Another week, another round of new movies for you to enjoy at home.
This week, plenty of exciting new releases are finally available for digital rental or purchase, led by Evil Dead Rise. There’s also Guy Ritchie’s The Covenant, the Owen Wilson Bob Ross-like Paint, and The Wandering Earth 2, the sequel to the Chinese mega-blockbuster.
On the streaming side of things, Netflix has a new Jennifer Lopez action movie called The Mother, Disney Plus debuts the new sci-adventure Crater, the Nike movie Air comes to Prime Video, and critically acclaimed movies Saint Omer, The Fabelmans, and Huesera: The Bone Woman premiere on new streaming services.
Let’s get into it!
New on Netflix
The Mother
Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix
Photo: Eric Milner/Netflix
Genre: Action drama
Run time: 1h 55m
Director: Niki Caro
Cast: Jennifer Lopez, Gael García Bernal, Paul Raci
In director Niki Caro’s (Mulan) latest Netflix action movie, Jennifer Lopez is mother. No, not that kind of mother, or that kind of mother, or that kind of mother. She’s a highly trained assassin who comes out of hiding to protect the daughter (Lucy Paez) she left behind years ago to conceal her from her powerful enemies. So like Beatrix Kiddo in Kill Bill, but instead of “The Bride,” she’s “The Mother” kind of mother. A mother like no other.
New on Disney Plus
Crater
Where to watch: Available to stream on Disney Plus
Image: Disney
Genre: Sci-fi adventure
Run time: 1h 45m
Director: Kyle Patrick Alvarez
Cast: Isaiah Russell-Bailey, Mckenna Grace, Brady Noon
Disney’s new coming-of-age sci-fi adventure is about a boy and his group of four best friends who take a trip to a mysterious crater before leaving the moon.
New on Hulu
Saint Omer
Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu
Image: Srab Films
Genre: Legal drama
Run time: 2h 2m
Director: Alice Diop
Cast: Kayije Kagame, Guslagie Malanda, Valérie Dréville
This French legal drama centers on Rama (Kayije Kagame), a French Senegalese novelist who journeys to Saint-Omer, France, to observe the trial of Laurence Coly (Guslagie Malanda), a mother accused of willingly allowing her infant daughter to be killed. As she learns more about Coly’s life, Rama becomes increasingly more distraught over the parallels to her own life and the impending birth of her own child. Saint Omer is directed by Alice Diop, an accomplished documentary filmmaker who decided to make the movie after attending a similar trial in real life.
New on Prime Video
Air
Where to watch: Available to stream on Prime Video
Image: Amazon Studios
Genre: Drama
Run time: 1h 51m
Director: Ben Affleck
Cast: Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Jason Bateman
A part of a new wave of basketball movies, Air tells the story of Nike’s partnership with Michael Jordan… without the Michael Jordan part of things (although Viola Davis plays his mother, Deloris). It has also a killer antagonist, which always helps.
New on Showtime
The Fabelmans
Where to watch: Available to stream on Showtime
Image: Amblin Entertainment
Genre: Coming-of-age drama
Run time: 2h 31m
Director: Steven Spielberg
Cast: Michelle Williams, Paul Dano, Gabriel LaBelle
Steven Spielberg’s semi-autobiographical drama follows the story of Sammy Fabelman (Gabriel LaBelle), a young aspiring filmmaker who finds stability in the medium of film amid the dysfunction of his family life and childhood in post-WWII Arizona. If that description isn’t enough to entice you, how about a cameo appearance by Twin Peaks creator David Lynch as acclaimed Hollywood icon John Ford?
From our review:
At the heart of nearly every Steven Spielberg film is the spirit of a boy who’s still saddened by his parents’ divorce, papering over his grief in cinema’s vast sandbox. You can see that kid’s pain unconsciously spilling out in the bickering mom and dad characters from Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It springs forth in the family dynamics of E.T.: the Extra-Terrestrial. And it evolves in Catch Me If You Can, as Frank Abagnale seeks refuge at the home of his mom’s second family. But Spielberg has never approached his own childhood with such straightforwardness as he does in his semi-autobiographical movie The Fabelmans, one of 2022’s best films so far.
New on Apple TV Plus
Still: A Michael J. Fox movie
Where to watch: Available to stream on Apple TV Plus
Image: Apple TV Plus
Genre: Documentary
Run time: 1h 35m
Director: Davis Guggenheim
Cast: Michael J. Fox, Tracy Pollan, Andrew Barber
This documentary tells the story of Michael J. Fox’s extraordinary life as Hollywood mega-star and his ongoing journey with Parkinson’s disease. Using archival footage, some scripted elements, and some of the classic documentary formats, Still is one of the most anticipated docs of the year.
New on Shudder
Huesera: The Bone Woman
Where to watch: Available to stream on Shudder
Image: XYZ Films
Genre: Horror
Run time: 1h 37m
Director: Michelle Garza Cervera
Cast: Natalia Solián, Alfonso Dosal, Mayra Batalla
This critically acclaimed horror movie from Mexico follows a new mother haunted by otherworldly forces.
From our review:
Huesera speaks in a language of breaking and setting, as rigid structures crack under pressure — the wood of sturdy furniture, the bones of an animal consumed for its flesh, the expectations of a mother-to-be. Powerful hands pry these things from their assigned purpose. In Huesera, Valeria is both a craftsperson’s hands and their medium: shrieking in agony as her bones are bent in ways they were not meant to, yet longing for the control to contort her life into a shape molded by her desires. Cervera has crafted a motherhood fable that responds to tradition by asking: Which tradition is strongest and most empowering? The Catholic rigidity embodied by a sculpture of the Virgin Mary? The witchcraft of the women imprisoned by such ideals? The punks who rebel? When someone whose life is in transition gets pulled in so many directions, the body is transformed, and the bones are reset.
New on VOD
Evil Dead Rise
Where to watch: Available to rent for $19.99 on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Image: Warner Bros. Pictures
Genre: Supernatural horror
Run time: 1h 36m
Director: Lee Cronin
Cast: Lily Sullivan, Alyssa Sutherland, Morgan Davies
The fifth installment in the venerable Evil Dead horror franchise stars Lily Sullivan (Mental) as Beth, a guitar engineer who decides to pay a visit to her estranged sister Ellie (Alyssa Sutherland) and her children after discovering that she is pregnant. When a massive earthquake rocks the foundations of Ellie’s apartment complex, an ancient evil is inadvertently unearthed — one that threatens to claim the lives of all those trapped inside the building.
From our review:
Evil Dead Rise is a movie made by sickos for sickos. It’s a fantastic update to the iconic franchise, filled with humor but bringing in Álvarez’s taste for the disgusting and upsetting. The refreshing change in scenery and cast, plus Sutherland’s breakout performance, proves this undead franchise still has a lot of life and fight in it.
At 97 lively minutes, it does feel like it’s over almost as soon as it begins. It’s a perfect onboarding movie for newer audiences who’ve never seen an Evil Dead movie, but for longtime fans, it breathes new air into a classic horror-comedy franchise, mixing Raimi’s old-school approach with the new school of gruesome horror. It proves there’s still a lot to color in within the old dead-lines.
Paint
Where to watch: Available to rent for $19.99 on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Image: IFC Films
Genre: Comedy
Run time: 1h 36m
Director: Brit McAdams
Cast: Owen Wilson, Michaela Watkins, Ciara Renée
Owen Wilson stars in this dark comedy as Carl Nargle, an afro-haired pipe-smoking artist whose popular public-access TV show devoted to painting is threatened by the arrival of a new artist (Michaela Watkins) who becomes the channel’s newest star. Distraught, Carl is forced to reckon with the choices of his life and his own thwarted artistic aspirations. It’s basically Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, but instead of focusing on a character modeled after real-life anchorman Mort Crim, it’s Bob Ross.
Guy Ritchie’s The Covenant
Where to watch: Available to rent for $19.99 on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Photo: Christopher Raphael/MGM
Genre: Military action thriller
Run time: 2h 3m
Director: Guy Ritchie
Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Dar Salim, Sean Sagar
One of two movies coming out this year about American soldiers escaping Afghanistan with their interpreters (along with Ric Roman Waugh’s Kandahar), The Covenant sees Jake Gyllenhaal team up with Guy Ritchie for a wartime drama.
The Wandering Earth II
Where to watch: Available to rent for $4.99 on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Image: Well Go USA
Genre: Sci-fi action adventure
Run time: 2h 53m
Director: Frant Gwo
Cast: Andy Lau, Wu Jing, Willis Chung
The prequel to the 2019 Chinese sci-fi action adventure film centers on a team of scientists tasked with building enormous engines designed to propel the Earth safely outside the radius of impending solar flare in search of a new solar system. Time is running out, and the scientists must survive the elements and their own interpersonal conflicts in order to survive.