Watch With Us is in the mood for adventure this Memorial Day weekend. No, we’re not traveling to a faraway land or even setting up the barbecue outside. Instead, we’re logging on to Netflix and watching these three underrated movies that are worth your time and attention.
Beans are the magical fruit in Jack the Giant Slayer, but instead of making the titular hero toot, they get him into a whole lot of trouble with some pissed-off giants. They aren’t as scary as the killer in To Catch a Killer, a crime movie that dramatizes how a sniper terrorizes an entire city.
Our third and final selection is a dramedy that unites the main stars from Seinfeld and The Crown and asks, “What would you do if your partner doesn’t like something you poured your heart and soul into?” You can’t go wrong if you want any of these three movies this weekend. If you’re not satisfied, we’ll climb a beanstalk as punishment.
‘Jack the Giant Slayer’ (2013)Everyone thinks they know the fairy tale with Jack, his three magic beans and one very angry giant, but Jack the Giant Slayer puts a new, CGI-assisted spin on the classic British children’s story. In this extravagant reimagining, Jack (Nicholas Hoult) is a dashing hero who has to save Princess Isabelle (Eleanor Tomlinson) after she’s mistakenly transported to Gantua, a realm filled with giants. They don’t like anyone intruding in their kingdom, so Jack will have to move heaven and earth to save Isabelle and make it back to his homeland with all of his limbs — and life — intact.
Jack the Giant Slayer is a grand adventure that showcases every dollar of its reported $200 million budget. Gantua and its oversized citizens are imagined in impressive, intimidating detail, and Jack’s fantastical medieval realm will make you want to grow some beans so you can go there yourself. Hoult is an engaging fantasy hero, and the supporting cast, consisting of British character actors like Bill Nighy, play villains you love to root against.
Jack the Giant Slayer is streaming on Netflix.
‘To Catch a Killer’ (2023)An unknown sniper is terrorizing Baltimore, and no one knows how to stop him. FBI agent Geoffrey Lammark (Ben Mendelsohn) is doing his best, though, and he recruits a crafty local officer, Eleanor Falco (Shailene Woodley), to help him solve the case. But with the gunman killing more people, first at a New Year’s Eve fireworks show and then at a crowded mall, their investigation quickly becomes a race against time to stop his reign of terror.
To Catch a Killer is special because it’s the kind of film Hollywood rarely makes anymore — a mid-level action drama that emphasizes plot and character over gratuitous violence and special effects. Plenty of people die in To Catch a Killer, but their deaths are never used for cheap thrills. The heart of the movie belongs to Mendelsohn and Woodley’s odd couple cops, who are different in every way except for their shared obsession with catching their killer.
To Catch a Killer is streaming on Netflix.
‘You Hurt My Feelings’ (2023)Beth (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) is a successful creative writing teacher in a loving marriage with therapist Don (Tobias Menzies). Things change for the worse when she asks Don to read a draft of her first novel, which he secretly doesn’t much care for. When Beth finds out about how Don feels, she reassesses their marriage and wonders what else he is lying about — or hiding.
You Hurt My Feelings sounds like a serious drama, but it’s really an intelligent comedy about the lies we tell ourselves and others in our everyday lives. Don isn’t a bad guy, but his honesty still hurts the wife he clearly loves. Beth doesn’t overreact, either — it hurts when someone whose opinion you value doesn’t like something you created.
The movie was written and directed by Nicole Holofcener, who specializes in making comedies of manners about the upper-middle class. She usually casts the right actors in her movies, and that’s true with You Hurt My Feelings, which gives television stars Louis-Dreyfus and Menzies two rare lead movie roles to shine in.
You Hurt My Feelings is streaming on Netflix.
