Hulu has some great movies to keep your mind off next week’s stressful Thanksgiving preparations.
Foodies will be inspired when they watch Julie & Julia, a light drama about the life of Julia Child and how her cooking inspired one New Yorker in the 2000s.
In need of a holiday but wary of waiting in line at the airport? Queen Latifah has you covered. Just stream Last Holiday, and you can spend some time at a chic mountain resort.
Finally, we all crave drama around this time of year, so why not watch Bee Season, a Richard Gere movie about a dysfunctional family?
‘Julie and Julia’ (2009)
Julie Powell (Amy Adams) spends most of her workday listening to phone calls from family members of 9/11 victims. In need of cheering up, she decides to cook, and who better to be her teacher than the world-renowned chef, Julia Child (Meryl Streep)? Julie doesn’t know Julia, of course, but she owns her book, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and by making each recipe in it, she finds a newfound purpose to her life.
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The beauty of Nora Ephron’s film is that it could’ve been just Julie’s story, and it would’ve been a perfectly fine movie. That it’s also about Julia — her struggles to become a chef late in life, her loving marriage to devoted husband Paul (Stanley Tucci) and her close bond with sister Dorothy (Jane Lynch) — is what makes Julie & Julia a surprisingly deep and moving exploration about two very different women. As Child, Streep goes beyond mere caricature and finds the complicated woman — determined to succeed, plagued by uncertainty about her new profession, but above all, joyful — behind the icon.
Julie & Julia is streaming on Hulu.
‘Last Holiday’ (2006)
Shy salesperson Georgia Bryd (Queen Latifah) just received some bad news for the holidays — she has several terminal brain tumors and only four weeks left to live. Not wanting to wallow in despair, she cashes in her life savings and decides to take one last holiday at a swanky mountain resort in the Czech Republic. Once there, she lives out her dream of being a modern-day Cinderella, but can she accomplish all the things on her bucket list before her time runs out?
A loose remake of the 1950 British comedy of the same name, Last Holiday sounds depressing, but it’s really a sweet, lightweight movie about a woman who discovers it’s never too late to realize her dreams. As Georgia, Latifah has her best lead role ever as a terminally ill woman given a short new lease on life. It’s fun watching her impress all the snotty rich folks at the resort and striking up a romance with coworker Sean (LL Cool J).
Last Holiday is streaming on Hulu.
‘Bee Season’ (2005)
When pre-teen Eliza (Flora Cross) starts winning regional spelling bees, her father, Saul (Richard Gere), becomes fixated with continuing her winning streak. He becomes so obsessed that he ignores the other members of his family, like his wife, Miriam (Juliette Binoche), who is still recovering from a past accident, and his son Aaron (Max Minghella), who rejects his father’s religion and embraces Eastern spirituality. When she makes the finals of an important spelling bee championship, Eliza can’t help but feel there’s more on the line than a trophy — it could be the future happiness of her family as well.
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Bee Season takes an intimate look at a family that’s just about to come apart. Everyone is damaged in some way, especially Miriam, who is far too vulnerable to fully attend to her children’s needs. The movie doesn’t judge, though — instead, it simply observes, and presents its four characters in all their flawed glory. Gere is still best known for his star turn in Pretty Woman, but in Bee Season, he gives one of his best performances as a father too blind by his own ambition to see all the damage he’s doing.
Bee Season is streaming on Hulu.
