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.
Arco (Ugo Bienvenu)
With his debut feature, Arco, Ugo Bienvenu puts a unique, thought-provoking twist on the solarpunk genre. He gives us a glimpse of the sort of sustainable utopia that one would expect from the genre: clean air, luscious gardens, thriving wildlife, and cities in the clouds (think Jack and Victoria’s pad in Oblivion, with a lot more greenery). But instead of contrasting this paradise with our contemporary society, Bienvenu shifts his reference point by 50 years, to a world desperately struggling to adapt to ferocious wildfires and biblical storms, and lamenting its failure to act when it mattered most. It is a slight but poignant change in perspective, which gives the playful adventure at the heart of the film a sobering air of contingency. – Oliver W. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Dead Man’s Wire (Gus Van Sant)
Gus Van Sant returns with Dead Man’s Wire, a movie shot in the same late-70s hues as Kelly Reichardt’s recent gem The Mastermind, and likewise concerned with unlawful men and the paradox of a decent criminal. Van Sant’s movie, however, is far more willing to deliver on genre tropes than Reichardt’s marvelous subversion. Bill Skarsgård eats great swathes of scenery as the very real Tony Kiritsis, a man who kidnapped his mortgage broker in 1977 after failing to make payment on a potentially lucrative plot of land. Van Sant imagines this tale in a way that echoes Dog Day Afternoon: an unhinged and stranger-than-fiction fable about good intentions gone wrong. It’s kind of a hoot. – Rory O. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Father Mother Sister Brother (Jim Jarmusch)
At first glance, Jim Jarmusch’s Father Mother Sister Brother seems a film where nothing happens—a criticism thrown at his work for decades. Three different stories, each set over a single day during a family reunion under less-than-ideal circumstances, none providing any real sense of resolution to the conflicts barely masked by each family’s pleasantries. But Jarmusch finds something extraordinary in the seemingly banal: his sharp writing and strong ensemble imply multitudes of resentments, open wounds, and scars between parents, children, siblings. Jarmusch lets us use our own familial experiences to read between the lines of these tense relations before his moving, cathartic close reminds us that bonds can strengthen and heal as much as they stretch and strain. — C.J. P.
The Voice of Hind Rajab (Kaouther Ben Hania)
In January 2024, the Palestine Red Crescent Society received an emergency call from Hind Rajab, a five-year-old girl traveling in a car with her aunt, uncle, and cousins in Gaza City. The Israeli army fired upon their vehicle and killed everyone but Rajab, who managed to call for help while pinned between the corpses of her relatives. After spending hours on the phone, the Red Crescent was able to coordinate an ambulance to rescue her, which was then destroyed once it arrived. Rajab and the two ambulance workers sent to save her were found dead 12 days later, after Israeli forces withdrew from the area. – C.J. P. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Young Mothers (Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne)
The new film from Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne is much like the others. The actors are mostly non-professional; the locations are real; the themes are sociological; the mood is often tense. The subject of their latest is unplanned pregnancies and the options made available for young French women who feel that their situation, whether exterior or interior, might not be suited for raising a child. – Rory O. (full review)
Where to Stream: VOD
Also New to Streaming
Hulu
In the Blink of an Eye
Kiss of the Spider Woman
Kino Film Collection
The Image Book
Unrelated
Prime Video
Man on the Run
The Summer Book
VOD
Atropia
H Is For Hawk