Hi friends,
If like me you’re a fan of Adam Driver, Greta Gerwig, and/or their weird tandem together, then I come bearing good news: a new teaser of their new film White Noise has just been released, and I’ve attached it here for your viewing. Enjoy!
As always, I hope you have a nice weekend.
OUR TOP TV SHOW OF THE WEEK
New on Netflix 🍅 rating: 100%
The Netflix four-part miniseries Lost Ollie is a bit like if Toy Story was adapted into a live-action dramedy. You’ll recognize the premise immediately: lost toy comes to life and loyally sets out on a journey to find its kid. But stuffed in between those points are poignant moments and reflections about life, family, and being.
The film isn’t also afraid to touch on darker themes, so if you’ve always wished for a slightly more mature but still kid-friendly version of this narrative—and if you’re a fan of the likes of Paddington the Velveteen Rabbit—then you’ll enjoy Lost Ollie.
OUR TOP MOVIE OF THE WEEK
On Amazon Prime Video, starting at $3.99 🍅 rating: 94%
Hit the Road is a dramedy that follows a family of four (plus one sickly dog) on their journey in the Iranian countryside.
The film is tender, funny, chaotic, and understandably likened to the definitive road trip film, Little Miss Sunshine. That said, it is also incomparably its own thing, touching a bit on both the starry-eyed surreal and the tragically real.
A heartfelt new comedy, Sprung, is streaming for free on Freevee. The show follows a group of newly released convicts who return to a life of petty thievery after realizing they’re up against an emerging global pandemic. It’s an amusing snapshot of the ridiculous lengths we went through in the horror year that is 2020, but it’s also filled with the good old sentiment that grounds funny shenanigans to their feet. It stars the reliable Martha Plimpton and is created by Gregory Thomas Garcia, the brain behind the beloved sitcom My Name is Earl.
If you’re a fan of Lady Di (or The Crown), the documentary The Princess is out now on HBO Max. While Diana Spencer and anything royal-related may seem like an oversaturated subject at this point, The Princess manages to be enlightening and absorbing thanks to its human approach and masterful use of contemporaneous footage. In a sea of Diana docus, it’s easily one of the best.
The German series Kleo is new on Netflix. It’s been likened to Killing Eve for its assassin and revenge spree premise, so if you’re looking for a follow-up to the latter, Kleo might just be the one.
Meanwhile, Captain Fantastic is new on Amazon Prime. The excellent family drama is the story of an eccentric family learning to reintegrate into the real world after years of isolated living in the wilderness.
On Netflix, the political thriller In the Line of Fire leaves on August 30.
The Christian Bale-starring biopic The Fighter, the sci-fi classic Gattaca, the gangster flick Goodfellas, the legal thriller Michael Clayton, and the crime dramas The Departed and Road to Perdition are all expiring the next day, August 31st on the same platform.
Over at Amazon Prime, the Ruth Bader Ginsburg documentary RBG is expiring on August 29th, while the cult classic Ghost World leaves the next day, August 30th.
Even more great titles are leaving Amazon Prime on the last day of August. This includes the A-lister heist drama The Italian Job, the historical epic Silence, the queer romance Call Me By Your Name, the baseball classic A League of Their Own, the third installment to the romantic trilogy Before Midnight, the OG sad girl film The Virgin Suicides, the Irish musical Once, and the Asian-American crime drama Better Luck Tomorrow.
Also leaving Amazon Prime on August 31st are the splendid documentaries I Am Not Your Negro and The Queen of Versailles.
That’s all for this week. This edition of the newsletter will be back on Friday, September 2.
Till then,
Renee