Netflix’s Army of Thieves, Paranormal Activity 7, and 9 new movies to watch

This weekend, Edgar Wright’s latest Giallo-inspied psychological thriller Last Night at SohoIn time for Halloween, the movie premieres at theaters. But if you’re not feeling up to head out to the movies this weekend though, don’t worry; there’s tons of new movies to rent and stream this weekend.

The top of the stack Army of Thieves, the international heist action prequel to Zach Synder’s zombie heist action film Army of the DeadParanormal Activity has a new Paranormal Activity entry, the paranormal fantasy drama for families LambNoomi Rapace stars in the film, as well as a Frank Frazetta-inspired animated rotoscope.

To help you get a handle on what’s new and available, here are the movies you can watch with the click of a button this weekend.

Army of Thieves

What to Watch:Netflix streaming available

Photo: Stanislav Honzik/ Netflix

Ludwig Dieter, the safe-cracking savant first introduced in Zach Snyder’s 2021 zombie heist film Army of the DeadReturns in this decidedly not-zombie-related movie about heists Army of ThievesThis is the. Six years ago, this was before the events that took place in Army of the DeadIn the beginning of Dieter’s safecracking career, the film finds Dieter. Recruited by a mysterious woman named Gwendoline (Nathalie Emmaneul) to take part in a high-stakes heist involving the cracking of three notoriously impenetrable safes across Europe, Dieter will have to rise to the occasion if he has any hope of becoming a legend among thieves — let alone making it out of the job alive. Directed by and starring Matthias Schweighöfer, Army of Thieves looks like an appropriately explosive and entertaining enough follow-up to Snyder’s original film, but is there more beneath the surface? Based on our review

Franchise-building’s narrow goals are a waste of time. Army of ThievesIt’s all down to the rind. The origin of Sebastian’s eventual Ludwig Dieter pseudonym is tied to a comic book, with cringeworthy abandon. Sebastian has nightmares of zombies attacking him and setting the scene for the storybeat. Army of the DeadFor protection, he puts himself inside a safe. And the film’s prologue connects directly to Snyder’s flick, through a flash-forward sequence. The only variation Schweighöfer takes is in the look and the feel of his movie: It isn’t nearly as bleak. Brightly lit and with far less gunplay, it also isn’t as gruesome — or as entertaining, for that matter. It drowns in quirky humor.

Paranormal Activity

What to Watch: Paramount Plus is available to stream

Image by Paramount Players

The Paranormal Activity franchise is back — likely thanks to the pandemic dent in the entertainment industry — straight to streaming. Directed by a William Eubanks who’s made some lower-budget, visually stunning genre movies like Underwater and The Signal, Next of Kin Follow a documentary filmmaker who descends into the Amish community. Paranormal Activity is a paranormal activity. But things are not as they seem in the God-fearing community. You can expect a few fewer flashing lights because there isn’t electricity. However, the formula has many 2021-friendly variations.

The Spine of Night

What to Watch:Amazon Prime Video, Apple and Vudu are available to rent at $6.99

Image: RLJE Films

If you’re desperately yearning for an animated dark fantasy horror epic in the vein of Ralph Bakshi’s Ice and fire Or, if you really want to. It is really Miss Metalocalypse The Spine of NightThis is the film you want. Director: Love, Death & RobotsWritten by Philip Gelatt, and animated by Morgan Galen King. The Spine of Night follows several generations of heroes and warriors who battle demonic forces unleashed on the world through a crime against Gods. This animated feature features hand-rotoscoped animation. It also stars Richard E. Grant and Lucy Lawless as well as Patton Oswalt and Joe Manganiello. The Spine of NightPromises to deliver an experience you will never forget.

Lamb

What to Watch:Rentable for as low as $19.99 at Amazon Prime Video and Apple.

Image by A24

Noomi RapacePrometheus) and Hilmir Snær Guðnason star in Valdimar Jóhannsson’s dark fantastical Icelandic drama Lamb as a couple who discover a strange half-human, half-lamb creature born in their sheep born. With no children of their own, the couple adopt the young “child,” naming it Ada and attempt to raise it as their own with love, all while dark unseen forces conspire to lure the strange newborn back to the wilderness. As critic Alison Willmore wrote in her review for Vulture, “Lamb isn’t a horror movie. It’s more like a fairy tale, with all the darkness that most fairy tales have before they’re tidied up for contemporary consumption.”

Snakehead

What to Watch:Amazon Prime Video, Apple and Vudu are available to rent at $6.99

Image: Samuel Goldwyn Films/Roadside Attractions

Shuya Chang (Sword of Destiny: Crouching Tiger and Hidden Dragon) stars in director Evan Jackson Leong’s action suspense drama SnakeheadTse plays the role of Sister Tse, an immigrant young woman trying to find a job in New York. Tse, who is being manipulated by Dai Mah(Jade Wu), becomes a Snakehead (aka a human smuggler). However, when the ruthless realities of the job become too much to bear, Tse will be forced to choose what kind of life it is she wants to live in America — and how far she’s willing to go in order to realize it. This trailer is exciting with impressive editing and action. Chang exudes both determination and a strong command of the circumstances in which she finds herself.

And here’s what dropped last Friday:

Dune

Watch out for these peopleAvailable to watch in theaters or stream via HBO Max

Warner Bros.

In the year 10191, Blade Runner 2049 director Denis Villenueve’s adaptation of the celebrated Frank Herbert sci-fi epic stars Timothée Chalamet as Paul Atreides, son and heir to the powerful Duke Leto Atreides (Oscar Isaac), who is forced to leave the planet of his birth to become the newly appointed stewards of Arrakis, a desert planet home to a coveted resource known as melange. There are sword fights, politics, intrigue, betrayal, drama, and oh — these colossal creatures called sandworms that burst out of the ground before devouring people. Honestly, there’s way too much to explain about DuneWe can’t possibly explain it all in one paragraph. This is why we created this guide. But enough of all that, let’s hone in on the biggest question: should you set aside time this weekend to watch Villeneuve’s latest, hulking sci-fi extravaganza? This is our review.

If you can get lost in the cocoon of production, costume, and art-design opulence, and sink into the Big Event angle of it all — which is why people go to the movies, isn’t it? — the film, styled as Dune Part OneIt is a powerfully evocative film. The problem, though, is the film’s pervasive emotional emptiness. Villeneuve (of) and Jon Spaihts, his co-writers. PassengersAnd Prometheus) and Eric Roth, rush through character journeys, and shortchange ostensible hero Paul Atreides (wild-hair-haver Timothée Chalamet). Instead of explaining the complex mythology, they instead condense entire towns into thinly rendered representations of pop-culture icons. The Fremen are now Tusken Raiders, the Bene Gesserit have become more or less Fremen. Macbeth’s witches.) The result is that there is no connective thread connecting all of these different elements to create a coherent whole. The film is a splendid, threadbare tapestry that unravels as you’re watching it.

Dune is available on HBO Max

HBO Max subscribers can get the sci-fi epic for free beginning Oct. 21.

The Protégé

What to Watch: Rentable for as low $5.99 at Amazon Prime Video, Apple and Vudu

Lionsgate Image

If you’re aching for another assassin action thrilling in the vein of 2017’s Atomic Blonde, 2019’s Anna or this year’s Kate then The ProtégéShould be right up your street. Starring Maggie Q (NikitaThe story centers around Anna (a young contract killer) who is adopted by Moody (Samuel L. Jackson). She was raised as his apprentice and partner. When Moody is brutally executed at the behest of devious businessman Michael Rembrandt (Michael Keaton), Anna embarks on a campaign of vengeance to uncover the reason why Moody was targeted, all while fending off Moody’s killer. While The Protégé may sound nearly identical to all those aforementioned assassin drama, what this film has in its favor is Martin Campbell, the director of 2006’s Casino RoyaleThe helm. Campbell is an old hand at these kinds of action films, so it goes without saying that if anyone can pull something fresh and exciting from this premise, it’s him.

Night Teeth

Watch out for these peopleThis is:Netflix streaming available

Image courtesy of Netflix

Adam Randall’s vampire horror thrillerNight TeethBenny, a young man who moonlights as a driver for a taxi company, discovers that two of his young clients are blood-sucking vamps. By Vampires vs. The Bronx, the film becomes Collateral. Benny is forced to drive them around while they wreck havoc on unsuspecting victims. It’s a strange and alluring premise for sure, though one that is very obviously indebted to a whole slew of vampire films that have preceded it. This is our review.

Sometimes it is too difficult to watch cinema. Even if the film’s premise isn’t very interesting, it can be distracting enough to last a few hours. Blade Underworld, and numerous other bloodsucking B-movies; its costumes from a burlesque revue of Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s DraculaMegan Fox performed from Jennifer’s BodyNight Teeth isn’t genuinely original, substantive, or scary. But as a remix of the vampire thriller’s most lizard-brain-focused qualities, Netflix’s latest Halloween offering is appreciated for how few demands it puts on its audience.

Bergman Island

What to Watch:Amazon Prime Video, Apple and Vudu are available to rent at $6.99

Image by IFC Films

Mia Hansen-Løve’s Bergman Island’s centers on Chris (Vicky Krieps) and Tony (Tim Roth), a married couple of American filmmakers who journey to Fårö island — the former home and inspiration for their creative idol Ignmar Bergman — for the summer in order to draw inspiration of their own from the fabled isle. The couple discovers themselves on their creative paths as their lives progress. As the lines blur between reality and writing, it becomes a reflective look into their pasts and futures. This trailer is whimsical and upbeat. Vicky Krieps, who plays both the role of a director and mother, stands out.

Knocking

What to Watch: Amazon Prime Video, Apple and Vudu are all available to buy for as low as $4.99

Image: Yellow Veil Pictures

With a premise that bears more than a passing resemblance to Joe Wright’s The Woman in the Window meets Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven, Frida Kempff’s KnockingMolly (Cecilia Milocco) is a recently traumatized survivor who hears a peculiar knocking sound along with loud screams from the apartment above. Molly, who has little support from either her neighbors or authorities, must discover the origin of the strange sounds. If she is not able to rescue the person trying to reach her, it will be her only chance to maintain her sanity. The trailer looks very familiar. KnockingThe film is an alarming, paranoia-inducing thriller featuring disturbing visuals, frightening sound design and menacing performances. If you’re up for something spooky this weekend, this is definitely the film to watch.

Space Jam: A New Legacy

What to Watch: Rentable for as low $5.99 at Amazon Prime Video, Apple and Vudu

Warner Bros. Pictures

Space Jam: A New LegacyStarring LeBron James, a fictionalized representation of him who is trying to get closer to Dom, his computer-game-obsessed child, but fails to succeed, is taken into the Warner Bros. Serververse by an evil artificial intelligence called Al-GRhythm (Don Cheadle). To escape, LeBron must assemble the Looney Toons cast from across the corners of several Warner Bros. franchises and compete in a winner-takes-all basketball match against the Rhythm’s Goon Squad of virtual basketball icons like Anthony Davis and Klay Thompson. Our review

First Space JamIt was originally created to help people sell shoes. The new company is a dizzying example of corporate power. Space JamWarner Bros. is selling everything it has made. Space Jam: A New Legacy isn’t really a movie — it’s a crash course in vertical integration and brand identity, a marketing slideshow with a two-hour running time. Its viewers are taken on a whirlwind tour through every Warner IP geared toward every demographic: Wonder Woman’s Themyscira for girls and women, The Matrix for older men, Harry Potter for Old adults under 40 who haven’t been reading the news much, and so forth. It is this way Hollywood operates today. This is how blockbuster movies will look in the future.

The Old

What to Watch: Rentable for as low $5.99 at Amazon Prime Video, Apple and Vudu

Universal Pictures

The basic idea of The Old, the latest horror thriller from director M. Night Shyamalan, is as terrifying and cockamamie as you’d expect from the title alone. A family is on holiday at a tropical resort when their lives take an unexpected turn. They find themselves locked up at strange beaches and are unable to leave. The worst part is that their bodies are rapidly growing in severity and their health is rapidly deteriorating. This forces them to seek safety, before they become nothing. Played by one of the trapped people on the beach Underground Railroad’s Aaron Pierre, is a rapper named Mid-sized Sedan. It’s true. According to our review

The Old has been marketed and constructed as a thriller — the opening act is steeped in dread, and its horror comes from the whittling down of its small cast, both psychologically and mortally. But it’s also a surprisingly sentimental film. While its title and premise presume a focus on an adult fear of aging and death, Shyamalan’s script and staging is overwhelmingly concerned with children. They are the only ones who see scenes prior to the beach. Trent is smart and precocious, making friends and reciting facts. Maddox, his older sister, looks after him. The nightmare of the beach isn’t what happens to the adults, who ought to know better, but the children, who, mere feet away from their parents, are thrust into adulthood without any guidance at all, getting a lifetime’s worth of regret compressed into a few moments.