{"id":25257,"date":"2024-12-17T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-12-17T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/?p=25257"},"modified":"2025-01-07T08:20:33","modified_gmt":"2025-01-07T16:20:33","slug":"the-best-movies-to-buy-or-stream-this-week-the-wild-robot-juror-2-conclave-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/the-best-movies-to-buy-or-stream-this-week-the-wild-robot-juror-2-conclave-and-more\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best Movies to Buy or Stream This Week: \u2018The Wild Robot,\u2019 \u2018Juror #2,\u2019 \u2018Conclave\u2019 and More"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Every Tuesday, discriminating viewers are confronted with a flurry of choices: new releases on disc and on demand, vintage and original movies on any number of streaming platforms, catalogue titles making a splash on Blu-ray or 4K. This twice-monthly column sifts through all of those choices to pluck out the movies most worth your time, no matter how you\u2019re watching.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

PICK OF THE WEEK: <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Who Killed Teddy Bear?<\/em><\/strong>: <\/strong>The new boutique label Cin\u00e9matographe closes out a killer first year with one of the true buried treasures of New York cinema\u2014a pre-Taxi Driver<\/em> snapshot of midtown sleaze (the credited assistant cameraman is future Taxi Driver<\/em> cinematographer Michael Chapman) that\u2019s long been all but impossible to see on home video, and then only in a censored edition. This new 4K and Blu-ray edition restores those slashed minutes, giving us a fresh look at a true outsider oddity, equal parts slasher thriller, grimy melodrama, and high camp. Sal Mineo is atypically terrifying as a busboy who\u2019s stalking a pretty disco hostess (Juliet Prowse); an impossibly young Elaine Stritch is a gas as the cynical club manager. (Includes audio commentary, featurettes, and essays by John Charles and Kyle Turner.)  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

ON MAX:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Juror #2<\/em><\/strong><\/a>: <\/strong>In the mid-to-late \u201890s, Clint Eastwood went on a run of adapting bestselling novels for the screen, but he somehow wasn\u2019t part of the concurrent burst of bold-face names turning John Grisham books into movies. His latest (and possibly last) feature feels like a make-good, a faux-Grisham Southern courtroom drama that\u2019s a smooth fit for his meat-and-potatoes, classical style. Nicholas Hoult (in a nicely reactive turn) stars as a recovering alcoholic and soon-to-be father who reports for jury duty and discovers, to his shock, that he is responsible for the crime that he\u2019s sitting in judgement of another man for committing. The pace is a little loopy and the supporting performances are wildly uneven, but Eastwood makes this potentially silly premise play, giving genuine urgency to the moral quandary at its center. It\u2019s old-fashioned studio filmmaking, in the best way. (Streaming December 20<\/em>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Super\/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story<\/em><\/strong><\/a>:<\/strong> <\/em><\/strong>DC Studios is behind this bio-doc of the man who played Superman, which puts an odd tension at its center; everything here, from the title to the framing, reminds us of Reeves\u2019s most famous role, even as a major theme becomes his intense desire to separate himself from it. That said, it\u2019s a fine and frequently moving picture, starting with his tragic, paralyzing horseback riding accident in May 1995 and moving back from the point, filling in the blanks of his life and career. Family testimony and home video footage paint the portrait of a man who was well-intentioned but far from perfect (especially as a father); the later sections lay out the practical, day-to-day struggles of his disability with fascinating detail, and the stories of his passing are simply heartbreaking, a wound for those who knew and loved him that still hasn\u2019t closed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ON MUBI:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dahomey<\/em><\/strong><\/a>: <\/strong>Atlantics<\/em> director Mati Diop helms this peculiar hybrid of documentary and magic realism. It considers 26 royal treasures looted from the titular African kingdom (now known as Benin) by French colonialists\u2014\u201cthe spoils of vast plundering,\u201d according to the deep, electronically enhanced voice that Diop gives to the 26th of them. That personification, and its ruminations, is intermingled with documentary footage of the artifacts being packed, sent, and unpacked. But then she carefully opens up the story, to question or (depending on your perspective) confirm our initial assumptions, weighing heavier questions of ownership, image, and cultural identity. It\u2019s never less than fascinating, even if, on the heels of a seismic picture like Atlantics<\/em>, it feels like a bit of a throwaway.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

ON 4K \/ BLU-RAY \/ DVD \/ VOD:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Wild Robot<\/em><\/strong><\/a>: <\/strong>The year\u2019s best animated movie is this gorgeous adaptation of Peter Brown\u2019s novel, brought to the screen with grace, humor, and just enough sentimentality by Lilo & Stitch<\/em> and How to Train Your Dragon<\/em> director Chris Sanders. <\/em><\/strong>Lupita Nyong\u2019o (astonishingly good) voices ROZZUM Unit 7134, nicknamed \u201cRoz,\u201d a personal assistant robot who washes up on a forest island and becomes the default mother of a gosling who she must then teach to fly, migrate, and the other essentials of bird fowl life. Like many of the best family movies, it\u2019s ultimately about both childhood and parenthood (depending on who\u2019s watching it); speaking as someone in the throes of the latter, it lands with genuine force and emotion. (Includes audio commentary, alternate opening, and featurettes.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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