JOY Mangano (Jennifer Lawrence) was always a creative kid. But as an adult, she’s wound up a struggling single mother with two kids living in a dilapidated house, while her deadbeat ex-husband (Édgar Ramírez) occupies the basement and her soap-opera–addicted mother (Virginia Madsen) never leaves her bedroom. Soon, her divorced dad (Robert De Niro) moves into the cellar, too. (See full review).
Available to watch: Netflix
WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT is a fictionalized take on Kim Barker’s The Taliban Shuffle. The memoir by the former South Asia bureau chief for the Chicago Tribune chronicled her experiences reporting from Afghanistan and Pakistan and how she manoeuvred around the region’s gender politics and eventually got addicted to the wartime adrenaline rush. Tina Fey is predictably good in her most serious role to date. Her Kim Baker (not Barker) is a fish out of water in Afghanistan, a heavy-drinking reporter who gives in to the cynicism that lingers in the air along with fecal matter. (See full review).
Available to watch: Netflix
THE WITCH takes place in 17th century New England, a pious family of settlers become convinced that their run of bad luck is the result of witchcraft and turn on one another in an attempt to root out the malevolence in their household. (see full review).
Available to watch: Netflix
GIRLHOOD follows 16-year-old Marieme, aka Vic (the charismatic Karidja Touré), who tries to find an identity of her own. She’s so busy taking care of her younger sister and staying out of the way of her abusive brother (Cyril Mendy) while her mother works nights cleaning hotel toilets that her grades have tanked and she’s been kicked out of the academic stream. (see full review).
Available to watch: Netflix
STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS has all of the strengths of the original trilogy and none of the weaknesses of the prequels. It continues the epic tale of the fight for freedom in a galaxy far, far away by telling the stories of a handful of people who get caught up in the fight, just as Luke Skywalker did, and have to choose sides. Taking the story forward – picking up some 30 years after Return Of The Jedi – was the only move, really. It lets Abrams (and his co-writer, Lawrence Kasdan, a veteran of both Jedi and The Empire Strikes Back) introduce a host of new characters whose stories are at least as engaging as the ones we’ve known for four decades. (see full review).
Available to watch: Netflix
THE HUNGER GAMES: MOCKINGJAY – PART 2 opens with Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) recovering from an attack by the brainwashed Peeta (Josh Hutcherson) and getting ready to lead the charge against President Snow (Donald Sutherland) and the Capitol. She’s assigned to an elite team that includes Boggs (Mahershala Ali), Finnick (Sam Claflin) and a rehabilitated (maybe) Peeta, whom Katniss still longs for. Soon she goes rogue in order to personally assassinate Snow. (See full review).
Available to watch: Netflix
THE DIARY OF A TEENAGE GIRL‘s director, Marielle Heller, understands that to be a teenager is to live with the torturous awareness that you’re walking around in the body of an adult but no one is willing to see you as one. In 1976 San Francisco, 17-year-old Minnie Goetz (Bel Powley) is struggling with exactly that, as well as a powerful sexual attraction to her mother’s boyfriend (Alexander Skarsgård) that cannot possibly end well – though both of them are doing their best to avoid talking about it. (See full review).
Available to watch: Netflix
JESSICA JONES is unlike any other comic book character you’ve met before. The series puts Krysten Ritter front and centre in what the Veronica Mars and Breaking Bad co-star describes as a “13-hour character study” rather than a great big superhero grappler. (Check out our full interview with Krysten Ritter here on her hit series).
Available to watch: Netflix
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