From IMDB:
In 1970s Los Angeles, a mismatched pair of private eyes investigate a missing girl and the mysterious death of a porn star.
From Netflix you can stream this 1 hour 55 minute B- comedy.
Tough guy Russel Crowe and his doofus sidekick Ryan Gosling compete, slug it out, and trade deadpan wisecracks. Good for a few laughs.
From KANOPY:
Two strangers wind up double-booked in the same upstate New York rental during the start of quarantine. Exacerbating the situation, these polar opposite personalities must learn to cope with each other’s eccentricities ultimately realizing they have more in common than meets the eye.
From KANOPY you can stream this 1 hour 41 minute love story.
Looking for a relaxing, sweet romance story? This “talking heads” film might be just what you are looking for. Just listening to the growing rapport between June (Katie Holmes) and Charlie (Jim Sturgess) as they banter on into the night might not be your bag. For some reason I was drawn into their conversations.
In the future when someone watches this film, will they possibly ask “What’s this COVID business?”
Give it a try. You might fall in love with the film.
From IMDB:
After being betrayed and left for dead in Italy, Charlie Croker and his team plan an elaborate gold heist against their former ally.
From Netflix:
A clever thief masterminds a major heist amid the waterways of
Venice, Italy — but a betrayal by one of his own spells disaster.
From Netflix you can stream this 1 hour 51 minute car chase thriller.
Car chases, helicopter chases, clever thieves, clever chess game of thieves against thief: Someone spent a lot of money producing such elaborate mayhem.
What you see is what you get. But the action scenes are fun.
From Amazon Prime:
Firebird follows a handsome, soulful young soldier who embarks on a clandestine sexual affair with a charismatic fighter pilot on a Soviet Air Force Base at the height of 1970’s Communist rule.
From Amazon Prime you can stream this 1 hour 47 minute film in spoken and subtitled English.
This true story takes place in 1977 Soviet occupied Estonia as well as in Moscow. Both the love story and the details of life under Russian (military) rule are interesting.
From IMDB:
Two former Army Rangers are paired against their will on the road trip of a lifetime. Army Ranger Briggs (Channing Tatum) and Lulu (a Belgian Malinois dog) buckle into a 1984 Ford Bronco and race down the Pacific Coast in hopes of making it to a fellow soldier’s funeral on time. Along the way, they’ll drive each other completely crazy, break a small handful of laws, narrowly evade death, and learn to let down their guards in order to have a fighting chance of finding happiness.
From Amazon Prime you can stream this 1 hour 41 minute comedy-drama.
While not exactly fit for children, this dog story has moments of fun, sadness, and eventually redemption. Definitely a feel-good film.
From PBS Passport:
Tom Ronstadt’s world has fallen apart. Tom returns to his hometown and begins to unravel the mystery that drove him away years ago, unaware that he is unearthing a devastating crime that will reveal secrets he could never have imagined.
From PBS Passport you can stream the 3 episodes of this mystery drama series. Each episode lasts about an hour.
With a cast of British actors “to die for”, you cannot go wrong:
Only warning in sight: Expect a constant stream of vulgar banter.
Sound intriguing? Expect shocking plot revelations.
DO NOT MISS!
From IMDB:
A French adaptation of the second (and much less well-known) version of D.H. Lawrence’s erotic tale.
From Kanopy:
Kino is now proud to present Lady Chatterley in a new, two-part, Extended European Edition featuring nearly an hour of additional material excluded from the film’s theatrical cut that explores the emotional and sensual borderlands uniting sex, love, and loyalty with even more intelligence, passion, and power than before. Through extra footage never seen in the US, director Pascale Ferran’s “rapturous visual tone poem” (New York Times) becomes both a highly erotic immersion into Lady Chatterley and Parkin’s passion and an equally frank and unsentimentally provocative portrayal of a marriage hobbled by war and ultimately torn apart by hypocrisy.
From KANOPY you can stream 6 hours and 5 minutes of this French adaptation with English subtitles. Actually it is 3 versions of the same film where each runs for 2 hours. Whatever difference there is between the first and the other two I could not find. Watching just the first 2 hours is more than sufficient.
When was the last time your watched a naked man and naked woman frolic in the rain? When was the last time you watched a naked man and woman in front of a blazing fireplace where he decorates every part of her body with wildflowers? Clearly this version of “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” is the most explicit and also the most photographically beautiful version I have ever seen
From IMDB:
A reclusive romance novelist on a book tour with her cover model gets swept up in a kidnapping attempt that lands them both in a cutthroat jungle adventure.
From Amazon Prime you can stream this 1 hour 51 minute comedy film.
Sandra Bullock comedies offer an easy way to relax. Here she teams up with Channing Tatum, Brad Pitt, and Daniel Radcliffe. Bullock continues to look good whereas Tatum might be ageing past his young hunk persona. Pitt’s part of the story comes to an unexpected end. Radcliffe’s agent continues to develop his client’s role variety.
Amazing how Bullock and Tatum can hold their breath and swim for several minutes through an underwater tunnel!
Surprisingly vulgar and explicit at times, but still the kind of fun you would expect from a Bullock comedy.
From IMDB:
Follows a young graffiti artist who discovers a shocking secret that would put him and the ones closest to him in danger.
From Netflix you can stream this 1 hour 50 minute serial killer thriller.
As serial killer stories go, this one is fairly original and never proceeds quite as you might hope or expect. Earlier formulas need not apply. Try not to get attached to any character in particular because that person might just disappear.
Hugh Bonneville of Downton Abbey fame plays the upper-class retired judge serial killer who never seems to lose his composure when threatened by exposure. If you want to portray a true psychopath, never show emotion, especially empathy. Does that make it easier to act in such an acting role?
Will he ever get caught? If you are into serial killers, and ONLY if, then DO NOT MISS!
From IMDB:
Pol Rubio starts to study Philosophy at the University of Barcelona while the relationship between Bruno and him begins to strengthen. Pol will meet new friends, new colleagues and new teachers apart from having to face conflicts in his new student stage, his complicated family and his new relationship with Bruno Bergeron in this way until becoming a Philosophy teacher.
From Netflix you can stream the 8 episodes of the second season of this Spanish (Barcelona) young adult soap opera. Each episode lasts about 45 minutes. Catalan is the original language of the series.
Season one was entitled simply “Merlí” and is not available. Merlí is the name of a favorite teacher who dies at the end of season one. Season two takes up from there with Pol grieving over the loss of his teacher Merlí.
All episodes center on a group of students studying philosophy at a university in Spain. This group of friends quickly formed at the beginning of their studies. Another notable character in particular is one of their teachers María Bolaño who is lonely and struggles with alcoholism. Each student has his or her own story to tell. Relationships, sexual and otherwise, are formed and fought over.
My recommendation for this forgettable series is that it is a light-hearted young adult snapshot of the culture of 21st century Spain.