It’s all about the movies this week, led by two blockbusters: Barbie, the biggest film of 2023, debuts on Showmax, while the more recent Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire stomps onto VOD rental. We also have live-action anime adaptation Golden Kamuy, a magical unicorn, and more!
SERIES
The Gilded Age S2
20 May 2024 – Showmax
The latest season of Bridgerton debuted on Netflix yesterday, and if you’ve somehow already binged it all… well, then you clearly need either sleep or some strong narcotics. But once you’ve regained your senses and crave some more old-timey drama, romance, and intrigue, then the new season of Julian “Downton Abbey” Fellowes’ The Gilded Age may just be what you’re looking for. This new season has been a hit with critics – 8/10 score on IMDb and a 93% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes – with HBO already renewing the show for a third season. The Gilded Age also has the odd distinction of being the only noteworthy streaming TV series release in the coming week.
MOVIES
Thelma the Unicorn
17 May 2024 – Netflix
Need something to keep the kids busy this weekend? Netflix has you covered with Thelma the Unicorn, a new animated feature film from co-directors Jared Hess (Napoleon Dynamite) and Lynn Wang (Unikitty!). The quirky musical comedy stars four-time Grammy Award-winning musician Brittany Howard as the voice of Thelma, a lowly pony with dreams of becoming a rock star. When a bit tomfoolery results in Thelma being mistaken for a magical unicorn, it finally puts her in the spotlight she’s always craved. But all her newfound global stardom also puts her in the crosshairs of a jealous musical rival!
Power
17 May 2024 – Netflix
And now for something that could not be more different. The American police has been in the news for a number of years now, and almost always for the wrong reasons. With several cases of grievous abuse of power leading to national unrest that caught the attention of the entire globe, the police force is no longer trusted by a vast amount of the very people it’s meant to protect. So what happened? How did the police get this power and why has it been so corrupted by it? This hard-hitting and aptly titled feature film documentary looks into the history of policing, its racial roots, and the very legality of its actions.
Golden Kamuy
17 May 2024 – Netflix
And if you need a breather from all that history of violence then what better than a movie about war?! Oh, don’t worry, this one doesn’t take itself all that seriously. Golden Kamuy is the live-action adaptation of Satoru Noda’s fan-favourite manga series, which has already been adapted into an anime series on Crunchyroll. Taking place in the turbulent late Meiji Era in Japan, the story follows an ex-soldier, nicknamed Immortal Sugimoto for his survival prowess in war, who joins the Hokkaido Gold Rush with dreams of finding a great hidden treasure based on map fragments tattooed onto the bodies of prisoners. This live-action film will actually lead to a TV series which will continue the story and is set for release after the fifth and final season of the anime debuts either later this year or early 2025.
Barbie
22 May 2024 – Showmax
Let’s be honest: Nobody expected Barbie to be as good as it was. Or as big. The no.1 blockbuster of 2023 – and the highest-grossing live-action comedy film of all time – the Margot Robbie-led film went on to earn a whopping $1.446 billion at the box office, and together with its unexpected release-window partner Oppenheimer, pretty much saved Hollywood last year. And it did it all while delivering several shockingly deep messages for a movie about a plastic doll come to life. It earned seven Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, Screenplay (for director Greta Gerwig and cowriter Noam Baumbach), Supporting Actor for Ryan Gosling as Ken and Supporting Actress for America Ferrera as Gloria, and won over 190 other awards. And now, if you somehow haven’t seen it yet, you can experience Barbie for yourself on Showmax.
Inside
23 May 2024 – Showmax
If you’re looking for something much, much smaller in scale though, Showmax also has covered for some indie fare. Psychological thriller Inside stars Willem Dafoe as an ambitious art thief who find himself trapped inside a luxury New York penthouse when a heist goes wrong. Armed with nothing but his wits and a priceless art collection, he has to find a way out before he is caught. Complicating matters greatly though is the fact that he also happens to be losing his mind!
VOD RENTALS/PURCHASES
The following movies have recently become available for digital purchase/rental:
Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire
Purchase: Apple TV – R200 / Google TV – R212
Rental: Apple TV – R170 / Google TV – R170
Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire is still busy stomping and roaring around in cinemas right now, but for some reason the latest entry in Warner Bros.’s Monsterverse movies is now also getting a VOD release. Although not quite as good as its colorful predecessor (and that includes the REALLY clumsy title), GxK is a whole lot of dumb fun where you can just switch off your brain and watch some kaiju trying to smash each other. This is one best enjoyed on the biggest screen with the loudest audio possible, so hopefully you can accommodate that spectacle at home. Currently sitting on $559 million worldwide, GxK is on its way to becoming the biggest box office entry in the Monsterverse saga (though it has to be noted that if wasn’t for the lingering effects of the pandemic, the $470 million-earning Godzilla vs Kong could possibly have hit a billion) and a sequel has already been greenlit.