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, Look Back, the critically acclaimed anime film based on Tatsuki Fujimoto’s manga of the same name, is finally available to stream on Prime Video. That’s not all, though; the time-travel comedy My Old Ass starring Aubrey Plaza also arrives on Prime Video this weekend alongside Poolman on Hulu, Black Cab on Shudder, and the Christmas rom-com Meet Me Next Christmas on Netflix. There are also several new releases available to rent or purchase on VOD, including A Different Man starring Sebastian Stan and Adam Pearson.
Here’s everything new that’s available to watch this weekend!
New on Netflix
Meet Me Next Christmas
Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix
Genre: Holiday rom-com
Run time: 1h 45m
Director: Rusty Cundieff
Cast: Christina Milian, Devale Ellis, Mitch Grassi
This holiday rom-com follows a woman who serendipitously met a handsome stranger in an airport one Christmas. After feeling the sparks, they decided to meet next year at a Pentatonix concert. Flash forward a year, and she can’t get a ticket to the sold-out concert! So she hires a personalized concierge service to help her get a ticket. But of course the concierge is handsome and charming… Who will she choose? Will she get to see Pentatonix live?
New on Hulu
Poolman
Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu
Genre: Mystery comedy
Run time: 1h 40m
Director: Chris Pine
Cast: Chris Pine, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Danny DeVito
Chris Pine’s directorial debut stars himself as Darren, a unflinchingly optimistic pool cleaner in Los Angeles — who’s also determined to make his community a better place à la Erin Brockovich (though the local city council is increasingly annoyed by him). After being contacted by a beautiful and mysterious woman, Darren embarks on a quest to unearth corruption in the city.
New on Prime Video
Look Back
Where to watch: Available to stream on Prime Video
Genre: Coming-of-age drama
Run time: 58m
Director: Kiyotaka Oshiyama
Cast: Yuumi Kawai, Mizuki Yoshida
Based on the one-shot manga by Chainsaw Man author Tatsuki Fujimoto, Kiyotaka Oshiyama’s coming-of-age anime drama centers on the life and friendship of Fujino (Yuumi Kawai) and Kyomoto (Mizuki Yoshida), two grade school classmates who bond over their shared love and passion for drawing manga. We added it to our list of the best animated features of the year, so you should definitely check it out.
My Old Ass
Where to watch: Available to stream on Prime Video
Genre: Comedy
Run time: 1h 29m
Director: Megan Park
Cast: Aubrey Plaza, Maisy Stella, Percy Hynes White
In this time-wimey comedy, a teenage girl named Elliot (Maisy Stella) does a lot of shrooms and somehow ends up in contact with her 39-year-old self (Aubrey Plaza). Her older self has lots of words of wisdom but one big warning: Don’t fall in love with the cute boy working on her family’s cranberry farm that summer. Stella and Plaza share a very easy and fun chemistry that makes their interactions a delight to watch. And the movie is especially poignant in the lessons that both versions of Elliot take from each other.
From our review:
Beyond the time-travel setup, My Old Ass’s most immediate hook is the leads and their easy rapport. This movie could have just been a collection of hijinks and jokes about touching your older self’s butt. But Park uses the timey-wimey elements to craft a story about those unheralded last moments, the ones we don’t realize will be watersheds on the way to growing up. Younger Elliott is eager to leave everything behind and move on to her next great adventure, but older Elliott is able to offer some perspective. At the same time, older Elliott gets to savor her bygone youth and tap into the days of being a fearless teenager who could conquer the world. My Old Ass is about growing up — the joy, the pain, and those little moments that resonate with us far longer than we think they will — and Park smartly pulls it off by drawing on Elliott’s perspectives of both the past and the present.
New on Shudder
Black Cab
Where to watch: Available to stream on Shudder
Genre: Horror
Run time: 1h 27m
Director: Bruce Goodison
Cast: Nick Frost, Synnove Karlsen, Luke Norris
This new horror movie, c0-written by Nick Frost (Shaun of the Dead), stars Synnove Karlsen (Last Night in Soho) and Luke Norris (The Duchess) as a couple who hail a black cab after a night out with their friends. Things take a sinister turn when their driver (Frost) abducts them and drives them out to a deserted (and supposedly haunted) stretch of road. What horrors await them when they reach their final destination, and will they leave a good tip?
New to rent
A Different Man
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Psychological thriller
Run time: 1h 52m
Director: Aaron Schimberg
Cast: Sebastian Stan, Adam Pearson, Renate Reinsve
Sebastian Stan (Captain America: The Winter Soldier) stars in A Different Man as Edward, an aspiring actor wracked with insecurity over his neurofibromatosis. After undergoing a radical medical procedure to transform his appearance, Edward’s life appears to be looking up — that is, until a man with neurofibromatosis named Oswald (Adam Pearson) comes into the picture. Will Edward be able to find peace with Oswald and his own past?
In the Summers
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Drama
Run time: 1h 35m
Director: Alessandra Lacorazza
Cast: René Pérez, Sasha Calle, Lio Mehiel
This drama follows a pair of siblings who live with their loving but emotionally unstable father during their yearly summer visits to his home in New Mexico. Told over the span of multiple years, In the Summers is a affecting portrait of a strained parent-child relationship.
The Outrun
Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu
Genre: Drama
Run time: 1h 58m
Director: Nora Fingscheidt
Cast: Saoirse Ronan, Paapa Essiedu, Nabil Elouahabi
Saoirse Ronan stars as a young woman, fresh out of rehab for alcoholism, who returns home to the distant Orkney Islands in Scotland as she figures out what to do with her life and struggles to connect with others. Eventually, she takes a job with the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and finds comfort in biology and birdwatching. The Outrun was originally a memoir of the same name by one of the movie’s screenwriters, Amy Liptrot, and premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.
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