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.
Ahed’s Knee (Nadav Lapid)
It’s always interesting, at the beginning of any Nadav Lapid film, to note the myriad Israeli institutions that have backed the project. Since Emile’s Girlfriend (2006), Lapid’s work has sought to make sense of Israeli society—his criticisms a byproduct of attempting to articulate the confusion and warring arguments in his own head. Having won Berlin’s Golden Bear with Synonyms in 2019, Lapid could claim to be the most renowned Israeli filmmaker of his generation. That his work is at risk of falling afoul of that same state speaks volumes about the country’s ever-increasing authoritarianism as a whole. Further confirmation of that renown came with news that his latest would compete for the Palme d’Or at an already-stacked Cannes. It’s titled Ahed’s Knee, a blistering work of meta filmmaking Lapid shot during the pandemic and that addresses censorship concerns head-on. – Rory O. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Anaïs in Love (Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet)
Watch an exclusive clip above.
The seasons have changed––spring is here, summer is on the way, and no film out right now better exudes the aura of love in the sunshine than Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet’s Anaïs in Love. Broke, behind on her rent, and considering breaking up with her boyfriend, thirtysomething Anaïs (Anaïs Demoustier) doesn’t quite know what she wants from life. Struggling to complete her thesis, she wanders aimlessly through the film’s first act––a free spirit with no sense of direction but capable of turning heads and drawing the attention of others wherever she goes. She’s like a manic pixie dream girl without the reductive qualities of the trope. Bourgeois-Tacquet creates in her lead an instantly recognizable portrait of a young woman right at that nexus point where not having your shit figured out is starting to look a little bit uncool. – Mitchell B. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Belle (Mamoru Hosoda)
If a name can trigger nostalgia, don’t be surprised when the occasional sense of deja vu sets in while watching Belle, a dazzling near-future tech fantasia wrapped around a tale, yes, as old as time. Directed by Mamoru Hosoda and mostly set in a vast online world of sweeping musical numbers and weightless action sequences, it tells of Suzu, an awkward teenager (as if there were any other kind) who finds quick fame performing as the pop-singer Belle: her avatar on a hugely popular social media platform called U that looks like a sugary cocktail of Tik Tok and “The Oasis” from Spielberg’s Ready Player One. – Rory O. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Directed by Richard Linklater
One of the great modern voices in American cinema, Richard Linklater’s laidback style could be misconstrued as effortless, but as The Criterion Channel’s fascinating new retrospective shows, the director is one of constant reinvention. Not only are some of his finest films here, but they also feature many overlooked rarities, including the lo-fi Tape, his humorous recent short Another Day at the Office, the four-hour experimental work Heads I Win/Tails You Lose, not to mention a number of documentaries both featuring and directed by Linklater.
Where to Stream: The Criterion Channel
Den of Thieves (Christian Gudegast)
Writer/director Christian Gudegast exploded early in 2018 with this stunning 2-hour, 20-minute piece of pop sleaze cinema. His debut Den of Thieves is Heat by way of Monster energy drink; all the broad strokes of an exciting crime drama but slick, sweaty and loud, and chock-full of all the cartoonishly toxic machismo and grease-stained details you could ask for. Gerard Butler brilliantly fills in the Pacino role as “Big Nick,” a drunken, divorced gorilla cop whose violent tendencies are displayed as prominently as his cheap-takeout-filled beard.” – Josh L.
Where to Stream: Netflix
Films of Endearment
Michael Koresky’s lovely new book Films of Endearment is one of the finest reads of the last year and now, fittingly for Mother’s Day, a cinematic supplement has arrived courtesy of The Criterion Channel’s new series. Featuring a pair of Jack Fisk-directed features, along with films from Jonathan Demme, Barbra Streisand, Kathleen Collins, John Huston, Donna Deitch, two of Meryl Streep’s underseen works, Falling in Love and A Cry in the Dark, and more, it’s a great opportunity for a group watch with your mother whether she is near or far.
Where to Stream: The Criterion Channel
Futura (Pietro Marcello, Francesco Munzi, and Alice Rohrwacher)
Teenagers think about the future without hesitation. They worry about what jobs they’ll get, where they’ll go to school, who they will marry, who they might sleep with, and how they will make the money needed to live a comfortable life. In Futura, the documentary from Pietro Marcello (Martin Eden), Francesco Munzi (Black Souls), and Alice Rohrwacher (Happy as Lazzaro), those worries become talking points, a central thesis of Italian teens without a filter. These three established directors cannot move past the general shrug of teenagehood, though, making a film that remains interesting only for its initial stretch, so long as the teens stay provocative. – Michael F. (full review)
Where to Stream: MUBI (free for 30 days)
Great Freedom (Sebastian Meise)
Its decades-spanning story centers on Hans (Franz Rogowski), a gay man who has lived through Nazi persecution only to find himself in a world where homosexuality continues to be deemed not only perverted but a criminal offense. We first meet Hans in 1968 as a middle-aged man. He’s caught by the police for having sex with men in public toilets and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment. He goes through the procedures, checks all his liberties at the prison gate, and picks up his new daily grind without so much as batting an eyelash. Even when standing up for young inmate Leo (Anton von Lucke) and landing in solitary confinement there seems to be no fear, no surprise, no protest. Just when one thinks he’s acting way too calm in such situations, the movie jumps back to 1945 and introduces us to a fresh-faced Hans in jail for the first time. Eventually we’d see another prison stint of Hans in 1957 and realize how many times he’s been through this and what motivated him to do what he does in 1969, following the decriminalization of homosexuality in Germany. – Zhuo-Ning Su (full review)
Where to Stream: MUBI (free for 30 days)
Inbetween Girl (Mei Makino)
Hitting much of the expected notes of the coming-of-age story yet doing so with a refreshing authenticity, Mei Makino’s Inbetween Girl stands out from the overstylized, mawkish breadth of straight-to-streaming tales of similair ilk we’ve gotten in the last few years. With a spectaular performance by Emma Galbraith as Angie Chen, a high school teenager reckoning with her parents and navigating a secret romance with a jock, Makino’s SXSW winner is a well-observed debut that finds the heart in life-altering first experiences.
Where to Stream: VOD
Jane by Charlotte (Charlotte Gainsbourg)
Is it possible for a documentary to be too intimate? If the answer is affirmative, a prime example might be Jane by Charlotte, actress Charlotte Gainsbourg’s study of her mother, the iconic Jane Birkin. Her film is drenched in love, respect, and sweetness, and after spending time with Birkin this approach feels deserved, more than appropriate. Yet the stakes are low, drama minimal, structure formless. It makes for a viewing experience that is occasionally enjoyable and largely unengaging. – Chris S. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Prismatic Ground
Returning for his second year, Prismatic Ground spotlights the best in new experimental documentary and avant-garde work. Born during the pandemic, this year is a hybrid edition, also taking place at Maysles, the Museum of the Moving Image, and Anthology Film Archives alongside free worldwide screenings. With work by Jodie Mack, Bill Morrison, Fabio Andrade, Christopher Harris, and many emerging filmmakers, it’s now underway through Sunday.
Where to Stream: Prismatic Ground
The Quick and the Dead (Sam Raimi)
With his first new film in a decade arriving in theaters this weekend, it’s been the opportune time to catch up with or revisit the works of Sam Raimi. One major bright spot is his wildly playful western The Quick and the Dead, which features a stacked cast (Sharon Stone, Leonardo DiCaprio, Gene Hackman, Russell Crowe, Keith David, Woody Strode, Lance Henriksen, and Gary Sinise) and crew (cinematographer Dante Spinotti, editor Pietro Scalia, and composer Alan Silvestri). With a tightly-contained story centering on a duel tournament, Raimi stylishly milks all the tropes of the western without modernizing it to the point of parody.
Where to Stream: Netflix
Transit (Christian Petzold)
Though German filmmaker Christian Petzold built a cachet for twisty, sumptuous riffs on Alfred Hitchcock with Phoenix and Barbara, this reputation obscures that his films are inherently about communication and the layers of interference making that interaction so difficult. His glorious Transit lays bare that notion, from its framing of an enigmatic but empathetic narrator to its knowingly obtuse narrative of mistaken identities and bait-and-switches–nonetheless punctuated by half-a-dozen meaningful conversations with near-strangers. – Michael S.
Where to Stream: MUBI (free for 30 days)
Wrath of Man (Guy Ritchie)
While his first two fast-talking, hyper-edited crime dramas, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, hit at the opportune pubescent period of this viewer’s early journey with cinema, I had mostly tuned out of the films of Guy Ritchie in subsequent years. Consider my surprise when Wrath of Man turned out to be an uncharacteristically patient, deliciously mean piece of work not without some sly Jason Statham levity. While half of the fun of this revenge-meets-heist drama would be undone if the narrative was chronological, seeing Ritchie partaking in a down-and-dirty, grotesque S. Craig Zahler approach to filmmaking makes for one of last year’s high points. – Jordan R.
Where to Stream: Amazon Prime
Also New to Streaming
Amazon Prime
California Split
Days of Heaven
Fire Will Come
The Ladies Man
The Criterion Channel
HBO Max
MUBI (free for 30 days)
Everybody Street
Love Steaks
Our Lady of the Nile
Time Piece
R100
VOD