Streaming Roulette, July: Angels, Witches, Hamilton, and the Czech New Wave

If you're new to the site this is how we share new streaming offerings for the month. We select a handful or two of titles and just randomly hit a place on the scroll bar to see what the film looks like - no cheating.  Ready? Let's play...

[Eavesdropping]
Mum: Look at the lovely sunshine all the other boys are out their playing in the water.
Dad: Pick up your knife.
Mum: You're just like your father.

The Witches (1990) on Netflix
The Grand High Witch watches a young child eating. She hates children! Has any actor had as genius a double feature as Anjelica Huston did in 1990 with The Witches and The Grifters? (Besides Kidman in 2001, of course!) Good lord she was on fire in the late 80s and early 90s. If you've never seen this you should watch it before the remake with Anne Hathaway starts filming. 

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Queen Latifah's "Bessie"

by Cláudio Alves

Sometimes, when watching a particularly starry TV production, whether it's a movie or a miniseries, one wonders how it might have impacted the Oscar race if had been released on the big screen. Would Mike Nichols' epic Angels in America have made Jeffrey Wright an Oscar nominee back in 2003? Could Drew Barrymore have snagged Sandra Bullock's Oscar if Grey Gardens had gone to movie theaters? With the 2002 Supporting Actress Smackdown nearly upon us, I began to wonder how Academy Award nominee Queen Latifah might have figured in the 2015 Oscar race with her Bessie. After all, that HBO film is one of AMPAS's favorite types of buzzy titles, a famous musician's biopic with a cast full of prestigious names…

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Streaming Roulette, June: Nezha, Lucy in the Sky, West Side Story

If you're new to the site this is how we share new streaming offerings for the month. We select a handful or two of titles and just randomly hit a place on the scroll bar to see what the film looks like - no cheating.  Ready? Let's play...

-Maid of Honor?
-Oh, that color is bad for Anita!

West Side Story (1961) on Netflix
Silly, Maria. Anita doesn't have bad colors --she's Rita Moreno!  ICYMI I hope you'll read our huge three part retrospective of West Side Story. It was a joy to write. Netflix so rarely has 20th century movies  that you should always stream them (even if you own the picture, just leave it running in the background) to remind them that first century of the artform they make their billions off of is kind of important. Just saying...

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Emmy Watch: "Made-for-Television Movie"

by Abe Fried-Tanzer

El Camino

The Emmy race for made-for-television movie hasn’t exactly been the most interesting category in recent years. This category was merged with Best Miniseries in 2011 for three years, during which only six of the nominees were TV movies, and then it was unmerged. Actors in made-for-TV movies still compete with actors in mini-series though in shared categories. Last year marked the first time that not a single acting nominee came from a TV movie. That will definitely not happen this year given the quality of the contenders...

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Emmy Watch: Contenders for "Limited Series"

by Abe Fried-Tanzer

We’re turning today to a new category of Emmy races: limited series and TV movies. Limited series is an entirely different ballgame, though changing rules and eligibility make this category just as fascinating as any. For instance, Big Little Lies, which won this prize three years ago, is now a potential contender for Best Drama Series. A number of shows featuring different storylines and characters each season, including American Crime Story, Fargo, and Genius, continue to be nominated, though all three of their latest iterations won’t premiere until after this season ends as a result of delays in filming and postproduction. American Horror Story earned four bids here before its eighth season got reclassified as a regular series with overarching threads. With no high-profile returning shows eligible this year, we have a whole slew of new contenders… 

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