Welcome to a Saturday edition of What’s New This Week. It’s a new month which means you have a lot of watching options. There are enough great titles now available to carry you through the weekend and beyond.
First things first: Goodfellas has been added. It doesn’t get much better than that. Some other titles to look for are Kill Bill Volumes 1 and 2, quite a few American Pie movies, The Hurt Locker, the Ocean’s Trilogy, Rust and Bone, The Armstrong Lie, Before the Flood, Coach Snoop, Jerry Seinfeld: I’m Telling You for the Last Time, Extract, Meet the Parents, and Paint it Black.
You’re going to have a great month of streaming! Below let’s check out some highlights you should definitely check out this weekend.
Altered Carbon Netflix Original
This new science fiction original is set in a future where people’s consciousness is digitized and stored. Their consciousnesses are contained in “stacks,” storage devices attached to the back of a person’s neck. Physical bodies themselves are “sleeves,” mere disposable vessels. Takeshi Kovacs (Joel Kinnaman), a violent mercenary, wakes up 250 years after his sleeve is killed, and he is given the choice to either spend the rest of his life in prison for his crimes or help solve the murder of the wealthiest man in the world. Are you still with me? With a big Bladerunner feel, this series has taken a few hits for its violent content but its conceptual cool should not be overlooked. Its production is stunning. Hang in there through the exposition. You’ll be rewarded.
Retribution: Miniseries Netflix Original
Don’t make the mistake of overlooking this new, moody series that quietly made its way to Netflix this week. Brought to us by way of BBC One (Gosh, I love those guys!), it’s the story of two neighboring families brought together by marriage and murder. When the man accused of murdering their family members ends up on their doorstep, murder, lies, and deception seep into their lives from every corner and from the most unexpected places. If you love a slow burn mystery like The Fall or Broadchurch, this is for you.
Babylon Berlin: Season 1 Netflix Original
Don’t be that person that misses out on incredible movies and series because you won’t watch subtitles. This addictive new crime series from Netflix is set in pre-Nazi Germany and follows a police detective in the capital of the Weimar Republic (the decadent city of Berlin) before the rise of Nazism. In the 20s, there was a raging nightlife, flourishing cabaret scene, and brutal criminal underbelly.
“It was really the capital of the world. And nobody really knows about it because, of course, the monstrosity of the Nazi period afterwards is so huge.” -Cocreator Achim von Borries
Already garnering acclaim, this is one series you want to add to the binge list. And if you really hate subtitles that much you can always turn on the English captioning…but it’s so much better to watch the original.
45 Years
Charlotte Rampling is phenomenal in this film about a couple about to celebrate their forty-fifth wedding anniversary. The planning for the party is going well until a letter arrives for her husband—the body of his first love has been discovered, frozen and preserved in the icy glaciers of the Swiss Alps. It’s beautifully acted and almost brutal in its look at what it takes to survive marriage.
On Body and Soul Netflix Original
One of this year’s five foreign-language Oscar finalists, this film is the story of two strangers who share a dream in which they appear in the same snowy forest, he as a stag, she a doe. It turns out their human counterparts work together, and once they discover their shared subconscious, they struggle to figure out if they can spend their waking moments together, too. It’s a mind-bending look at romance and the power of dreams.
There are so many great things to stream this weekend! What are you going to watch first? Let us know in the comments!
