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The weekend is here! If you’re looking for something to watch, we can help. We’ve dug through Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video, HBO Max and Disney+ to find some of the best titles on each service. STREAMING ON NETFLIX ‘Mean Girls’
The clique-based high school comedy has rarely been told with the rapier wit or the surgical precision of this “tart and often charming” teen comedy from Mark Waters, directing a script adapted by Tina Fey from Rosalind Wiseman’s book “Queen Bees and Wannabes.” Fey turned Wiseman’s youth-focused self-help book into the fabulously funny story of a new girl (Lindsay Lohan) who must quickly learn how to navigate a tricky social stratum. Rachel McAdams is deliciously despicable as the most popular (and thus, the most powerful) girl in school, while the “Saturday Night Live” veterans Amy Poehler, Tim Meadows, Ana Gasteyer and Fey herself shine in supporting turns. These are the 50 best movies on Netflix.STREAMING ON NETFLIX ‘The Beast in Me’ (2025)
Claire Danes and Matthew Rhys deliver electric performances in this moody character drama about an unsolved crime that bonds two very different Long Island neighbors. Danes plays Aggie, an acclaimed author recovering from a personal tragedy, while Rhys plays Nile, a callous real estate magnate who made tabloid headlines when his wife disappeared. When Aggie decides to write about Nile, the two develop a complex working relationship, with each trying to exploit the other in order to salvage their own damaged reputations. Our critic called the show “a highly strung thriller in a New York vein — leafy suburban days, gritty construction-site nights.” Here are 30 great TV shows on Netflix.STREAMING ON HULU ‘The Host’
The Oscar-winning Bong Joon Ho (“Parasite,” “Okja”) gleefully picks up where “Godzilla” left off with this delightfully subversive riff on urban monster-movie conventions (with generous doses of environmental activism and familial melodrama thrown in for good measure). His mutant sea creature is created by the carelessness of the local government and the American military, another sharp inquiry into who the real monsters are. Bong also takes a keen interest in the human dynamics at play, and how the dysfunctional family at the story’s center comes together for a common cause. Here are Hulu’s best movies and TV shows.STREAMING ON AMAZON PRIME VIDEO ‘All Good Things’
Those who eagerly followed the twists and turns of the true crime documentary series “The Jinx” should seek out this earlier dramatization of its events from the “Jinx” director Andrew Jarecki. Ryan Gosling stars as David Marks — a fictionalized version of Robert Durst — who leaves his life of privilege to be with his wife, Katie (Kirsten Dunst), only to become a suspect in her disappearance and in an increasingly bizarre series of unsolved murders. Gosling is given a tricky task, finding the humanity in a seemingly impenetrable character who may or may not be a murderer; and Dunst makes a good match, conveying how this sincere woman could have seen that humanity — and the price she paid for it. Here are a bunch of great movies on Amazon.STREAMING ON HBO MAX ‘Happy Together’
It’s a trick of fiction, and certainly film, that doomed relationships tend to be far more romantic than happily-ever-after scenarios, but Wong Kar-wai’s “Happy Together” is the rare film where the sparks that fly between a fractious couple are swooned upon like fireworks. Tony Leung and Leslie Cheung play queer lovers who arrive in Buenos Aires from Hong Kong in search of a more fulfilling life, but the city, gorgeously rendered by the cinematographer Christopher Doyle, catalyzes the tension in their on-again/off-again relationship, which answers moments of transcendence with a suffocating pattern of codependency and betrayal. There are times when the walls of their tiny apartment seem to close in, yet Wong has a flair for capturing the elegance of Buenos Aires, and the seductive music tells a different story. Stephen Holden called the film “powerfully moody.” See more great movies streaming on HBO Max.STREAMING ON DISNEY+ ‘The Mandalorian’
Although “The Mandalorian” takes place between the events of “Return of the Jedi” and “The Force Awakens,” this thrilling sci-fi-adventure series makes a virtue of simplicity, casting off the dense mythology that has burdened the “Star Wars” brand. Most of the blessedly short episodes are about a Clint Eastwood-like bounty hunter (Pedro Pascal) and his precious charge — popularly known as Baby Yoda but officially known as the Child — who square off against various galactic beasts and cutthroats. Mike Hale called it “well paced and reasonably clever, with enough style and visual panache to keep your eyes engaged.” The 50 best things to watch on Disney+ right now.
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