Nickel Boys — Prime Video
RaMell Ross’ feature debut is one of the year’s boldest and most visually inventive dramas. Adapted from the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Colson Whitehead, it’s told almost exclusively in first-person point of view as it follows the friendship between two young African-American men whose lives are derailed after they’re sentenced to serve time in the unforgiving hell of a 1960s-era Florida reformatory. It’s radical cinematic trick may prove difficult for some viewers, but if you stick with it, you’ll be rewarded with a gut-wrenching tale of injustice and broken lives that you in the shoes of its characters like few other films have managed to.
The Leopard — Netflix
Italian author Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa did not live to see the publication of his deeply personal masterwork, The Leopard, based on his family’s tumultuous history as Sicilian aristocrats caught up in the uncertainty of Italy’s unification in the late 19th century. Published in 1958, after its author’s death, the novel was the source material for a visually lush 1963 film adaptation directed by Luchino Visconti and starring Burt Reynolds. Now Netflix has produced a sumptuous, Italian-language series about the tragic melodrama of Prince Fabrizio and his aristocratic family as they attempt to keep their traditions alive amid sweeping sociopolitical changes.
Stevie Van Zandt: Disciple — Showmax
Bruce Springsteen’s “rock and roll brother”, anti-apartheid cultural activist, Sopranos star, satellite radio pioneer, gifted storyteller and New Jersey renaissance man Steven Van Zandt is the deserved focus of this documentary. It is directed by Bill Teck and features testimonials from everyone from the Boss to Sir Paul McCartney and Bono.
Daredevil: Born Again — Disney Plus
Charlie Cox and Vincent D’Onofrio reunite for this reboot of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s (MCU) series about blind Hell’s Kitchen lawyer and night-time vigilante Matt Murdock and his arch-nemesis, the imposing and deadly Wilson Fisk. So far it’s promising to be far more of a noirish-crime thriller in the vein of last year’s DC smash hit The Penguin than most of the MCU’s previous small-screen adaptations. Whether it stays that way remains to be seen, but for now it’s a dark, moody existential cat-and-mouse game between Daredevil and Fisk as they both claim to have become new men, even if their devotion to the Big Apple threatens to expose their true natures and force them back into potentially deadly conflict.
Chaos: The Manson Murders — Netflix
The shocking murderous exploits of cult leader Charles Manson and his followers have fascinated true crime pundits and intellectuals since Sharon Tate and others were murdered in the Hollywood Hills in 1969. Legendary documentary maker Errol Morris has now entered the shark-infested waters. Netflix says the documentary “explores the darkest corners of recent history, casting light on newly revealed links between the CIA, LSD, Manson, Jack Ruby and Vincent Bugliosi, the prosecutor whose 1974 best-seller, Helter Skelter, chronicled the Manson trial”.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.