10 Best Movies Like The Woman In Cabin 10

This article contains discussions of addiction and mental health.

Based on Ruth Ware’s bestselling novel of the same name, the Netflix original movie “The Woman in Cabin 10” stars Keira Knightley as Lauren “Lo” Blacklock, a journalist who boards a luxury cruise ship for an important article. Invited by the wealthy Richard Bullmer (Guy Pearce) and his even wealthier wife Anne (Lisa Loven Kongsli), Lo is prepared to enjoy herself aboard the beautiful oceanliner … but when she hears a noise that definitely sounds like a woman being thrown overboard, Lo is terrified. Making everything even more frightening, Lo is sure that the woman she heard in the struggle was the woman she met in cabin number 10, but according to the staff, there’s nobody staying in cabin 10 aboard the Aurora. Not only do Lo’s fellow passengers not believe her, but eventually, she starts to suspect that Richard and Anne know more than they’ll reveal.

Without spoiling the exciting conclusion of “The Woman in Cabin 10” here, suffice to say that the film centers around one basic throughline: a woman whom nobody trusts is gaslit within an inch of her life and tricked into believing that what she sees and hears is a lie, only for the narrative to ultimately reveal that the woman was unjustly tricked and there’s something deeply sinister going on just underneath the surface. Once you’ve finished watching “The Woman in Cabin 10,” what should you try next? We have a few options, all of which feature deeply complicated and often conflicted protagonists who need to figure out a mystery and are frequently misled along the way.

When it comes to “gaslighting” — a term that, as a reminder, refers to when you manipulate a person mentally to attempt to alter their sense of reality — there are few movies that better represent this phenomenon than Alfred Hitchcock’s beloved classic “Rear Window.” Released in 1954 and based on Cornell Woolrich’s short story “It Had to Be Murder” (and adapted for the screen by writer John Michael Hayes), “Rear Window” stars James “Jimmy” Stewart as L.B. “Jeff” Jefferies, a photojournalist who’s temporarily trapped in his New York City apartment thanks to an injury that’s left him in a cast covering most of his lower body. Luckily for Jeff, his window looks out on the courtyard of his apartment building and into several neighboring windows, allowing the journalist to, for lack of a better word, openly spy on his neighbors. Though most of them are simply amusing, Jeff is deeply unsettled and startled one night when his neighbor Lars Thornwald (Raymond Burr), who frequently argues with his bedridden wife, makes a racket and then carries a large metal case out of his home a whole bunch of times.

Naturally, Jeff is suspicious that Lars murdered his wife, and with the reluctant support of his model girlfriend Lisa Fremont (an absolutely stunning Grace Kelly), he starts investigating on his own. “Rear Window” is undoubtedly one of the most famous thriller movies in the genre, so if you just finished “The Woman in Cabin 10” and want to go back to basics, try this universally acclaimed film.

A lot of “The Woman in Cabin 10” hinges on a secret ruse, mistaken identities, and tricking people to accomplish a nefarious goal — which makes it pretty similar to “Gone Girl,” David Fincher’s 2014 adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s blockbuster 2012 novel. On the morning of his fifth anniversary with his wife Amy Elliott-Dunne (Rosamund Pike), nice Midwestern boy turned bar owner Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) arrives home from said bar to discover his house seemingly ransacked and his wife gone. As Nick, his sister Margo (Carrie Coon), and the local authorities — namely, detective Rhonda Boney and her officer cohort James Gilpin, played respectively by Kim Dickens and Patrick Fugit — try to figure out what happened to Amy, all signs point to Nick as the guilty party, even though the audience knows he didn’t do it. So what happened here?!

It all comes back to Amy, a singular and terrifying mastermind — whom some would undoubtedly diagnose as a sociopath — who discovers that her husband is cheating on her with one of his creative writing students, Andie Fitzgerald (Emily Ratajkowski) — and decides to plot her revenge. Without spoiling either “Gone Girl” or “The Woman in Cabin 10,” we’ll just say that sometimes, the proverbial call is coming from inside the proverbial house … and you should look at the people around you and try and figure out if they’re lying or telling the truth. (One note: Flynn’s book is also incredible, and you should seek it out if you’re an avid reader.)

A horror classic that, like “Rear Window,” belongs in the cinematic gaslighting hall of fame, 2020’s reboot of “The Invisible Man” wisely casts powerhouse performer Elisabeth Moss as a woman who’s experiencing terrifying and traumatic events … but nobody believes her. In Leigh Whannell’s take on this horror staple, Cecelia Kass (Moss) can’t escape a physically abusive relationship with tech CEO Adrian Griffin (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) but ultimately manages to drug him and get out of his highly protected compound with the help of her sister Emily (Harriet Dyer). When horrifying things start happening — including the murder of her loved ones — Cecelia realizes that Adrian might be using some of his highly advanced technology to stalk her and can’t be talked out of this seemingly far-fetched idea, particularly because whoever is causing this events is invisible (so Cecelia always gets blamed). As she tries to uncover the truth, Cecelia puts herself in mortal danger … and ends up facing off against Adrian one last time.

“The Invisible Man” is genuinely scarier — quite a bit scarier than “The Woman in Cabin 10,” to be very frank — than most of the other films on this list, but if you’re feeling particularly brave, you won’t want to miss out on this one. Grab a cozy blanket, get ready to be freaked out, and queue up “The Invisible Man” if you’re a fan of “The Woman in Cabin 10.”

After “Gone Girl” became an unqualified literary and cinematic success story, there were a lot of copycats — some good and some bad. Thankfully, “The Girl on the Train” is a pretty worthy entry into this super-specific niche of dark thrillers featuring an unreliable female narrator. In the movie adaptation of Paula Hawkins’ book directed by Tate Taylor and written by Erin Cressida Wilson, we meet our troubled protagonist Rachel Watson (Emily Blunt), a recovering alcoholic who was let go from her job but still rides a commuter train in and out of New York City to fill her empty days. During her journeys, she becomes obsessed with a young beautiful couple whose house is visible from the train — Scott and Megan Hipwell, played by Luke Evans and Haley Bennett — but when Megan goes missing after Rachel has an accident leaving the train, she becomes convinced that Megan was murdered and will stop at nothing to prove it. To make Rachel appear even less reliable, we learn that she’s also been lightly stalking her ex-husband Tom Watson (Justin Theroux) and his new wife Anna Watson (Rebecca Ferguson), who have a baby together … devastating Rachel, who suffered from constant fertility issues during her marriage to Tom.

The conclusion of “The Girl on the Train” is genuinely shocking, and the build-up to get there is actually quite fun — Blunt’s performance can be a little overwrought, but all things considered, she’s good as the increasingly desperate Rachel. If you want to see where novels and movies like “The Woman in Cabin 10” got their inspiration, look no further than projects like “The Girl on the Train.”

Years after playing queen bee Blair Waldorf on “Gossip Girl,” Leighton Meester joined forces with Netflix for the thriller movie “The Weekend Away,” based on the title of the same name by Sarah Alderson and directed by Kim Farrant (with Alderson penning the screenplay). After having a baby, Beth (Meester), an American who lives in London with her husband Rob (Luke Norris) and decides to go on a vacation to Croatia with her best friend Kate (Christina Wolfe), especially because — as she admits to Kate during the trip — her marriage to Rob isn’t in a great place. The two go out for a wild night together, but when Beth wakes up in the morning with only a fuzzy recollection of the night before only to find Kate missing, she understandably starts to worry.

Rob arrives in Croatia but doesn’t seem to take Beth’s concerns seriously — in fact, the police don’t either, and the only person who does listen to her is Zain (Ziad Bakri), the taxi driver who took them to the club the night before — and so Beth is left to try and solve this mystery alone, even as evidence arises that there might be something going on between Rob and Kate. “The Weekend Away” is a tightly plotted thriller anchored by Meester’s excellent central performance, and as a bonus, it’s a short little movie at just 89 minutes long (if you’re the kind of person who longs for a movie under 90 minutes).

Let’s not mince words here: Joe Wright’s 2021 adaptation “The Woman in the Window” isn’t a perfect movie. Far from it, actually — and this is almost certainly the movie that ended up spawning spoofs like Netflix’s patently absurd “The Woman in the House Across the Street from the Girl in the Window.” Still, if you love literary adaptations centered around women that nobody wants to believe — like “The Woman in Cabin 10” — you’ll want to check out “The Woman in the Window.” Adapted from A.J. Finn’s runaway hit thriller of the same name, Wright’s movie centers around child psychologist Anna Fox (Amy Adams), an agoraphobe who spends all of her time in her massive Brooklyn townhouse separated from her husband and young daughter. 

Bored and alone, Anna spends quite a lot of time watching her neighbors out of her windows, including the new family in the neighborhood, the Russells — made up of patriarch Alistair (Gary Oldman), his wife Jane (Jennifer Jason Leigh), and their son Ethan (Fred Hechinger). After meeting Jane and Ethan and hearing horror stories about Alistair, Anna grows increasingly suspicious of him after she believes she sees him stabbing Jane to death … only for a “new” Jane to appear in her place (played by Julianne Moore). Nobody believes Anna, but she feels determined to figure out what happened to “Jane,” even as she grapples with her own demons. “The Woman in the Window” can veer into the absurd, but it pairs perfectly with “The Woman in Cabin 10.”

Based on Iain Reid’s 2016 novel of the same name, Charlie Kaufman’s audacious and wonderfully bizarre 2020 film “I’m Thinking of Ending Things” doesn’t just feature a somewhat unreliable female narrator, but will leave you questioning your own reality by the time the credits roll. Jessie Buckley, in one of her earlier roles, plays the Young Woman who leads the movie — throughout the narrative, she’s referred to as several names, including Lucy, Louisa, Lucia, and Ames — who goes home with her boyfriend Jake (Jesse Plemons) to meet his parents even as she thinks about breaking up with him. Several strange things occur when she meets his parents, known only as Mother and Father (played by Toni Collette and David Thewlis), and throughout the movie’s run time, the audience keeps catching up with a mysterious school janitor, checking in on him as he watches movies and works at a high school.

Make no mistake: “I’m Thinking of Ending Things” is baffling, confusing, gross, awe-inspiring, and even off-putting at times. It’s also incredible and well worth a watch if you haven’t seen it already, particularly because Buckley, Plemons, Collette, and Thewlis are all exceptionally good. If you’re ready to get your mind bent and become an unreliable narrator yourself when you try and explain the plot to your friends later, think about “I’m Thinking of Ending Things.”

There are actually two major adaptations of the late Stieg Larsson’s hit novel “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” and both of them — a 2009 Swedish version directed by Niels Arden Oplev and starring Noomi Rapace, and a 2011 take by American visionary David Fincher starring Rooney Mara — are absolutely worth watching. Here, we’re going to focus on Fincher’s version, which casts Mara as the titular girl, Lisbeth Salander, a hacker and vigilante who’s constantly determined to punish powerful people for their wrongdoings. When a journalist named Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig), who’s trying to claw his career back after a professionally disastrous libel case, is asked to find a girl who disappeared 40 years prior — by the girl’s wealthy grandfather Henrik Vanger (the late, great Christopher Plummer) — he enlists Lisbeth’s help after the two meet while trying to take down a truly horrible man guilty of reprehensible crimes.

“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” features a gripping story, incredible performances from Mara, Craig, and Plummer, and is an extremely worthy adaptation of Larsson’s novel … and it works alongside “The Woman in Cabin 10” because it centers around a woman who isn’t believed by the people around her until it’s, perhaps, too late. Check out Fincher’s take on “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” and while you’re there, try Oplev’s version too.

Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio have worked together quite a lot, and if you forget about their 2010 collaboration “Shutter Island,” you’re really missing out. Based on Dennis Lehane’s thriller novel of the same name, the story focuses on Teddy Daniels (DiCaprio), a United States Marshal who heads to the titular island outside of Boston with his partner Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo) to investigate a disappearance at the island’s main building, the Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane. As the two men look for the missing Rachel Solando (Emily Mortimer), Teddy struggles with personal demons, including mental health issues and clear post-traumatic stress disorder from his time serving in the United States Military during World War II — where he was one of the soldiers to liberate Dachau, a concentration camp.

To spoil “Shutter Island” for anyone who hasn’t seen this stunning and frankly underrated movie before would be a crime, so we are not going to do that here … but if you’re familiar with “Shutter Island,” you know that the movie builds and builds until it reaches a truly astonishing and shocking conclusion. Scorsese and DiCaprio have flashier and more “acclaimed” collaborations, but don’t sleep on “Shutter Island” — which, like “The Woman in Cabin 10,” features a protagonist who’s never sure about what’s real and what’s not.

The second Alfred Hitchcock thriller on this list is also one of the best psychological thrillers ever made — so if you want to feel like you can’t tell the difference between reality and fiction, absolutely queue up “Vertigo.” This 1958 film, like “Rear Window,” stars James Stewart — but this time, he’s a John “Scottie” Ferguson, a retired police officer turned private investigator with a deep fear of heights who agrees to tail the wife of Gavin Elster (Tom Helmore), a seemingly troubled woman named Madeleine (Kim Novak). As Scottie follows Madeleine through San Francisco, he spots her doing some odd things, like spending hours staring at a single portrait of a woman named Carlotta Valdes to whom she bears a striking resemblance … and when Scottie and Madeleine eventually interact, it’s because she jumps into the San Francisco Bay and he rescues her.

From there, “Vertigo” becomes a cautionary tale of sorts about obsession, love, and fixations on the past, especially after Madeleine apparently dies and leaves Scottie bereft. “Vertigo” features one of the best film scores ever, astounding turns from Stewart and Novak, and Hitchcock’s classically twisted storytelling. Don’t miss this one.

If you or anyone you know needs help with addiction issues, help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA’s National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

If you or someone you know needs help with mental health, please contact the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741, call the National Alliance on Mental Illness helpline at 1-800-950-NAMI (6264), or visit the National Institute of Mental Health website.