Do you feel like you’re drowning … but you haven’t even left your couch? Welcome to the Great Content Overload Era. To help you navigate the choppy digital waves, here are The Globe’s best bets for weekend streaming.
Mother of All Shows (Streaming on Highball TV, on-demand via Apple TV)
Melissa D’Agostino as Liza in Mother of All Shows.Supplied
An ambitious musical dramedy that threatens to fly completely under the Canadian-film radar, the new feature Mother of All Shows is worth catching for two reasons: its tremendous use of a (seemingly) limited budget, and the star power of Wendie Malick. The American actress and former model perhaps best known for her ace coming performances on the sitcoms Dream On, Just Shoot Me and Hot in Cleveland gets the juiciest role of her career in director Melissa D’Agostino’s feature. Playing a narcissistic matriarch named Rosa (yes, that’s a Gypsy reference) who is staring down a fatal medical diagnosis, Malick faces off against her estranged daughter Liza (D’Agostino) through the fantasy of a 1970s variety show.
The conceit gets a big boost from ingenious production design and some genuinely snappy musical numbers, though it’s Malick who steals the show time and again as Rosa, who is equal parts wounded and venomous. While the script stretches the one-note conceit past the breaking point – frequently, it feels like the movie would have made a solid web series – and there is miscasting sprinkled throughout, Malick keeps the entire production on its toes. And for those readers wondering what “Highball TV” is listed above, it’s the niche streaming service specializing in genre and art-house films that D’Agostino and her partner Matt Campagna launched in 2018 – another ambitious made-in-Canada effort worth checking out.
The Dead Don’t Hurt (on-demand via Apple TV, Amazon)
Viggo Mortensen and Vicky Krieps in The Dead Don’t Hurt.Supplied
An elegantly rustic and explicitly feminist reworking of the western, Viggo Mortensen’s second directorial effort, The Dead Don’t Hurt, was dealt something of a raw deal after making its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival this past September. An independent production arriving in the midst of the actors’ strike, the movie got unfortunately lost in the shuffle of confusing industry times, even though Mortensen pushed it hard at TIFF, and beyond. Now available on-demand, after a brief theatrical run in the U.S., the film is well worth catching up on, building on the behind-the-camera promise Mortensen showed with his debut feature, the 2020 drama Falling.
Starring Vicky Krieps as a French-Canadian flower-seller named Vivienne struggling to adapt to life in a corrupt Nevada town in the 1860s while her carpenter husband Holger (Mortensen) is off fighting in the Civil War, The Dead Don’t Hurt is an effective feature balancing multiple angles. In its unconventional narrative structure – the film begins with its ending, working back to peel away the pain that frontier life can deliver – and its tender perspective on a brutal era, Mortensen’s film acts as a mirror of his own public persona: tightly drawn, deeply felt, refreshingly unconventional.
Leo (Netflix)
Leo features the voices of Adam Sandler and Bill Burr.Supplied
With three kids running around the house – and generally controlling the Apple TV remote – I watch a lot of children’s entertainment. Mostly while answering e-mails or half-writing columns such as this, which means overhearing/side-eyeing a lot of mediocre-and-worse flicks featuring the voice of Chris Pratt. But the other day my middle son stumbled upon “the turtle movie” on Netflix, which is actually the 2023 film Leo, starring the voices of Adam Sandler as the titular tuatara lizard and Bill Burr as his turtle buddy, longtime residents of a Grade 5 classroom.
Perhaps because the film is co-directed and co-written by Sandler’s longtime buddy Robert (Triumph the Insult Comic Dog) Smigel – who also co-wrote the Sandman’s last great comedy, You Don’t Mess with the Zohan – or because the one-time Billy Madison put more effort into the production than most any of his previous Netflix projects, Leo is a surprising, touching delight. Packed with witty original songs and threaded with a genuinely affecting narrative that speaks to kids and adults alike, the film earned the entirety of my attention. Long live the “turtle movie” ... until Despicable Me 4 hits streaming.
The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare (Prime Video)
From left, Alex Pettyfer, Henry Cavill, foreground centre, Alan Ritchson, background centre, Hero Fiennes Tiffin and Henry Golding in a scene from The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare.Daniel Smith/The Associated Press
Guy Ritchie’s latest action film bypassed a theatrical release in Canada this spring because of rights issues – curiously, just like the director’s previous two films, Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre and The Covenant – but is now finally available for the nation to belatedly discover. Seemingly Ritchie’s version of Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare stars Ritchie’s Man from U.N.C.L.E. leading man Henry Cavill as a Second World War spy tasked with takin’ out Nazis, violently. You can likely imagine the rest, but curiosity is surely piqued by the supporting cast that Ritchie assembled, including Alan (Jack Reacher) Ritchson, Henry Golding (another Ritchie regular after The Gentlemen), and Inglourious Basterds’ own Til Schweiger.
Purple Rain (Hollywood Suite)
Prince in Purple Rain.Supplied
While rumours swirl in Hollywood about how a nine-hour documentary about Prince directed by Ezra Edelman (O.J.: Made in America) is stuck in limbo as a result of tensions with the late musician’s estate, now feels like the right time to revisit Purple Rain. Also: Saturday happens to mark the 40th anniversary of the rock opera, directed by Albert Magnoli (who would become Prince’s manager) and starring the musical icon alongside Apollonia Kotero, Morris Day, and character-actor extraordinaire Clarence Williams III. C’mon folks, let’s go crazy.