Each week on Polygon, we round up the most notable new releases to streaming and VOD, highlighting the biggest and best new movies for you to watch at home.
This week, Transformers One, the animated sci-fi adventure movie starring Chris Hemsworth (Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga) and Brian Tyree Henry (Atlanta), rolls out onto VOD following its theatrical premiere last month. That’s not all, though; there’s tons of other exciting new releases arriving on streaming this week, like M. Night Shyamalan’s horror thriller Trap on Max, the Kate Beckinsale-led action drama Canary Black on Prime Video, the horror drama Don’t Move on Netflix, and much more!
Here’s everything new that’s available to watch this weekend!
New on Netflix
Don’t Move
Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix
Genre: Horror thriller
Run time: 1h 32m
Director: Adam Schindler, Brian Netto
Cast: Kelsey Asbille, Finn Wittrock, Daniel Francis
This Sam Raimi-produced thriller is about a serial killer who drugs a woman with a paralytic drug. She only has 20 minutes to flee and fight for her life before the drug kicks in and she can’t move or even talk properly. Finn Wittrock, who once played a serial killer in American Horror Story: Freak Show, stars as the murderer, with One Tree Hill’s Kelsey Asbille as the woman who’s drugged.
From our review:
Don’t Move isn’t a film about the paralyzing effects of grief, really — even if its writers perhaps once thought it was. It’s, well, a film about how scary it would be not to be able to move, just like it says in the title. And sometimes — when booting up Netflix on a Friday evening after a tiring week, for example — that kind of efficient delivery on expectations is all you really need.
Daddio
Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix
Genre: Drama
Run time: 1h 40m
Director: Christy Hall
Cast: Sean Penn, Dakota Johnson
Remember Locke, that 2013 chamber piece starring Tom Hardy as a construction foreman who talks to himself and several off-screen characters while driving on the freeway? Well, Daddio is kinda like that, but there’s a crucial difference: Instead of one, there are two on-screen characters talking to each other! Dakota Johnson stars as a woman who has a frank conversation with Clark (Sean Penn), a cab driver who gives her a ride to her apartment in Manhattan from JFK International Airport. What do they talk about? Oh, y’know, life and love and vulnerability and stuff like that.
New on Max
Trap
Where to watch: Available to stream on Max
Genre: Horror thriller
Run time: 1h 45m
Director: M. Night Shyamalan
Cast: Josh Hartnett, Ariel Donoghue, Saleka Shyamalan
M. Night Shyamalan is back with a new horror thriller, this time starring Josh Hartnett (Oppenheimer) as Cooper, a father bringing his teenage daughter to a concert for her favorite pop star, Lady Raven (Saleka Shyamalan). Isn’t that nice? Unfortunately, Cooper is also a serial killer and the entire concert is actually an elaborate trap to catch him. Oh no!
From our review:
Within the Shyamalan pantheon, Trap skews closer to the superficial suspense of Old or the campy pleasures of The Happening than it does the raw, tension-filled ferocity of Split. It’s got a little too much on its plate and a little too much heart to be a sheer thrill ride, and it’s worth adjusting your expectations to that. Whatever else Trap may be, it is a Shyamalan movie through and through — ambitious in its initial concept, distracted in its thematic exploration, and delighted in its own twists.
New on Prime Video
Canary Black
Where to watch: Available to stream on Prime Video
Genre: Action drama
Run time: 1h 41m
Director: Pierre Morel
Cast: Kate Beckinsale, Rupert Friend, Ray Stevenson
Not to be confused with DC superheroine Black Canary, Canary Black follows a CIA agent (Kate Beckinsale) who must track down her husband after he’s been kidnapped by terrorists. It’s almost a gender-swapped Taken, which tracks because it comes from Taken director Pierre Morel! Let’s see if Agent Avery Graves also has a particular set of skills that make her a nightmare for people like the kidnappers.
New on Crunchyroll
Gridman Universe
Genre: Mecha action
Run time: 1h 58m
Director: Akira Amemiya
Cast: Hikaru Midorikawa, Yūya Hirose, Yume Miyamoto
The feature-length sequel to 2018’s SSSS.Gridman and 2021’s SSSS.Dynazenon is finally available to stream in North America, thanks to Crunchyroll! A year after the events of SSSS.Gridman, the world is finally at peace following the disappearance of the kaiju, Gridman, and Akane Shinjou. But when a new kaiju suddenly emerges, Yuuta will have to regain his lost memories and become Gridman once more to save the day.
New on Shudder
Azrael
Where to watch: Available to stream on Shudder
Genre: Action horror
Run time: 1h 26m
Director: E.L. Katz
Cast: Samara Weaving, Vic Carmen Sonne, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett
This movie isn’t just horror. It’s post-apocalyptic horror, except the apocalypse in question is the biblical Rapture. All the humans who didn’t ascend to heaven are now plagued by demonic creatures known as the Burned Ones. Azrael (Samara Weaving), the main character, finds herself exiled from her cult, which believes speaking is the sin that caused the Rapture (so they cut out their own vocal chords), and the movie picks up with her set to be used as a human sacrifice.
New to rent
Transformers One
Genre: Sci-fi adventure
Run time: 1h 17m
Director: Josh Cooley
Cast: Chris Hemsworth, Brian Tyree Henry, Scarlett Johansson
This animated prequel to the Transformers franchise chronicles the origins of Orion Pax (Chris Hemsworth) and D-16 (Brian Tyree Henry) — years before they would later become known as Optimus Prime and Megatron. Set on the planet of Cybertron, Transformers One centers on Orion and D-16’s friendship before a quirk of fate set them on the path to becoming bitter enemies.
From our review:
Director Josh Cooley’s semi-reboot of the Transformers cinematic universe — whether it has any association with the Transformers Bay-verse is somehow unclear — is better than its prequel premise (and trailers) suggests. Transformers One is funny, sometimes sweet, occasionally heartbreaking, and utterly convincing in telling an origin story for friends turned foes Optimus Prime and Megatron. Thanks to its strong cast and a solid story buttressed by a classic hero’s journey, Transformers One has a spark that we’ve rarely seen in a Transformers flick outside of 2018’s Bumblebee.
Frankie Freako
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Comedy horror
Run time: 1h 25m
Director: Steven Kostanski
Cast: Conor Sweeney, Kristy Wordsworth, Matthew Kennedy
Are you ready to get your freak on? Then you should watch Frankie Freako, the latest horror comedy from Psycho Goreman director Steven Kostanski! After boring workaholic Conor (Conor Sweeney) calls a late-night party hotline while his wife (Kristy Wordsworth) is away, he gets more than he bargains for when Frankie (Matthew Kennedy) — a monster from another dimension — arrives with his pals to liven up his humdrum life. It’s like Gremlins meets Cool World, if you’re looking for a explanation of this film’s vibe.
From our review:
Kostanski could have been content to just riff on Critters and the joys of bad horror-movie dialogue with Frankie Freako. Sweeney nails the cadence of every schlock actor who’s been riffed on by Mystery Science Theater 3000, and Kostanski’s script tees him up with groan-worthy one-liners that play for laughs from a knowing audience. The set-pieces of the freakos running amok are simultaneously familiar and extraordinary: As Conor’s house is destroyed, each bit of vulgar graffitied profanity or trashed wall art seems perfectly placed and in character. While Wes Anderson’s attention to detail is easier to spot, the Frankie Freako production design team is just as intent on dazzling viewers with every frame.
Daaaaaalí!
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Comedy drama
Run time: 1h 17m
Director: Quentin Dupieux
Cast: Anaïs Demoustier, Édouard Baer, Jonathan Cohen
This farcical comedy, billed as a “real fake biopic,” follows Judith (Anaïs Demoustier), a beleaguered journalist who repeatedly tries (and fails) to produce a documentary on her most elusive subject to date: the eccentric, inscrutable, and frequently insufferable artist Salvador Dalí (Édouard Baer).
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