The Downstream: November 2022
10 great movies to watch before they leave streaming this month.
Need a break from Thanksgiving prep? Already worn out by December holidays and EOY? Here are ten movies leaving their streaming services this month that will make you say…
All About My Mother, Hulu
All that great Pedro Almodóvar cinema I’ve been hyping on Hulu is leaving at the end of November! If you’ve only got time to watch one, make it what is probably his magnum opus, All About My Mother. This modern melodrama riffs on seminal classics like All About Eve and A Streetcar Named Desire, amplifying both their irony and their sincerity until it’s something else wild and wonderful entirely.
The Darjeeling Limited, Hulu
Mostly reminding you to (re)watch this movie so you can enjoy the chat I had with Wes Anderson expert Sophie Monks Kaufman about what is ultimately my favorite of the director’s movies. At the very least, I’d argue it’s the most misunderstood and overlooked of his works:
Drinking Buddies, Hulu
If you’ve been sipping the Miss Flo spritz and feel your goodwill toward Olivia Wilde, take a chug from Drinking Buddies. This lo-fi rom-com about partners realigning, both in business and romance, is a delightfully simple and human affair. Filmmaker Joe Swanberg gets something raw and real from a cast that includes heavyweights like Wilde, Anna Kendrick, and Jake Johnson. It may feel slight, but take a second to marvel at the miraculous veracity of each moment. That’s not effortless.
Fatal Attraction, HBO Max
At a time when we’re celebrating family, why not throw an erotic thriller into the viewing queue? Don’t just write off films like Fatal Attraction as shlocky entertainment — it’s a Rorschach blot for society’s sexual values. Here, we can see the Reagan-era importance of protecting the family and the need for Michael Douglas’s Dan Gallagher to re-center himself around this paramount need in the face of relentless and aggressive pursuit by Glenn Close’s thirsty Alex Forrest. (If you don’t know about how test audiences changed the character’s fate, it’s really worth listening to Glenn Close talk to Marc Maron about what she took away from the experience.)
Hustlers, Hulu
It’s Scorsese in stilettos! I still owe Hustlers another watch because, admittedly, I kind of blacked out the second half of it after receiving a tough phone call midway through. But any movie that uses Sean Kingston’s “Beautiful Girls” as a sound cue to indicate that 2007 was some kind of Edenic paradise deserves our attention and a salute.
Jackie Brown, HBO Max
There are certain Tarantino fans who will have you believe that, actually, Jackie Brown is his best film. I don’t know if I’m quite ready to go that far … or even move it into my top tier. That said, I saw this in a theater a few years ago and found it both wackier, wittier, and warmer than I recalled. It might be worth another watch, if for nothing else to appreciate the odd yet endearing chemistry between Pam Grier and the later Robert Forster.
My Own Private Idaho, Criterion Channel
If you read my review of Bones and All out of Venice, perhaps you recall that I compared what Timothée Chalamet is doing in the film to what the late River Phoenix does in My Own Private Idaho. To get a better sense of why that might be, why not watch this road trip drama about two broken souls trying to be vulnerable with each other?
Promising Young Woman, HBO Max
By the time the endless discourse around the 2020 Best Picture nominees came to a close, no movie was more wounded than Promising Young Woman. I won’t say the film is perfect or anything. Emerald Fennell’s candy-coated visuals do give you a bit of a sugar high that can’t quite sustain when it gets into the meatier unpacking of its themes. But I think the way people took its ending at face value, particularly including how it deploys the police, was incredibly reductive (and probably reflective of people projecting their anxieties of the year’s events onto the film). Give it another watch and see if you think it’s meant to be as neat and tidy as people think it is.
Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Amazon Prime Video
I cna’t explain why, but every once in a while, I just get this powerful urge to rewatch Vicky Cristina Barcelona. I find the film strangely intoxicating as it follows two Americans visiting Spain only to get caught up in romantic entanglements beyond their wildest imaginations … and leave largely unchanged by it. Perhaps it’s a great reflection of movie-watching itself. Either way, fun movie! Rebecca Hall MVP.
Wedding Crashers, Netflix
The last time you saw Wedding Crashers was probably chopped to bits on TBS. Revisit the film in all its raunchy, uncut glory on Netflix. This crude, crass but ultimately quite caring comedy still packs the laughs all these years later. It’s a surprisingly dense two hours that keep you engaged throughout.
You can always keep up with my film-watching in real-time on the app Letterboxd. I’ve also compiled every movie I’ve ever recommended through this newsletter via a list on the platform as well.
More on EO later, but the score is among the newest additions to my “movie scores to write to” playlist.
Choo choo, get on board the Glen Powell train! Loved this GQ profile of the preferable young gun in Top Gun Maverick (and I am excited to catch up with his Devotion sooner rather than later).
Also, as a subscriber of Anne Helen Petersen’s fantastic Substack newsletter Culture Study, I have a few one-month gift subscriptions I can give away! If any readers of mine enjoy posts like the below, let me know and I can get you signed up for this:
For The Playlist, I reviewed the so-so Strange World.
Another ranking for /Film, this time of the 12 best Timothée Chalamet performances. (For anyone who pearl-clutches at Lady Bird’s placement, may I remind you this is sizing up his contributions more than the movies themselves.)
For Slant, a talk from NYFF with Bones and All director Luca Guadagnino and star Taylor Russell hit the interwebs — it was the second time during the festival that an interview subject complimented my notes.
I also talked to legendary Polish director Jerzy Skolimowski and his filmmaking partner Ewa Piaskowska about their extraordinary film EO. Don’t be an ass (because it’s a movie about a donkey) and check this fantastic gem of a movie out when you get a chance!
For Decider, I said STREAM IT to Dual on Hulu, A Christmas Story Christmas on HBO Max, and The Wonder on Netflix but SKIP IT to Don’t Leave on Netflix.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Yours in service and cinema,
Marshall