Every Tuesday, discriminating viewers are confronted with a flurry of choices: new releases on disc and on-demand, vintage, and original movies on any number of streaming platforms, catalog titles making a splash on Blu-ray or 4K. This biweekly column sifts through all of those choices to pluck out the movies most worth your time, no matter how you’re watching.
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It is a loaded week on the disc and streaming front, with three big titles on three big streamers, a wonderful new music documentary, and a boatload of first-rate catalog titles.
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ON NETFLIX:
‘I Care A Lot’: There’s something genuinely exhilarating about a movie where you have no one to “root for” – because, at some point, you realize there’s no way to guess how it’s all going to turn out. Everyone involved in this fast-paced thriller is absolutely reprehensible (up to and including Dianne Wiest, who comes on like a sweet old lady and then turns on the burners), and the writing is so sharp and nasty, and antagonists Rosamund Pike and Peter Dinklage are so well matched in their ruthlessness, that an anything-goes spirit takes over. The picture aligns itself into a more conventional good/bad binary in the third act, which is a bummer. But until then, this is ruthless, wicked fun.
ON HULU:
‘Nomadland’: In the opening scene of “Nomadland,” Frances McDormand finds a coat. It’s a small, quiet, and (at that point) unexplained beat, but she turns that simple moment into the most evocative act; we don’t know anything about this woman yet, but she’s just told us everything. McDormand is an actor who thrives in complicated dialogue, yet her most powerful moments in Chloé Zhao’s marvelous drama, only her third after “Songs My Brother Taught Me” and 2017’s tremendous “The Rider,” are entirely wordless – minute-long monologues cannot tell all the stories she tells, in her face and her eyes. The alchemy of this casting had to be just right; the wrong actor might overplay these scenes and outplay the real people Zhao surrounds her with, or drain away too much personality and end up condescending to the material. But both McDormand and David Straithairn find just the right notes, blending with their surroundings and co-stars to create a moving, affecting portrait of a fascinating yet rarely dramatized subculture.
ON HBO MAX:
‘Judas and the Black Messiah’: Director Shaka King’s dramatization of the murder of Black Panther leader Fred Hampton transcends (most of) the traps of the staid bio-drama, thanks to the easy connections to contemporary events, the pulsing urgency of the filmmaking, and the jaw-dropping performances of Daniel Kaluuya as Hampton as LaKeith Stanfield as Panther associate and FBI informant Bill O’Neal. It’s the kind of historical film where the narrative is so propulsive, and the characters so compelling, that you get lost in what’s known and not; the ending is the reason it exists, yet by the time it gets there, this viewer was shocked anew by those events.
ON BLU-RAY / DVD / VOD:
‘The Go-Gos’: The formulations of the rock bio-doc have become similarly set in stone, yet this told-from-the-inside story of the rise of the New Wave-adjacent girl group (from director Allison Ellwood) feeds off the relentless energy and infectious freedom of the music at its center. And by focusing on this group, Ellwood is also telling the story of the waning days of the L.A. punk scene, the introduction and infestation of MTV, and the precarious position of women in rock in the 1980s. The interviews are entertaining, the juxtapositions are ingenious, and the music, of course, is aces. (Also available on demand.)
ON BLU-RAY:
‘Pump Up the Volume’: One of the definitive cinematic texts of Generation X, this teen drama from director Allan Moyle (“Empire Records”) stars Christian Slater as a high-school introvert who lets it all loose on short-wave radio broadcasts, anonymously giving voice to the hopes and fears of himself and his peers. It’s occasionally self-inflated and self-important – as we all were back then – but it’s an earnest and honest picture, and it taps into the specific charm and presence of Mr. Slater in a way few films after “Heathers” did. (Includes theatrical trailer.)
‘Some Kind of Wonderful’: Paramount’s new “John Hughes 5-Film Collection” collects, at a welcome $20 price point, three previously-released films from the prolific ‘80s writer/director/producer (“Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” “Planes, Trains, and Automobiles,” and “Pretty in Pink”) along with two features making their Blu-ray debuts. The first is this 1987 high school drama, written and produced by Hughes and directed by Howard Deutch, who also helmed the previous year’s “Prety in Pink” – for which this seems like a gender-swapped answer record, situating its characters into a similar love triangle but changing the outcome (perhaps in response to the earlier film’s reception). That wrap-up feels like a bit of a cheat, but it’s a better film nevertheless; its characters have more dimension, and the three actors playing them (Eric Stoltz, Mary Stuart Masterson, and Lea Thompson) ground them in a naturalism that the earlier movie lacks. (Includes audio commentary, featurettes, and new Deutch interview.)
‘She’s Having a Baby’: The other new-to-Blu title is this 1988 comedy/drama, part of Hughes’ big play (along with “Planes, Trains” the previous year) to break out of the box of youth-oriented entertainment, this time telling the story of a complicated married couple (Kevin Bacon and Elizabeth McGovern) and their perhaps ill-advised attempts to start a family. It doesn’t quite work – the silly sidebars that get such giggles in high school moves seem desperate, and the perspective is so pointedly skewed to Bacon’s character that McGovern barely comes off as more than a harried cipher. But several scenes find the difficult truths of Hughes’s best work, and indicate he could have successfully stretched into more mature subject matter. Alas, it was a box office disappointment, and two years later the Hughes-penned “Home Alone” made the GDP of a small nation, and thus ended his experiments with movies for grown-ups. (Includes archival interview and trailer.)
‘Smooth Talk’: Laura Dern was still a teen when she starred (and owned) this 1985 coming-of-age drama, new to the Criterion Collection, from director Joyce Chopra (from Tom Cole’s adaptation of a Joyce Carol Oates story). Dern is Connie, a high school girl discovering the pleasures of the opposite sex, and one of the many insights of Chopra’s movie is how recognizably it captures the innocence of being, simply, “boy crazy” – and how that innocence can curdle when it’s noticed by the wrong boy. In this case, that boy is a man, in the form of Treat Williams, and the film’s daring third act amounts to a two-hander of pursuit and retreat that becomes more unnerving the longer it goes. (Includes new conversations, new and archival interviews, three Chopra short films, essay by Honor Moore, and Oates’ original story and piece on the adaptation.)
‘Man Push Cart’: The first two feature films by Iranian-American writer/director Ramin Bahrani join the Criterion Collection, and they’re an ace double feature – close-to-the-ground portraits of life on the margins of New York City, and people grinding it out, day after day, in the dim hope of carving out a little piece of the American Dream for themselves. This 2005 drama concerns Ahmad (Ahmad Razvi), a Pakistani immigrant who operates a pushcart selling food and drink to business people and construction workers, hoping only to one day own his cart himself. The complications that entail are fascinating (and frustrating), but this isn’t a plot-driven picture; its true value is in capturing the way it feels to do this work, to live in the city, and to feel like you’re grasping at something that keeps slipping away. (Includes audio commentary, new conversations, early Bahrani short film, trailer, and essay by Bilge Ebiri.)
‘Chop Shop’: Bahrani’s follow-up adopts a similar neorealist style, and tells a related story – this time of twelve-year-old drop-out Ale (Alejandro Polanco) who works a variety of hustles near the auto shops of Willets Point, Queens, attempting to make enough money to support himself and his sister (Isamar Gonzales), and maybe make their own way. The story strokes are similar, but the emotional beats are new, as Ale’s relationships are complicated and occasionally exploded by his expectations, dreams, and disappointments. As with “Man Push Cart,” “Chop Shop” feels lived in and experienced, filled with the kind of character that rarely warrants the attention of even indie filmmakers. (Includes audio commentary, new conversations, rehearsal footage, trailer, and an essay by Viet Thanh Nguyen.)
‘Lady Sings the Blues’: Many of the conventions of the biographical drama have been with us for a good long while – some of them go all the way back to the early films of the century – but one of the most influential of all biopics was Sidney J. Furie’s Motown-funded 1972 story of legendary jazz songstress Billie Holiday. Though adapted from her autobiography, much of the picture is outright fiction, and many of the rougher edges of Holliday’s horrifying life are sanded down. But Furie gets the feel of that life right, the texture of the juke joints and the irresistible draw of her addictions, and Diana Ross is stunningly effective as Ross. And Richard Pryor, in one of his first important film roles, steals the show in the hybrid role of Piano Man, her occasional accompanist, confidante, and partner in crime. (Includes audio commentary, featurette, and deleted scenes.)
‘The Kid Stays in the Picture’: The storied life of Robert Evans – the would-be matinee idol who became head of Paramount Pictures during the tumultuous New Hollywood era and oversaw the production of “Rosemary’s Baby,” “The Godfather,” and many more – was first told in his autobiography, and the unforgettable audiobook adaptation that became a Hollywood must-hear. Directors Nanette Burstein (“American Teen”) and Brett Morgen (“Cobain: Montage of Heck”) built this documentary around his raspy voice and cynical worldview, while turning such then-unusual techniques as still photo animation into documentary standbys. It remains both an innovative doc and a deliciously entertaining one.
‘Man With a Movie Camera’: This 1929 silent feature from Soviet director Dziga Vertov is both one of the most influential documentaries and most important experimental films of all time, springing from the footsteps of the observational “actualities” of early cinema into an energetic exploration of the sheer joys of filmmaking – how images are captured, but more importantly, how they’re manipulated. It is, in some ways, a catalog of techniques explored and perfected, but it doesn’t feel like a checklist either; you can feel the pleasure Vertov is experiencing by playing in his sandbox, and by sharing the castles he’s built. (Includes audio commentary, interview, and video essay.)
‘Mandabi’: The legendary Senegalese filmmaker Ousmane Sembène’s second feature – new on Blu from the Criterion Collection – is valuable first and foremost as a document of village life in that African country. But there’s much more happening here than mere anthropology, as Sembène tells a twisty tale in which the simple kindness of a money order from a distant relative turns into an entire ordeal for its protagonist, marred by red tape, unexpected expenses, and a parade of friends and relatives hoping to share in his good fortune. Sembène first constructs the tale as a comedy of frustration, but then digs deeper, perceptively casting its outcome as inevitable in an atmosphere in which colonialism breeds corruption. (Includes new introduction and conversation, featurette, Sembène short film, and an essay by Tiana Reid.)
