Advertisement
Supported by
Watching
Send any friend a story
As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. Anyone can read what you share.
Welcome to Watching, The New York Times’s TV and movie recommendation site.
At the beginning of every month, Netflix Canada adds a new batch of movies and TV shows to its library. Here are the titles we think are most interesting, broken down by release date. Netflix occasionally change schedules without giving notice. (Unfortunately, streaming information provided in our Watchlist listings apply only to viewers in the United States.)
‘Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie’
Starts streaming: April 1
Add it to your Watchlist.
Two decades after the bawdy British sitcom “Absolutely Fabulous” became a cult favorite, particularly in the gay community, Eddy (Jennifer Saunders) and Patsy (Joanna Lumley) return for a booze-soaked victory lap that’s as diverting as it is dispensable. It barely qualifies as a movie — the plot involves Kate Moss (as herself) falling into the Thames — but Eddy and Patsy’s blinkered response to modern trends is funny in any era.
—
‘Across the Universe’
Starts streaming: April 1
Add it to your Watchlist.
There’s plenty in this Beatles-inspired musical that’s tough to defend, from the shoehorning of song references (the main characters are named Jude and Lucy) to the broad application of late-60s Baby Boomer clichés. But director Julie Taymor’s conceptual artistry makes “Across the Universe” compelling and singular in its best moments. Also, the Beatles happened to write some pretty good songs.
—
‘Dom Hemingway’
Starts streaming: April 1
Add it to your Watchlist.
Writer-director Richard Shepard, who rejiggered Pierce Brosnan’s 007 image for his underrated crime comedy “The Matador,” does likewise for Jude Law in “Dom Hemingway,” transforming the slight actor into tattooed, musclebound, foul-mouthed ex-con on a mission. The world may not need another nasty British crime drama, but Law’s performance as a man seeking retribution for a 12-year prison stint separates it from its ilk.
—
‘Metallica: Some Kind of Monster’
Starts streaming: April 1
Add it to your Watchlist.
Life imitates “This is Spinal Tap” in Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky’s exceptional behind-the-scenes documentary about the tortured making of Metallica’s 2003 album “St. Anger.” The breakout star here is Phil Towle, a full-time performance coach who is brought on board to ease the tension between the longtime bandmates, but mostly deepens their personal vulnerability and group dysfunction.
—
‘De Palma’
Starts streaming: April 5
Add it to your Watchlist.
The setup for Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow’s documentary about the iconoclastic director Brian De Palma is simple: Sit him down in a chair and have him talk through his entire four-decade career in chronological order. But the approach pays off in De Palma’s colorful stories and ornery commentary on the highs and lows of pursuing a distinct artistic vision from inside and outside the Hollywood system.
—
‘Titanic’
Starts streaming: April 6
Add it to your Watchlist.
The flaws of James Cameron’s grand historical romance — the clunky dialogue, the unnecessary framing device, that tacky Celine Dion song — has made it an easy target in the years since it won the Oscar for best picture (as well as 10 others). But its old-fashioned appeals, married to state-of-the-art effects, continue to make it more absorbing than expected on multiple viewings. It was a box-office sensation for a reason.
—
‘The Get Down’: Season 1, Part 2
Starts streaming: April 6
Add it to your Watchlist.
This visionary fiasco from Baz Luhrmann and Stephen Adly Guirgis about the burgeoning hip-hop and disco scene in the South Bronx in the mid-to-late ’70s earned mixed notices for the six-episode first part of its first season. But its outsized ambition and gonzo craft made it a true television event. The second half of the season picks up the action in 1978, as Zeke, Shaolin Fantastic and other young artists continue to plug away at their musical dreams.
—
‘Mad Max: Fury Road’
Starts streaming: April 9
Add it to your Watchlist.
A full 30 years after the previous “Mad Max” movie, director George Miller returned with the best one yet, a breathtaking action bonanza about a post-apocalyptic future in which women, led by Charlize Theron’s Imperator Furiosa, take the lead in rebelling against the despotic ruler who controls the territory from on high. On top of being one of the best action movies ever produced, “Mad Max: Fury Road” is a political allegory that will likely be relevant well into our own future.
—
‘Footloose’
Starts streaming: April 13
Add it to your Watchlist.
When a Chicago teen moves to a rural town where rock music and dancing have been outlawed, he’s gotta cut — in fact, everybody’s gotta cut — footloose. The original hit from 1984 (it was remade in 2011) is very much a commercial product of its time, but Kevin Bacon’s spirited performance as a rebel in tight jeans and flexible sneakers holds up, as does John Lithgow’s hissable, Bible-thumping villain.
—
‘The Light Between Oceans’
Starts streaming: April 17
Add it to your Watchlist.
After building his reputation on audacious art films like “Blue Valentine” and “The Place Beyond the Pines,” director Derek Cianfrance attempts a classically staged historical drama about a couple (Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander) that struggles to conceive and decides to claim an orphaned baby as their own. The repercussions are predictably severe, but Cianfrance and his actors keep the emotions from tipping over into outright melodrama.
—
‘Tropic Thunder’
Starts streaming: April 20
Add it to your Watchlist.
Blockbuster comedies are notoriously hard to pull off because the spectacle often takes away from the laughs or vice versa. But Ben Stiller’s ingenious sendup of Hollywood self-importance has the improvisational looseness of sketch comedy and the scale of an expensive war drama. Robert Downey Jr.’s performance as a Method actor who poses as a black soldier is a standout, but it’s one among many satirical digs at the disconnect between pampered artists and the world they purport to illuminate.
—
‘Big Eyes’
Starts streaming: April 24
Add it to your Watchlist.
From the late 1950s through the mid-60s, Walter Keane sold painting after painting of big-eyed children, which found a prominent place in living rooms across the country. The only trouble? His wife, Margaret, painted them; he did not. This solid biopic from Tim Burton earns Margaret (Amy Adams) a place in his gallery of reclusive, disrespected artists — like Ed Wood and Edward Scissorhands — whom society (and critics) misunderstand.
—
‘Queen of Katwe’
Starts streaming: April 25
Add it to your Watchlist.
In broad strokes, this story of a 10-year-old chess prodigy from the slums of Kampala, Uganda, conforms to other inspirational Disney sport movies drawn from a true story. But director Mira Nair and her cast, led by David Oyelowo as a missionary and chess-team mentor, bring authenticity and heart to “Queen of Katwe,” defying mere formula. They were not rewarded at the box office, but the film stands to have a long virtual shelf life.
—
‘American Honey’
Starts streaming: April 27
Add it to your Watchlist.
Mixing professional actors with talented amateurs, and a bare-bones screenplay with road-movie spontaneity, the British director Andrea Arnold (“Fish Tank”) offers a sprawling, messy vision of the heartland that few of her American counterparts have bothered attempting. Following a poor, adolescent girl (Sasha Lane) on a bus full of teenagers selling door-to-door magazine subscriptions, “American Honey” doubles as a rambunctious tour through America’s conservative hinterlands and an insightful coming-of-age film.
—
‘Casting JonBenet’
Starts streaming: April 28
Add it to your Watchlist.
Coming just over 20 years after the 6-year-old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey was found murdered in the basement of her family home in Boulder, Colo., this formally striking documentary from director Kitty Green revisits the scene through a multilayered performance piece. Through the casting of actors to play the roles of Ramsey and other people associated with the case, Green comments on the relationship between truth and fiction, and the personal ways a horrific tragedy like that can be interpreted.
Advertisement
