{"id":28604,"date":"2026-02-10T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-10T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/?p=28604"},"modified":"2026-02-09T19:32:20","modified_gmt":"2026-02-10T03:32:20","slug":"the-best-movies-to-buy-or-stream-this-week-if-i-had-legs-id-kick-you-sisu-road-to-revenge-a-woman-under-the-influence-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/the-best-movies-to-buy-or-stream-this-week-if-i-had-legs-id-kick-you-sisu-road-to-revenge-a-woman-under-the-influence-and-more\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best Movies to Buy or Stream This Week: If I Had Legs, I\u2019d Kick You<\/i>, Sisu: Road to Revenge<\/i>, A Woman Under the Influence<\/i>, 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

A Woman Under the Influence<\/em><\/strong><\/a>:<\/strong> John Cassavetes\u2019s most-acclaimed (and most commercially successful) indie effort gets a 4K upgrade from Criterion, so that you can appreciate the warts-and-all intensity of one of the greatest performances in movie history: Gena Rowlands as the title character, an over-stressed wife and mother whose tenuous hold on reality finally tips over. Peter Falk co-stars as her husband, whose short fuse does much to contribute to her shaky state, and his presence is a major component of the picture\u2019s skill; this is no simple story of a lady goin\u2019 crazy, but of the aspects of a seemingly \u201cnormal\u201d life that can drive even the calm, cool, and collected off the deep end. As is his style, Cassavetes takes no shortcuts \u2014 scenes play out at full, uncomfortable length, overwhelmed by long, awkward silences and impenetrable crosstalk. And at the center of it all is Rowlands, as dangerous as a stick of dynamite and as vulnerable as an open wound. (Includes audio commentary, archival interviews, trailer, and essay by Kent Jones.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

ON HBO MAX:<\/strong>
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If I Had Legs, I\u2019d Kick You<\/em><\/strong><\/a>: <\/strong>I\u2019m not sure I\u2019ve ever seen a film so vividly capture the moment-to-moment feeling of living with anxiety (and living around people with it) \u2014 which makes it a nerve-rattling, sometimes harrowing sit. But it\u2019s putting a real state of being on screen, anchored by a jaw-dropping performance by Oscar nominee Rose Byrne; writer\/director Mary Bronstein opens with a close-up of Byrne\u2019s face, listening, stressed, already fuming, and as she listens, flinches, and reacts, it pushes in closer, and closer, and somehow closer still. And that\u2019s a pretty apt visual representation of the entire movie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Sisu: Road to Revenge<\/em><\/strong><\/a>: <\/strong>The original Sisu<\/em> was an unexpected hit back in 2022, though box office experts may have been underestimating the degree to which moviegoers wanted to watch Nazis getting brutally, gorily dispatched. Last year\u2019s follow-up was a comparative disappointment, which is a shame, because writer\/director Jalmari Helander and star Jorma Tommila have really cracked a code here; about halfway through, it occurred to me that these movies are live-action Road Runner cartoons, just as relentlessly paced, disinterested in the realities of the physical world, and willing to go to great lengths for big, absurd laughs. And, bonus, they clock in at 90 minutes or less \u2014 a brevity that other makers of grindhouse homages would be wise to bear in mind. (Includes featurette and alternate ending.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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