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Summer is finally here, and there's no better way to beat the heat than staying in and having a great movie night. As temperatures start to get higher, so do the number of movies on the platform, from romances like Set It Up to recent Oscar contenders like Rustin and Nyad. Whether you're looking for something deep and thought-provoking or light for the whole family, there are a plethora of incredible films on Netflix. With over 40 amazing movies on this list alone, it can be difficult to choose, but our carefully written recommendations will help you find just what you're looking for.
An absurdist comedy-drama film of epic proportions, Everything Everywhere All at Once was written and directed by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, aka The Daniels. The movie stars Michelle Yeoh as Evelyn Quan Wand, a Chinese-American immigrant who, while being audited by the IRS, finds herself connected to different versions of herself across parallel universes. Evelyn then unwittingly becomes embroiled in a fantastical adventure to stop a powerful being from destroying the multiverse. The film also stars Stephanie Hsu, Ke Huy Quan, Jamie Lee Curtis, and James Hong. On its release, Everything Everywhere All at Once was a massive success and earned universal acclaim. The film made history at the 95th Academy Awards with 11 nominations and seven wins, including the Best Actress Award for Yeoh, who became the first Asian woman nominated in the category. Though billed as a comedy, the film incorporates elements of science fiction, fantasy, martial arts, and animation to explore themes of absurdism, surrealism, depression, generational trauma, and Asian-American identity.
Oscar winners Annette Bening and Jodie Foster dominate in the biographical sports drama Nyad. Directed by documentarians Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, Nyad is their feature directorial debut, which benefits from their experience capturing authenticity. As expected from most sports dramas and biopics, Nyad shares a story of perseverance, the triumphs of determination, and a message of hope, showcased by the undeniable on-screen power of Bening and Foster.
In 1972, a Uruguayan flight crashed while carrying a rugby team on their way to Chile, and the survivors of the wreck had to work together to survive in the treacherously cold weather of the Andes. This real-life event is the subject of J.A. Bayona's film Society of the Snow, which tackles the incredible story of the survivors and their attempts to survive for two months in the mountains. Director Bayona got the idea for the film upon discovering the book The Society of the Snow, which was written by Pablo Vierci, and used the same name for his film. The cast, largely composed of newcomers in the acting world, is completely composed of Uruguayan and Argentinian performers.
The film was nominated for two Oscars, including Best International Feature Film, a Golden Globe for Best Non-English Language Film, and a Critic's Choice Award for the same category. With a budget of 60 million euros, The Society of Snow is the most expensive Spanish film ever made. With music by Michael Giacchino, the film is acclaimed for its emotional undertone and important message. - Emily Cappello
The first film in the trilogy is Before Sunrise (1995) and tells the story of two young strangers, Jesse (Hawke) and Celine (Delpy), who meet on a train and spend a night together in Vienna. Through conversations that span the course of a night, the two form a bond and share their views and philosophies on life and love. In an effort to not spoil the second and third films, all I will say is that the second installment, Before Sunset (2004) takes place nine years later and then the third film, Before Midnight (2013) takes place nine years after the second film.
If you have never seen them before, I am genuinely jealous because I only wish that I could go back and experience these films again for the first time. I watched all three in consecutives nights the first time I saw them and it is an experience I will never forget. If you are looking for a movie to watch with your loved one for Valentines Day (or any day for that matter), I would HIGHLY recommend the Before movies. The first two are currently streaming on HBO Max and the third is currently streaming on MUBI.
For years now, streaming services have been putting out hundreds of what I like to refer to as \u201Calgorithm movies\u201D to rack up views and drive subscriptions for their service. While many streaming services are guilty of this, the repeat offender is Netflix. In fact, they aren\u2019t just a repeat offender, they created the algorithm movie monster.
To me, an algorithm movie is a film that has a compelling storyline and an A-list cast but is ultimately very underwhelming in execution. Algorithm movies could be anything from a bad action movie to a romantic comedy. It\u2019s usually very predictable and whatever formula the writers are going for usually comes off as dull and uninspired. You have probably even seen one or two of these yourself on Netflix over the past few years - \u201CPurple Hearts\u201D, \u201CThe Gray Man\u201D, \u201CRed Notice\u201D, etc. Ironically, most of these \u201Calgorithm movies\u201D are among the most matched movies ever on Netflix, yet the collective audience and critics ripped them apart.
This past weekend we saw a prime example of an algorithm movie hit Netflix. It came in the form of a star studded rom com featuring Ashton Kutcher, Reese Witherspoon, Jesse Williams, and Steve Zahn. \u201CYour Place or Mine\u201D was on paper going to be great. In reality, the film was like almost every other Netflix algorithm movie, completely void of any real emotion or purpose. I am ashamed to admit that I fell for the algorithm trap. When I saw the trailer a few months ago I was completely won over and counting down the days till this film came out. About 25 minutes into the film I couldn\u2019t wait for it to end. Some will say I am being too harsh, but I genuinely wanted the film to succeed. I adore Ashton Kutcher and Reese Witherspoon is one of my favorite actresses, but even with all of that, there is no denying that the script feels like something an AI would write, the direction was lackluster, and the chemistry is some of the worst I have ever seen on screen.
Over the weekend I posted a clip of the climatic scene in Your Place or Mine on Twitter (can be seen below) and over 140,000 people viewed the tweet. Of those 140,000 people, I had dozens of people comment, quote tweet, and DM me their thoughts on the film - not a single one of them disagreed with the film being atrocious. Keep in mind that normally nothing I tweet is universally agreed upon. I could tweet \u201CCasablanca is a good movie\u201D and I would have fifteen people in my DMs and twenty trolls calling me out on Twitter. So in a world where no one can agree on anything, why can we all agree that Netflix algorithm movies are bad? And is there anything that we can do to change that?
To start, I want to make it clear that not all algorithm movies are total flops, the term just means that the movie was created with the intent of getting lots of clicks, not for being a great piece of art. If a film has an appealing premise or three or four actors/actresses you like are in the movie, Netflix has already won because you are going to click on the movie. If enough people click the movie, it catapults into their top 10, which means even more people will click on the movie. At no point in that cycle does the film being great play a role in people clicking on it. For this reason, Netflix doesn\u2019t care if their films are good, they just care that you watch them. Sure, they have a couple of awards films that they put out each year, but the bulk of their content is not made to be quality content, it is meant to be consumed. The more things you consume per month, the more likely you are to justify spending money on your subscription for next month.
Streaming services like Netflix make a lot of money off of algorithm movies, and that\u2019s why they continue to make them. When your upside for each family is a mere $15 a month (unlike the theatrical business model where it is $15 per person for each quality movie), you don\u2019t really get rewarded for quality films, you get rewarded for driving more people to the service which can only be done if you churn out lots of content, good or bad. Netflix keeps making these films because people keep watching them and talking about them with their friends, even if they are terrible.
People stop watching these algorithm movies - I am a strong believer this will never happen because as long as they keep hiring A-list actors to act in these lifeless films, people will continue to watch. Heck, I solely watched \u201CYour Place or Mine\u201D because Reese Witherspoon was in it. Netflix knows this and knows that our culture is so celebrity obsessed that most people will watch anything if one of their favorite actors or personalities are in it.
Netflix runs out of money to pay the A list actors so much money to act in these terrible films - I think this one could eventually play out down the road. The reason most actors don\u2019t care to act in a bad movie for Netflix is because they are getting paid astronomically more than they would for any other film. The old phrase in the industry used to be \u201Cone for them one for me\u201D meaning actors would do one movie for a paycheck then one movie that gets them creatively excited. However, recent years have shown that the slogan now is more like \u201Cone for Netflix one for me\u201D.
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