Mean Girls, The Zone of Interest, Netflix’s Mea Culpa, and every new movie to watch this weekend

Greetings, Polygon readers! Each week, we round up the most notable new releases to streaming and VOD, highlighting the biggest and best new movies for you to watch at home.

This week, Priscilla, the new historical drama from Sofia Coppola starring Cailee Spaeny and Jacob Elordi, is finally available to stream on Max. That’s not all there is to watch this weekend, as there’s plenty of exciting new releases on streaming and VOD.

Blackberry, the biographical comedy-drama about the eponymous handheld device, is streaming on Hulu along with the videogame documentary Hideo Kojima: Connecting Worlds and All of Us Strangers, the romantic fantasy starring Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal. Mean Girls, The Promised Land, and Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest are also available to purchase and watch on VOD. There’s even a new feature-length sequel to the 2020 heist anime Great Pretender to enjoy on Crunchyroll this weekend!

Here’s everything new to watch this weekend!

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New on Netflix

Mea Culpa

Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix

Photo: Bob Mahoney/Perry Well Films 2/Netflix

Genre: Legal thriller
Run time: 2h
Director: Tyler Perry
Cast: Kelly Rowland, Trevante Rhodes, Sean Sagar

Actress-singer Kelly Rowland stars in this new Tyler Perry-directed thriller as Mea Harper, a married criminal defense attorney who takes on a new client: Zyair Malloy (Moonlight’s Trevante Rhodes), an artist accused of murdering his girlfriend. As she and Zyair unexpectedly grow close, Mea finds herself faced with a deadly choice between her desires and her professional obligations.

New on Hulu

Blackberry

Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu

Image: IFC Films

Genre: Biographical comedy-drama
Run time: 1h 59m
Director: Matt Johnson
Cast: Glenn Howerton, Jay Baruchel, Matt Johnson

Did you like Air, the biographical drama about the origin of Nike’s business relationship with Michael Jordan? Well, buckle up for BlackBerry, a biographical drama about the rise and fall of the eponymous handheld communications device.

Hideo Kojima: Connecting Worlds

Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu

Image: 7a Films/Filmworks

Genre: Documentary
Run time: 1h
Director: Glen Milner
Cast: Hideo Kojima, Guillermo del Toro, George Miller

In 2015, Hideo Kojima left behind Metal Gear Solid, stealth-action franchise he created back in 1987, founded a new studio, and embarked on his first project as an independent game developer. Hideo Kojima: Connecting Worlds is an hour-long documentary about the making of 2019’s Death Stranding, featuring interviews with Kojima’s colleagues and admirers discussing his unique creative process and cultural legacy.

All of Us Strangers

Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu

Image: Film4/TSG Entertainment

Genre: Romantic fantasy
Run time: 1h 45m
Director: Andrew Haigh
Cast: Andrew Scott, Paul Mescal, Carter John Grout

Andrew Scott (Fleabag) stars in this romantic fantasy as Adam, a lonely screenwriter who, after meeting and falling in love with his mysterious neighbor Harry (Paul Mescal), discovers he can visit his parents, who passed away over 30 years ago, in his childhood home. Troubled by this revelation, Adam must unpack not only his memories of the past but his feelings in the present.

New on Max

Priscilla

Where to watch: Available to stream on Max

Image: A24

Genre: Biographical drama
Run time: 1h 50m
Director: Sofia Coppola
Cast: Cailee Spaeny, Jacob Elordi, Dagmara Domińczyk

Cailee Spaeny (Bad Times at the El Royale) stars in Sofia Coppola’s latest drama. This one’s about Priscilla Beaulieu, the girlfriend and later wife of American music star Elvis Presley (Jacob Elordi). Priscilla charts the arc of their complicated relationship, from their first meeting in West Germany when she was just 14 to their often tumultuous life in the public eye.

From our review,

In Luhrmann’s Elvis, Olivia DeJonge does a commendable job as Priscilla, but the script just asks her to play a stock Hollywood biopic type, the wife whose alternating doting and rejection helps illustrate the watermarks of a male genius’ career. In Priscilla, the duo’s relationship takes center stage instead, affording them equal dramatic weight even when they’re apart, and letting Spaeny and Elordi create living, breathing visions of these American icons in private moments behind the scenes.

New on Crunchyroll

Great Pretender: Razbliuto

Where to watch: Available to stream on Crunchyroll

Image: Wit Studio/Crunchyroll

Genre: Action mystery
Run time: 1h 28m
Directors: Hiro Kaburagi, Mai Teshima
Cast: Yuka Komatsu, Shunsuke Takeuchi, Mariya Ise

Fans of the 2020 anime Great Pretender, rejoice: There’s a new feature-length sequel to the series, this time starring the Laurent Thierry’s former lover Dorothy! After a run-in with Jay, a charismatic member of a crime syndicate in Taipei City, inadvertently puts her in the cross-hairs of a vengeful mob boss, an amnesiac Dorothy must elude her potential captors and search for answers to the questions of her past life as a professional conwoman.

From our review,

Great Pretender: Razbliuto marks the return of the series’ characteristic blend of comedy and drama, with a small cast of eccentric criminals of shifting allegiances and motivations organically trying to one-up one another, while they all attempt to come out of a life-threatening situation intact — and possibly a little richer. The movie isn’t likely to pique the interest of anyone who hasn’t already watched the original anime, but Great Pretender fans should find it a satisfying continuation of a story that left them hanging.

New to rent

Anyone but You

Where to watch: Available to purchase on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

Image: Brook Rushton/Sony Pictures

Genre: Romantic comedy
Run time: 1h 43m
Director: Will Gluck
Cast: Sydney Sweeney, Glen Powell, Alexandra Shipp

Sydney Sweeney (Euphoria) and Glen Powell (Top Gun: Maverick) star in this romantic comedy loosely based on William Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing as Bea and Ben, two young singles who become cold towards one another after an otherwise great first date. After unexpectedly being reunited at a destination wedding in Australia, the pair agree to pretend to be dating in order to ward off their exes. Shenanigans ensue!

Freud’s Last Session

Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

Photo: Sony Pictures Classics

Genre: Drama
Run time: 1h 48m
Director: Matt Brown
Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Matthew Goode, Jodi Balfour

Oscar-winning actor Anthony Hopkins and Matthew Goode (Stoker) star as Sigmund Freud and author C.S. Lewis in this fictionalized drama about the two major figures debating the nature of God, death, and psychology on the eve of World War II.

From our review,

Nothing really comes of it. Nothing comes of anything either man says. It’s all noise — all passionless anger going in circles, captured by a camera that seems averse to lingering on the tremendous talents of Hopkins and Goode, who try their best to rescue Freud’s Last Session from itself. Alas, their attempts are in vain, since Lewis ends up with nothing resembling a real outlook or perspective, and in the process, Freud ends up arguing with himself. The closing titles mention that, in the days leading up to World War II, Freud did in fact meet with an Oxford don, whose identity is unknown. It’s just as well; the film could have named Goode’s character John Doe and little would’ve changed.

Mean Girls

Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

Photo: Jojo Whilden/Paramount Pictures

Genre: Musical teen comedy
Run time: 1h 52m
Directors: Samantha Jayne, Arturo Perez Jr.
Cast: Angourie Rice, Reneé Rapp, Auliʻi Cravalho

This musical comedy based on the Broadway musical based on the 2004 teen comedy follows the story of Cady Heron (Angourie Rice), a homeschooled teenager who moves from Kenya to the United States to attend school for the first time. When her crush on a boy named Aaron (Christopher Briney) puts her on the outs with the most vengeful group of popular girls in the school, Cady will have to find a way to come out on top.

From our review,

Mean Girls (2024) likely won’t replace the original 2004 movie in anyone’s hearts. The start and the end — the most Cady-focused parts — aren’t strong enough to carry the rest of the film, especially when comparing Rice’s take on the character to Lindsay Lohan’s original movie performance, or Erika Henningsen’s strong vocals in the original Broadway cast recording.

But Rapp, Cravalho, and the rest of the cast hold up the movie, and generally turn it into a good time. There are enough infectious songs to make up for the dull ones, though the ratio isn’t quite enough to solidify it as a transcendent musical experience. (There are always a few duds in a musical, but there should be more bangers.) Overall, the 2024 Mean Girls hits the right notes, continuing the original movie’s legacy instead of totally revamping it.

Memory

Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

Image: Ketchup Entertainment

Genre: Drama
Run time: 1h 39m
Director: Michel Franco
Cast: Jessica Chastain, Peter Sarsgaard, Merritt Wever

Jessica Chastain (Zero Dark Thirty) stars in this new film about a troubled social worker who meets Saul (Peter Sarsgaard), a former classmate who suffers from early onset dementia. When she’s hired to care for Saul, they form an unlikely bond over their shared trauma.

The Zone of Interest

Where to watch: Available to purchase on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

Image: A24

Genre: Historical drama
Run time: 1h 46m
Director: Jonathan Glazer
Cast: Christian Friedel, Sandra Hüller, Johann Karthaus

Based on the novel by Martin Amis, Jonathan Glazer’s latest film follows the story of Rudolf Höss (Christian Friedel), the commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp who chose to build his family home opposite a wall overlooking the camp.

From our review,

The Zone of Interest may be the most powerful movie about complicity that’s ever been made, particularly about the Holocaust. The movie’s true warning isn’t that regular life can go on even amid atrocity, it’s that people are capable of pretending that atrocity isn’t happening. Glazer seems to suggest that people aren’t unaware of destructive historical events going on around them, but rather that they actively close their ears to it. The Höss family doesn’t drown out the camp, or begrudgingly ignore the roar of its furnaces or the gunshots from over the wall. They just keep going like it isn’t there at all. The effect of all their silence is one of the loudest and most unique views a film has ever taken on one of history’s most horrific atrocities.

The Promised Land

Where to watch: Available to purchase on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

Image: Magnolia Pictures

Genre: Historical drama
Run time: 2h 7m
Director: Nikolaj Arcel
Cast: Mads Mikkelsen, Amanda Collin, Simon Bennebjerg

Mads Mikkelsen (Last Round) stars as Ludvig Kahlen, an impoverished war hero in 18th century Denmark who years to tame his own plot of land, build a successful colony, and earn a noble title for himself while doing so. When Ludvig’s ambitions run afoul of a ruthless nobleman who rules over the land, the two men are pitted against one another in a battle of wills.

Occupied City

Where to watch: Available to purchase on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

Image: A24

Genre: Documentary
Run time: 4h 22m
Director: Steve McQueen
Cast: Melanie Hyam, Carice van Houten

Director Steve McQueen (Small Axe) returns with a new documentary that chronicles the Nazi occupation of Amsterdam during World War II. Juxtaposing archival footage of the city’s past and present, Occupied City is a life-affirming meditation on the nature of human resilience and the precarity of the future.

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• Source: https://www.polygon.com/2024/2/23/24075729/new-movies-watch-mean-girls-netflix-mea-culpa-the-zone-of-interest