Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
The end of August can be a bittersweet time for everyone. It means that the days of sweltering heat, sticky humidity and mosquito bites are coming to a close, but also that the warm weather is leaving and the school year is starting again. We urge you not to dwell on the negative because the start of a new month also means your favorite VOD service is about to drop a heap of brand-new movies for you to discover! So cheer up, because your weekends of relaxation and escape aren’t going anywhere. And whether you use Amazon Video, iTunes, Vudu or your cable’s on demand service, there are a variety of new releases coming out for you to enjoy.
This week’s theme is all about revivals. If you’re a Disney fan or just a normal human being with a heart and soul, then you surely watched Aladdin repeatedly as a child. So hang on to your magic carpet, folks, because the live-action remake of everyone’s favorite film is now available on demand. The 2019 remake breathes new life into the classic film, and Will Smith as the Genie is a match made in heaven! Also, for those Apocalypse Now fans, director Francis Ford Coppola is releasing Apocalypse Now: Final Cut in honor of the movie’s 40th anniversary. Longer than the original but shorter than the redux and fully restored and enhanced with the latest in audiovisual technology, Apocalypse Now: Final Cut is the version that Coppola believes to be the best of them all. And if you’ve been waiting to rent the biopic Rocketman before watching Taron Egerton don glittery suits as Elton John, then your wait is over!
Want to know what else is out there? Check out what other dramas, mysteries and romance movies you can buy or rent this week.
Aladdin
No need to rub any lamps because your wish came true: Aladdin is finally available to buy on demand! Starring Will Smith as the affable Genie, Aladdin tells the story of our favorite street rat—do we really need to tell you the plot of this movie? We hope not!— and his quest to change his identity to marry the woman he loves. But while this live-action remake of the Disney classic adheres to the major themes of the original story, director Guy Richie added a few modern twists to the tale: Genie falls in love with Jasmine’s handmaiden, Dalia, Jafar is a misogynist rather than a pseudo-pedophile and Jasmine is a strong woman who wants to be Sultan in her own right— did anybody else get the chills when Naomi Scott belted the new song “Speechless?” But not to worry, the original Academy-Award winning soundtrack is well preserved and even given a new kick thanks to the musical talents of Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (La La Land, The Greatest Showman)! So grab on to your magic carpet and get ready to fall in love again with Aladdin, now available to buy on iTunes.
Apocalypse Now: Final Cut
This year marks the 40th anniversary of the release of Apocalypse Now, one of the greatest and most significant films to be released in our time. In honor of this momentous year, genius director Francis Ford Coppola decided to release Apocalypse Now: Final Cut, which Coppola believes is the best version of the movie (versus the original and the redux version which included an extra 49 minutes of unseen footage). For those who have not seen the movie before, Apocalypse Now is an epic film about the Vietnam War and the soldiers who experienced it. It follows Captain Benjamin Willard (Martin Sheen)as he embarks on a river journey from South Vietnam to Cambodia to “terminate with extreme prejudice” a rogue U.S. Army Special Forces Colonel (Marlon Brando). This gritty, intense and horrifying film works to depict a brutally-honest picture of what soldiers experienced during the Vietnam War, and succeeded in doing so with flying colors. Apocalypse Now is considered one of the greatest films of all time, yet Apocalypse Now: Final Cut is the version that Coppola “recommends to you as his favorite,” then it is sure to be a movie we cannot afford to miss.
[Where to stream Apocalypse Now: Final Cut]
To Buy:
Aladdin
Itsy Bitsy
Share
Vicious
The Fanatic
Apocalypse Now: Final Cut
Leto
To Rent:
Godzilla: King of the Monsters
The Secret Life of Pets 2
Light of My Life
Rocketman
Killers Anonymous
Stuck
5B
The Creatress
Ladyworld
$0.99 iTunes Movie Rental
Veronica Mars
After 12 years of abandonment, the TV series Veronica Mars is back. But before you jump into Season 4 of what was one of the most highly-anticipated streaming releases this summer, it would make sense to go back to where it all started, right? You can watch the first three seasons of the cult-favorite series on Hulu, but you should not stop there if you want to be completely caught up because the new season picks back up five years after Veronica Mars, the movie. The film takes place seven years after the events of the series’s third season, and much has changed: teenage sleuth Veronica Mars (Kristen Bell) has grown up and made a new life for herself as a lawyer in New York City. But when her ex-boyfriend, Logan Echolls, is accused of murdering his pop star girlfriend and fellow Neptune High alum, Mars returns to her hometown to help him find a good lawyer. In true Veronica Mars fashion, nothing is ever as it originally seems, and Mars is soon sucked back into the investigative world to find out the truth.
