Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.
Amrum (Fatih Akin)
There’s a reason behind the odd credit at the start of Amrum: “A Hark Bohm film by Fatih Akin.” While the two collaborated before on the latter’s In the Fade, this project had a different beginning. Bohm wrote the script to direct himself before realizing he wouldn’t have the strength to do so. Raised on the island of Amrum (and a teen during the film’s 1945 setting), it was surely a very personal project that Akin initially refused to take over. – Jared M. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Chronicles of a Wandering Saint (Tomás Gómez Bustillo)
Tomás Gómez Bustillo’s charming, intelligent Chronicles of a Wandering Saint is a natural follow-up to the two short films for which he is known: Soy Buenos Aires (a strange, picaresque rags-to-riches tale) and Museum of Fleeting Wonders (a collection of dramatized paranormal happenings). In Chronicles, as in the two short films, he is primarily concerned with spiritual, ethical, and religious contrasts; scenarios in which miracles are mixed with coincidences, faith with rationality, and boredom with inspiration. But that is where the comparisons end; for Chronicles is in every way a more serious, controlled, and moving work of art, which stands with the very best of contemporary Argentine cinema. – Oliver W. (full review)
Where to Stream: Metrograph at Home
Erupcja (Pete Ohs)
It’s no coincidence that Bethany (Charli xcx) and Rob (Will Madden) find themselves in Warsaw. While an obvious fact—she recommended the Polish city as an alternative destination when he suggested Paris—it’s also a familiar escape hatch now that things have grown serious. Because Bethany senses a proposal on the horizon. She’s lived with Rob for a year in London and he’s started hinting about a surprise for his “love.” It’s time to pull the ripcord. – Jared M. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Hokum (Damian McCarthy)
Anyone familiar with Irish filmmaker Damian McCarthy’s work already knows he’s one of the most exciting new names in horror. His underseen debut Caveat was a moody ghost story that showed off his ability to create unnerving imagery and unbearably tense sequences, but it was his terrifying sophomore feature Oddity that put him on the map for genre fans. After making one of the scariest films in years, it comes as no surprise that McCarthy got the attention of a company like NEON, which hopped aboard for his latest feature Hokum. It’s McCarthy’s biggest production to date and further boosted by Adam Scott taking on the lead role, all of which suggests Hokum would give its director plenty room to conjure up more unforgettable scares. Instead the film is more like a remix of McCarthy’s prior features, retreading ground with a heavier hand and constituting an underwhelming experience. – C.J. P. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
In the Grey (Guy Ritchie)
In the Grey, written and directed by Guy Ritchie, is a nifty bit of entertainment. Ninety minutes long before credits and starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Henry Cavill, and Eiza González, the action thriller concerns a small group of “extraction specialists” whose job it is to get very powerful people to pay their debts. They often work in the service of other very powerful people. In this case, they are tasked to recover a one-billion-dollar debt from bad guy Manny Salazar (Carlos Bardem) for a nefarious, New York City law firm of which the shady Bobby (Rosamund Pike) is an employee. – Dan M. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Is God Is (Aleshea Harris)
“Complicated” doesn’t begin to describe the family history that twin sisters Racine (Kara Young) and Anaia (Mallori Johnson) are facing in Is God Is, Aleshea Harris’ film adaptation of her acclaimed play. A directorial debut brimming with storytelling ingenuity and stylistic verve, the revenge tale follows the sisters on their path toward justice after their father left them and their mother for dead. While sometimes the theatrics at play can take away from the desired emotional connection, it’s quite an impressive first outing in the directorial chair for Harris, hopefully leading to more opportunities. – Jordan R.
Where to Stream: VOD
Omaha (Cole Webley)
Early one morning, a single father and widower (John Magaro)––credited as Dad––wakes up his perceptive nine-year-old Ella (Molly Belle Wright) and mischievous six-year-old Charlie (Wyatt Solis) and asks them to pack a suitcase as quickly as they can. Everyone is a bit groggy, but they load the car (including their golden retriever Rex) just as a police officer comes to staple an eviction notice on the front door. With a running push in neutral (a familiar routine), Dad and Ella get his clunker revved and started, and soon they’re on their way. Where are they going? The kids––and we––are left to figure that out. – Jake K-S (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Pillion (Harry Lighton)
Dogs Don’t Wear Pants finally has a companion piece. Harry Lighton tackles the duality of sexual attraction head-on in a gay sub-dom debut that shocks, tickles, delights, and devastates in equal measure (but not without pulling viewers out of the emotional quicksand it creates). In his edgiest career turn, Harry Melling plays Colin, a hushed, soft-smiling, barbershop-quartet-singing submissive who’s yet to find a man that really gets him—a bad biker clad in tight black leather that holds him by the thick chain around his neck and gives the dog the open couch seat while making him sit on the floor. Enter: Ray (Alexander Skarsgård), the tall-walking, rarely talking epitome of sizzling-hot dominance. The desired degradation opens Colin’s world as wide and willfully as his mouth, offering a deeply romantic enlightenment angle on the BDSM lifestyle that few films have deigned to take. – Luke H.
Where to Stream: HBO Max
Ricky (Rashad Frett)
Ricky (Stephen James) has only been out of prison a few weeks, but the real world has already become too much for him. His parole officer Joanne (Sheryl Lee Ralph) keeps showing up at his house to berate him. His mother Winsome (Simbi Kali) treats him like he’s already a lost cause. He just lost a job that was supposed to be guaranteed by childhood friend Terrence (Sean Nelson). Fifteen years ago he convinced Ricky to do a robbery with him; when the heat came down on them, Terrence split and Ricky was left with the consequences. And having spent so much of his life in prison, he doesn’t know how to be around people anymore. He struggles to speak and look others in the eye. He’s a strong guy with muscles and an imposing stature, but inside it’s like he’s still that scared teenager who was arrested all those years ago. He doesn’t know how he’s going to make it, but Ricky has one thing going for him––he knows how to cut hair. With dreams of opening a barbershop one day, Ricky attempts to build a life for himself. – Jourdain S. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Weeknights (Alfred Giancarli)
Following a trio of graveyard shift workers at a desolate college campus, Weeknights is a formally fascinating experiment in capturing the mundane. With a precise visual eye and a strong sense of settling the viewer into each location through a limited number of shots, Alfred Giancarli creates a tranquil debut feature that would make Tsai Ming-liang proud. – Jordan R.
Where to Stream: Means.tv
Also New to Streaming
The Criterion Channel
200 Cigarettes
After Hours
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
The Darjeeling Limited
Dr. No
From Russia with Love
Full Moon in Paris
The Game
Goldfinger
A Good Marriage
The Harder They Come
Marie Antoinette
Melancholia
Motel Destino
Muriel’s Wedding
Nomad
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Objectified
Pacific Heights
Pauline at the Beach
The People vs. Larry Flynt
Rachel Getting Married
Repo Man
The Searchers
The Straight Story
Straight to Hell
Sullivan’s Travels
Touki bouki
Typhoon Club
Walker
A Wedding
Wild at Heart
Disney+
Hoppers
Hulu
Keeper
Jimpa
Kino Film Collection
Aimée & Jaguar
Drifter
Metrograph at Home
Days
Edward II
Hahaha
Hill of Freedom
Keep the Lights On
The Living End
Oasis
Peppermint Candy
Stranger by the Lake
Totally F***ed Up
A Vanishing Fog
Will-o’-the-Wisp
MUBI
4 Days in France
BPM
Bull Durhman
End of the Century
Solo
Thelma
Shudder
The Ice Tower
VOD
I Swear
The post New to Streaming: Pillion, Is God Is, Erupcja, Omaha & More first appeared on The Film Stage.
from The Film Stage https://ift.tt/HCgcdFo
0 Comments