A trio of team-ups lead a movie-heavy list of streaming releases this weeks: Mark Wahlberg and Halle Berry ply spy games in The Union, Awkwafina and John Cena are on the run in Jackpot!, and Liam Hemsworth and Russell Crowe go to war in Land of Bad.
SERIES
Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War S1
21 August 2024 – Netflix
Here’s the thing about the Wild West: It probably wasn’t all that wild. There’s a lot of romanticizing and stretching of the truth for dramatic effect that happened in many of the most famous tales from that era of Americana. But there are also stories that is every bit as jaw-dropping as you’ve heard. And separating the fact from the fiction of one of the West’s most legendary figures is what Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War looks to do. Narrated by Ed Harris, the docuseries uses dramatic reenactments to explore what really happened in the town of Tombstone when Wyatt Earp and his fellow-lawmen brothers found themselves in an epic feud with local scoundrel Ike Clanton and his gang of cowboys.
MOVIES
Jackpot
15 August 2024 – Prime Video
With movies like The Heat, Bridesmaids, and Spy, director Paul Feig has proven he knows how to make a great movie about a mismatched group of funny people. And he’s doing it again with Jackpot. This near-future-set action comedy sees Awkwafina star as aspiring actress Katie Kim (Awkwafina), who moves to Los Angeles for her career, only to find herself accidentally winning the lottery. Except in 2030 LA, the lottery works a little differently: If you have the winning ticket, you can only get the prize if you make it to sundown and until then it’s free rein for anybody with a losing ticket to kill you and take the winning ticket for themselves. Desperate to survive the hordes of jackpot hunters, there’s only one thing to do: reluctantly join forces with John Cena’s amateur lottery protection agent Noel Cassidy who will do everything in his power to see Katie get her jackpot, in exchange for his own piece of the prize.
Talk to Me
16 August 2024 – Showmax
Alien: Romulus hits theatres today and it’s a good film, but it has one problem: It’s not scary enough. If you’re looking for something to really unnerve you this weekend, look no further than Talk to Me, which finally gets a local streaming release on Showmax. Arguably the top breakout horror hit of 2022, Talk to Me follows a group of Australian high schoolers who find and use a mysterious embalmed hand to communicate with spirits and even let the dead possess their bodies for short periods, as long as you follow the rules. When one of these possessions goes awry though, social outcast Mia (Sophie Wilde) finds herself thrown into a supernatural nightmare in which she doesn’t know what’s real or not. As Noelle notes in her 8.5/10 review, Talk to Me doesn’t have the most original setup, but thanks to strong character work to bolster the chilling thrills, it delivers in spades.
The Union
16 August 2024 – Netflix
Netflix’s biggest high-profile release for the month (sorry, Zack Snyder but it’s not your director’s cut nonsense), The Union sees Mark Wahlberg teaming up with Halle Berry for this fish-out-of-water spy caper. Wahlberg stars as Mike, a blue collar construction worker from Jersey, who suddenly has his ex-high school sweetheart Roxanne (Halle Berry) show up in his life again. Roxanne is not to rekindle old flames though (well, probably not initially). Turns out she’s a super spy whose entire covert network has been compromised. Not knowing who to trust, Roxanne and her spy boss (JJ Simmons) does the only thing they can: Recruit complete outsider – and this 100% not compromised – to their side and train him to help complete a high-stakes global intelligence mission. Because that is the most logical thing to do, right?
Land of Bad
19 August 2024 – Showmax
Indie film distributor The Avenue has established an M.O. of producing low- to mid-budget movies starring notable Hollywood stars. These are the type of movies that won’t win any awards, but you won’t mind see as the M-Net 8pm Sunday night movie. And a frequent collaborator now has been Russell Crowe who co-stars with Liam Hemsworth in The Avenue’s latest effort, the hilariously terribly titled Land of Bad. The action-thriller follows an elite Special Forces extraction team sent into the South Philippines, who find themselves cut off and fighting for survival after walking into a brutal ambush. Left outnumbered and determined to leave no man behind, rookie officer Kinney’ (Hemsworth) only hope to make it out alive is the assistance of remote Air Force drone pilot Reaper (Crowe).
VOD RENTALS/PURCHASES
The following movies have recently become available for digital purchase/rental:
Sting
Purchase: Apple TV – R160
Rental: Apple TV – R45
This is not quite the Charlotte’s Web remake I imagined. Sting is the new arachnophobic horror film that follows rebellious 12-year-old Charlotte, who stumbles on a strange spider in her aunt’s apartment building. Naming the critter sting, she decides to keep it as a pet, even discovering it has certain unexpected talents. Oh and it also grows at an alarming rate and has an insatiable appetite for flesh. Maybe keeping Sting as a pet is not the best idea, as Charlotte and her family soon find out!