Dracula, The Outpost, and the best things we watched this weekend

What did the Polygon employees spend their weekend watching? Whether or not it’s the most recent virally widespread Netflix sequence, discovering an animated gem, or educating ourselves in older style classics, most of us discover one thing price recommending earlier than we head again to work.

And as ordinary, the solutions vary extensively, as some individuals try what’s new and widespread on streaming providers, and a few return to previous favorites. So right here’s what we’re watching proper now, and what you may take pleasure in watching as properly. Head to the feedback to drop in your individual suggestions.

Bram Stoker’s Dracula

Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 adaptation of Dracula completely slaps. It stars ’90s heartthrobs Keanu Reeves and Winona Ryder because the novel’s protagonist Jonathan Harker and his bride-to-be Mina, in addition to legends like Gary Oldman as Dracula, Anthony Hopkins as Professor Van Helsing, Richard E. Grant as Physician Jack Seward, and Tom freakin’ Waits because the mad minion Renfield.

Coppola’s course is steel as hell. The opening scene sees Depend Dracula plunging his sword right into a stone cross that cracks and begins filling the room with blood. Coppola was impressed by the silent movie period and wished all of his results to be sensible — he even informed EW that he fired his VFX workforce after they informed him it couldn’t be performed and employed his son, Roman, who was “an fanatic about magic.” Problematic nepotism apart, the impact labored. Bram Stoker’s Dracula has a uniquely goth visible fashion. (In that very same interview he known as Keanu Reeves “a prince,” which is categorically appropriate.) —Emily Heller

Bram Stoker’s Dracula is on the market to lease on Amazon, Vudu, and Apple.

Moonstruck

[Loud, completely off-key voice you only get from staying inside for seven months] WHEN THE MOON HITS YOUR EYES LIKE A BIG PIZZA PIE, THAT’S AMOOOOOOORE!!!!!

Moonstruck is thought to be one of many nice romantic comedies of all time, however mio dio, it’s actually the antidote to dangerous vibes. Written by acclaimed New Yawk playwright John Patrick Shanley, the movie stars Cher as Loretta Castorini, a widow hoping to lastly land a husband and a gentle life. However when Johnny (Danny Aiello), the person she settles for, jets off to Sicily to take care of his dying mom, she meets his brother Ronny (Nicolas Cage), a greasy 23-year-old who falls head over heels in love along with her at first sight. The emotions are reciprocated, and out of the blue the lady who by no means thought she’d love once more is caught in a romantic quagmire.

Shanley’s film is like My Huge Fats Greek Wedding ceremony with fewer jokey jokes and deeper characters. Although it’s one in every of his earliest performances, Cage slices off kilos of prosciutto in each scene — it’s simply whacked. Cher is the alternative: grounded, fierce, however weak (it’s no shock she received the Oscar in 1988). Director Norman Jewison (Fiddler on the Roof, Rollerball) surrounds the pair with a solid of professionals, together with the regal Olympia Dukakis as Loretta’s mom, Vincent Gardenia because the bozo dad, and Frasier’s John Mahoney in a small however key position enjoying the quintessential, pathetic womanizer. A lot of the film takes place in Brooklyn Heights throughout winter, and in case you’ve ever clocked time strolling New York streets via a bitter freeze or ducked right into a family-run Italian joint for refuge, pasta, and a stiff drink, the film will transport you. It’s alive sufficient that it could work even in case you don’t have the reminiscences. —Matt Patches

Moonstruck is on the market to lease on Amazon, and is coming to the Criterion Assortment in November.

The Outpost

I’m a sucker for an excellent battle film, even those that harm … and The Outpost harm fairly a bit. It’s largely a narrative of our army being supremely negligent, and the troubled younger males who finally paid for its errors. However the meat of the movie — the frilly engagement referred to as the Battle of Kamdesh, ain’t half dangerous.

A troubled manufacturing (the director’s son handed part-way via), it feels rather a lot like two movies spliced collectively. The again half is rather a lot higher than the primary, particularly because it doesn’t embrace any of Orlando Bloom’s preposterous Southern drawl. However even that portion of the movie feels rushed — particularly the CGI particular results. I’d suggest watching it the entire method via, simply to get a sense for what we ask our armed service members to do after they go off to battle.

I can’t say sufficient in regards to the efficiency of Caleb Landry Jones (Three Billboards Outdoors Ebbing, Missouri), who offers its sprawling solid an emotional centerline. His efficiency is almost undone nonetheless by Scott Eastwood (The Destiny of the Livid, Pacific Rim: Rebellion), whose try to be Mormon Captain America falls flat.

Earlier than you watch this film, do your self a favor and watch the 2 episodes of Netflix’s Medal of Honor that it offers with. Mixed, episodes 2 (Clint Romesha) and eight (Ty M. Carter) provide first-person interviews with the troopers who had been truly there and gives a greater framework for understanding the battle scenes, which at instances endure from directorial tunnel imaginative and prescient.

Whenever you’re completed, return and watch Restrepo once more. And don’t overlook to vote. —Charlie Corridor

The Outpost and Medal of Honor are each streaming on Netflix. Restrepo is on the market via Amazon.

PEN15

I assumed it could take some convincing to get my spouse to observe PEN15 with me: She doesn’t do properly with cringe-fests, and once I talked about that the sequence was executive-produced by The Lonely Island, she stated, “You already know that’s not a promoting level for me.” (I did know that.) In actuality, all it took was the trailer, through which the present’s inherently humorous, novel conceit — early-30s co-creators Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle enjoying their middle-school-aged selves, the characters Maya Ishii-Peters and Anna Kone, with no de-aging — is on full show.

The trailer additionally comprises an instant-classic line spoken by Anna to Maya: “You might be my precise rainbow gel pen in a sea of blue and black writing utensils.” PEN15 is a pitch-perfect nostalgia journey for Outdated Millennials like us, with its dial-up modems, bubblegum pop, and frosted lip gloss. (Actually, my spouse, similar to Maya and Anna, began seventh grade within the yr 2000.) And naturally, it may be completely devastating when it illustrates simply how a lot hasn’t modified over the previous twenty years, like women being labeled “slutbags” whereas boys are known as “gamers.”

However the present’s beating coronary heart is the friendship between the 2 women, who’re at that fraught age the place every thing’s altering and every new growth is a life-or-death second and BFFLs may not truly find yourself being, y’know, BFFLs. It’s via the ups and downs of that relationship that PEN15 affords a refreshingly sincere and honest portrayal of center college. —Samit Sarkar

PEN15’s second season premiered on Sept. 18; each seasons can be found to stream on Hulu.

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