See '28 Years Later' in theaters, rent 'Final Destination: Bloodlines' and 'Friendship,' stream 'A Minecraft Movie' on Max

Yahoo

4 hours ago

Hello, Yahoo Entertainment readers! Brett Arnold here, and I'm back with another edition of Trust Me, I Watch Everything.
I'm a film critic who hosts a weekly 'Siskel & Ebert'-inspired podcast called 'Roger (Ebert) & Me' covering all new releases, and this week there are tons of movies to put on your radar.
The highly anticipated sequel 28 Years Later arrives in theaters alongside the latest from Disney-Pixar in the kiddie sci-fi adventure Elio. At home, recent hits like Final Destination: Bloodlines and A24's Friendship are now available to rent. On streaming, A Minecraft Movie comes to HBO Max, and a couple indie flicks worth discussing land on Shudder and Paramount+ w/ Showtime.
Read on for all the details!
What to watch in theaters
Movies newly available to rent or buy
Movies debuting on streaming services you may already have
Movies newly available on streaming services you may already have
My recommendation:
Why you should watch it: First things first: 28 Years Later is the start of a planned trilogy, a fact you'd never know unless you're extremely plugged into reading about movies online. The sequel is already shot and has a release date — 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple is currently slated to come out January 2026, though the planned third film has not yet been produced.
The movie, disappointingly, is very much part one of three, feeling like an Act 1 more than a cohesive and fully satisfying whole. An out-of-the-blue tonal shift button at the end is the only real indicator that there's more on the way, as the story of this movie pretty much ends, and there's an extra scene that teases something entirely different to come.
There's plenty to praise here, though, despite that inherent disappointment in expecting a finished product and getting merely the start of one. The creative team behind the original film returns here, with Danny Boyle in the director's chair, Alex Garland penning the script, and cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle doing incredible work and keeping up with the digital aesthetic that became synonymous with 28 Days Later by shooting the movie on modified iPhone 15s.
The film takes place, well, 28 years after the rage virus began, and in that time the infected have evolved, but I won't spoil the sheer fun and horror of discovering these new variants. Like all good zombie flicks, it reflects the era in which it was made, and there are obvious parallels here to real-world events like Brexit, and it's hard to not think of the film as a response to the mass death we all experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic.
It's a more thoughtful and somber film than some may be expecting, lighter on zombie action than its predecessors and more focused on domestic drama and acceptance of circumstances. It's surprisingly emotionally affecting by the third act, once Ralph Fiennes, the film's MVP, enters. Alfie Williams, the film's lead — a child actor making his debut — is terrific too. Jodie Comer and Aaron Taylor-Johnson both feel more like plot conveniences than characters.
It's a shame that the movie is undercut by the 'this is the start of a trilogy' of it all, because when it works, it's damned good, and Boyle is really back in top form, a terrific showcase for his heightened, damn-near experimental style. In short, it's still good but may not be the movie audiences are expecting.
🍿 What critics are saying: Critics are big fans of it. AP's Jake Coyle writes, "Buried in here are some tender reflections on mortality and misguided exceptionalism, and even the hint of those ideas make 28 Years Later a more thoughtful movie than you're likely to find at the multiplex this time of year." William Bibbiani at TheWrap agrees, writing that "the filmmakers haven't redefined the zombie genre, but they've refocused their own culturally significant riff into a lush, fascinating epic that has way more to say about being human than it does about (re-)killing the dead."
👀 How to watch: 28 Years Later is now in theaters nationwide.
Get tickets
🤔 If that's not for you...
: The latest from Disney-Pixar arrives after a yearlong delay and a new creative team taking over the project, and the movie does show signs of tinkering. It's a story about a boy with dead parents who doesn't feel like he belongs on Earth, so he hopes to be abducted by aliens, which then happens. They mistake him for the leader of Earth, which he runs with. Despite the messiness that rears its head, mostly in the form of too many characters and subplots, it's imaginative and sweet in the way we've come to expect from Pixar, and it's fun to see the storied animation studio trafficking in sci-fi tropes that adults will recognize as references to classic films and kids will find new and exciting. It's a solid effort, but definitely not up there with the best of them. Get tickets.
:Another week, another Die Hard variant, this time it's a comedy-focused spin on the material starring Rebel Wilson, Anna Camp, Anna Chlumsky and recent Oscar winner D'Vine Joy Randolph. The premise here is 'Die Hard meets Bridesmaids,' with the action scenario unfolding at a wedding and the maid of honor being a secret agent, much to the surprise of the rest of the wedding party. It's not without a few laughs, but it's largely uninspired, and your mileage will vary depending on how funny you find Rebel Wilson. Get tickets.
You've probably heard of Marlee Matlin, the Academy Award-winning deaf actress, but you probably don't know her incredible story, and she's something of a hero to the deaf community. The movie is an informative profile of her career and activism, showing how she was instrumental in making the U.S. more inclusive of deaf people, including by starting the conversation that led to eventual congressional action that mandates all TVs and TV programming require the inclusion of closed captioning subtitling technology. That's just one example among many, and it's an honest and moving documentary, one that pairs nicely with another recent doc on Apple TV+, called Deaf President Now, which is also worth a watch if you found this compelling. Get tickets.
My recommendation:
Why you should watch it: It has been 14 years since the surprisingly good Final Destination 5, and thankfully Final Destination: Bloodlines more than makes up for lost time with what has to be the most crowd-pleasing and ambitious entry yet. This movie got a sold-out crowd to cheer the death of a child in its opening scene, which is quite an impressive feat.
It's an absolute blast, as nihilistic as it is laugh-out-loud hilarious, and finds a clever and fun way into slightly retooling its concept, which might've felt lame in any other franchise, but due to the premise, it works great here. Let me explain: In the franchise thus far, death always comes for a group of unrelated strangers after they survive some sort of freak accident, but in this entry, it's hereditary.
It takes this idea a step further by incorporating a period-set element and suggesting that not only is everybody who survived the opening incident marked for death, so are their families, since they should technically never have been born, according to "death's design," to use Final Destination parlance. That '60s-set extended opening sequence in a high-rise Seattle Space Needle-esque structure isn't just a highlight of the movie, by the way, but also one of the best of the entire series.
The bread and butter of the franchise, cruelly funny Rube Goldberg-style death sequences that have a lot of fun teasing the audience with misdirects before landing on the ultimate mode of demise, is in top form here, one-upping itself as it goes with some truly jaw-dropping set pieces. Formula can really be such a comfort, even if it's disgustingly gruesome! It also features an unexpectedly affecting send-off to the late Tony Todd, as it becomes clear that the scene was written with the knowledge that he didn't have much time left.
🍿 What critics are saying: It's the highest-rated entry in the series with 93% on Rotten Tomatoes. Radheyan Simonpillai at the Guardian raved that it 'breathes new life' into the franchise, and Jacob Oller at the AV Club says it 'honors a legacy of unrepentant silliness and gleeful gore with a knowing wink.'
👀 How to watch: Final Destination: Bloodlines is now available to rent or purchase on digital and on-demand.
Rent or buy 'Final Destination: Bloodlines'
➕ Bonus recommendation:
Why you should watch it: The comedy of Tim Robinson is definitely not for everyone, but those that do appreciate his sense of humor rabidly anticipate his work, and his beloved Netflix sketch comedy series I Think You Should Leave has become something of an obsession for its devotees. If you've ever watched that show and wondered, 'Could one of these deranged characters ever anchor a feature-length film?" we now have an answer, and it's, quite surprisingly, a yes.
Everybody's comparing Friendship to I Love You, Man, which makes sense given the premise and the fact that Paul Rudd costars in both, but a better point of comparison might be The Cable Guy. It's about a suburban dad (Robinson) with an unsatisfied wife (Kata Mara) and a kid who thinks he's a loser befriending his super cool neighbor (Rudd) and becoming a little too into him, alienating him and his other pals along the way.
It's funny throughout if you find Robinson's antics amusing and likely aggravating if you don't. It also features probably the funniest drug trip sequence of all time, a wonderful subversion of the comedy trope.
🍿 What critics are saying: Critics love it, with 88% on Rotten Tomatoes; Chase Hutchinson at TheWrap goes so far as calling it 'the year's best comedy.' Robinson's brand of humor, though, is definitely divisive, with Time's Stephanie Zacharek aptly summarizing the average nonbeliever view: 'How much Tim Robinson is too much? Maybe the exact amount you get in Friendship.'
👀 How to watch: Friendship is now available to rent or purchase on digital and on-demand.
Rent or buy 'Friendship'
🤔 If those aren't for you...
When Die Hard came out in 1988, it set the template for the next decade of action movies. For a while, every flick in that genre could easily be described as 'Die Hard on a ...' John Wick is the modern Die Hard in that sense, and damn near every action flick since has the 'John Wick on a ...' or 'John Wick but ...' feel, and Fight or Flight is no exception. Delightfully, though, it is 'John Wick, but specifically that one part where every hitman is out to get him, on a plane,' which rocks. Josh Hartnett continues his recent resurgence, and he appears to be doing his own stunts here, which adds a lot to the very well-choreographed close-quarters combat. It's a silly movie that knows it, and it has a lot of fun getting as bloody as possible. Now available to rent or buy.
A good old-fashioned horror flick — no irony to be found here, just pure commitment to its own spooky aesthetic — that mashes up A Nightmare on Elm Street with a more generic supernatural 'urban legend' flick. It's a cheap indie, but it has a great creature design, the backstory they've come up with is compelling, and there are several unsettling images throughout. It's solid!Now available to rent or buy.
A horror-comedy mockumentary that essentially plays like, 'What if The Blair Witch Project was about bigfoot, and it was funny?' It's no Christopher Guest film, but it's funnier than you'd expect from a fairly tired premise, with just enough hilarious jokes thrown in to make up for the familiar stuff. Now available to rent or buy.
Ethan Embry stars in this strange and hard-to-classify horror-adjacent movie that plays around in a few too many genres and never really finds control of its tone. After a violent animal attack, paranoia spreads through Spiral Creek. But when Deputy Ren Accord gets too close, his son vanishes, and reality begins to fracture. It's a compelling journey until the third act, where it peters out. Now available to rent or buy.
My recommendation:
Why you should watch it: This documentary about astronaut Sally Ride delves into an aspect of her life that was once hidden from public view. It's about Sally Ride's life with Tam O'Shaughnessy, her life partner of 27 years whose existence was only made known after Ride's death from cancer in 2012. The dramatizations of their relationship that occur in the film feel a bit off, but once you realize they're doing it because there's no documented evidence of their relationship, the tactic hits home. It's an enlightening doc about a fascinating subject.
🍿 What critics are saying: Lisa Kennedy at Variety notes that the film is "a consequential work because of her insights," referring to O'Shaughnessy, adding that "her candor here marries a spectacular professional saga with the personal love story convincingly." Caryn James at the Hollywood Reporter sums it up well here: "Sally stands perfectly well without any fussy touches, as an important addition to the record of what we know about a pioneering cultural figure — in all her complexity, ambition and guardedness."
.👀 How to watch: Sally is now streaming on Hulu.
Stream 'Sally'
My recommendation:
Why you should maybe watch it: I am not the target demographic for A Minecraft Movie. As such, I did not enjoy it, despite appreciating how much personality director Jared Hess, the man behind the cultural phenomenon that was Napoleon Dynamite and also the less successful Nacho Libre, manages to sneak into it.
It absolutely feels like a movie made by the guy who made those, and that's fun, but there's just something ironic to the idea of making a movie about the power of creativity and imagination that's indistinguishable from similar formulaic fare about characters chasing a glowing orb. All you need to make a mega-budget movie these days is Jack Black and a green screen!
Despite feeling this way, I must acknowledge the movie is a colossal hit and that kids are going absolutely feral for it, so if you managed to avoid taking your children to a 'chicken jockey' screening, renting or buying it at home may be the most cost-effective way to endure it.
🍿 What critics are saying: It's no surprise that critics felt similarly, with a 48% 'rotten' designation on Rotten Tomatoes — again, this is a movie for children, not critics. I echo the sentiment of the Atlantic's David Sims, who agreed it's good that kids are going to movie theaters, even if 'the film occasionally made me want to pop an Advil.' Mark Kennedy at the Associated Press, however, liked it and praised Jason Momoa's performance in particular.
.👀 How to watch: A Minecraft Movie is now streaming on HBO Max.
Stream 'A Minecraft Movie'
🤔 If that's not for you...
Musician turned filmmaker Flying Lotus directed this derivative sci-fi horror flick that's all style over substance. If you've seen genre classics like The Thing, Alien or Solaris, or even something like Event Horizon, you've seen this movie, which plays like a mash-up of all of those films and more. It never transcends the fact that it's a love letter to other films to become its own movie, even if it has some striking visuals. Starring Eiza Gonzáles and Aaron Paul. Now streaming on Shudder.
Love Me couldn't be stranger — it's a love story set in a post-apocalyptic, human-free future, between a buoy and a satellite. The story spans billions of years as they learn what life was like on Earth, and the two sentient beings discover themselves and what it means to be alive and in love. It's easier to watch than it is to explain, and it stars Kirsten Stewart and Steven Yuen. Now streaming on Paramount+ w/ Showtime.
That's all for this week — see you next Friday at the movies! For a look back at picks from previous weeks, see below.