The best films on BBC iPlayer (21st April 2024)
David Farnor | On 21, Apr 2024
Who needs to pay for a subscription when you can stream new and old cinematic gems alike for free on BBC iPlayer?
What films are currently available on BBC iPlayer? We round up the best movies on BBC iPlayer right now, with their expiry dates listed so you know how long you have to stream them. (Click here to see our reviews of the best TV shows on BBC iPlayer.)
I, Tonya
Margot Robbie is never less than magnetic in this hugely entertaining, darkly funny sport biopic of America’s skating wild child.
Tove
Alma Pöysti is outstanding in this effervescent biopic of Moomins creator Tove Jansson.
Available until: 14th May 2024
Mary Queen of Scots
Mary Stuart attempts to overthrow her cousin Elizabeth I, Queen of England, only to find herself condemned to years of imprisonment before facing execution.
The Duchess
The superb Keira Knightley is only outshone by the costumes in this lavish drama about the Duchess of Devonshire.
Available until: 14th May 2024
Eternal Beauty
Sally Hawkins delivers a standout performance as a woman battling depression and schizophrenia in Craig Roberts’ second directorial effort.
The Power of the Dog
A triumphant return to feature filmmaking for Jane Campion, this is a brooding Gothic Western that simmers with slow-burn menace.
Available until: 12th May 2024
Aftersun
Paul Mescal is heartbreakingly good in this poignant, absorbing trip through a summer memory.
On Chesil Beach
Dominic Cooke brings Ian McEwan’s novella to life in this awkwardly moving drama about a naive couple on their honeymoon.
Decision to Leave
Park Chan-wook’s psycho-romance is the South Korean master’s most mature work to date.
Available until: 12th May 2024
Pain and Glory
Antonio Banderas is powerfully understated in Pedro Almodóvar’s beautifully personal meditation on film and memory.
Magic Mike
Channing Tatum is superb in Steven Soderbergh’s thoughtful character study of men who happened to be strippers.
Available until: 20th May 2024
Full Time
Call My Agent’s Laure Calamy is sensational in this gripping domestic drama that’s shot and edited like a high-stakes thriller.
Sicario
Denis Villeneuve’s thriller is so intense it has blisters on its blisters.
Available until: February 2025
Captain Phillips
Tom Hanks and Barkhad Abdi are superb in this intense, riveting hijacking thriller.
Available until: 6th May 2024
Dark Waters
Mark Ruffalo is riveting to watch in this grippingly old-fashioned legal thriller.
Available until: 19th May 2024
The Gift
Joel Edgerton is perfectly unnerving in this masterful psychological horror.
The Two Faces of January
An enjoyable, old-school thriller that plays things as cool as its hats.
Available until: 9th May 2024
Apocalypse Now: Final Cut
Vietnam, 1970. Captain Willard takes a journey upriver to assassinate Colonel Kurtz, a once-promising officer who has gone completely mad. In the company of a Navy patrol boat filled with street-smart kids, an Air Cavalry officer, and a freelance photographer, Willard ventures into enemy territory.
The Martian
A thrilling, funny blockbuster that celebrates intelligence over explosions.
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
This impeccable adaptation of John le Carre’s spy thriller is an atmospheric puzzle of betrayal, distrust and decline.
Ghostbusters (2016)
This hugely entertaining reboot is so busy doing its own thing that it’s impossible not to enjoy.
Available until: 28th April 2024
Sorry to Bother You
Boots Riley’s absurd, shrewd satire of modern society is an unpredictable, entertaining ride.
Available until: 15th May 2024
Baby Done
Matthew Lewis and Rose Matafeo are a hugely charming couple in this endearing, funny comedy about parenthood.
La La Land
Damien Chazelle’s bittersweet showstopper is a dazzling musical tribute to the timeless magic of the movies.
Available until: 30th April 2024
The Heat
Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy have entertaining chemistry in this fun odd couple comedy.
Available until: 13th May 2024
Eddie the Eagle
Eddie the Eagle is an uncynical sports movie about someone doing their best. And it’s heartwarming and uplifting in a way that is utterly disarming.
Available until: 22nd May 2024
Blinded by the Light
Springsteen and 1980s Luton collide in this moving coming-of-age drama and ode to the universal power of music.
Easy A
A starmaking turn from Emma Stone, a serious lesson and an endlessly quotable script make this teen movie an A-grade classic.
Shaun the Sheep Movie
A perfectly contained piece of entertainment that mines each frame for every possible laugh.
Available until: 26th April 2024
Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit
Can your favourite stop-motion duo work as a feature-length film? By heck, they can: Aardman’s 85-minute adventure is full of visual slapstick, verbal wit and endless puns, not to mention Ralph Fiennes in his first truly comedic role – and, of course, a giant monster rabbit. It’s when you stop noticing the action set pieces are made out of clay that you realise just how superb it is.
Available until: 23rd April 2024
Beauty and the Beast (1991)
“Tale as old as time…”
Available until: 30th April 2024
Bill
This funny Shakespeare biopic from the Horrible Histories team is Monty Python for kids.
Available until: September 2024
Relic
Natalie Erika James’ thoughtful, terrifying debut is a haunted house tale with heart.
The Blair Witch Project
The definitive found footage flick is still eerily atmospheric.
Ghost Stories
This chilling and entertaining adaptation of the stage play is a theatrical triumph.
Available until: 13th May 2024
What We Do in the Shadows
Taiki Waititi’s vampire comedy is moving, clever and mercilessly quick, but most of all, it’s exceedingly funny.
The Babadook
Unsettling Australian horror tale. Widow Amelia’s worries about her highly strung young son’s behaviour worsen when a mysterious pop-up book inspires fresh fears.
Cat People
The first horror film producer Val Lewton made for RKO Pictures redefined the genre by leaving its terrors to the audience’s imagination. A Serbian émigré in Manhattan believes that, because of an ancient curse, any physical intimacy with the man she loves will turn her into a feline predator.
I Walked with a Zombie
A nurse tending a paralysed woman on a Caribbean island discovers that her charge hides a terrifying secret. Jacques Tourneur’s 1943 classic stars Frances Dee and Tom Conway.
Available until: 23rd October 2024
Ali & Ava
Clio Barnard’s beautifully warm tale of acceptance and affection is an understated delight.
This Beautiful Fantastic
When a reclusive young woman is threatened with eviction unless she gives her garden a makeover, she sets to work, watched by her curmudgeonly neighbour.
Twelve Monkeys
Brad Pitt plays a convict from 2035 is sent back in time to find the cause of a virus which has wiped out most of the planet’s population in Terry Gilliam’s time travel classic.
By the Grace of God
François Ozon’s timely drama about victims of abuse within the Catholic church is a powerful display of restrained, urgent filmmaking.
Persian Lessons
A strong cast elevates this unusual, uneven but ultimately moving wartime drama.
Available until: November 2024
A Bunch of Amateurs
This warm-hearted documentary about a film club in Bradford is a winning celebration of community and cinema.
Wildlife
Paul Dano directs a stellar cast in this enthralling all-American drama.
My Summer of Love
Natalie Press and Emily Blunt star in Paweł Pawlikowski’s drama about an unlikely relationship that develops over the course of a summer.
Moonlight
This brooding deconstruction of masculinity and profound tale of identity is one of the best films of 2017.
Available until: 1st September 2024
A Farewell to Arms
Helen Hayes and Gary Cooper are on iconic form in this adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s novel about an American serving as an ambulance driver in Italy during World War I, who falls in love with a nurse.
Man on the Moon
Jim Carrey is remarkable in this biopic of controversial comedian Andy Kaufman. Star of Taxi and Saturday Night Live, Kaufman’s unorthodox humour was often misunderstood.
Available until: December 2024
Mr Blandings Builds His Dream House
Cary Grant and Myrna Loy star in this comedy about a family forced out of their Manhattan apartment court disaster when they buy a dilapidated country house, fit only for demolition.
The Young Offenders
A smartly written, brilliantly acted and very funny comedy that’s well worth seeking out.
Blue Story
Rapman leaps to the big screen with this authentic, urgently told story of young lives in a gang war.
Fort Apache
The first of John Ford’s cavalry trilogy, in which a demoted commanding officer takes his resentment out on the men of Fort Apache, a remote outpost in the Arizona desert.
Available untiL: February 2025
She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
Western drama with John Wayne as a US cavalry officer on his last duty before retiring, escorting two women civilians to a stagecoach. The second in John Ford’s cavalry trilogy.
Available until: February 2025
The Outlaw
Unconventional western about the life of outlaw Billy the Kid, including his partnership with Doc Holliday and clashes with lawman Pat Garrett. Stars Jane Russell and Jack Buetel.
Available untiL: February 2025
Rancho Notorious
Unusual western about a young man hunting for the brutal killers of his fiancee. A rare foray into the genre for director Fritz Lang.
Available until: February 2025
Silver Screen Classics
Silver Screen Classics: Collection 1
BBC iPlayer has the rights to a bunch of classics from old Hollywood studio RKO, including Citizen Kane (1941), King Kong (1933), Suspicion (1941), The Magnificent Ambersons (1942) and Top Hat (1935). Others include Angel Face (1952), Beautiful But Dangerous (1954), Blackbeard the Pirate (1952), Bringing Up Baby, Carefree (1938), Fort Apache (1948), The Gay Divorce (1934), Kitty Foyle (1940), Love Affair (1939), Miracle of the Bells (1948), Mr Blandings Builds His Dreamhouse (1948), My Favourite Wife (1940), She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949), The Sky’s the Limit (1943), The Spanish Main (1945), The Velvet Touch (1948), Vivacious Lady (1938) and Wagon Master (1950).
Available until: November 2024
Silver Screen Classics: Collection 2
Just when you think BBC iPlayer can’t spoil us any more, up pops a second wave of classic films from RKO Pictures, one of Hollywood’s Golden Age studios. This collection includes the classic Gershwin musical A Damsel in Distress, classic 1950s chiller The Thing from Another World, and more Katherine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers and Cary Grant than you can shake a stick at. Other titles include: Second Chance, I Remember Mama, Holiday Affair, Bachelor Knight, Yellow Canary, Primrose Path, Sylvia Scarlett, Hotel Reserve, Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Windy Poplars.
Available until: November 2024
iPlayer Originals and Exclusives
Happy New Year, Colin Burstead
Tragicomedy directed by Ben Wheatley about the difficulty of family relations. Middle-aged Colin organises a New Year’s Eve gathering for his extended family. Read our review
Available until: December 2024
The Fear of God: 25 Years of The Exorcist
The Exorcist is, without a doubt, one of the scariest films ever made – and, without a doubt, the man most determined to convince you of that fact is Mark Kermode. The BBC critic is known for his ardent love of William Friedkin’s seminal horror, so it is no surprise that in 1998, he wound up presenting a documentary marking its 25th anniversary. 21 years on, however, it is a surprise that BBC iPlayer should bring it back to our screens for Halloween, after the documentary has existed in various cuts in various places but never available to stream legally until now. Read our full review
Available until: November 2025/a>
Family Shorts
The Gruffalo
The definitive adaptation of Julia Donaldson’s book tells the magical tale of a mouse who takes a walk through the woods in search of a nut – and tells everyone he meets of his imaginary creature.
The Gruffalo’s Child
A little Gruffalo ignores her father’s warnings and tiptoes out into the snow in search of the Big Bad Mouse in this charming sequel.
Zog
The story of a keen young dragon in his first years at Dragon School.
Room on the Broom
A kind witch invites a surprising collection of animals to join her on her broom, much to the frustration of her cat.
The Highway Rat
A greedy rat (David Tennant) travels the highway in search of other animals’ food, before his sweet tooth finally leads him to a sticky outcome.
Stick Man
Stick Man tells the tale of a happy-go-lucky father’s epic journey to make it home in time for Christmas.