed with shocking twist after shocking twist that will leave you gasping.

It earns every second of its almost two-and-a-half-hour runtime, while delivering an intricately plotted storyline about a Japanese heiress who intends to flee, and her handmaiden who’s actually a pickpocket with a secret agenda.

It’s loosely based on the novel Fingersmith by Sarah Waters, suffused with Gothic elements and plenty of sexy scenes.

A sapphic and twisty thriller in every sense of the term.

One of the oldest and most haunting films on this list, Picnic at Hanging Rock, is suffused with sapphic undertones and quiet horror—the kind that slowly and softly creep up on you when you least expect it.

Simply put, it’s the story of a group of boarding school girls and their teachers who go on a picnic to Hanging Rock, Victoria—except some of them don’t come back, ever.

While what happens to them remains an unsolvable mystery, it’s the effect of their disappearance on everyone else that the film focuses on, drawing out the small details and layering the subtext with queer metaphors and more.

An utterly unsettling and seductive watch.

Balancing comedy and horror together is always a fine act, and Jennifer’s Body does it admirably well, so much so that it has become a cult classic.

Starring Megan Fox in the lead as the cheerleader-turned-serial-killer, it follows a succubus possessing the body of a high school student on a demonic rampage to devour the flesh of men, Meanwhile, her bookworm best friend scrambles to find a way to stop the violence.

Gory yet funny, it is also an engaging story of female friendship and love, and makes for a wickedly funny watch.

Finally, one can never go wrong with a sapphic neo noir from the Wachowskis, which is exactly what Bound is.

In the film, two lovers hatch a daring scheme to steal a bunch of mob money and blame it on one of their ex-boyfriends.

Will they get away with it, or does the heist go disastrously wrong?

You have to watch it to find out!