6 Best Movies to Watch If You Love Ben Affleck’s Animals
When a kidnapping turns a family’s private crisis into a public spectacle, the tension comes from watching decent people make choices they may not be able to undo. That is the nerve Animals presses, and it makes a strong starting point for a six-film watchlist about missing people, moral pressure and suspicion.
These are companion watches, not all direct remakes or identical plots; each connects through a different strand of crime-thriller tension.
The recommendations below move from hard-edged investigations to stories that are more interested in uncertainty. That distinction helps you choose: if you want answers and procedure, go toward Gone Baby Gone or State of Play; if you want an unsettling point of view, choose Burning; if you want family responsibility and social context in the same thriller, save Highest 2 Lowest for last.
There are plenty of crime films built around a disappearance, but the strongest ones understand that the case changes the people waiting for answers. A parent may act on fear, an investigator may have to choose between procedure and urgency, and the public may decide who looks guilty before the evidence is complete. Animals brings those pressures together through a family’s kidnapping crisis. The recommendations here follow that emotional structure while offering different settings, rhythms and kinds of moral uncertainty.
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The countdown
6. Prisoners
Two young girls vanish on Thanksgiving, and Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) becomes convinced that the police have not moved quickly enough. Detective Loki (Jake Gyllenhaal) follows the evidence while Keller begins taking matters into his own hands, turning a search for the children into a frightening test of what desperation can make a parent do. The mystery keeps its focus on the families and on the consequences of every choice.
The film also asks what happens when the official process cannot move at the speed of a terrified parent. Keller’s decisions are understandable in the moment but frightening in their consequences, and Loki’s investigation gives the story a competing model of persistence. That tension keeps the audience from treating the case like a simple puzzle with a satisfying answer waiting at the end.
Denis Villeneuve’s controlled direction makes the rain-soaked setting feel like another source of pressure. Jackman gives Keller a raw, volatile urgency, while Gyllenhaal plays Loki as a patient investigator who notices details others overlook. The film’s central question—how far can someone go when a child is missing?—makes it a natural follow-up to Animals.
It lands at #6 because its atmosphere and moral conflict are exceptional, but its bleakness is relentless and its focus is more on the investigation than the intimate family-and-politics collision in Animals. Choose it when you want a heavier, slower-burning mystery. [Official trailer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVrcTyDojxg ) · [UK viewing options](https://www.justwatch.com/uk/movie/prisoners)
5. Burning
Lee Jong-su runs into Hae-mi, a woman he knew growing up, and agrees to look after her cat while she travels. When she returns with Ben, a wealthy and unsettling man she met abroad, Jong-su is drawn into an uneasy triangle. Hae-mi later disappears, and Ben’s casual confession about a disturbing hobby gives Jong-su a reason to suspect the worst—though the film keeps uncertainty alive.
Its ambiguity is carefully built from the distance between what Jong-su sees and what he wants to believe. Hae-mi’s absence becomes a space for suspicion, and Ben’s wealth and ease make him difficult to read without making him automatically guilty. The result is a mystery that invites conversation after the credits rather than a procedural that closes every question.
Steven Yeun’s Ben is friendly enough to be invited in and opaque enough to make every silence feel loaded. Yoo Ah-in’s Jong-su is more observer than action hero, which turns the mystery into a portrait of jealousy, class difference and frustrated imagination. The long pauses are deliberate: the audience is left weighing what it saw against what Jong-su believes.
At #5, Burning offers the list’s most ambiguous missing-person story, but it is a meditative psychological drama rather than a tightly plotted kidnapping thriller. It suits viewers who like unanswered questions and atmosphere more than a neat resolution. [Official Cannes trailer](https://www.festival-cannes.com/en/medialibrary/burning-by-lee-chang-dong-trailer/) · [UK viewing options](https://www.justwatch.com/uk/movie/burning)
A quick pause for another tense watch
4. State of Play
Washington reporter Cal McAffrey (Russell Crowe) is investigating a killing tied to a rising congressman, Stephen Collins (Ben Affleck). A separate death begins to look connected to Collins’s staff and private life, and Cal’s reporting pulls him into a story where political access, old friendship and journalistic responsibility keep colliding. Rachel McAdams plays Della Frye, a younger reporter whose instincts help push the investigation forward.
The newsroom angle gives the film a welcome practical rhythm. Cal and Della have to check sources, decide what is publishable and keep following leads that threaten to damage a political figure Cal has known for years. That professional conflict makes the thriller about judgment as much as revelation, a useful companion to a story where public image is part of the danger.
The film’s pleasure is in watching reporting happen: interviews, source protection, competing explanations and the slow realization that a political scandal has more than one story inside it. Affleck gives Collins enough charm to make his public confidence believable, while Crowe plays Cal as a reporter who knows the cost of getting too close to a subject.
It earns #4 because it combines a missing-person-adjacent investigation, political stakes and Affleck’s screen presence more directly than the films below it. It sits behind the top three because its ensemble mystery sometimes spreads attention across so many threads that the emotional center softens. [Universal’s trailer and film page](https://www.universalpicturesathome.com/movies/state-of-play) · [UK viewing options](https://www.justwatch.com/uk/movie/state-of-play)
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3. Gone Baby Gone
In a working-class Boston neighborhood, private investigators Patrick Kenzie (Casey Affleck) and Angie Gennaro (Michelle Monaghan) are hired to find four-year-old Amanda McCready after she disappears. The search brings them into contact with Amanda’s troubled mother, the police officers leading the case and people who may know more than they admit. As the investigators get closer to the truth, the case becomes a difficult choice about what is best for a child.
Patrick and Angie’s Boston connections make the neighborhood feel like a living part of the mystery. People are not just witnesses who appear to deliver clues; they have long memories, loyalties and reasons to distrust outsiders. Patrick’s familiarity helps the search, but it also makes the final moral question personal, which is why the film remains difficult to shrug off.
Ben Affleck’s directorial debut understands how a close-knit neighborhood can be both a source of help and a wall of silence. Casey Affleck gives Patrick an ordinary, local quality that makes him feel at home in the streets he is searching. The film’s moral tension lingers because the investigation does not offer a clean answer that makes everyone feel innocent.
It takes #3 because its missing-child mystery and ethical dilemma are the closest match to Animals’ pressure cooker, with a sharper focus on community and consequence than the lower-ranked picks. It narrowly misses the top two because its emotional reach is smaller in scale than the marital and public-performance drama of Gone Girl or the class-and-family stakes in Highest 2 Lowest. [Miramax official trailer](https://www.miramax.com/movie/gone-baby-gone/) · [UK viewing options](https://www.justwatch.com/uk/movie/gone-baby-gone)
A mid-list recommendation
2. Gone Girl
On their fifth wedding anniversary, Amy Dunne (Rosamund Pike) disappears from the couple’s Missouri home. Her husband Nick (Ben Affleck) becomes the obvious focus of the investigation and of a media storm that rapidly turns their marriage into a national spectacle. The question is not simply what happened to Amy, but how well either spouse knows the person they married—and how much the public wants to believe a simple version of the story.
The story’s shifts in perspective make the audience reassess not only Nick but its own appetite for a clean villain. The investigation is surrounded by cameras, commentators and people who believe they can read a marriage from a handful of gestures. That social spectacle gives the mystery unusual staying power and helps explain why it is the closest Affleck-centered companion to Animals.
David Fincher makes domestic spaces feel like evidence and uses the media attention to show how quickly a person can become a character in someone else’s narrative. Affleck’s restrained, sometimes unreadable performance is an asset: Nick’s expressions invite suspicion without giving the audience an easy answer. Pike’s work gives Amy a presence even when she is absent from the screen.
It is #2 because the missing-person case, marriage, public suspicion and Affleck performance make it the strongest tonal cousin to Animals. It stops just short of the top spot because Highest 2 Lowest builds a more layered conflict around family, money and social responsibility, giving its thriller premise a wider moral frame. [20th Century Studios’ trailer](https://www.20thcenturystudios.com/movies/gone-girl) · [UK viewing options](https://www.justwatch.com/uk/movie/gone-girl)
Before the No. 1 pick
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1. Highest 2 Lowest
Spike Lee relocates Akira Kurosawa’s High and Low to contemporary New York. Denzel Washington plays music executive David King, whose family is pulled into a kidnapping and ransom crisis. The crime forces a brutal question: what does a person owe to a loved one, and what does that person owe to everyone else caught in the consequences? The story moves from a private, carefully managed world into a city-wide moral and police investigation.
The thriller’s family crisis is inseparable from David King’s place in the city. His money creates an apparent ability to act, but the film keeps testing whether influence can protect the people who matter without transferring danger to someone else. That tension makes the ransom plot emotionally and socially complicated, which is the main reason it outranks the other strong missing-person stories.
The film’s class contrast gives the thriller its extra charge. David’s wealth and influence can open doors, but they cannot make the human cost disappear. Lee balances procedural momentum with sharp attention to New York’s social geography, while Washington makes David’s confidence feel earned and his uncertainty credible. The result is a crime story that has both the mechanics of a ransom case and the weight of a public decision.
It takes #1 because it brings together the missing-person urgency of Prisoners and Gone Baby Gone, the moral ambiguity of Burning, and the public scrutiny found in Gone Girl—then adds an unusually clear question about privilege and responsibility. That broader conflict makes it the most rewarding companion to Animals, rather than simply the closest plot match. [Apple’s official trailer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KU44alTInfo) · [Apple TV film page](https://tv.apple.com/gb/movie/highest-2-lowest/umc.cmc.3rbg43tt2brl2cp5wwacfrmhx)
What these six thrillers have in common
The strongest follow-up to Animals depends on which part of the film you want more of. Prisoners and Gone Baby Gone keep the missing-child investigation in the foreground, then ask what moral boundaries survive a crisis. Gone Girl turns disappearance into a question of marriage and public image. State of Play shifts the pressure toward politics and journalism, while Burning is the deliberately uncertain choice for viewers who prefer mood over answers.
Highest 2 Lowest sits at the top because it connects the most threads at once: family danger, a ransom demand, public consequences and a protagonist whose resources cannot solve the ethical problem for him. These are all different kinds of crime films, but each gives the viewer something more specific than a mystery to solve. They make the investigation test a relationship, a community or a person's idea of what is right.
How to choose your next watch
If you want the missing-child case to stay front and center, choose Gone Baby Gone for its neighborhood investigators and difficult ethical question, or Prisoners for a far bleaker search in which a father’s desperation becomes part of the danger. If you want the investigation to expose a relationship, Gone Girl turns a disappearance into a study of marriage, suspicion and the audience’s own assumptions.
For a political angle, State of Play connects a death and a political career to the choices reporters make while following a source. Burning is the most patient option: it lets the mystery remain uncertain and asks viewers to decide how much of Jong-su’s suspicion comes from evidence. Each film gives you a different kind of tension, so the right pick depends on whether you want procedure, ambiguity or character conflict.
Highest 2 Lowest brings several of those strands together. It has the urgency of a ransom story, the pressure of a family crisis and a wider question about how wealth affects the choices available to people. That range is why it sits at the top of this specific watchlist, even though another viewer might prefer the tighter procedural structure of Prisoners or the more intimate uncertainty of Gone Girl.
Taken as a group, these recommendations show how crime stories can create suspense without relying on the same formula. A missing person can reveal a neighborhood’s loyalties, a marriage’s private history, a newsroom’s ethical limits or a city’s class divisions. The strongest follow-up is the one that continues the particular thread that stayed with you after Animals.
A kidnapping story becomes more than a race against a deadline when the people trying to solve it disagree about what a good outcome looks like. That is the shared pressure across several films here. Prisoners makes the conflict immediate and physical; Gone Baby Gone makes it local and ethical; Highest 2 Lowest asks how far a person’s means can reach when the decision affects more than one family.
The investigation itself also changes from film to film. State of Play follows the reporting process, where sources and verification matter as much as the next clue. Gone Girl uses media attention to make the public part of the case, with people treating a private marriage as a story they can solve from a distance. Burning moves in the opposite direction, keeping its evidence uncertain and its lead character’s perspective in doubt.
That variety explains why the ranking is not based only on which film has the most similar plot. A companion watch can match the premise, but it can also extend an idea that Animals raises. Someone drawn to the family’s position under pressure may prefer Highest 2 Lowest; someone fascinated by how public image affects a suspect may prefer Gone Girl; a viewer interested in community loyalty may find Gone Baby Gone the most lasting choice.
There is also a difference in viewing pace. Prisoners is long and deliberately heavy, asking the audience to remain inside an increasingly desperate search. State of Play is brisker and built around information gathering. Burning takes its time, and its final effect depends on how much ambiguity a viewer enjoys. Choosing by pace can be just as helpful as choosing by genre.
The stories approach violence and uncertainty with different levels of directness. Some show the investigation in a procedural manner; others focus on how characters behave when they do not know what is true. None of these titles is a light, uncomplicated watch, but the emotional intensity varies. A viewer seeking a tightly plotted crime mystery has options that do not require the same patience as Burning.
Affleck’s connection is another reason the list works as a double feature guide. Gone Girl and State of Play feature him as an actor in stories where his public identity becomes part of the audience’s reading of the character. Gone Baby Gone connects through his work behind the camera. The other recommendations widen the list beyond his filmography and show how the same moral tension can work with a different director and lead.
The strongest crime thrillers leave room for the viewer to judge the choices rather than simply applaud the solution. They let a plan succeed and still ask who paid for it, or reveal the truth without making the characters’ lives simpler. That is the thread that keeps these recommendations close to Animals even when their settings, protagonists and endings differ.
For a weekend watch, start with the title that matches your mood rather than trying to reproduce the exact plot. Go with Gone Girl for a twisty public mystery, State of Play for a newsroom investigation, or Prisoners for an intense search. Save Highest 2 Lowest for the film that joins family suspense to a wider social question.
That range is also why the films work as a sequence. A viewer can move from a tightly focused disappearance case to a broader story about institutions and public responsibility, then finish with a thriller whose central conflict reaches beyond the immediate crime. Watching them together makes it easier to see how suspense changes when the stakes belong to one family, a neighborhood, a newsroom or a whole city.
Conclusion
If Animals left you looking for another story about a disappearance that turns private life into a moral emergency, start with Gone Girl for Affleck and public suspicion, Gone Baby Gone for a missing-child case with an uncomfortable choice, or Prisoners for an intensely bleak search. Pick Burning when you want ambiguity, and State of Play when the political dimension is what caught your attention.
Highest 2 Lowest wins this particular list because its kidnapping story expands into a question about the limits of money, status and personal responsibility. It is the most complete next watch for someone who wants a crime thriller that keeps the suspense moving while giving the central decision real weight. Tell us which one you would queue first—and whether another Affleck thriller belongs above it.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Which movie is closest to Animals?
Gone Baby Gone is the closest match if you want a missing-child investigation and an ethical dilemma. Gone Girl is closer if you want Affleck, marriage under pressure and public suspicion. Highest 2 Lowest shares the kidnapping and ransom setup while widening the story into questions about family, money and social responsibility.
The case moves through Boston’s neighborhoods and police system, but its lasting tension comes from the investigators’ personal connection to the people involved. It is the best fit when you want a search story that asks what justice means after the facts become painful.
Is Highest 2 Lowest a Ben Affleck movie?
No. It is directed by Spike Lee and stars Denzel Washington. It is included for its kidnapping thriller premise, moral pressure and investigation rather than an Affleck connection.
No. Spike Lee directs this crime thriller starring Denzel Washington. It is on the list because its kidnapping and ransom stakes, family conflict and social consequences make it a strong follow-up to Animals.
What is Gone Girl about?
It follows the disappearance of Amy Dunne and the investigation that places her husband Nick under intense police and media scrutiny. The film is a psychological thriller about marriage, image and what the public thinks it knows.
The movie follows the investigation into Amy Dunne’s disappearance and the suspicion directed at her husband Nick. It becomes a psychological thriller about marriage, storytelling and the way public opinion can turn incomplete evidence into certainty.
What is Gone Baby Gone about?
Two Boston private investigators search for a missing four-year-old girl. As they follow the case through the neighborhood and police investigation, the truth leads to a painful question about what is best for the child.
Two private investigators search for a missing young girl in their Boston community. Their work brings them into contact with her family, the police and people who may be hiding information, and the case develops into a moral dilemma.
Is Burning a straightforward crime thriller?
No. It is a slow, ambiguous psychological mystery. A woman’s disappearance and a disturbing confession create suspicion, but the film leaves viewers weighing evidence, perception and the protagonist’s assumptions.
It has a mystery and criminal suspicion, but its pace is meditative and its point of view stays uncertain. Viewers looking for a clear procedural resolution may find it frustrating; viewers who enjoy atmosphere and ambiguity may find that uncertainty is the point.
Where can I watch these movies in the UK?
Streaming and rental rights change. Check each linked JustWatch UK page before watching; it lists the current services and digital rental options for that title.
Streaming availability changes by country and date. The linked JustWatch pages show current UK subscription, rental and purchase listings, but check the service itself before paying or subscribing.
Does State of Play star Ben Affleck?
Yes. Affleck plays congressman Stephen Collins in the 2009 political thriller, alongside Russell Crowe, Rachel McAdams and Helen Mirren.
Yes. Affleck plays congressman Stephen Collins, whose staff member’s death connects a political scandal to a reporter’s investigation.
What should I watch after Prisoners?
Try Gone Baby Gone for another missing-child mystery with a difficult moral choice, or Gone Girl for a disappearance story shaped by marriage and public scrutiny.
Gone Baby Gone is the closest thematic follow-up for the missing-child case and moral dilemma. Gone Girl is better if you want an investigation shaped by a marriage and media attention.
Why is Highest 2 Lowest ranked first?
It combines the kidnapping stakes with family conflict, public consequences and a broader question about privilege. That combination makes it the most layered match for the tension in Animals.
Its kidnapping story combines personal danger with a broader question about influence, money and responsibility. That gives it a more expansive moral conflict than a thriller focused only on identifying a suspect.
Is Animals available on Netflix?
Yes. Netflix’s official title page lists Animals as a 2026 film starring Ben Affleck, Kerry Washington and Gillian Anderson. Availability can still vary by region.
Netflix’s official page lists the 2026 film and its starring cast. Catalogue access can vary by country, so check the Netflix app in your region.
More Places to Find Great Movies and TV Shows
For further film discovery, visit ScreenRant, CBR, Collider, IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, MovieWeb, Slashfilm, TV Guide, Entertainment Weekly, Deadline and The Hollywood Reporter.
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