Pop Culture and Cult Movies to Watch While At Home

Last week, I shared recommendations for toy and pop culture themed documentaries, TV shows and cartoons that are worth checking out while we’re all stuck at home. The response was really positive, so I figured I’d do a follow up with even more. This time, I’m tackling movies. Since we deal with toys and collectibles, I tracked down a number of cult favorites and pop culture movies that should tickle that nostalgic itch. I mixed that in with some modern films I enjoyed, and others. I’ve broken it down by genre, with a selection of family friendly offerings, animated films, sci-fi and fantasy movies, horror flicks, and more. Like last time, this isn’t just the most popular films out there, though there are more than a few fan favorites here. This list will feature films you may not realize are streaming now, some childhood favorites you may have forgotten about, or (hopefully) a few films you’ve never seen.

I’ve added official descriptions, and links to where the films will be available to stream right now. Again, this will be limited to most of the common streaming services, such as Netflix, Amazon Prime, Shudder, and a few others. There’s over 60 recommendations here, so I hope it keeps you busy. Enjoy!

Family Friendly Films

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990)
In New York, mysterious radioactive ooze has mutated four sewer turtles into talking, upright-walking, crime-fighting ninjas. The intrepid heroes — Michelangelo (Robbie Rist), Donatello (Corey Feldman), Raphael (Josh Pais) and Leonardo (Brian Tochi) — are trained in the Ninjutsu arts by their rat sensei, Splinter. When a villainous rogue ninja, who is a former pupil of Splinter, arrives and spreads lawlessness throughout the city, it’s up to the plucky turtles to stop him.
Where to stream: Netflix

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze (1991)
The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Mark Caso, Michelan Sisti, Leif Tilden, Kenn Troum) again battle their archenemy, the rogue ninja Shredder (Francois Chau). Shredder attempts revenge by obtaining the same radioactive ooze that created the Turtles and unleashing two new monstrous mutants: Tokka, an oversized snapping turtle, and Rahzar, a fearsome wolf-like creature. When Shredder plans to use the remaining ooze on himself, the Turtles must harness their ninja fighting skills to stop him.
Where to stream: Netflix

Small Soldiers (1998)
When teenager Alan (Gregory Smith) buys a set of Commando Elite action figures, he’s unaware that they have been programmed with military technology. The toys, including leader Chip (Tommy Lee Jones), spring to life and start taking their directives seriously, beginning by “killing” their enemies, the toy Gorgonites. But Archer (Frank Langella) and the Gorgonites won’t go down without a fight. Alan gets caught in the middle of the war, as does his neighbor and crush, Christy (Kirsten Dunst).
where to stream: Netflix

The Wizard (1989)
Corey refuses to let his emotionally disturbed younger brother Jimmy be institutionalized, and the two run away together. They soon join forces with a resourceful girl, who notices that Jimmy has a special talent: he is a “wizard” at video games and can achieve the high score on absolutely everything he plays. Evading their parents and a sinister bounty hunter, the trio head for a climactic showdown at the national video game championships in California.
Where to stream: HBO Go

Monster Squad (1987)
Count Dracula adjourns to Earth, accompanied by Frankenstein’s Monster, the Wolfman, the Mummy, and the Gillman. The uglies are in search of a powerful amulet that will grant them power to rule the world. Our heroes – the Monster Squad are the only ones daring to stand in their way.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Flight of the Navigator (1986)
12-year-old David is accidentally knocked out in the forest near his home, but when he awakens eight years have passed. His family is overjoyed to have him back, but is just as perplexed as he is that he hasn’t aged. When a NASA scientist discovers a UFO nearby, David gets the chance to unravel the mystery and recover the life he lost.
Where to stream: Disney+

Explorers (1985)
The visionary dreams of three curious and adventuresome young boys become an exciting reality in Explorers, the action-fantasy from director Joe Dante, who combines keen humor, warmth and fantasy with unexpected twists. In their makeshift laboratory, the boys use an amazing discovery and their ingenuity to build their own spaceship and launch themselves on a fantastic interplanetary journey.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Willow (1988)
Fearful of a prophecy stating that a girl child will be born to bring about her downfall, the evil Queen Bavmorda imprisons all pregnant women within the formidable stronghold of Nockmaar. A child, Elora Danan, is born in the Nockmaar dungeons and identified as the prophesied child by a birthmark on her arm. However, before the black sorceress arrives to claim the child, Elora’s mother convinces her reluctant midwife to escape with the baby. Willow, a timid farmer and aspiring sorcerer, is entrusted with delivering the royal infant from evil.
Where to stream: Disney+

Short Circuit (1986)
After a lightning bolt zaps a robot named Number 5, the lovable machine starts to think he’s human and escapes the lab. Hot on his trail is his designer, Newton, who hopes to get to Number 5 before the military does. In the meantime, a spunky animal lover mistakes the robot for an alien and takes him in, teaching her new guest about life on Earth.
Where to stream: IMDb TV (free with ads) • Crackle (free with ads)

Big (1988)
When a young boy makes a wish at a carnival machine to be big—he wakes up the following morning to find that it has been granted and his body has grown older overnight. But he is still the same 13-year-old boy inside. Now he must learn how to cope with the unfamiliar world of grown-ups including getting a job and having his first romantic encounter with a woman.
Where to stream: HBO Go

The Black Hole (1979)
The explorer craft USS Palomino is returning to Earth after a fruitless 18-month search for extra-terrestrial life when the crew comes upon a supposedly lost ship, the USS Cygnus, hovering near a black hole. The ship is controlled by Dr. Hans Reinhardt and his monstrous robot companion, but the initial wonderment and awe the Palomino crew feel for the ship and its resistance to the power of the black hole turn to horror as they uncover Reinhardt’s plans.
Where to stream: Disney+

Little Monsters (1989)
A young boy is scared of the monster under his bed. He asks his 6th grade brother to swap rooms for the night as a bet that the monster really exists. Soon the brother becomes friends with the monster and discovers a whole new world of fun and games under his bed where pulling pranks on kids and other monsters is the main attraction.
Where to stream: Netflix

Comedy

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)
A high school slacker pretends to be sick to skip school and have an exciting day off alongside his girlfriend and his best buddy through Chicago, while trying to outwit his obsessive school principal and his unconformited sister along the way.
Where to stream: Netflix

Clue (1985)
Clue finds six colorful dinner guests gathered at the mansion of their host, Mr. Boddy — who turns up dead after his secret is exposed: He was blackmailing all of them. With the killer among them, the guests and Boddy’s chatty butler must suss out the culprit before the body count rises.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (1988)
When the incompetent Officer Frank Drebin seeks the ruthless killer of his partner, he stumbles upon an attempt to assassinate Queen Elizabeth.
Where to stream: Netflix

The Golden Child (1986)
After a Tibetan boy, the mystical Golden Child, is kidnapped by the evil Sardo Numspa, humankind’s fate hangs in the balance. On the other side of the world in Los Angeles, the priestess Kee Nang seeks the Chosen One, who will save the boy from death. When Nang sees social worker Chandler Jarrell on television discussing his ability to find missing children, she solicits his expertise, despite his skepticism over being “chosen.”
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Necessary Roughness (1991)
When the Texas Southern Armadillos football team is disqualified for cheating and poor grades, the University is forced to pick from a team that actually goes to school. Will they even win a single game?
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Groundhog Day (1993)
A narcissistic T.V. weatherman, along with his attractive-but-distant producer and mawkish cameraman, is sent to report on Groundhog Day in the small town of Punxsutawney, where he finds himself repeating the same day over and over.
Where to stream: Netflix

The Birdcage (1996)
A gay cabaret owner and his drag queen companion agree to put up a false straight front so that their son can introduce them to his fiancé’s conservative moralistic parents.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987)
A man must struggle to travel home for Thanksgiving, with an obnoxious slob of a shower ring salesman his only companion.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997)
As a swingin’ fashion photographer by day and a groovy British superagent by night, Austin Powers is the ’60s’ most shagadelic spy, baby! But can he stop megalomaniac Dr. Evil after the bald villain freezes himself and unthaws in the ’90s? With the help of sexy sidekick Vanessa Kensington, he just might.
Where to stream: Netflix

Tremors (1990)
Hick handymen Val McKee and Earl Bassett can barely eke out a living in the Nevada hamlet of Perfection, so they decide to leave town — despite an admonition from a shapely seismology coed who’s picking up odd readings on her equipment. Before long, Val and Earl discover what’s responsible for those readings: 30-foot-long carnivorous worms with a proclivity for sucking their prey underground.
Where to stream: Netflix

Teen Wolf (1985)
When a shy teenager’s new-found powers help him score at basketball – and with the popular girls – he has some pretty hairy decisions to make.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Action and Adventure

Big Trouble in Little China (1986)
When trucker Jack Burton agreed to take his friend, Wang Chi, to pick up his fiancee at the airport, he never expected to get involved in a supernatural battle between good and evil. Wang’s fiancee has emerald green eyes, which make her a perfect target for immortal sorcerer Lo Pan and his three invincible cronies. Lo Pan must marry a girl with green eyes so he can regain his physical form.
Where to stream: HBO Go

Red Dawn (1984)
It is the dawn of World War III. In mid-western America, a group of teenagers band together to defend their town—and their country—from invading Soviet forces.
Where to stream: Netflix • Amazon Prime

Scott Pilgrim vs The World (2010)
As bass guitarist for a garage-rock band, Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera) has never had trouble getting a girlfriend; usually, the problem is getting rid of them. But when Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) skates into his heart, he finds she has the most troublesome baggage of all: an army of ex-boyfriends who will stop at nothing to eliminate him from her list of suitors.
Where to stream: Netflix

Highlander (1986)
There can be only one! He fought his first battle on the Scottish Highlands in 1536. He will fight his greatest battle on the streets of New York City in 1986. His name is Connor MacLeod. He is immortal.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Equilibrium (2002)
In a dystopian future, a totalitarian regime maintains peace by subduing the populace with a drug, and displays of emotion are punishable by death. A man in charge of enforcing the law rises to overthrow the system.
Where to stream: Netflix

Knights of Badassdom (2013)
Three best friends and dedicated roleplayers take to the woods to reenact a dungeons and dragons-like scenario as a live action role-playing game. Trouble arises when a prop spellbook purchased from the internet ends up being a genuine grimoire and they unwittingly conjure up a blood-lusting succubus from hell.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

F/X (1986)
A movies special effects man is hired by a government agency to help stage the assassination of a well known gangster. When the agency double cross him, he uses his special effects to trap the gangster and the corrupt agents.
where to stream: Amazon Prime

Kung Fu Hustle (2004)
Set in Canton, China in the 1940s, the story revolves in a town ruled by the Axe Gang, Sing who desperately wants to become a member. He stumbles into a slum ruled by eccentric landlords who turns out to be the greatest kung-fu masters in disguise. Sing’s actions eventually cause the Axe Gang and the slumlords to engage in an explosive kung-fu battle. Only one side will win and only one hero will emerge as the greatest kung-fu master of all.
where to stream: Netflix

Léon: The Professional (1994)
Léon, the top hit man in New York, has earned a rep as an effective “cleaner”. But when his next-door neighbors are wiped out by a loose-cannon DEA agent, he becomes the unwilling custodian of 12-year-old Mathilda. Before long, Mathilda’s thoughts turn to revenge, and she considers following in Léon’s footsteps.
Where to stream: Crackle (free with ads)

The Incredible Hulk Returns (1988)
Dr. David Banner meets a former student, who has a magical hammer that summons Thor, a Norse god who is prevented from entering Valhalla. When the two superheroes stop feuding long enough to breathe, they are a team unmatched by any of their enemies.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Animated

Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie (1994)
Bison, the ruthless leader of the international terrorist organization Shadowlaw, has been desperately searching for the greatest fighter on the planet for years. He finds it in Ryu, a young wanderer who never stays in one place long enough for Bison to find him. He does, however, get a fix on Ken Masters, an American martial arts champion who studied with Ryu as a child under the same master. Meanwhile, Major Guile of the United States Army is forced to team up with Chun Li from China in hopes of apprehending Bison and putting a stop his international ring of crime.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Gantz:O (2016)
Somewhere in Tokyo, there is a room. In that room is a black sphere. Periodically, people who should otherwise have died are transferred to the room. There, the sphere gives them special suits and weapons, and sends them out on a mission to kill aliens here on Earth. While these missions take place, the rest of the world is largely oblivious to them. These missions are lethal – few participants survive them. The sphere calls the shots, and it’s not the slightest bit nice. Its name… Gantz.
where to stream: Netflix

Seoul Station (2016)
Suk-gyu is desperately looking for his runaway daughter. He spares neither money nor effort and after a while his search leads to results. One of his contacts claims to have found the girl. But joy is replaced by shock when he finds out that she works as a prostitute in the center of Seoul. Suk-gyu decides to pose as a client to get close to his daughter. But just before the long awaited and dreaded reunion, panic breaks out at nearby Seoul Station. The place is very popular with the homeless of the Korean capital. And one of them, who had died during the day, comes alive again and start attacking and eating another misfortunate. The undead cannibal epidemic spreads like wildfire. The authorities hermetically close off the city center and decide to wait out the end of the outbreak, until there’s no one left…
Where to stream: Amazon Prime • Shudder

Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993)
Andrea Beaumont strolls back into town, rekindling an old romance with Bruce Wayne. At the same time, Batman is mistaken for a masked vigilante assassin who has begun systematically eliminating Gotham’s crime bosses. Now on the run, Batman must solve the mystery, while navigating his relationship with Andrea.
Where to stream: DC Universe

Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children (2005)
Two years have passed since the final battle with Sephiroth. Though Midgar, city of mako, city of prosperity, has been reduced to ruins, its people slowly but steadily walk the road to reconstruction. However, a mysterious illness called Geostigma torments them. With no cure in sight, it brings death to the afflicted, one after another, robbing the people of their fledgling hope.
Where to stream: Crackle (free with ads)

The Secret of NIMH (1982)
A widowed field mouse must move her family — including an ailing son — to escape a farmer’s plow. Aided by a crow and a pack of superintelligent, escaped lab rats, the brave mother struggles to transplant her home to firmer ground.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Akira (1988)
A secret military project endangers Neo-Tokyo when it turns a biker gang member into a rampaging psychic psychopath that only two teenagers and a group of psychics can stop.
Where to stream: Hulu

Science Fiction and Fantasy

Moon (2009)
With only three weeks left in his three year contract, Sam Bell is getting anxious to finally return to Earth. He is the only occupant of a Moon-based manufacturing facility along with his computer and assistant, GERTY. When he has an accident however, he wakens to find that he is not alone.
Where to stream: Netflix

Upgrade (2018)
A brutal mugging leaves Grey Trace paralyzed in the hospital and his beloved wife dead. A billionaire inventor soon offers Trace a cure — an artificial intelligence implant called STEM that will enhance his body. Now able to walk, Grey finds that he also has superhuman strength and agility — skills he uses to seek revenge against the thugs who destroyed his life.
Where to stream: HBO Go

Escape From New York (1981)
In a bleak, alternate future, Manhattan Island has become the nation’s only maximum security prison. When Air Force One crash lands in the prison, the government sends in a disposable hero— Kurt Russell icon, Snake Plissken, an outlaw and former war hero—to get him out.
Where to stream: Shudder

RoboCop (1987)
In a violent, near-apocalyptic Detroit, evil corporation Omni Consumer Products wins a contract from the city government to privatize the police force. To test their crime-eradicating cyborgs, the company leads street cop Alex Murphy into an armed confrontation with crime lord Boddicker so they can use his body to support their untested RoboCop prototype. But when RoboCop learns of the company’s nefarious plans, he turns on his masters.
Where to stream: HBO Go

Dragonslayer (1981)
The sorcerer and his apprentice Galen are on a mission to kill an evil dragon in order to save the King’s daughter from being sacrificed in accordance to a pact that the King himself made with the dragon to protect his kingdom. A fantasy film from Disney Studios that exhausted all possible visual effects of the time.
where to watch: Amazon Prime

Pan’s Labyrinth (2006)
Living with her tyrannical stepfather in a new home with her pregnant mother, 10-year-old Ofelia feels alone until she explores a decaying labyrinth guarded by a mysterious faun who claims to know her destiny. If she wishes to return to her real father, Ofelia must complete three terrifying tasks.
Where to stream: Netflix

Enemy Mine (1985)
A soldier from Earth crashlands on an alien world after sustaining battle damage. Eventually he encounters another survivor, but from the enemy species he was fighting; they band together to survive on this hostile world. In the end the human finds himself caring for his enemy in a completely unexpected way.
Where to stream: HBO Go

Krull (1983)
A prince and a fellowship of companions set out to rescue his bride from a fortress of alien invaders who have arrived on their home planet.
Where to stream: Crackle (free with ads)

Turbo Kid (2015)
In a post-apocalyptic wasteland, an orphaned teen (Munro Chambers) must battle a ruthless warlord (Michael Ironside) to save the girl (Laurence Leboeuf) of his dreams.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

The Endless (2018)
Two brothers return to the cult they fled from years ago to discover that the group’s beliefs may be more sane than they once thought.
Where to stream: Netflix

Horror

Re-Animator (1985)
This classic ‘80s cult horror hit follows a student who brings the dead back to life. Herbert West (the brilliant Jeffrey Combs) has just enrolled at a new school after an attempt to revive a former professor went very wrong. Convinced he’s on the verge of a breakthrough, West sneaks into the morgue and revives a corpse, and that’s where the terror—and comedy—begins. RE-ANIMATOR was the first, and still the best, of Stuart Gordon’s gruesome (and raunchy) H.P. Lovecraft adaptations. 30 years later, it remains essential viewing for any true horror fan.
Where to stream: Shudder

House (1985)
Roger Cobb is a author who has just separated from his wife. He moves into a new house and tries to work on a novel based on his experiences in the Vietnam War. Strange things start happening around him; little things at first, but as they become more frequent, Cobb becomes aware that the house resents his presence.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Zombie (1980)
After making his name in the giallo subgenre, Lucio Fulci breathed new life into his career with this ultra-gory 1979 masterpiece about a group of unfortunate Americans who foolishly set sail for a remote Caribbean island that’s crawling with worm-filled zombies. Thanks to its extraordinarily gruesome FX and that still-unbelievable zombie vs. shark-scene, ZOMBIE sparked a zombie-gore trend in Italy, and landed itself a permanent spot on the list of the greatest zombie movies in the history of the subgenre. Essential viewing for all Shudder-ers!
Where to stream: Shudder

The Evil Dead (1981)
When a group of college students finds a mysterious book and recording in the old wilderness cabin they’ve rented for the weekend, they unwittingly unleash a demonic force from the surrounding forest.
Where to stream: Netflix

The Gate (1987)
Three young children accidentally release a horde of nasty, pint-sized demons from a hole in a suburban backyard. What follows is a classic battle between good and evil as the three kids struggle to overcome a nightmarish hell that is literally taking over the Earth.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

C.H.U.D. (1984)
Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers… A rash of bizarre murders in New York City seems to point to a group of grotesquely deformed vagrants living in the sewers. A courageous policeman, a photo journalist and his girlfriend, and a nutty bum, who seems to know a lot about the creatures, band together to try and determine what the creatures are and how to stop them.
where to stream: Amazon Prime

Train to Busan (2016)
When a mysterious virus breaks out across the country, the infected turn into the murderous undead. A few terrified travelers find themselves trapped on a bullet train from hell, fighting for their lives as hordes of the living dead crash towards them, crawling closer with every stop. Suspicion is rife and tensions run high as some will do anything to survive and make it to the safe zone.
Where to stream: Shudder

Bubba Ho-tep (2002)
Bubba Ho-tep tells the “true” story of what really did become of Elvis Presley. We find Elvis as an elderly resident in an East Texas rest home, who switched identities with an Elvis impersonator years before his “death,” then missed his chance to switch back. He must team up with JFK and fight an ancient Egyptian mummy for the souls of their fellow residents.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

The Cabin in the Woods (2012)
When five college friends (Kristen Connolly, Chris Hemsworth, Anna Hutchison, Fran Kranz, Jesse Williams) arrive at a remote forest cabin for a little vacation, little do they expect the horrors that await them. One by one, the youths fall victim to backwoods zombies, but there is another factor at play.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime • Hulu

The Beyond (1981)
In this gore classic, a woman inherits a hotel built over an entrance to Hell. But when she starts to renovate, the gates get opened, bringing forth enough demons, killer spiders, ghosts, and evil zombies to make a grand reopening highly unlikely. The middle film in Lucio Fulci’s “Gates of Hell Trilogy” is considered one of his best by fans, thanks to some of the most extremely terrifying and gory sequences in horror history. Chopped by censors in 1983, it took nearly 20 years and Quentin Tarantino’s help before the film saw a proper uncut release in the U.S.
Where to stream: Shudder

City of the Living Dead (1980)
A reporter and a psychic try to close the gates of hell before zombies invade Earth in the first of Italian gore maestro Lucio Fulci’s “Gates of Hell” trilogy. After a priest guarding the gates dies, Mary and Peter learn that his death created the opportunity for the dead to rise in only a few days. Soon enough, gruesome things start happening – including the film’s most famous sequence where a female victim literally pukes her guts out. If George Romero’s living dead films are too tame for you, Fulci’s films should satisfy all your creepy cravings.
Where to stream: Shudder

Dog Soldiers (2002)
Sergeant Harry Wells leads a team of British soldiers on a routine expedition to the Scottish Highlands. The six men would rather be at home watching a game, but they are even more dismayed when a carcass lands on their campfire. The next morning, they happen upon a severely injured Captain Richard Ryan and the bloody remains of his squadron.
Where to stream: Shudder

The Return of the Living Dead (1985)
When a bumbling pair of employees at a medical supply warehouse accidentally release a deadly gas into the air, the vapors cause the dead to re-animate as they go on a rampage seeking their favorite food: brains!
Where to stream: Amazon Prime

Tucker and Dale vs Evil (2010)
Two hillbillies are suspected of being killers by a group of paranoid college kids camping near the duo’s West Virginian cabin. As the body count climbs, so does the fear and confusion as the college kids try to seek revenge against the pair.
where to stream: Netflix

The Fog (1980)
The ghosts of shipwrecked sailors return to get revenge on a seaside village on the 100-year anniversary of their deaths at the hands of the town’s founders. Since six were murdered, six residents of Antonio Bay are destined to die. Who will it be? Radio host Adrienne Barbeau? Hitchhiker Jamie Lee Curtis? Party planner Janet Leigh? Priest Hal Holbrook? Or maybe they’ll all be pulled into the fog… John Carpenter’s fearsome follow-up to HALLOWEEN proved the horror legend’s success was no mere fluke. Guillermo del Toro recently named it one of his favorite films.
Where to stream: Shudder

Stake Land (2010)
Martin was a normal teenage boy before the country collapsed in an empty pit of economic and political disaster. A vampire epidemic has swept across what is left of the nation’s abandoned towns and cities, and it’s up to Mister, a death dealing, rogue vampire hunter, to get Martin safely north to Canada, the continent’s New Eden. Contains strong language, violence and gore.
Where to stream: Shudder

The Void (2017)
A blood-soaked man limping down a deserted road is rushed by officer Carter to a nearby hospital with a skeleton crew. Trapped inside by hooded figures, Carter discovers that the patients and staff are transforming into something inhuman.
Where to stream: Shudder

Infestation (2009)
Our hero, Cooper, awakes to find himself nauseous, weak and covered in webbing, hanging from the ceiling of an office where, just minutes ago, he started his new job. As he struggles out of his slimy prison he comes face to face with his opponent – a grotesque, powerful and very angry bug. All 3 ft of it.
Where to stream: Amazon Prime