Netflix giveth, and Netflix taketh away. For every film, there is a season - and those can creep up on you pretty quickly when it comes to streaming services.
Netflix is constantly adding new content to its servers, as you know. As I'm currently shelling out $38.55 every month (that's for the premium plan to watch and download on multiple devices and share with my kids, plus tax), I feel that Netflix could afford to add a few thousand terabytes of storage just from my payment.
Yet here we are, losing great content just as fast as we get the new stuff. Listen, if it means getting a new Knives Out flick, I'll gladly give up The Ridiculous 6. But no, that abomination will likely be the last thing ever streamed by the robots and the lizard people when our sun becomes a red giant and utterly consumes the planet. But the good stuff, that's the stuff we lose. The clock is ticking on three of the best movies that may have flown under your radar until now.
Netflix is losing 3 vastly underrated movies this month
Oldboy: leaving March 23rd
None of these films could be considered a box office success. The first, Oldboy, can be excused in large part as the 2003 film received a very limited release outside of Korea. Just to clarify, this is the original revenge thriller masterpiece from director Park Chan-wook, not Spike Lee's 2013 remake. Lee is typically a masterful filmmaker, but his take on the material, even starring Josh Brolin, was oddly lifeless.
That's not the case with the original. The bare-bones plot: an alcoholic wakes from a drunken stupor to find he's imprisoned. For 15 years, he has no idea why he's been taken. He finally escapes - and as Roger Ebert wrote in his four-star review, that's when the story truly begins. Oldboy is a truly brilliant film and has never been matched. Oh, and for those Daredevil fans out there - the inspiration for the hallway fight is here.
The Nice Guys: leaving March 31st
There's nothing as reliable in Hollywood as the buddy cop movie. That's especially true when you have two such charismatic leads as Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling in 2016. Add writer-director Shane Black, who wrote Lethal Weapon, The Long Kiss Goodnight, and directed Iron Man 3, and there's every reason to expect box office success. That's not what happened.
I'm still not sure why. Gosling plays a hapless private investigator; Crowe is a borderline thug who does whatever he's hired to do. Their chemistry is perfect as they investigate a missing person case, which may turn into a murder case, then progresses into a conspiracy that "goes to the very top," as these things do. It's all done with tongue firmly in cheek, and it is hilarious.
An Affair to Remember: leaving March 31st
Time to go really old school now. Old school, as in 1957's An Affair to Remember. It's fondly remembered as a classic, and rightly so. But when it was released, it only grossed $3.5 million. Sure, that was a lot more money then, but in 2025 dollars, that's still just $44 million. None of these films was a financial success.
But artistically... it's hard to find another movie that matches the influence of this film. When it comes to leading men, there have been many pretenders to the crown over the decades - from Hugh Jackman and Michael B. Jordan to Hugh Grant and Pierce Brosnan - but no one has ever come close to the OG of ineffable, effortless charm as Cary Grant.
An Affair to Remember was remade as Love Affair in 1994, with Warren Beatty and Annette Bening. Not knocking either actor, but no one remembers that version. Nor do they remember the original version of the story filmed in 1939, also titled Love Affair. Sleepless in Seattle is less a remake than an homage. As great as that movie is, it can't match the romance of Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr.
You could scroll through your Netflix feed for hours and still not find a better thriller, action comedy, or romance than these three films.