The best movies new to Netflix, HBO Max, and Amazon Prime (January 2023)

Pleased new 12 months, Polygon readers!

We’re excited to be again within the swing of issues after the vacations and able to share with you the perfect motion pictures now out there to stream on Netflix, HBO Max, Prime Video, Shudder, and Hulu. Our record this month consists of Andrzej Żuławski’s 1981 cult basic horror movie Possession starring Sam Neill and Isabelle Adjani, 2004’s The Aviator starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Kathryn Bigelow’s 1995 cyberpunk thriller Unusual Days, and extra. Right here’s what to observe this month based mostly on all the pieces new throughout the platforms:

Editor’s decide

Possession on Shudder

Picture: Gaumont/Anchor Bay Leisure

Style: Psychological horror
12 months: 1981
Run time: 2h 4m
Director: Andrzej Żuławski
Forged: Isabelle Adjani, Sam Neill, Heinz Bennent

Exterior of essentially the most ardent of cinephile circles, Andrzej Żuławski isn’t a reputation that evokes enthusiastic recognition in the US. Identified for his transgressive model of arthouse cinema, Żuławski’s profession was stymied by Communist authorities in his homeland of Poland, with lots of his early movies being both closely censored, banned, or in a single occasion, practically destroyed upon launch. It additionally doesn’t assist that the few movies of his which were launched within the States have since gone out of print — although that seems to be altering quickly.

For those who do know Żuławski’s title, it’s probably for his 1981 psychological horror movie Possession, a movie whose cult standing amongst horror connoisseurs has solely been amplified within the many years since its launch by its problem to acquire on bodily media, not to mention to view on-line. Fortuitously for everybody, that’s not the case — Possession is now lastly out there to stream courtesy of Shudder.

Set in Chilly Struggle-era West Berlin, Żuławski’s movie stars Jurassic Park’s Sam Neill as Mark, a Russian spy who returns dwelling to search out that his spouse, Anna (Isabelle Adjani), has left him and desires a divorce. When Anna refuses to expose why, solely saying that she has not left him for another person, Mark grows suspicious and has her tailed. What he finally discovers is a horrifying secret past his comprehension, one which awakens a long-dormant wellspring of hysteria, resentment, and despair between the 2 that threatens to tear aside not solely their small household, however their very sanity as nicely.

Impressed by Żuławski’s personal tumultuous divorce in 1976 and his subsequent struggles with suicidal ideation, Possession blurs the road between the autobiographical and the phantasmagorical, with hysterical performances by Neill and Adjani that vacillate between disturbing, comical, and disquietingly sympathetic. An inspiration for all the pieces from Ari Aster’s Midsommar to the 2016 music video for Huge Assault’s “Voodoo in My Blood,” Possession is a vital must-watch for any critical horror fan. —Toussaint Egan

Possession is offered to stream on Shudder.

New on Netflix

The Aviator

Picture: Warner Bros. Video

Style: Biographical drama
12 months: 2004
Run time: 2h 50m
Director: Martin Scorsese
Forged: Leonardo DiCaprio, Cate Blanchett, Kate Beckinsale

Martin Scorsese’s 2004 biopic on the lifetime of eccentric aviation mogul Howard Hughes is likely one of the finest motion pictures to land on Netflix this month. A lot so, we made it our editor’s decide for the platform this week! Leonardo DiCaprio delivers a fascinating efficiency as Hughes, one which marries the person’s legendary public repute for bravado and outrageous enterprise selections together with his private struggles with undiagnosed obsessive-compulsive dysfunction and hypochondria. It’s a wide ranging movie, each within the scale of its story and the beautiful craft evident in its majestic manufacturing. —TE

The Aviator is offered to stream on Netflix.

The Raid 2

Picture: Sony Footage House Leisure

Style: Motion/thriller
12 months: 2014
Run time: 2h 30m
Director: Gareth Evans
Forged: Iko Uwais, Arifin Putra, Oka Antara

The follow-up to the 2011 smash (and we do imply smash) hit The Raid, Gareth Evans’ 2014 sequel packs a heavy punch as nicely (and a few hammers). Set simply after the occasions of the primary film, Rama (Iko Uwais, reprising his lead position) is shipped undercover to reveal corruption in Jakarta’s police. This includes getting himself despatched to jail, surviving a jail riot, and ingratiating himself with members of the Jakarta underworld. Full of high-octane motion sequences, loads of gore, and jaw-dropping shows of the Indonesian martial artwork pencak silat, followers of The Raid also needs to try the ante-upping sequel. —Pete Volk

The Raid 2 is offered to stream on Netflix.

New on HBO Max

Unusual Days

Picture: twentieth Century Fox House Leisure

Style: Sci-fi/thriller
12 months: 1995
Run time: 2h 25m
Director: Kathryn Bigelow
Forged: Ralph Fiennes, Angela Bassett, Juliette Lewis

Like Żuławski’s aforementioned Possession, Kathryn Bigelow’s 1995 cyberpunk movie starring Ralph Fiennes and Angela Bassett is one other cult basic whose repute is outlined in no small half by its relative inaccessibility to observe on-line. That too has modified, nevertheless, as HBO Max has not too long ago added the film to the service, and in HD no much less.

Set in a futuristic Los Angeles simply two days earlier than the top of the twentieth century, Unusual Days follows Lenny Nero (Fiennes), a black-market dealer dealing in a bootleg know-how that permits the person to document their very own reminiscences and bodily sensations and expertise them after the very fact. When Lenny comes throughout a recording that threatens to implicate the LAPD in a high-profile homicide, he’s pressured to show to his outdated good friend Lornette “Mace” Mason (Bassett) as a way to uncover the origins behind the recording whereas staying one step forward of a mysterious killer that wishes him useless.

Conceived by producer James Cameron and impressed by the 1992 LA riots that erupted within the wake of the notorious Rodney King trial, Unusual Days is a pitch-black sci-fi thriller that touches on institutional racism, voyeurism, societal collapse, and sexual violence, the latter of which is concentrated totally on girls and Black individuals. It’s a tough watch — however however a worthwhile one which rewards its viewers with a trio of terrific performances and a strikingly unique imaginative and prescient of a bygone alternate future. —TE

Unusual Days is offered to stream on HBO Max.

New on Hulu

Professor Marston and the Surprise Girls

Picture: Sony Footage Leisure

Style: Biographical drama
12 months: 2017
Run time: 1h 48m
Director: Angela Robinson
Forged: Luke Evans, Rebecca Corridor, Bella Heathcote

You might be accustomed to the story of the DC Comics superhero Surprise Girl, often known as Princess Diana of Themyscira. However are you aware the real-life origins behind of the leotard-clad, tiara-wearing, and golden-lasso-wielding demigoddess? Angela Robinson’s 2017 biographical drama follows the story of William Moulton Marston (Luke Evans), the psychologist turned comedian creator behind the creation of Surprise Girl, whose polyamorous relationship between his spouse, Elizabeth (Rebecca Corridor), and his mistress, Olive (Bella Heathcote), served because the inspiration behind the character’s earliest adventures and depiction. Professor Marston and the Surprise Girls is an enchanting movie, not only for its recounting of a unprecedented real-life story, however for its delicate and sympathetic depiction of a dedicated polyamorous couple and the BDSM neighborhood at giant. You’ll by no means have a look at the character of Surprise Girl the identical method once more after watching this, and I imply that emphatically as a praise. —TE

Professor Marston and the Surprise Girls is offered to stream on Hulu.

New on Amazon Prime Video

The Indiana Jones sequence

Picture: Paramount Footage/Lucasfilm

Style: Motion/journey
12 months: 1981 (Raiders of the Misplaced Ark); 1984 (Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom); 1989 (Indiana Jones and the Final Campaign); 2008 (Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Cranium)
Run time: 1h 55m (Raiders of the Misplaced Ark); 1h 58m (Temple of Doom); 2h 7m (Final Campaign); 2h 2m (Kingdom of the Crystal Cranium)
Director: Steven Spielberg
Forged: Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, Paul Freeman

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Future, the fifth entry within the iconic action-adventure sequence and the primary since 2008’s Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Cranium, is ready to reach in theaters this June. What higher time to reacquaint or familiarize your self with the intrepid death-defying exploits of Dr. Henry Walton “Indiana” Jones Jr.? Your entire sequence has been added to Prime Video this month, and you actually can’t go unsuitable with watching all of them (sure— that features Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Cranium). The primary movie, Raiders of the Misplaced Ark, is an undisputed basic and requisite look ahead to anybody who loves globetrotting adventures and watching Nazis get punched into aircraft propellers. Nonetheless, I really feel particularly compelled to suggest 1989’s Indiana Jones and the Final Campaign, which sees sequence star Harrison Ford group up alongside Sean Connery as an estranged father-son duo embarking on a race to search out the Holy Grail and stop an unscrupulous businessman allied with the Nazis from reaching immortality. —TE

The Indiana Jones sequence is offered to stream on Prime Video.

The most effective of the remainder

The Day After Trinity

Picture: PBS/The Criterion Assortment

Style: Documentary
12 months: 1981
Run time: 1h 28m
Director: Jon Else

Christopher Nolan returns this July with Oppenheimer, a biographical drama based mostly on the lifetime of theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer starring Cillian Murphy. For those who, like us, are ready with bated breath for Nolan’s newest, you could be curious sufficient to brush up on the historical past of Oppenheimer’s key position because the “father of the atomic bomb.” Fortunately for you, the 1981 documentary The Day After Trinity has been added to streaming. Else’s movie charts Oppenheimer’s life from his days as a schoolboy as much as the creation of what would concurrently change into his best contribution to human historical past and his deepest life-defining remorse. —TE

The Day After Trinity is offered to stream on Criterion Channel.