There are a fair number of good new movies and series added on Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Prime, so lets get right to it!
Hulu
There are some really good new options available on Hulu this week, including Mad to Be Normal, the 2017 bio-pic about British psychiatrist R.D. Laing. This movie has a great cast, with David Tennant, Elizabeth Moss, Gabriel Byrne and Michael Gambon. Laing was apparently a hero in Britain for challenging tranquilizers and ECT(electro-convulsive therapy) for group therapy and more holistic methods of healing a disease. The Guardian calls it one of David “Tennant’s best performances” and gives it 4/5 stars. Another big addition to Hulu this week is The Wedding Plan, the 2016 Israeli film written and directed by Rama Burshstein. It’s about an orthodox Jewish woman in her 30’s who wants to be married, after several unsuccessful tries,so she rents a wedding hall and prepare for the wedding, without exactly having a specific mate yet. This is an edgy film about being Orthodox and a woman, in the Twenty-First century.. Burshstein won Best Actress award in the category Israeli Feature Films at the Haifa International Film Festival 2016 for this role and it gets an 86% on Rotten Tomatoes. And it’s great to recommend a good movie made by a woman, too. Also, on Hulu has Lost in London, a 2017 movie written and directed by Woody Harrelson. It’s a comedy, also starring Owen Wilson, Eleanor Matsuura and Willie Nelson, about Harrelson trying to get home after a night out in London. Everyone plays themselves, it’s kind of screwy, but it gets a 75% on Rotten Tomatoes and a 7.8/10 on IMDb. Oh, and Beatriz At Dinner is finally ON Hulu. I recommended it last weekend, and it is indeed available this week, so tune in. And, finally, get ready, because on May 31, Thursday, I, Tonya, will be steaming on Hulu.
Netflix
Netflix, too, has some good new stuff this week, the most interesting for me being Steve Martin & Martin Short An Evening You Will Forget For the Rest of Your Life. It’s classic stand up from the two comedians and music and characters they’re famous for. If you love either comic or both or music, tune in and it gets a 7.1/10 on IMDb, if you need any convincing. Also new to Netflix is Ibiza, a Netflix Original movie starring Gillian Jacobs, Vanessa Bayer and Phoebe Robinson. It’s about a business trip gone haywire, for three friends from New York. I haven’t watched this yet, but I’m including since the trailer looks good and it’s a girl trip movie, but beware, it only gets a 5.1/10 on IMDb. Netflix also offers The Joy of Techs, a British TV show from 2017. It features Marcus Brigstocke(technophobe) and Alexis Conran(technophile) as they investigate the latest gadgets. It’s a reality show, I know, but it’s witty, funny and it also gets an 8.3/10 on IMDb.And, finally, Netflix has added Season 2 of Fauda, the Israeli series about 2 men, one Israeli, the other Palestinian. It stars Lior Raz, Hisham Sulliman and Gali Kavillio. Fauda is a political thriller, it’s violent and rated TV MA, but it has won Academy Awards in Israel and the New York Times chose it as the Best International TV Show last year. And it gets an 8.4/10 on IMDb.
Amazon Prime
Amazon has added their new series this week, Picnic at Hanging Rock, starring Natalie Dormer. It is an Australian production and reportedly delves deeper into the mystery, adding tinges of horror. It also stars Lily Sullivan and Lola Bessis and consists of six episodes. It gets a 6.3/10 on IMDb and has gotten strong ratings in Australia thus far. Amazon has also added The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher: Beyond The Pale, a BBC movie staring Paddy Considine. It’s a production from 2014, and also stars John Hefferman and Laura Morgan. It’s a mystery about an enquiry agent(Considine) who investigates charges against the son of a politico he previously worked for. It gets a 7.1/10 on IMDb, ad if you like it, there are 3 more available on Amazon Prime. Amazon has also added LBJ, the 2017 biopic, starring Woody Harrelson. It covers Johnson’ life after the Kennedy assassination, and also stars Jennifer Jason Leigh and Bill Pullman. It received some criticism about Harrelson‘s ample makeup, but it was directed by Rob Reiner and gets a 6.3 on IMDb. You be the judge. And, finally, Amazon added a new colorized version of Things To Come, the 1936 classic sci-fi movie starring Raymond Massey. I haven’t seen it yet, and I’m not always crazy about the colorization movement, but this is a wonderful movie, based on an H.G. Wells classic tale of a futuristic England and a man(Massey) fighting to end all war. It also stars Ralph Richardson, Margaretta Scott and Pearl Argyle. And it gets a 6.7/10 on IMDb.
So binge while camping with your wifi or veg out in front of the TV, but enjoy your holiday weekend and stream some great movies online!
Grownups Guide to Streaming 