Best Thriller Movies of 1990

The highest-rated thriller films from 1990, ranked by MovieMagicScore based on authentic viewer ratings.

Thriller 1989 Thriller 1991 All Time Thriller

Action Comedy Drama Horror Science Fiction Romance Animation Documentary Fantasy Crime

Misery

1990

After an accident, acclaimed novelist Paul Sheldon is rescued by a nurse who claims to be his biggest fan. Her obsession takes a dark turn when she holds him captive in her remote Colorado home and forces him to write back to life the popular literary character he killed off.

7.7

The Godfather Part III

1990

In the midst of trying to legitimize his business dealings in 1979 New York and Italy, aging mafia don, Michael Corleone seeks forgiveness for his sins while taking a young protege under his wing.

7.4

Miller's Crossing

1990

Set in 1929, a political boss and his advisor have a parting of the ways when they both fall for the same woman.

7.4

The Hunt for Red October

1990

A new technologically-superior Soviet nuclear sub, the Red October, is heading for the U.S. coast under the command of Captain Marko Ramius. The American government thinks Ramius is planning to attack. Lone CIA analyst Jack Ryan has a different idea: he thinks Ramius is planning to defect, but he has only a few hours to find him and prove it - because the entire Russian naval and air commands are trying to find Ramius, too. The hunt is on!

7.4

Ghost

1990

After a young man is murdered, his spirit stays behind to warn his lover of impending danger, with the help of a reluctant psychic.

7.2

Bullet in the Head

1990

Three childhood friends from the slums of Hong Kong flee to war-time Saigon after accidentally murdering a gang leader, but their troubles only escalate.

7.6

Red Dawn

1990

On October 2, 1968, a student uprising descends into violence after the Mexican government begins to use lethal force against the protesters.

8.1

Nikita

1990

A beautiful felon, sentenced to life in prison for the murder of a policeman, is given a second chance – as a secret political assassin controlled by the government.

7.1

Die Hard 2

1990

One year after his heroics in Los Angeles, John McClane is an off-duty cop who is the wrong guy in the wrong place at the wrong time. On a snowy Christmas Eve, as he waits for his wife's plane to land at Washington Dulles International Airport, terrorists take over the air traffic control system in a plot to free a South American army general and drug smuggler being flown into the US to face drug charges. It's now up to McClane to take on the terrorists, while coping with an inept airport police chief, an uncooperative anti-terrorist squad, and the life of his wife and everyone else trapped in planes circling overhead.

7.0

#10

Wild at Heart

1990

Young lovers Sailor and Lula hit the road to start a new life together away from the wrath of Lula’s deranged, disapproving mother, who has hired a team of hitmen to cut the lovers’ surreal honeymoon short.

7.0

#11

State of Grace

1990

Hell's Kitchen, New York. Terry Noonan returns home after a ten-year absence. He soon reconnects with Jackie, a childhood friend and member of the Irish mob, and rekindles his love affair with Jackie's sister Kathleen.

6.9

#12

Presumed Innocent

1990

Rusty Sabich is a deputy prosecutor engaged in an obsessive affair with a coworker who is murdered. Soon after, he's accused of the crime. And his fight to clear his name becomes a whirlpool of lies and hidden passions.

6.8

#13

King of New York

1990

A former drug lord returns from prison determined to wipe out all his competition and distribute the profits of his operations to New York's poor and lower classes in this stylish and ultra violent modern twist on Robin Hood.

6.7

#14

Boiling Point

1990

Masaki, a baseball player and gas-station attendant, gets into trouble with the local Yakuza and goes to Okinawa to get a gun to defend himself. There he meets Uehara, a tough gangster, who is in serious debt to the yakuza and planning revenge.

6.9

#15

The Reflecting Skin

1990

In 1950s rural Idaho, a young boy watches helplessly as his friends and brother fall under the spell of a mysterious widow living up the road and becomes convinced that she is a vampire.

6.7

#16

Buried Alive

1990

A married woman and her lover plot to kill her husband to make off with the insurance money. However, their attempt to murder him using poisonous fish toxins backfires in surprising ways.

6.7

#17

The King of the Kickboxers

1990

Jake, a New York policeman poses as an actor to expose the making of martial-arts death movies in Thailand.

6.6

#18

Revenge

1990

Michael ‘Jay’ Cochran has just left the Navy after 12 years and he's not quite sure what he's going to do, except that he knows he wants a holiday. He decides to visit Tiburon Mendez, a powerful but shady Mexican businessman who he once flew to Alaska for a hunting trip. Arriving at the Mendez mansion in Mexico, he is immediately surprised by the beauty and youth of Mendez’s wife, Miryea.

6.5

#19

Narrow Margin

1990

An L.A. District Attorney attempts to take an unwilling murder witness back to the United States to testify against a top-level mob boss. Frantically attempting to escape two deadly hitmen sent to silence her, they board a Vancouver-bound train only to discover that the killers are onboard with them. For the next 20 hours, as the train hurls through the beautiful but isolated Canadian wilderness, a deadly game of cat and mouse ensues in which their ability to tell friend from foe is a matter of life and death.

6.4

#20

Darkman

1990

Dr. Peyton Westlake is on the verge of realizing a major breakthrough in synthetic skin when his laboratory is destroyed by gangsters. Having been burned beyond recognition and forever altered by an experimental medical procedure, Westlake becomes known as Darkman, assuming alternate identities in his quest for revenge and a new life with a former love.

6.4

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Best Thriller Movies of 1990

This ranking features the top thriller movies released in 1990, sorted by MovieMagicScore viewer ratings. Looking for more? Browse all genres from 1990 or see the best thriller movies of all time.