Now Stream This: ‘Burning’, ‘Suspiria’, ‘Blindspotting’, ‘Extremely Wicked’, ‘War Horse’, ‘Under Siege’ and More

(Welcome to Now Stream This, a column dedicated to the best movies streaming on Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, and every other streaming service out there.)

The weekend is closing in fast, and thank heavens for that. If you’re anything like me (and if you are, I’m sorry), you like to spend your weekends indoors, watching movies. Thankfully, we live in the golden age of content, where thousands of titles are available to stream. And that’s where Now Stream This comes in – I’m here to sift out all the nonsense, and give you some of the best options available. These are the best movies streaming right now. Let’s get streaming!

The Best Movies Streaming Right Now

1. Burning
Now Streaming on Netflix

Release Date: 2018

Genre: Psychological Drama

Director: Lee Chang-dong

Cast: Yoo Ah-in, Steven Yeun, Jeon Jong-seo

Lee Chang-dong‘sBurning is hypnotic, disturbing and near-perfect. Like The Great Gatsby remade as a thriller, Burning follows directionless young man Lee Jong-su (Yoo Ah-in) who strikes up a relationship with childhood friend Shin Hae-mi (Jeon Jong-seo). The romance is short-lived, however, because Hae-mi returns from an extended vacation with a new beau – the handsome, mysterious Ben (Steven Yeun). Ben is everything Jong-su is not: confident, wealthy, charming. But there’s also something clearly off about him. And when Hae-mi disappears, Jong-su become convinced foul play is involved – and Ben is to blame. Burning embraces its title, simmering at first then picking up heat, before bursting into a full-blown fire that can no longer be contained. The three leads are incredibly strong, but it’s Yuen who makes the biggest impression, proving yet again that he should be a much bigger star.

For fans of: The Great Gatsby, First Reformed, sunsets.

 

2. Suspiria
Now Streaming on Amazon Prime Video

Release Date: 2018

Genre: Horror

Director: Luca Guadagnino

Cast: Dakota Johnson, Tilda Swinton, Mia Goth, Chloe Grace Moretz

The very idea of remaking Dario Argento’s Suspiria is sacrilegious to some. And when folks got their first look at footage from Luca Guadagnino‘s take on the material, many were surprised and puzzled. Why would the Call Me By Your Name director remake Suspiria but strip out all the bright color – a staple of the original. The answer is simple: Guadagnino is trying to make his own movie, not remake someone else’s. Yes, this Suspiria uses the same “dance academy run by witches” idea, but the 2018 Suspiria goes in a much different direction, telling a female-driven story where nearly every role – including on male character – is played by a woman. Dakota Johnson is an innocent American girl attending a dance academy in Germany. Little does she know, the academy is run by witches who have targeted her to be the host body for an ancient witch in the coven. Bodies flail, blood flows, and passions rise, culminating in a climax that dips into complete anarchy. This is definitely not Argento’s Suspiria – and that’s okay.

For fans of: Mother!, The Duke of Burgundy, exploding heads.

 

3. Blindspotting
Now Streaming on MaxGO

Release Date: 2018

Genre: Drama

Director: Carlos López Estrada

Cast: Daveed Diggs, Rafael Casal, Janina Gavankar, Jasmine Cephas Jones, Ethan Embry, Tisha Campbell-Martin, Utkarsh Ambudkar, Wayne Knight

Many audiences completely missed Blindspotting last year, and what a damn shame that is. Because this movie is dynamite. A fierce, funny, wholly original drama bursting with energy, life, and humanity, Blindspotting is timely, sharp and powerful. Daveed Diggs plays Collin, a man trying to stay clean during the last three days of his probation. That’s easier said than done, though, because Collin’s life-long friend Miles (Rafael Casal) is a walking timebomb ready to go off, and prone to getting Collin in trouble. In the midst of it all, Collin witnesses a white cop shoot and kill an unarmed black man, and proceeds to find himself spiraling into PTSD following the experience. Diggs and Casal, who also both wrote the film, are electric together, but Diggs’s performance alone is a show-stopper. Through it all, Diggs and Casal will occasionally break into verse in the midst of dialogue. That may sound gimmicky, but it works perfectly, particularly in one raw, charged final scene.

For fans of: Sorry to Bother You, Kicks, watching great movies and then asking, “Why the hell don’t more people know about this?”

 

4. Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile
Now Streaming on Netflix

Release Date: 2019

Genre: Drama

Director: Joe Berlinger

Cast: Zac Efron, Lily Collins, Kaya Scodelario, Jeffrey Donovan, Angela Sarafyan, Dylan Baker, Jim Parsons, John Malkovich, Haley Joel Osment

Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile appears to be giving some people pause, and not just because of its lengthy title. Some viewers seem puzzled as to why the movie is presenting infamous serial killer Ted Bundy as a charming, likable guy even though we all know he wasn’t. But that’s exactly the point director Joe Berlinger is trying to make here: Bundy was a master at manipulating those around him into thinking he was a great guy incapable of the horrible acts he stood accused of. Extremely Wicked is told mostly from the perspective of Bundy’s longtime girlfriend Elizabeth Kendall, aka Elizabeth Kloepfer (Lily Collins). As a result, we only really see Bundy acting out his “normal guy” persona. This isn’t the type of serial killer movie where we see the killer committing his crimes – all but one murder happens off camera, to the point where it almost looks the movie is trying to present Bundy as innocent (don’t worry; it’s not). What makes Extremely Wicked work is Zac Efron‘s chilling, transformative performance. The actor does an uncanny job channelling the serial killer, down to nearly every tic and mannerism. Efron’s performance alone makes this worth checking out.

For fans of: I, Tonya, Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes, oddly placed needle-drops.

 

5. War Horse
Now Streaming on Netflix

Release Date: 2011

Genre: Drama

Director: Steven Spielberg

Cast: Jeremy Irvine, Emily Watson, David Thewlis, Tom Hiddleston, Benedict Cumberbatch, Eddie Marsan, Niels Arestrup, Toby Kebbell, David Kross, Peter Mullan

War Horse is one of Steven Spielberg‘s many underrated 21st century pics, and I demand that stop immediately. Because this is a beautiful, heartfelt saga, with Spielberg in full John Ford mode – albeit with a bit more sentimentality. The story follows a horse (duh) who starts out on a farm in England in the early 1900s, and then passes from one owner to the next throughout Europe, as the events of World War I begin to increase. Through it all, Joey’s original owner (Jeremy Irvine) hopes to get him back. The narrative format makes War Horse almost feel like an anthology film, with Joey bringing the audience from one short story to the next. Spielberg doesn’t anamorphize Joey – the animal behaves and acts like an animal. But that doesn’t make him any less of a fully realized character.

For fans of: Horses, but not war.

 

6. Under Siege
Now Streaming on Hulu

Release Date: 1992

Genre: Action

Director: Andrew Davis

Cast: Steven Seagal, Tommy Lee Jones, Gary Busey, Erika Eleniak, Colm Meaney

Walking disaster Steven Seagal as made many movies – and many of them are entertaining. But the only one I’d consider actually good is Under Siege. The film hails from The Fugitive director Andrew Davis, and stars Seagal as a smart-talking cook on a battleship. Of course, Seagal’s character is no mere cook – he’s actually an ass-kicker. And thank heavens for that, because soon the battleship – which has nuclear weapons on it – is taken over by terrorists, lead by a scene-stealing Tommy Lee Jones. In other words, this is Die Hard on a boat. But Davis does such a great job ratcheting up the tension, and Jones hams it up to the extreme, resulting in a thrilling, entertaining action flick, the likes of which Seagal would never make again.

For fans of: Die Hard, The Fugitive, knife fights.

 

7. Ronin
Now Streaming on Amazon Prime Video

Release Date: 1998

Genre: Action-Drama

Director: John Frankenheimer

Cast:  Robert De Niro, Jean Reno, Natascha McElhone, Stellan Skarsgård, Sean Bean, Jonathan Pryce

This kick-ass spy drama features one of the last times Robert De Niro bothered to show up and turn in a great performance (finger crossed for The Irishman). De Niro plays an American mercenary who joins an international team tasked with stealing a briefcase. That’s a simple enough plot, but director John Frankenheimer packs in a meaty blend of high-stakes drama and show-stopping action scenes, including one of the best car chases ever caught on film. And what’s in the briefcase everyone is after? It doesn’t matter. It’s a classic MacGuffin in place just to get a group of characters together for a thrilling, dangerous adventure.

For fans of: Mission: Impossible, Notorious, Robert De Niro firing a bazooka.

 

8. 12 Monkeys
Now Streaming on Hulu

Release Date: 1995

Genre: Sci-Fi Mystery

Director: Terry Gilliam

Cast: Bruce Willis, Madeleine Stowe, Brad Pitt, Christopher Plummer

What’s the last genuinely great Terry Gilliam movie? The answer is easy: 12 Monkeys. Gilliam has directed since then, but his output following this 1995 sci-fi thriller has been subpar, to say the least. But 12 Monkeys finds him firing on all cylinders, directed a weird, bleak post-apocalyptic time travel saga. Bruce Willis (back when he was awake) plays a convict of the future, living underground after a virus has decimated most of the planet. Scientists send Willis back to Philadelphia in the 1990s to try to find out where the virus came from, with hopes of finding a cure (he can’t go back and stop it from spreading, the scientists stress – there’s no way to change the past). Every time Willis thinks he has the answer, the solution to the problem, something weird happens to throw him off-kilter. It makes for an eerie, engrossing movie that still holds up to this day (even if the world didn’t really end in the 1990s, as the film suggests).

For fans of: Looper, The Fisher King, La Jetée, Philadelphia portrayed as the grimy hell-hole that it really is.

 

9. Cloverfield
Now Streaming on Shudder

Release Date: 2008

Genre: Sci-Fi Found Footage

Director: Matt Reeves

Cast: Lizzy Caplan, Jessica Lucas, T.J. Miller, Michael Stahl-David, Mike Vogel, Odette Yustman

Now that all the hype has died down, the mystery box has been opened, and the secret sequels have come and gone, it’s easy to forget how incredible Cloverfield is. People tend to think of this as nothing more than a found footage monster movie, but there’s something incredibly heartbreaking buried beneath all the mayhem. At the heart of this story about a gigantic monster tearing up New York City is a saga about friends, lovers, and impending doom. There’s a cruelty at play here – the sense that the universe is cold, unfeeling, indifferent. Mortality is inescapable. Your youth, and your passion, aren’t enough to spare you from a terrible fate. The only solace you can find is the knowledge that while you’ll die, you might be lucky enough to die in the arms of someone you care about, and who cares about you in return. And not even that is a certainty.

For fans of: Alien, The Mist, being reminded of your own inescapable demise.

 

10. Romeo is Bleeding
Now Streaming on Amazon Prime Video

Release Date: 1993

Genre: Neo-Noir

Director: Peter Medak

Cast: Gary Oldman, Lena Olin, Annabella Sciorra, Juliette Lewis, Roy Scheider

This mostly forgotten neo-noir ’90s thriller stars Gary Oldman as an incredibly corrupt cop who is tasked with killing a sexy, crazy assassin played by Lena Olin. Oldman is unable to do the deer, and this leads to all sorts of complications, as Olin’s seductive killer proceeds to make his life a living hell, bumping off lots and lots of people. Borderline sleazy and full of twists and turns, Romeo is Bleeding is prime for rediscovery.

For fans of: True Romance, State of Grace, excessive narration.

The post Now Stream This: ‘Burning’, ‘Suspiria’, ‘Blindspotting’, ‘Extremely Wicked’, ‘War Horse’, ‘Under Siege’ and More appeared first on /Film.

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