Read more about every movie coming to Hulu in August 2023
Read more about every movie coming to Max in August 2023
Prime Videois honestly the streaming platform to be on these days. Every month, they just absolutely kill it. So much as you might dislike Bezos, his streaming service has an excellent selection. Now if they could release a season ofInvinciblemore than every ten years, you wouldn’t need another streaming platform.
Talking about movies, though, they really outdid themselves this month with plenty of fantastic titles. Just take a look.
Amadeus (Aug. 1)
A true masterpiece in every sense. Yes, it is long, but it is one of the best movies you’ll ever witness. An epic film about the life and times of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart told through the eyes of his embittered and resentful competitor, Antonio Salieri.
To him, Mozart is nothing but a frat boy, and Tom Hulce’s characterization as a rude and irreverent man with a laugh that will haunt your dreams is spot on.It’s a historical fiction that takes liberties, but it’s exceptionally fun to imagine a man trying to sabotage Mozart’s career at every turn, only to see his works rise above all others to the point that everyone knows his music in this day and age. The costumes, the music accompanying all the operas, the powdered wigs, and the madness; you need to sit down accompanied by a glass of wine for this one.
Galaxy Quest (Aug. 1)
Think parody of Star Trek, and you’re already in the right ballpark for what to expect. It’s a comedy with a sci-fi flair, but you may still enjoy it without that prior knowledge. The basic pitch is that the cast of everyone’s favorite sci-fi series, “Galaxy Quest,” is living off the revenue from the cons that keep them relevant about 20 years after the show has ended.
Everything comes to a halt, though, when they get abducted by aliens who need them to actually save their planet, mistaking their TV show for “historical documents.” It’s a pretty perfect comedythat’s even getting a miniseriesin the future. Everyone in this movie is cast perfectly, with Tim Allen doing his best Buzz Lightyear, Sigourney Weaver suffering through a character who’s relegated to eye candy,and Alan Rickman living his life as if he never made it big as an actor.
Related:Tron 3: Plot, Cast, and Everything Else We Know
Punisher War Zone (Aug. 1)
Criminally underrated. Everyone panned this movie upon release, but it could very well have kicked off the John Wick universe. It’s the closest to the comic books that the Punisher ever gets. He doesn’t sit around scheming, and he doesn’t brood; he just kills people. For two hours, he whacks thugs left and right with zero remorse. Lacking a bit in the personalization department, sure, but this gets closest to how the Punisher operates, where everything else is a distraction to his dedication to murdering bad guys to get where he needs to.
Oh yeah, and the 2004Punisheris also coming to Prime Video if you don’t want to watch him kick ass for two straight hours. They’reboth great films, though, in different ways, as Thomas Jane’s Punisher has more heart and character moments but fewer brutal action sequences.
Of all the 2D animated films of the early 2000s that came, went, and lost a whole boatload of money, this is the best. A commercial failure for Dreamworks, they got saved by Shrek for the next few years. This film, though, stars Kenneth Branagh and Kevin Kline voicing two scoundrels trying to find the city of gold in the New World.
The banter between the two is hilarious due most likely to the fact that Kline and Branagh actually had the very unusual situation of being able to record their lines right next to each other. It certainly makes for a dozen or more memorable lines for the film.
It also features the best effort Elton John has ever put forth on a movie soundtrack, period. ButLion King,you say! Watch this one and see if you still feel that way with total certainty after ‘Friends Never Say Goodbye’ has finished. The songs are bright, emotional, and have a tendency to relentlessly get stuck in your head. Wrapped all up in a beautifully detailed world brought to life by some extremely talented people.
Related:Is the Barbie movie for adults?
When Harry Met Sally (Aug. 1)
The perfect balance of sweet to salty on this one, with genuinely touching moments as well as some hilariously down-to-earth moments to round it out. On the one hand, you have the bubbly optimistic Meg Ryan, while on the other, you have the pessimist Billy Crystal.
Your classic opposites attract plot starts to play out over the course of 12 years, with them gradually growing to like each other slightly more. It stands on its ownwhere rom-coms are concernedand isn’t afraid to be irreverent at the same time.
The Saw Anthology (Aug. 1)
That’s six of them. All the best ones, really. Now the Saw movies have quite the reputation as pointless torture with no real stakes other than watching people get gored. The truth could not be further here when the series starts. Sure, bySaw 3Dit descends into that, butin the beginning, they weren’t super bloody, relied on smart writing, clever traps, and asking the important questions like, do I cut open some guy’s stomach to grab the key to my trap?
These are fun movies, though, if you are a fan of horror. They feature what is perhaps the greatest element in movies of the genre, creativity. Reverse bear traps, deadly nerve agents, trick furnaces, there’s something new with each edition, and behind it is the genius Jigsaw. It’s rare you get sucha compelling villainto back up a series like this, where most of them just don’t even talk.
