Netflix Watch Instantly Recommendation Thread

ATJ fans, especially those who want to watch a great looking movie that could also be watched as a family, should check out her "Emma," which is very good.

Yes, liked her in that too.

The best thing about the finale was the strong implication that Beth was about to defect to the Soviets - and why wouldn't she!

Overall I enjoyed it for its immaculate design and some very touching character moments - all of Beth's relationships were pretty well drawn, and I particularly liked Borgov's ultimate graciousness in defeat. I think it more or less earned the Hollywood cliches of the last episode. I'm not convinced it had anything particularly to say, or that it'll stick with me for more than a few weeks, however.

The shock-haired guy was such a treat.

yeah he was great

More bitching about people bitching about The Queen's Gambit:

I'm now seeing an article making the rounds about how Jolene was a Magic Negro, which is being gleefully cosigned and... does anyone actually remember how that trope works? What were Jolene's mystical abilities? Where were the other complex, well-explored characters in contrast to Jolene aside from Beth, the one character whom everyone else existed to be in service to or in conflict with? Can we think through our engagement with things beyond the surface of an overeager sophomore essay? The actual criticism of the show is that no one in it is a halfway complex personality except for Beth and mmmmmmmmaybe at a stretch her adopted mother; everyone else is a prop for her to react to. The show works, possibly because of this, but if you're going to go in on lazy characterization you can't just pick one character from the Giant Pile Of Stock Characters permeating the entire thing and say that one is The Problem. Well, you can, but it doesn't strengthen your argument.

Not sure if I've already done so, or someone else has, but "His House" was a stunner

If redacted really was a magic redacted, I don't think she would've been portrayed so heavily as being on a path of self actualisation.

xpost - yes I loved His House

If redacted really was a magic redacted, I don't think she would've been portrayed so heavily as being on a path of self actualisation.

The article I read cast that self-actualization as a cynical pre-emptive attempt to distract people from the trope

Which... come on, people are not that devious a good 95% of the time

Not sure if I've already done so, or someone else has, but "His House" was a stunner

Yep. I liked how the scariest bit wasn't the supernatural elements but the situation in South Sudan and what they had to do to escape it. Not that I was actually averting my eyes from the screen for that bit as I was for the other stuff. The writers have the whitest names ever (Felicity Evans and Toby Venables) and it was originally going to be about Muslim refugees from Syria. https://thebrowngeeks.com/a-conversation-with-his-house-screenwriters-felicity-evans-toby-venables-part-1/

dan it might be helpful to the rest of us if you linked to the analyses you're refuting. I've seen the magical negro trope invoked several times, I think it's a reasonable read tbh, though of course I'll yield to your perspective. as an aside the last "cracker" at the end I found extremely cringe

the trope didn't bother me much because the stakes just felt so low to begin with, if jolene hadn't helped beth out at the end one of the other hundred characters who spent the entire series falling at her feet would have

I mentioned it in the non Netflix streaming thread (lol at me) but Sorry to Bother You is on UK Netflix and is very worth your time!

More bitching about people bitching about The Queen's Gambit:

I'm now seeing an article making the rounds about how Jolene was a Magic Negro, which is being gleefully cosigned and... does anyone actually remember how that trope works? What were Jolene's mystical abilities? Where were the other complex, well-explored characters in contrast to Jolene aside from Beth, the one character whom everyone else existed to be in service to or in conflict with? Can we think through our engagement with things beyond the surface of an overeager sophomore essay? The actual criticism of the show is that no one in it is a halfway complex personality except for Beth and mmmmmmmmaybe at a stretch her adopted mother; everyone else is a prop for her to react to. The show works, possibly because of this, but if you're going to go in on lazy characterization you can't just pick one character from the Giant Pile Of Stock Characters permeating the entire thing and say that one is The Problem. Well, you can, but it doesn't strengthen your argument.
― DJP, Tuesday, December 1, 2020 12:57 PM (six days ago) bookmarkflaglink

really good points. there is something old fashioned about the narrative structure of the queen's gambit and its exclusive focus on the hero's journey, where other characters periodically pop up and then fade away and are just kind of disposable. it reminds me of a 19th century novel like vanity fair or great expectations. you have this naive outsider who learns the contours of a baffling social world and ultimately learns to bend it to her will.

i like this aspect of the show. there is a kind of stylized detachment it enables that, i think, echoes beth's own personality and perspective.

i haven't finished the series yet, so i don't actually know what happens when jolene returns.

She takes her man, iirc

I've watched the first few episodes of Cuckoo and found it more enjoyable than expected

I started watching Barbarians and two episodes in, it seems like a smarter, better version of The Last Kingdom.

Blasphemy

hey, stop whatever you're doing and watch Nate.
https://www.netflix.com/title/81264694
https://www.vulture.com/article/natalie-palamides-nate-netflix-comedy-review.html
https://www.interviewmagazine.com/culture/natalie-palamides-amy-poehler-nate-netflix

she borrows A LOT from the great Adrienne Truscott but I'm not mad about it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h88lcf2UJKo

I started watching Barbarians and two episodes in, it seems like a smarter, better version of The Last Kingdom.

That keeps cropping up on my splash page. Will have to check it out

Sweet Home is bonkers but fun so far

it's next on my watch list so good news.

anyone watch 40 year old version?

not great

might be interesting if you are a fan of the writer, it's about her life as a playwright who gives rapping a little go. We hadn't heard of her, my missus just thought the trailer was cute.

The film barely resembled the trailer iirc.

I loved 40 Year Old Version, one of the best films I saw this year! Honest, open, well-filmed and scripted and Blank is spectacular in it. Strongly recommended.

it had the little rap about the white guy's butt intact. But yeah if you think a rap career is going to happen... it doesn't. Do things like "Harlem Ave" (the play in the movie) still get made? Goddam

I have sat through several "Harlem Aves" in my time.
I can't speak to how much the trailer resembles the film but I can say that it's an unvarnished and measured look at trying to be a creative in the city and not lose your soul. I liked it better than 8 Mile if that helps.

Wow. I guess i was too beyond belief with the people she was working for.

she decked that one guy and they still hired her and were idiots?

watched a few months ago

they're burlesques but definite types.

so bridgerton...yeesh. the brainless midcult trash 2020 promised for loyal mayor pete voters who thought desperate housewives needed more sex scenes

it's very bad and the episodes feel very very long. it's not even like "sumptuous," the clothes generally look cheap and shitty and every interior looks the same.

Man, did we not like the first episode of Aunty Donna. Who was the first troupe to kind of combine that sort of broad and surreal stoner comedy with lots of exaggerated ott faces and lots of screaming? Surely it preceded stuff like Tim and Eric, right? Given I didn't dig Tim Robinson and don't dig Eric Andre and Tim and Eric (though at least appreciate the anarchy of Eric Andre), maybe it's a generation thing and I'm just too old?

i enjoyed 40 year old version tho the romance felt forced and the first performance was just way too painful

I'll cede that but turnabout is fair play for every "protagonist gets a hottie" autobio-comedy ever made.

Who was the first troupe to kind of combine that sort of broad and surreal stoner comedy with lots of exaggerated ott faces and lots of screaming? Surely it preceded stuff like Tim and Eric, right?

https://i2-prod.mirror.co.uk/incoming/article1965804.ece/ALTERNATES/s615b/The-Goodies.jpg

https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2018/09/051-ea1a409.jpg?quality=45&resize=620,413

https://nostalgiacentral.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/goodies33.jpg

Huh, I've somehow never heard of the Goodies.

Just watched the first episode of a cop show set in Dakar called SAKHO & MANGANE. Mismatched detective partners who hate each other, drug gangs, murder, etc., but curses and whatnot, too. In French, and I was surprised how much I caught/remembered from seventh grade. I’m in for the full season.

Dakar Noir.

We just started SAKHO & MANGANE based on your description, and are really into it already. I love the medical examiner.

The Queen's Gambit was much better than expected but the last 3 episodes felt like they could have been stretched more.

My gf binged Queen's Gambit and I joined her cold for the last episode.

I dunno if anyone's written about this, but I couldn't help thinking that part of the reason that this caught the zeitgeist so squarely is that it represents an impossibly of-our-time fantasy: a flawed woman makes her way to the apex of her industry based on talent, a strong support system and immense hard work and, on meeting the glass ceiling, is met by a group of gatekeeper men who ultimately deferentially acknowledge everything she's done and more or less apologize for not taking her seriously. I'm not sure I've ever seen a television story climax that way.

p much every other episode goes the same way

My gf binged Queen's Gambit and I joined her cold for the last episode.

I dunno if anyone's written about this, but I couldn't help thinking that part of the reason that this caught the zeitgeist so squarely is that it represents an impossibly of-our-time fantasy: a flawed woman makes her way to the apex of her industry based on talent, a strong support system and immense hard work and, on meeting the glass ceiling, is met by a group of gatekeeper men who ultimately deferentially acknowledge everything she's done and more or less apologize for not taking her seriously. I'm not sure I've ever seen a television story climax that way.

― the serious avant-garde universalist right now (forksclovetofu), Sunday, January 3, 2021 2:18 AM (four hours ago)

I think this was at least subtext to every critical piece I read about it, but this essay (which is very positive) examines this pretty closely iirc:

https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/always-lived-castle-one-month-queens-gambit/

Thanks for sharing that, seems pretty much dead on given my limited exposure. I’m glad I only gave it an hour. Good set dressing tho!

There is a sort of fussiness in the production design of most Netflix (and Amazon etc.) period content that I find suffocating...an "accuracy" fetish the result of which is all the details getting flattened onto a single, unconvincing plane, like a set-design uncanny valley. You watch these shows and the actors seem as enthralled by this really cheap nostaglia as the viewer is supposed to be.

Anyway I attempted QG three times and it felt (like most of these shows do) like all the moving parts were contingent on this truly awful look, for me anyway it moved like molasses, couldn't watch it.

On that note I watched the first season of Red Oaks recommended in the other thread which managed somehow to look *exactly* like mid-80s north Jersey by dialing down that decade's signifiers (or assigning them degrees of importance), making them feel incidental as they would to the characters. Great show!

Having been a teen myself in mid-80s N Jersey I think I will check this out.