One thing we love about Netflix is that it produces some of the most creative and original films we've seen in recent years. Oscar nominees such as Train Dreams and KPop Demon Hunters have exceeded our expectations and proven to be truly innovative, and romances like People We Meet On Vacation and Champagne Problems have delivered comfort when we've needed it. But sometimes, no matter how big the film or how famous the star, Netflix originals can simply fall off the face of the earth after their premieres.
Ever since this year's Oscar nominations came out, big names including Timotheé Chalamet, Ethan Hawke, and Benicio del Toro have been everywhere. While the films they're currently starring in -- Marty Supreme, Blue Moon and One Battle After Another, respectively -- have been critically acclaimed and received tons of press, each of them appears in Netflix originals that feel like they've been lost to the algorithm.
Despite Chalamet being one of the biggest stars around these days, how many people have ever seen The King, the 2019 medieval drama that co-stars Joel Edgerton? (Some might argue Edgerton, who starred in Train Dreams, was overlooked at this year's Oscars. He, too, appears in several other Netflix originals that you might not have seen.)
Is it the algorithm? Is it that some of these films just weren't that great to begin with? Or are there just too many new releases arriving on streaming these days? Let's take a look at a few Netflix films starring Oscar nominees and winners that have fallen way below the radar.
The King (2019)
Directed by David Michôd and co-written by Michôd and Joel Edgerton, The King stars Timothée Chalamet as Hal, a prince and reluctant heir to the English throne who has rejected his noble life and prefers living among the people. After his father's death, Hal is crowned King Henry V and is forced to embrace the life he previously tried to escape.
Edgerton plays Hal's closest friend, John Falstaff, and the film also features Sean Harris, Ben Mendelsohn, Robert Pattinson and Lily-Rose Depp. The story is based on Shakespeare's Henriad, his collection of historical plays that includes Richard II, Henry IV, Part 1, Henry IV, Part 2 and Henry V.
Reptile (2023)
Director Grant Singer cut his teeth on music videos, and police thriller Reptile is his debut film. 2026 Oscar nominee Benicio del Toro plays a detective investigating the death of a woman whose shady boyfriend (Justin Timberlake) finds her body, but Timberlake is just one of several creeps who could be suspects in her murder. The film is slick and stylish with an impressive supporting cast that also includes Alicia Silverstone, Frances Fisher, Michael Pitt and Eric Bogosian, but Reptile stealthily slithered past viewers when it first came out.
The Guilty (2021)
The Guilty stars Jake Gyllenhaal and only features the disembodied voice of Ethan Hawke. Both have received Oscar nods, with Hawke earning one this year for Blue Moon, and I think it's weird that more people don't talk about this thriller.
The Guilty is directed by Antoine Fuqua, who previously collaborated with Hawke on Training Day, and takes place entirely at a Los Angeles 911 call center. Gyllenhaal's character is under pressure while fielding calls and trying to track down a woman who called to report her own abduction. Also appearing in the film (in voice only) are Paul Dano, Riley Keough, Bill Burr, and Oscar-winning Da'Vine Joy Randolph.
The Stranger (2022)
We wouldn't blame anyone for overlooking a Netflix original movie called The Stranger, which came out two years after the Netflix series of the same name. But the movie shares only its title with the show.
It stars Joel Edgerton and Sean Harris, with Edgerton as an undercover police officer who gets a little too close to the prime suspect (Harris) in a child abduction case. The psychological thriller is loosely based on the real-life case of the disappearance and killing of an Australian boy named Daniel Morcombe.
Steve (2025)
Cillian Murphy earned his Best Actor Oscar for Oppenheimer, a film that was inescapable when it came out, thanks in part to the media frenzy around Barbenheimer. But to follow up that blockbuster, he chose Steve, a quiet film that arrived in 2025 and barely registered with viewers. The movie is an adaptation of Shy, a novel by Max Porter, about the headmaster -- Steve -- of a school for troubled young men that's about to close, leaving these boys nowhere else to go. Though the film came out last October, it never quite got the exposure you'd expect for a film starring one of the decade's biggest actors.
