Twisters, Netflix’s The Union, and every movie new to streaming this week
Each week on Polygon, we round up the most notable new releases to streaming and VOD, highlighting the biggest and best new movies for you to watch at home.
This week, Twisters, the standalone sequel to 1996’s Twister starring Daisy Edgar-Jones (Normal People) and Glen Powell (Anyone But You), finally blows its way onto VOD. If you’d rather not go chasing tornadoes, I don’t blame you; there’s lots of other exciting releases on streaming to choose from this month. We’ve got the new spy thriller The Union starring Mark Wahlberg and Halle Berry on Netflix, the Purge-like action comedy Jackpot! on Prime Video, the streaming debut of Immaculate on Hulu and Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga on Max — which also has a new “Black and Chrome” version which just released on VOD this week.
Here’s everything new that’s available to watch this weekend!
New on Netflix
The Union
Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix
Genre: Spy comedy
Run time: 1h 39m
Director: Julian Farino
Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Halle Berry, Mike Colter
Mark Wahlberg plays Mike, just your average blue-collar construction worker, who reunites with his high school sweetheart Roxanne (Halle Berry), who is revealed to be a secret agent. Mike gets pulled into the high-stakes world of espionage because, as it turns out, the identity of every spy in Roxanne’s agency has been compromised, so they need to tap in a plucky, street-smart nobody to help save the world. Oh, and J.K. Simmons is there!
Daughters
Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix
Genre: Documentary
Run time: 1h 42m
Directors: Angela Patton, Natalie Rae
This documentary follows four girls with incarcerated fathers as they get ready for the Daddy Daughter dance at the prison, one of the very few opportunities they get to meet physically. Their fathers, meanwhile, undergo a Fatherhood Training Program that helps them emotionally prepare for this moment. Daughters won two awards at Sundance Film Festival.
They Shot The Piano Player
Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix
Genre: Musical docudrama
Run time: 1h 43m
Directors: Fernando Trueba, Javier Mariscal
Cast: Jeff Goldblum, Tony Ramos, Abel Ayala
This animated docudrama follows a music journalist (voiced by Jeff Goldblum) who embarks on a globe-trotting journey to uncover the truth behind Francisco Tenório Júnior, a Brazilian samba-jazz pianist who was instrumental in popularizing Bossa Nova music, and the reason behind his sudden mysterious disappearance.
New on Hulu
Immaculate
Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu
Genre: Psychological horror
Run time: 1h 29m
Director: Michael Mohan
Cast: Sydney Sweeney, Álvaro Morte, Benedetta Porcaroli
Sydney Sweeney (Euphoria) stars in this new supernatural horror movie as Cecilia, a devout nun who is invited to serve at a beautiful secluded convent to tend to ailing nuns on their deathbeds. Upon arriving, Cecilia quickly discovers that the convent has much more in store for her, as she awakens to discover she is miraculously pregnant.
From our review:
From the beginning, Immaculate director Michael Mohan is thoroughly committed to delivering a throwback exploitation movie of exorbitant sleaze. There may not be any outright sex in the movie, but there are long scenes of nuns taking baths in skimpy white dresses, and leering priests lurking around every corner that interrogate Cecilia over her virgin status — only to verify the purity and truth of their coming savior, of course. Immaculate also has more graphic blood, guts, and gore than most action movies these days. All of these little elements are hallmarks of prime 1970s nunsploitation, the horror offshoot specifically centered on the cloth.
New on Prime Video
Jackpot!
Where to watch: Available to stream on Prime Video
Genre: Action comedy
Run time: 1h 44m
Director: Paul Feig
Cast: John Cena, Awkwana, Simu Liu
Jackpot! is like The Purge… but with a comedic twist. In this world, anyone who loses the lottery gets to hunt the winner, and if they murder the winner before sundown, they get the jackpot (get it?). Awkwafina plays a struggling actress who’s the lucky lottery winner, so long as she can stay alive by the time the sun goes down. She hires a lottery protection agent (played by John Cena) to help keep her alive.
New on Max
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
Where to watch: Available to stream on Max
Genre: Sci-fi action
Run time: 2h 28m
Director: George Miller
Cast: Anya Taylor-Joy, Chris Hemsworth, Tom Burke
Mad Max director George Miller has returned with another explosive entry in his post-apocalyptic action series. Set an indeterminate amount of years before Mad Max: Fury Road, Anya Taylor-Joy (The Queen’s Gambit) stars as Furiosa, a young woman who struggles to reclaim her freedom after being kidnapped by Dementus (Chris Hemsworth), the ruthless leader of an army of bikers. Along the way, she’ll cross paths with Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme), her future boss-turned-adversary, and Praetorian Jack (Tom Burke), her mentor and ally.
From our review:
An epic, nearly 20-year saga likely isn’t what most people were expecting from Furiosa, but the approach allows the world to expand in pleasing ways. The MCU-ification of cinema means that franchise blockbusters often reveal characters, important MacGuffins, narrative loose ends, and potential sequel nods in bite-size teases that are less and less likely to lead anywhere. But with Furiosa, Miller widens the scope of the Mad Max landscape exponentially, as characters old and new blast their way onto the screen, giving clearer insight into the setting of the Wasteland, its societal hierarchies, its gasoline-fueled wars, and its steampunk-hued reality.
New on Metrograph at Home
P.P. Rider
Where to watch: Available to stream on Metrograph at Home
Genre: Comedy drama
Run time: 1h 58m
Director: Shinji Sōmai
Cast: Tatsuya Fuji, Michiko Kawai, Masatoshi Nagase
Based on a story written by Leonard Schrader — the brother of writer-director Paul Schrader —this quirky, 1983 melancholic drama newly restored follows three high school friends who journey across Japan in order to save the life of a bully who has been kidnapped by the Yakuza. Why are they trying to rescue him? Why, to get their own revenge on the bully before he’s killed, of course!
Typhoon Club
Where to watch: Available to stream on Metrograph at Home
Genre: Teenage drama
Run time: 1h 55m
Director: Shinji Sōmai
Cast: Yuichi Mikami, Youki Kudoh, Tomokazu Miura
This one’s another streaming premiere of a restoration on Metrograph at Home. Set over the course of five days, this 1985 adolescent drama follows a group of junior high kids who are trapped inside their school during a typhoon. Cut off from the outside world with no adult supervision, the school becomes a powder keg for the student’s pent-up angst, exploding in series of fantastical sequences that blur the line between reality and imagination. How will their lives be changed from this experience after the storm inevitably subsides? You’ll have to watch Typhoon Club to find out.
New to rent
Twisters
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Disaster thriller
Run time: 2h 2m
Director: Lee Isaac Chung
Cast: Daisy Edgar-Jones, Glen Powell, Anthony Ramos
Director Lee Isaac Chung follows up his 2020 breakthrough Minari with a standalone sequel to the 1996 film Twister starring Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton. Starring Daisy Edgar-Jones and Glen Powell, Twisters follows a dueling group of storm chasers as they attempt to navigate and survive a outbreak of tornadoes wreaking havoc through Oklahoma.
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (Black & Chrome Edition)
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Sci-fi action
Run time: 2h 28m
Director: George Miller
Cast: Anya Taylor-Joy, Chris Hemsworth, Tom Burke
Move over Godzilla Minus One/Minus Color — there’s a new monochromatic version of a recent sci-fi movie release in town! Like 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga has received its own “Black and Chrome” version, transforming the colorful cacophonous spectacle of George Miller’s post-apocalyptic action movie into a black and white movie about the moral grey area between revenge and retribution in a world gone mad. You’ll have to watch this version yourself to see which one you prefer.
Watchmen: Chapter 1
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Superhero drama
Run time: 1h 23m
Director: Brandon Vietti
Cast: Troy Baker, Adrienne Barbeau, Corey Burton
Watchmen is back, this time as a multi-part animate film series! In an alternate 1985, a government-sponsored superhero has been inexplicably murdered. Determine to apprehend his killer, a costumed vigilante named Rorschach reunites with his estranged former colleagues scores the criminal underworld of New York is his search for clues. What he uncovers is a conspiracy that threatens to endanger the entire world. Will he be able to track down the conspirators before it’s too late?
National Anthem
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Drama
Run time: 1h 39m
Director: Luke Gilford
Cast: Eve Lindley, Charlie Plummer, Mason Alexander
Charlie Plummer (Looking for Alaska) stars in this coming-of-age drama as Dylan, a 21-year-old construction worker trying to support his younger brother and alcoholic mother in rural New Mexico. After crossing paths with a close-knit community of queer ranchers and rodeo performers, Dylan find himself navigating his own sense of sexuality and the emotional challenges that come with newfound love, life, and family.
Mother’s Instinct
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Psychological drama
Run time: 1h 34m
Director: Benoit Delhomme
Cast: Jessica Chastain, Anne Hathaway, Josh Charles
Benoit Delhomme’s period drama stars Jessica Chastain and Anne Hathaway as Alice and Céline, two housewives with a sisterly bond who live next door to one another in an picturesque 1960s American suburb. When their idyllic lives are upended by inexplicable tragedy, the harmony of their daily existence is shattered by paranoia, grief, and barely concealed rage exploding to the surface.
June Zero
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Historical drama
Run time: 1h 45m
Director: Jake Paltrow
Cast: Tzahi Grad, Joy Rieger, Koby Aderet
Director Jake Paltrow’s latest film explores the trial of Adolf Eichmann, the principal architect of the Holocaust, from the perspective of several individuals who were either present or involved in some way with this historic reckoning.
Based on true accounts, June Zero follows the story of Haim (Yoav Levi), a Moroccan Jew tasked with protecting Eichmann during his trial; Shlomi (Tzahi Grad), a soldier-turned-factory owner commissioned to build an oven to cremate Eichmann’s remains; David (Noam Ovadia), an Israeli teenager working in Shlomi’s factory; and Micha (Tom Hagi), an Auschwitz survivor who becomes the chief interrogator of Eichmann’s trial.
