Netflix’s Damsel, Poor Things, Wonka, and every new movie to watch this weekend

Netflix’s Damsel, Poor Things, Wonka, and every new movie to watch this weekend

Time Stamp: March 8, 2024 6:15 PM

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, Damsel, a new dark fantasy adventure starring Millie Bobby Brown of Stranger Things fame, premieres on Netflix. That’s not the only big streaming debut this weekend, as Yorgos Lanthimos’ Frankenstein-esque dark comedy Poor Things starring Emma Stone finally arrives to stream on Hulu, along with Wonka on Max and Mean Girls on Paramount Plus.

There’s several exciting new release on VOD this week as well, including Wim Wenders’ Oscar-nominated drama Perfect Days starring Kōji Yakusho (Cure, 13 Assassins) and Matthew Vaughn’s irreverent spy comedy Argylle starring Bryce Dallas Howard. There’s also a ton of other recent VOD releases available for reduced prices this week, like All of Us Strangers, Anyone but You, and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom.

Here’s everything new to watch this weekend!

New on Netflix

Damsel

Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix

Millie Bobby Brown in a translucent blue cavern in Damsel

Photo: John Wilson/Netflix

Genre: Dark fantasy
Run time: 1h 47m
Director: Juan Carlos Fresnadillo
Cast: Millie Bobby Brown, Ray Winstone, Nick Robinson

Stranger Things’ Millie Bobby Brown stars in this fantasy action film as a princess who agrees to marry the prince of a neighboring kingdom, only to discover his family intends to sacrifice her to a ravenous dragon. Trapped fathoms beneath the Earth’s surface in a cavernous series of catacombs with the fearsome creature, she’ll have to muster every ounce of her courage, strength, and guile to escape with her life and reap vengeance on her would-be suitor.

To Kill a Tiger

Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix on March 10

The back of a person with orange bows in their hair looking out at field of plains and trees.

Image: Netflix

Genre: Documentary
Run time: 2h 5m
Director: Nisha Pahuja

This Oscar-nominated documentary executive produced by Dev Patel and Mindy Kaling follows the story of a young girl and her family in rural India who, in the wake of devastating assault, seek justice with the help of an advocacy organization dedicated to combating sexual violence.

New on Hulu

Poor Things

Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu

Emma Stone as Bella Baxter lounging in a garden chair, holding a book, smiling, and raising a cocktail glass in Poor Things

Image: Searchlight Pictures

Genre: Dark comedy
Run time: 2h 22m
Director: Yorgos Lanthimos
Cast: Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe, Mark Ruffalo

Emma Stone stars as a young woman brought to life from a brain transplant in this twist on the Frankenstein formula, adapted by Greek dark comedy filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos from Alasdair Gray’s novel. It’s been an awards darling so far, winning five BAFTAs and two Golden Globes, and it was nominated for 11 Oscars, including Best Picture.

The Marsh King’s Daughter

Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu

Daisy Ridley holding a rifle while standing in front of a river in The Marsh King’s Daughter.

Image: Lionsgate Films/STX Entertainment

Genre: Psychological thriller
Run time: 1h 49m
Director: Neil Burger
Cast: Daisy Ridley, Ben Mendelsohn, Brooklynn Prince

Daisy Ridley stars in this psychological thriller based on Karen Dionne’s novel as Helena, a woman with a troubled past who journeys into the the marshlands of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula on the hunt for her father (Ben Mendelsohn), who has escaped police custody. Knowing that he will eventually come to terrorize her family, Helena arms herself to either kill or capture him before he hurts anyone else.

New on Max

Wonka

Where to watch: Available to stream on Max

Wonka stands with his cane in front of him as dancers hold up umbrellas with ‘Wonka’ on them behind him in the movie Wonka.

Photo: Jaap Buittendijk/Warner Bros. Pictures

Genre: Musical fantasy
Run time: 1h 56m
Director: Paul King
Cast: Timothée Chalamet, Calah Lane, Keegan-Michael Key

Timothée Chalamet (Dune: Part Two) stars in this new musical prequel to Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory as everyone’s soon-to-be-favorite chocolatier, now simply an aspiring magician looking to break into the candy business. He’ll have to find a way to overcome the nefarious chocolate cartel and build a factory of his own if he’ll any hope of achieving his dream, though.

From our review:

Normally, I consider it unfair to compare two movies like this, but as I said, I’m a huge fan. Yet more importantly, Wonka directly invokes the previous film in ways big and small, going so far as to have Chalamet’s version of the character speak in the same diction as Wilder’s, complete with a “Scratch that, reverse it” line. As this is a story about a young Willy Wonka, the film must leave a little room to get from here to there, so Chalamet is granted the space to make the character his own. But this is a version of Willy that’s too sanded-down, too approachable to be truly memorable.

New on Prime Video

Ricky Stanicky

Where to watch: Available to stream on Prime Video

A young man with brown hair in a turquoise suits stands next to a taller, more muscular man in a tanned white suit and hat.

Image: Prime Video

Genre: Comedy
Run time: 1h 53m
Director: Peter Farrelly
Cast: Zac Efron, John Cena, Jermaine Fowler

After moving to the more dramatic side of things with Green Book, slapstick comedy director Peter Farrelly (Dumb and Dumber) returns with an outlandishly named movie with an even more outlandish premise. Three friends have been using an imaginary fourth friend named Ricky Stanicky to get out of anything they might want to get out of — responsibilities, events, you name it. When their partners begin to suspect Stanicky isn’t real, the trio hires an actor (John Cena) to be Ricky Stanicky.

Marlowe

Where to watch: Available to stream on Prime Video

A man (Liam Neeson) standing in a forested area in front of a dark sedan dress in a brown pinstripe suit, dark red tie, and a gray fedora.

Image: Quim Vives/Briarcliff Entertainment

Genre: Neo-noir crime thriller
Run time: 1h 49m
Director: Neil Jordan
Cast: Liam Neeson, Diane Kruger, Jessica Lange

Liam Neeson (Taken) plays Raymond Chandler’s iconic down-on-his-luck detective in a feature-length adaptation of the 2014 Philip Marlowe novel The Black-Eyed Blonde by John Banville. Hired by a glamorous heiress (Diane Kruger) to ascertain the whereabouts of her ex-lover and bring them back, Marlowe quickly finds himself entrenched in an investigation that goes far deeper (and potentially far deadlier) than a lover’s quarrel.

New on Paramount Plus

Mean Girls

Where to watch: Available to stream on Paramount Plus

The three Plastics and Cady sitting on Regina’s pink bed, about to write in the Burn Book

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.

What Happens Later

Where to watch: Available to stream on Paramount Plus March 10

Genre: Romantic comedy
Run time: 1h 44m
Director: Meg Ryan
Cast: Meg Ryan, David Duchovny, Hal Liggett

It’s the return of the Meg Ryan rom-com, this time also written and directed by her! Her second directed feature (following the 2015 drama Ithaca), What Happens Later sees her star against David Duchovny. The two plays exes who are stuck together at an airport during a snowstorm.

New on MGM Plus

American Fiction

Where to watch: Available to stream on MGM Plus

A bald man with glasses and a beard holding a stack of books in a book store.

Image: MGM/Amazon Studios

Genre: Comedy-drama
Run time: 1h 57m
Director: Cord Jefferson
Cast: Jeffrey Wright, Tracee Ellis Ross, Sterling K. Brown

The Oscar-nominated debut from Cord Jefferson stars Jeffrey Wright (The Batman) as Thelonious “Monk” Ellison, a frustrated novelist living in Los Angeles who writes a scathing satire of stereotypical “Black” books, only for it to skyrocket to the prestigious heights of literary acclaim. Feels like a shoe-in for fans of such movies as Putney Swope and Bamboozled.

New to rent

Argylle

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

A man with a buzzcut dressed in a emerald suit lifts a woman with short blonde hair in a gold dress and heels on a dance floor.

Photo: Peter Mountain/Universal Pictures/Apple Original Films/Marv

Genre: Action comedy
Run time: 2h 19m
Director: Matthew Vaughn
Cast: Bryce Dallas Howard, Sam Rockwell, Bryan Cranston

What happens when you take the meta-fictional irreverence of Stranger than Fiction and smash it together with a premise similar to Matthew Vaughn’s 2014 movie Kingsman: The Secret Service?

What you get is Argylle, an action satire of paperback spy fiction à la 1984’s Romancing the Stone that follows Elly Conway (Bryce Dallas Howard), an introverted novelist who is dragged kicking and screaming into a world of international espionage when it turns out that her popular spy novels are predicting the future. Who is the real agent Argylle? You’ll have to watch in order to find out.

From our review:

Argylle is too winking, too keen to show that it’s in on its own joke, to admit any real romantic feeling or any excitement that runs deeper than the surface level of its flashy choreography. Vaughn, the impish ringmaster, delights in challenging the audience to figure out what’s real and what’s fictional within his stylized, nested worlds. It’s just that he never really answers the question: Why should we care? With Argylle, he mounts a playful, rollicking thriller with an all-star cast and some dazzling action — but then holds the audience at arm’s length from it, just to show how clever he’s been in putting it together. The truly clever thing would have been to let the dumb film be joyously dumb, and invite the audience to lose themselves in it instead.

Perfect Days

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

Genre: Drama
Run time: 2h 3m
Director: Wim Wenders
Cast: Kōji Yakusho, Tokio Emoto, Yumi Asō

Legendary German filmmaker Wim Wenders’ latest movie is a slice-of-life drama that combines four short stories. It has been nominated for Best International Feature at this year’s Oscars, and has gotten particular praise for Kōji Yakusho’s lead performance.

Occupied City

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

an archival image of a group of people holding umbrellas behind a drummer walking down an empty street.

Image: A24

Genre: Documentary
Run time: 4h 22m
Director: Steve McQueen
Cast: Melanie Hyams, 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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