Best New Movies to Watch on Netflix, (HBO) Max, Amazon Prime, Hulu and More

G20 has a premise that can only exist in the movies: At a G20 summit in Cape Town, South Africa, the world’s leaders are held captive by terrorists. The only one that can save them is the gun-toting, ass-kicking U.S. President Danielle Sutton (Viola Davis), who will use all the weapons in her arsenal — her intelligence, her leadership skills and an Uzi — to stop them and save everyone.

Ridiculous, right? But it’s also fun in a check-your-brain-at-the-door kind of way. Sometimes, you just want to see someone kick some butt and smash things. And who better to do that than Davis, who takes a break from winning awards in dramas like Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom to bust some heads and take no prisoners.

Movie biopics about musical legends have become a bit of a running joke over the past decade or so. Anyone who endured Bohemian Rhapsody or Back to Black will tell you that the genre has become a parody of itself. But A Complete Unknown is one of the better recent biopics because of the assured direction by James Mangold, a strong supporting cast with Oscar nominees Edward Norton and Monica Barbaro and a great lead performance by Timothée Chalamet as Bob Dylan.

The movie takes place during Dylan’s early days as an up-and-coming singer in the early ‘60s New York City folk scene, where Pete Seeger (Norton) mentors him and Joan Baez (Barbaro) collaborates with him professionally and personally. Dylan soon eclipses them both in popularity, but his desire to experiment — specifically by ditching his acoustic guitar for an electric one — causes him to question his purpose as a musician and a symbol of the emerging counterculture movement. 

Chalamet is an uncanny mimic, but his performance as Dylan is more than just a flattering imitation. He understands that Dylan can’t really be entirely understood, and his slipperiness —  his resistance to being pinned down to just one identity — is the bulk of his appeal. A Complete Unknown is nirvana for Dylan fans, but it’s accessible and entertaining enough for the uninitiated, too.

In 2019, Disney ruled the box office with their live-action remake of the beloved 1994 animated movie, The Lion King. It was only a matter of time before they released the inevitable sequel — or in Mufasa’s case, a prequel  — and while it didn’t make as much money as its predecessor, it’s better and more memorable.

That’s largely due to director Barry Jenkins, who brings his distinctive empathy for his characters — even photorealistic CGI ones — and eye for the odd striking visual to the origin story of Mufasa (voiced by Aaron Pierre) and Taka (voiced by Kelvin Harrison Jr.), his adoptive brother. Despite their different temperaments, the two cubs form a strong bond, and they’ll need it as they flee from the dangerous Outsiders. Can the brothers hold back their enemies to reclaim the Pride Lands before it’s too late?

It’s time to defy gravity all over again as one of 2024’s highest-grossing movies is now available to stream — Wicked! In John M. Chu’s candy-colored adaptation of the hit Broadway musical, the origins of The Wizard of Oz’s two witches get the feature film treatment, complete with a massive 160-minute runtime.

That’s how long it takes to tell the story of Elphaba Thropp (Cynthia Erivo), a green-skinned outcast at Shiz University who strikes up an unlikely friendship with the perky, blonde and popular Galinda (Ariana Grande). But can this friendship survive the handsome Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey), who pulls at Elphaba’s heart, or the secret the Wizard (Jeff Goldblum) is hiding from them all?

Wicked is unabashedly a musical, full of soaring ballads and power anthems about love and being free, and the filmmaking is like that, too. It’s a bit exhausting, but it’s also fun and easy on the eyes. Erivo is deadly serious as the proto-Wicked Witch of the West, while Grande is as bouncy and shiny as one of the bubbles she uses to fly around in. 

William Lee (Daniel Craig) is a 50-year-old American in Mexico with nothing to do except hang out in bars and try to pick up men who aren’t interested in him. Things change when he meets Eugene Allerton (Drew Starkey), a young GI who is also drifting through life. The two soon begin an affair, but Eugene isn’t sure he wants to be with any man, let alone William. But William is madly in love and is willing to travel to the ends of the Earth to make Eugene stay with him.

Queer is an odd film to classify — it’s not quite a romance or a drama or a comedy, although it contains elements of all those genres. The third act gets trippy (literally) and may leave you feeling confused, but it’s worth it for the dynamic lead performances by Craig and Starkey. They play lovers lost to each other and to themselves, and they may just make you swoon.

All Sister Barnes (Sophie Thatcher) and Sister Paxon (Chloe East) want to do is save Mr. Reed’s (Hugh Grant) soul. That’s why the two young Mormon missionaries knock on the reclusive man’s door and walk into his isolated cabin to plead their case. But Mr. Reed, with his old cardigan and warm smile, isn’t as friendly as he appears to be. He’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and he’s out to test the two girls’ faith through a series of twisted games that could lead to their deaths.

Heretic was one of last year’s best horror movies, and it’s not hard to understand why. The setup is intriguing, and the battle of wills between Mr. Reed and the two girls generates enough dramatic tension to keep you interested throughout the film’s 111-minute runtime. It’s Grant, though, who impresses the most, giving a creepy, uncharacteristically sinister performance that rightfully earned him a Golden Globe nomination.

When robot Roz (Lupita Nyong’o) crash-lands on a seemingly deserted island, it sends a signal to be retrieved by its corporate masters. While waiting to be picked up, Roz befriends various animals it finds on the island, including a sly fox named Fink (Pedro Pascal) and Brightbill (Kit Connor), an orphaned gosling Roz shelters from potential predators. As Roz becomes more at home with its new animal friends, it must soon make a fateful choice: leave the island or stay and be a “wild robot.”

Adapted from the beloved children’s book of the same name, The Wild Robot is a fantastic animated movie that recalls earlier classics like The Iron Giant and The Secret of NIMH. Nominated for three Oscars, the film boasts a great voice cast that also includes Catherine O’Hara and Bill Nighy as two older animals who give Roz valuable advice. The Wild Robot is a kids movie that is also for adults, and it will make you yearn for your own island adventure.

The Gorge has a great, pulpy premise: Two elite snipers from different countries must keep watch over a mysterious gorge on opposite sides. They can’t talk to each other, and they can’t ask any questions about what’s in the gorge and why it must be guarded. But soon, both cocky Levi (Miles Teller) and stoic Drasa (Anya Taylor-Joy) begin to bond, and they eventually strike up a romantic relationship. But an accident occurs and they must both venture deep into the gorge and discover its many secrets, which could alter the world forever.

The Gorge is a cornball sci-fi action picture, but it’s also tons of fun and doesn’t take itself too seriously. As she proved with 2024’s Furiosa, Taylor-Joy is a badass action heroine and Teller employs all the bro-y charm he displayed in Top Gun: Maverick. The movie’s monsters are a bit disappointing, but with humans like Miles and Anya reciting poetry to one another, you don’t really care.

David and Benji Kaplan (Jesse Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin) are cousins who have little in common. When their grandmother leaves them money to travel to Poland for a Jewish heritage tour, both men use it as an opportunity to get reacquainted with one another. But Benji’s impulsiveness gets on David’s nerves, and as they visit various Holocaust sites with a tour group, their trip threatens to drive them further apart. Can they reconcile in time to honor their late grandmother?

A Real Pain is a classic road-trip movie crossed with a family drama that is sometimes serious, sometimes funny, and always entertaining. As the two cousins, Eisenberg and Culkin have a prickly chemistry that makes you understand why the two characters love each other and also can’t stand one another. Culkin won an Oscar for his work, but Eisenberg is just as good, and his sharply observant screenplay largely avoids the cliches that drag movies in this genre down.

The 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich were marred by a terrorist attack known as the “Munich massacre,” when eight members of the militant group known as Black September took members of the Israeli Olympic team hostage and eventually killed them. Because it happened during a major sporting event, the incident was covered extensively by ABC’s sports crew, who pivoted from interviewing athletes to broadcasting an event with enormous political significance.

September 5 is a dramatic recreation of the moments leading up to and during the terrorist attack and the behind-the-scenes drama that took place among ABC’s staff. A talented cast led by Peter Sarsgaard as ABC Sports president Roone Arledge breathes life into what could have been a static historical film, and the themes of journalistic integrity and morality in the face of a crisis are more relevant than ever.

How did one of TV’s landmark shows get its start? The answer lies in Saturday Night, director Jason Reitman’s massively entertaining dramatization of that fateful night in 1975 when a bunch of struggling actors, comedians and oddballs became overnight stars. The film follows creator and producer Lorne Michaels (Gabriel LaBelle) as he tries to temper his cast’s ballooning egos while keeping disapproving NBC network executives from realizing his true vision of broadcast anarchy.

It’s up for debate how accurate Saturday Night really is, but there’s no arguing it’s a blast to watch actors like Dylan O’Brien, Lamorne Morris and Cory Michael Smith embody such comedic legends as Dan Aykroyd, Garrett Morris and Chevy Chase, respectively. The movie is light and breezy and makes you feel like you were actually backstage when Saturday Night Live was born.

Mild-mannered breakfast cereal sales rep Tobias (Andrew Garfield) isn’t having the best of luck finding love. He’s just getting over a divorce when he meets Almut (Florence Pugh), a carefree chef with whom he immediately connects. They soon move in together and contemplate having kids when Almut becomes ill, forcing the couple to make some harsh decisions about their future.

While We Live in Time’s story may seem like a routine melodrama, the way it’s told is anything but normal. It freely moves back and forth in time, showing the later stages of their relationship first before rewinding to depict how they first met.

As the lovestruck couple, Garfield and Pugh generate real chemistry that makes you believe their mutual attraction to each other. The movie is sad but never depressing and features enough scenes of Almut cooking to make you hungry after watching it.

The horror film Smile was a surprise hit in 2022, so it was only a matter of time before a sequel was made. In Smile 2, pop singer Skye Riley (Naomi Scott) is haunted by the death of a former boyfriend. Her trauma attracts an entity that possesses her family and friends, causing them to harm and kill themselves. Can Skye stop this supernatural creature before it claims her?

Smile 2 is the rare sequel that takes the core concept of the original and does something radically different with it. This is a horror movie set in a pop music world with a lead protagonist who isn’t all that sympathetic. Scott is terrific as Skye, a woman whose fame can’t save her from battling demons both internal and external. Like any good horror sequel, Smile 2 has plenty of gruesome deaths and an ending that will make you utter, “WTF?!?”

Love and food go hand in hand, and there’s no better movie to showcase that than The Taste of Things. Set in 1898 on a large country estate in France, the film follows expert cook Eugenie (Juliette Binoche) and gourmet Dodin (Benoît Magimel) as they prepare an elaborate meal for the estate’s owners. Eugenie and Dodin are longtime companions, and while Dodin wants to marry his lover, she has always rebuffed his proposals. Will this dinner enact a change of heart?

The Taste of Things doesn’t have much of a plot, but that’s OK since its chief pleasures lie in just watching Eugenie and Dodin do what they do best — cook. As the love interests, Binoche and Magimel have such palpable chemistry that it’s not a total shock to discover that the actors were once in a romantic relationship. If you like movies that will make your mouth water and your heart beat faster, then The Taste of Things is worth savoring.

How far would you go to enjoy the good life? That’s the central question behind Delicious, a movie that could be best described as “Parasite in France.” A German family rents an isolated villa in the French countryside for their summer vacation. But when a young woman, Teodora (Carla Diaz), is hit by their car, they decide to help by employing her as their maid.

But Teodora isn’t who she appears to be, and soon, each member of the family realizes she could be doing more harm than good. What’s Teodora’s endgame? And when her true intentions are discovered, will it be too late? 

Delicious is derivative, but its social commentary has bite. Diaz is effective as the outsider who wants in, and the ending is unexpected and satisfactory. 

The pope is dead, and a replacement needs to be found quickly. Cardinal Thomas Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes) is in charge of organizing a conclave of the world’s best priests to determine who will be the next pope. But surprising revelations and intense political campaigning threaten to derail the process, and Thomas must decide who is telling the truth and who just wants to be chosen to fulfil their ambitions.

Conclave is one of 2024’s best movies, and it’s one of the most unexpected thrillers you’ll ever watch. Picking the next pope doesn’t sound particularly suspenseful, but director Edward Berger milks enough thrills from the material to make it a can’t-miss treat. The cast is outstanding, with Fiennes showing once again why he’s one of the best actors working today.