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.
American Doctor (Poh Si Teng)
Poh Si Teng’s American Doctor is a harrowing, heartbreaking portrait of Palestinian, Jewish, and Zoroastrian doctors who are risking their lives to tend to the overwhelming victims of the ongoing genocide in Gaza and speak the truth in any way they can. Dan Mecca said in his Sundance review, “When will this end? When will this bloodshed stop? And when will the United States of America stop supporting it? Filmmaker Poh Si Teng offers a clear-eyed, unrelenting look at the genocide in Gaza with her documentary American Doctor. It follows three doctors––Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, Dr. Thaer Ahmad, and Dr. Mark Perlmutter––that are consistently trying to save lives in the Gaza Strip. On some trips they are approved to enter. On others they are denied for specious reasons. Dr. Perlmutter is Jewish, Dr. Sidhwa is Zoroastrian, and Dr. Ahmad is Palestinian. Their mission is the mission of all medical professionals: to heal everyone they can.”
Where to Stream: VOD
Being Heumann (Sian Heder)
Sian Heder’s Oscar winner CODA felt like a movie out of time. It was the kind of broad crowd-pleaser that Miramax would have released to awards success a couple of decades earlier, which I would argue only triumphed with the Academy as voters were quietly nostalgic for the kind of American indie that disappeared alongside the Weinsteins. It certainly didn’t hold up to scrutiny as a lived-in, authentic account of the deaf community, with its simplistic and reductive attempt to chronicle their many challenges feeling too distractingly like an outsider’s perspective when framed through the audience surrogate of the family’s non-hearing-impaired daughter. For Heder to follow it with a tale more explicitly about disability-rights activism naturally got my alarm bells ringing, but Being Heumann does a far better job balancing its audience-satisfying instincts with an embedded perspective of its characters’ everyday struggles, never allowing the viewer to feel on the outside looking in. – Alistair R. (full review)
Where to Stream: Apple TV
The End of Oak Street (David Robert Mitchell)
The End of Oak Street opens with a rollicking gusto, Michael Giacchino’s assured heavyweight score ripping us straight from the production cards into a 1982 suburban block party in Flowervale, Michigan, where the styles and aesthetics of the ‘70s still reign supreme in outfits, home decor, cars, you name it. From there, it’s Meet the Platts: Greg (Ewan McGregor) and Denise’s (Anne Hathaway) marriage is on the rocks, and their teen children Audrey (Maisy Stella) and Brian (Christian Convery) can tell. But the kids have their own problems, like crushes and Jumanji-pilled bully bike chases. Until the Platts—and everyone else in a two-mile radius—suddenly share the same problem: their neighborhood has been inexplicably transported to the Mesozoic era, otherwise known as the Age of Dinosaurs, in a cross-epochal paranormal event. – Luke H. (full review)
Where to Stream: HBO Max
Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass (David Wain)
As the world continues fermenting its vile culture, the gang behind The State and Wet Hot American Summer is back to save you from the merciless onslaught of bad news. At least for 90 minutes. The dynamic duo of director David Wain and screenwriter Ken Marino are now in their third decade of bringing a unique brand of irreverent comedy to cinema. In the wake of their MTV sketch comedy show The State, Wain and co. premiered their cult hit Wet Hot American Summer at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival. This year, they return once more with Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass, a hilarious Hollywood farce in their signature absurdist voice. – Kent M. W. (full review)
Where to Stream: Netflix
Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! (Josef Kubota Wladyka)
In dance, you have to lead with confidence. Your partner looks to you for guidance, and they require you to look back at them responsively, to move instinctually without faltering. There’s need for surefootedness, consistency, and impeccable timing. Luckily for us, Josef Kubota Wladyka’s fun and deceptively frothy third feature Ha-chan, Shake Your Booty! has all of these qualities in spades. – Blake S. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
The Heart of the Beast (David Ayer)
After a few less-than-successful forays into big-budget ensemble fantasy tentpoles, David Ayer has entered a phase of leaner and meaner sole protagonist action thrillers. The latest comes in the form of the Brad Pitt-led survival picture Heart of the Beast, which follows a retired Special Forces veteran and his combat dog attempting to traverse a treacherous landscape following a plane crash. While there are a few effective set pieces, and the overall picture is quite competently made, Ayer doubling down on a saccharine level of earnestness lessens the desired emotional impact.
Where to Stream: VOD
The Incomer (Louis Paxton)
The extended opening of The Incomer, written and directed by Louis Paxton, is very funny and engaging. That the film never reaches those heights again is something of an indictment. Far away and remote on a lonely, lovely Scottish isle, siblings Isla (Gayle Rankin) and Sandy (Grant O’Rourke) live simple, quiet lives. They hunt and gather by the sea and among the birds. They mourn their parents, most recently their father, and they watch out for trespassers on their land—Incomers, they call them. – Dan M. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Leviticus (Adrian Chiarella)
Being queer—especially in this rapidly regressive age—means becoming acquainted with a base level of fear for most of your life. It is something you learn early on: not only when you must discover who can be trusted with your survival, but whether they might betray that trust later. Violence takes so many forms that it can lead to a sort of paranoia that folds in on itself. Adrian Chiarella’s Leviticus understands this intimately. By blending the mechanics of It Follows with the trauma of conversion therapy, he crafts a tense, thematically potent feature debut that is more than just a clear metaphor—this is a creepy horror picture in its own right. – Devan S. (full review)
Where to Stream: Hulu
Misty Green (Chris Rock)
Misty Green is a disaster on all fronts. It’s a film that seems to hate its characters, the audience, and Black cinema in general. It’s a Hollywood satire with no insight. It’s a character study with no character. It’s a drama uninterested in its own stakes. It’s a comedy unconcerned with making us laugh. The longer you watch it, the more it seems to only exist as a platform for writer-director Chris Rock’s most hateful impulses. The titular actress is a cipher, shepherded from scene to scene by plot mechanisms alone. Rosalind Eleazar plays Misty Green with energy and commitment, but the narrative has no real respect for her as a woman. The real star of the film is Rock himself, who plays a hapless director mysteriously named Jordan Green. He even shares his name with Misty’s mentally ill brother, referred to as Jay presumably to lessen confusion. But like most of the problems in the film, this needless misunderstanding can be attributed to Rock’s shocking lack of imagination. Going by Rock’s script, the most important thing to know about Misty Green is that she lets men down. – Jourdain S. (full review)
Where to Stream: Netflix
Paper Trail (Don Hertzfeldt)
Following his short film ME from a few years ago, Don Hertzfeldt has returned with Paper Trail, one of his most gut-punching, imaginative shorts. Starting with a very simple concept best left unspoiled, it expands into an experience rather devastating. With an original score by Naomi Alligator, it’s now available to stream for free for a limited time on Vimeo.
Where to Stream: Vimeo
Also New to Streaming
MUBI
The Cat
The Delinquents
Female Perversions
Innocent Sorcerers
Malni – Towards The Ocean, Towards The Shore
Man of Iron
Man of Marble
Músicas
The Promised Land
Sweet Smell of Success
Switchblade Sisters
The Wedding
Without Anesthesia
Netflix
Avedon
VOD
Atonement
Other Mommy
The post New to Streaming: The End of Oak Street, Being Heumann, Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty!, Paper Trail & More first appeared on The Film Stage.
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