Bros, Netflix’s School for Good and Evil, and every new movie to watch

The YA Fantasy Film of the Week The School for Good and EvilPremieres available on Netflix If mythical creatures, wizards, and magic aren’t your cup of tea, not to worry — there’s plenty of other films available on streaming and VOD this week to choose from.

This is the new rom-com BrosYou can stream the movie starring Billy Eichner on Netflix. Descendant, The Australian crime thriller The StrangerStarring Joel Edgerton and Sean Harris, the Korean romance drama 20th Century Girl. Horror film about motherhood MatriarchHulu streams the documentary. Mama’s BoyIt is now available on HBO Max and in the latest episode of the found-footage horror series, V/H/S. V/H/S/99Shudder streaming the movie “The Killing” this weekend There’s tons more to stream, rent, and watch, so why not take a look at everything this weekend has to offer?

Bros

What to Watch:Amazon, Apple, Vudu and Vudu are all available for rent at $19.99

Photo: Nicole Rivelli/Universal Pictures

Billy Eichner is the executive producer and star of this comedy. His character, Bobby, plays a man struggling with commitments who seeks out a love with Aaron Shepard (“Luke Macfarlane), who himself has his share of issues about being in relationships). This is one of the most important gay romance comedies ever released by major studios and has an openly LGBTQ cast.

This is our review

Eichner’s best when his ravings are instigated by more organic means. That can mean pushing his way through a crowd of clubgoers (“THEY WON’T STOP VOGUEING!”) or finding himself incapable of not having the last word when Aaron’s mother, an elementary school teacher, says second graders are too young to learn about queer history. He’s also, as it turns out, a fairly tender romantic lead with a lovely singing voice, delivering an eleventh-hour musical performance that feels like an instant rom-com classic, even if its meaning (some sort of convoluted subversion of Lin-Manuel’s “Love is love is love is love” speech, about how “love is not actually love”) remains murky at best.

The School for Good and Evil

What to Watch:Netflix streaming available

Image: Helen Sloan/Netflix

The School for Good and Evil the 2022 fantasy film based on Soman Chainani’s 2013 novel of the same name, reads like the premise of the Harry Potter series fed through a juice processor. Just replace “Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry” with “The School for Good and Evil,” switch out Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy with two childhood friends named Sophie and Agatha, and substitute in professor Clarissa Dovey (Kerry Washington) and Lady Leonora Lesso (Charlize Theron) for Minerva McGonagall and Severus Snape and voilà — the same great YA fantasy taste with no problematic pulp!

Our review:

The School for Good and EvilIt is a fairytale for anyone who loves fairy tales and wants to see them dissected, weighed, and balanced. It’s a fairy tale where the witchy outcast girl can be a hero, and the girl who wants to be a princess falls in love with her inner dark side. It’s a fairy tale for those who know that one of the most powerful and most underrated forms of true love is the friendship between two teenage girls. Everyone who wrote inexplicable stories about princesses, witches, and read fairy-tale retellings over the middle school years will find every moment a delight.

Bullet Train

What to Watch:Amazon, Apple, Vudu and Vudu are all available for rent at $5.99

Photo: Scott Garfield/Sony Pictures

Brad Pitt stars in this action thriller as a repentant hitman codenamed “Ladybug” trying to complete an assignment aboard a high-speed train to Kyoto while surrounded by a bunch of goofy, eccentric assassins looking to kill him.

Our review:

It’s funny, but it works. Bullet Train is committed to letting its core cast make as big an impression as they can through quirks and fights, as Olkewicz’s knotty script ping-pongs between past and present. The film is presented as a mystery — there’s a John Wick-style legend of a Russian gangster who rose through the ranks of the Japanese underworld, and it ties into several characters’ backstories. The story really is a series of Rube-Goldberg machines that each activates in turn and then stops to tip another inanimate object. Inevitably, it’ll bite someone in the ass — usually Ladybug.

Bodies Bodies Bodies

What to Watch:You can rent for just $4.99 from Amazon, Apple, or Vudu

Gwen Capistran/A24 Photo

A young woman named Bee (Maria Bakalova) and her girlfriend, Sophie (Amandla Stenberg), are invited out to a hurricane party at a secluded mansion by Sophie’s friends: a spoiled group of rich 20-somethings with a penchant for drama. After playing the murder-mystery-find-the-killer party game, they quickly discover that there’s a real killer among them.

Our review:

Bodies Bodies BodiesPlays like a compressed version The Scream, sped up as if the filmmakers believe they’re playing to a generation that can’t keep both eyes on a full-length feature film. Filmmakers make the difficult choice of increasing both bloodshed and absurdity simultaneously. Instead of allowing satire to give way horror-movie tension they increase the volume and absurdity of the defensiveness and recriminations as characters are more threatened. At one point, mortal peril is interrupted by the equally shocking betrayal that one friend may be hate-listening to another’s podcast.

The Stranger

What to Watch:Netflix streaming available

Image by Netflix

Sean HarrisMission: Impossible FalloutThe 2022 Australian thriller features Jeremy Edgerton as Henry Teague. Henry Teague (played by Josh Edgerton) is an affable man who has made bad choices and suffered from physical pain. Unbeknownst to Mark, Henry is in fact a key suspect in one of the largest organized manhunts in Australia’s history.

Descendant

What to Watch:Netflix streaming available

Image by Netflix

Documentary filmmaker Margaret Brown’s 2022 film follows the director’s search for the remnants of the last known slave ship to arrive in the United States in her hometown of Mobile, Alabama. Brown interview the descendants of slave Africans onboard the ship to find justice and healing.

20th Century Girl

What to Watch:Netflix streaming available

Image: Seo Ji Hyung/Netflix

Korean drama romance, Na Bo-ra (Kim Yoo–jung) is the story about a young Korean woman named Na Bo-ra who remembers her first love in 1999 as a teenager after she received a mysterious tape.

Matriarch

What to Watch:Hulu streamable

Image: Hulu

Laura (Jemima Ruder) is able to overcome an overdose and return to her house to heal. She also wants to reconnect with Kate Dickie, her mother. Upon arriving, she soon realizes that something terrible and inhuman has change the denizens of the village, and at the epicenter is none other than own mother — or rather, perhaps, something impersonating her.

Mama’s Boy

What to Watch:You can stream HBO Max on your computer.

Travers Jacobs/HBO. Photo

This documentary follows the story of Dustin Lance Black, the Academy Award-winning screenwriter behind 2008’s MilkAs he tells of his Mormon upbringing and how he came out as gay. He also shares his story about his love for Anne and his struggle to heal, love and reconcile with Anne.

The fastest woman on earth

What to Watch:You can stream HBO Max on your computer.

Image Credit: Max

This documentary was filmed over seven years and follows Jessi, a professional racing driver who also happens to be a TV personality. She pilots a customized car with an old fighter jet engine in order to break the world record for fastest female racer.

Rosa Parks: The Rebellious Lives of Rosa Parks

What to Watch:Peacock is available to stream

Don Cravens via Getty Images

Based on Jeanne Theoharis’ 2015 biography, this documentary co-directed by Yoruba Richen (Guide to Freedom: The Green BookJohanna Hamilton (1971) tells the story of civil rights icon Rosa Parks’ life up to and after her historic role in the Montgomery bus boycott. Interviews with people who know her, as well as archival footage. Rosa Parks: The Rebellious Lives of Rosa Parks is a testament not only to the film’s namesake, but to an era of history-making civil disobedience.

Raymond & Ray

What to Watch:Apple TV Plus is available for streaming

Image: Apple Studios

Ethan HawkeThe Good Lord BirdEwan McGregor (TrainspottingComedy-drama about two brothers who come together after their father’s death.

V/H/S/99

What to Watch:Shudder streaming available

Image by Shudder

The fifth installment in Bloody Disgusting’s ongoing series of found-footage horror anthology, V/H/S/99Features many returning and new directors such as Johannes RobertsWelcome to Raccoon city! Resident Evil), Tyler MacIntyre Tragedy GirlsFlying LotusKuso(and more) as they examine five horrific stories that take place around the turning of the millennium.

Beyond the Neon

What to Watch:Rentable for as low as $3.99 at Amazon, Apple and Vudu

Image: Gravitas Ventures

The found footage crime drama, based on a true story follows Joey (Joseph Saladino), and his team of filmmakers as they attempt to expose the Las Vegas sex trafficking rings. Joey is determined to find her sister and reunite the Las Vegas escort.

The book keepers

What to Watch:Amazon offers a $2.99 rental; Apple sells it for $9.99

Image: First Run Features

This documentary follows the story of Dick Wall, a man determined to honor his late wife’s life by speaking on her behalf for her debut memoir book tour. His son is his director. The book keepersIt is a moving documentary that shows the resilience and strength of loved ones in the aftermath of tragedy.