The Downstream: September 2024
10 great movies to watch before they leave streaming this month.
Whether you’re about to dance your way through the 21st night of September tomorrow…
…or are waiting for it to just be over…
…there’s one thing that unites us all. We only have 10 days left to watch these titles before they leave their current streaming homes.
Bad Lieutenant, Criterion Channel
Some of the best movies about religion fall well outside the church cul-de-sac. Those who want a serious interrogation of what the principles of faith, such as forgiveness, mean out in an unforgiving world need not be scared of the NC-17 rating that Abel Ferrara’s Bad Lieutenant bears. Harvey Keitel’s crooked cop finds himself on an unexpected path in search of redemption after investigating the rape of a young nun. It’s a grimy and gritty journey that is not for the faint of heart, yet it makes his cleansing all the more powerful.
Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, Amazon Prime Video
If you think movies haven’t caught up to a polyamorous world (or at least one that’s slightly curious about it), think again. 1969’s Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice is a dispatch from the frontlines of the sexual revolution as two married couples flirt with the idea of a wife swap. Filmmaker Paul Mazursky’s genius gambit is not to fixate on the doing of the deed but on the discussion of getting there. This isn’t some kind of smut film or Silent Generation fantasy. The awkwardness of getting there is the point, and those conversations illuminate the gap between what people profess about sensual liberation and how far they’re willing to apply those principles in their own lives.
Dirty Grandpa, Amazon Prime Video
Look, is this a particularly “good” movie? Not necessarily. (I’ll never forget that they gave out branded condoms at the promotional screening in Houston.) But I’ll be darned if Dirty Grandpa isn’t a movie I think about way more than plenty of “good” movies because it’s so content to entertain. There’s plenty of fun stuff in the dynamic between Robert De Niro’s horny widower and Zac Efron as his put-out grandson. But the real highlight is — of course — Aubrey Plaza as a woman inexplicably on a mission to bang De Niro. As far as dumb movies go, this is on the better end.
(500) Days of Summer, Hulu
A part of me wonders if screenwriters Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber knew what they got themselves into when they included a reference to the protagonist of (500) Days of Summer misreading the ending of The Graduate. Did they know that their movie, too, would inspire legions of misreadings on the real nature of star-crossed lovers? I thought I’d find this deeply late ‘00s Sundance hit deeply cringe-worthy when I rewatched it — which, by the way, was as much anticipating how I might feel about my simplistic first reading at 16 and less about anything in the film itself. Due in large part to the full range of emotional intelligence on display from stars Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, it holds up pretty well! If nothing else, (500) Days of Summer makes for a fantastic conversation-starter about love and relationships.
The Last Five Years, Amazon Prime Video
With all due respect to Jeremy Jordan — a phrase that should specifically trigger one reader (who I guess I will learn if they read these or not) — The Last Five Years might be a literal two-hander, but it’s just the Anna Kendrick show. I’m frustrated that we as a society have not found more ways to let her just own being the musical theater nerd that she is. This filmic version of Jason Robert Brown’s show begins by catching her character Cathy in a melodramatic moment of self-pity before moving backward chronologically through her rocky relationship with Jordan’s Jamie, whose songs contrastingly move forward in time. She’s moving toward his beginning, in other words, and we see her bitterness decalcifying into romantic idealism with devastating effect. It’s a literalization of that great truth sung by Joni Mitchell: “I've looked at life from both sides now / From win and lose and still somehow, It's life's illusions I recall / I really don't know life at all.”
The Lovers, Criterion Channel
Consider Azazel Jacobs’ The Lovers something like an A24-ification of Nancy Meyers’ It’s Complicated. Husband and wife Michael (Tracy Letts) and Mary (Debra Winger) are each seeing other people, but even those affairs have started to get as stale as their marriage. Unexpectedly, the two rekindle their flame amid escalating pressures from their romantic partners to disband their official union. Jacobs amplifies the wild irony of their unexpected “comedy of remarriage” with a wildly melodramatic score by Mandy Hoffman, which contrasts with the pitch-perfect minimalism practiced by the characters. Maybe the film itself is something like an affair in the aggregate: it feels so wrong, and yet oh so right. (Fact-check needed.)
The Man in the Moon, Amazon Prime Video
If your idea of “young Reese Witherspoon” stops at Election or Cruel Intentions, it’s time to dig even further back to her delightful screen debut in 1991’s The Man in the Moon. As Dani, a fiery 14-year-old experiencing a romantic awakening in 1950s rural Louisiana, Witherspoon gets some meaty material to chew on straight out of the gate. She spits sharp-tongued sass and wears her passionate emotions on her sleeve, foreshadowing three decades’ worth of memorable characters all somehow fashioned in the style of a Southern belle. As Dani pursues her first love, an older farmhand neighbor Court (Jason London), something always rings beautifully true. The film — the final directorial effort by To Kill a Mockingbird’s Robert Mulligan — understands both the joy of discovering grand feelings inside oneself … even if it’s a bit heavy-handed in conveying those from time to time.
Pain & Glory, Peacock
Tilda Swinton has commented that she sees writer-director Pedro Almodóvar’s recently premiered The Room Next Door (in which she stars) as the “natural successor” to his 2019 autofictional work Pain & Glory. The comparison is fair given that both films from the greatest living Spanish director take the nearness of death as their subject. Discussions of age do feel weightier and more pronounced now, too, as the septuagenarian filmmaker reflects more acutely on mortality. But Pain & Glory is perhaps the easier and more pleasant sit because it has a self-reflexive quality thanks to Antonio Banderas, an Almodóvar stalwart, playing a thinly veiled version of the director. It’s looking at death and old age not solely on their terms. Instead, it’s a glorious and eclectic look at the full spectrum of life — and a lesson on how to appreciate each stage.
Rosemary’s Baby, Amazon Prime Video
Rosemary Woodhouse (Mia Farrow) is just an ordinary woman with a workaholic husband and two neighbors (including Ruth Gordon, in an Academy Award-winning turn) who redefine “overbearing” … even adjusted for New York City standards. She gets pregnant just like she wants, but there’s a sense of foreboding doom that accompanies her pregnancy. Director Roman Polanski makes sure viewers never quite sure of what it is, and we don’t have to know for it to be chilling. It could be the apartment, where most of the movie takes place. It could just be nerves. It could be something truly sinister. But whatever is going on, it drives Rosemary over the edge … and refuses to stay confined to just one side of the screen. There’s a reason Rosemary’s Baby has been the gold standard for claustrophobic horror for over half a century now.
Uncle Buck, Netflix
For many years, I only knew of Uncle Buck as a reference from when my parents made pancakes (this was quite often) because John Candy’s titular avuncular character makes a ginormous hotcake. It’s a memorable sight, to be sure, but the rest of the movie is no slouch either! I don’t think this gets nearly enough love among John Hughes’ movies, probably because it doesn’t center its young characters. It’s got that right mixture of humor and heart that defines his Midwestern-tinged ‘80s classics.
A Different Man got my first 3.5-star review ever for Slant Magazine back at Sundance, and now it’s out in limited theaters. See it as soon as you can. And when you have, check out my interview with stars Sebastian Stan and Adam Pearson.
Also, one of my least favorite Sundance titles just premiered in theaters on VOD. Avoid Winner, a Wikipedia biopic of leaker Reality Winner, if you value your time. Here’s my review for The Playlist if you need any more convincing.
You’re probably more likely to come upon it when it hits Apple TV+ next weekend, but here’s what I thought out of the George Clooney-Brad Pitt buddy hitman movie Wolfs out of Venice.
You can keep track of all the freelance writing I’ve done this year through this list on Letterboxd.
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.
If you aren’t tired of me talking about Venice, check out my appearance on
this week! Thanks again to my friend for having me on to yammer about three titles I suspect we’ll be hearing about for the next few months: Babygirl, The Brutalist, and The Room Next Door.I enjoyed listening to this meta-interview of one of our great interviewers, Sam Fragoso, by Abbi Jacobson on Talk Easy.
Some of my favorite coverage I read out of the Toronto International Film Festival, which concluded last week, came from Joe Reid for Vulture. His analyses of what’s going on with Amy Adams and Barry Keoghan are both excellent.
This Letterboxd feature on the history of the audio commentary track is a great read as well.
Something different for subscribers this weekend: a conversation about TV!
Yours in service and cinema,
Marshall