When it comes to popular movies and blockbusters, Amazon Prime is one of the top streaming services. Amazon’s acquisition of the famed MGM studio in 2022 added 4,000 films to their catalog, which already boasted thousands of hit movies – many of them R-rated. (Prime also offers original content.  Here are the best Amazon Prime original movies.)

To determine the best R-rated movies to stream on Amazon Prime this May, 24/7 Tempo developed an index using average ratings on IMDb, an online movie database owned by Amazon, and a combination of audience scores and Tomatometer scores on Rotten Tomatoes, an online movie and TV review aggregator, as of early May 2023, weighting all ratings equally. We considered only movies with at least 5,000 audience votes on either IMDb or Rotten Tomatoes, and ruled out documentaries. Data on streaming availability, also current as of early May, comes from the streaming guide Reelgood. Directorial credits are from IMDb.

Click for a list of the best movies on Amazon Prime this month

Prime’s streaming catalog includes many infinitely re-watchable ‘90s cult classics like “Pulp Fiction,” “The Big Lebowski,” and “Dazed and Confused.” It also boasts a wide array of indie films, including “Captain Fantastic,” which follows an idealistic father who chooses to raise his children in isolation from society until his wife commits suicide and he risks losing custody of the only family he has left.

Romantic comedies, war films, dramas, and psychological thrillers are all available in quantity. Also offered are Best Picture nominees including Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist,” Gus Van Sant’s “Good Will Hunting,” and Martin Scorsese’s wild tale of excess, “The Wolf of Wall Street.” (See where it places on this list of Martin Scorsese’s movies ranked worst to best.)