Welcome back to FlixWorthy, your weekly guide to Netflix streaming. Yet again we're bringing you a handful of new or notable selections from Netflix's streaming catalogue. Some will be classics, some will be little-seen gems, some will be shows you might have missed, and some...some will be crap so awful they simply has to be seen to be believed. Here's what's FlixWorthy this week, kids.
(1954, Not Rated, 98 min.)
The old lizard's had a good run these past five decades. Sure, it kind of sucks if you're a Tokyo property owner, but assuming you're not directly in the stomping path, you can't beat the entertainment value of setting up the grill, pulling up a few lawn chairs, and watching Godzilla beat the crap out of Mothra for the thirty-seventh time. Word just broke last week that Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures are planning yet another big-budget outing for G-man (which we can only hope will be better than the 1998 Roland Emmerich abortion), but it all started here: the original, Japanese-language film Gojira, in all its rubber-suited grandeur. By most accounts this version is far superior to the Americanized version that was released as Godzilla: King of the Monsters, but if you're averse to subtitles or have an unhealthy craving for Raymond Burr, you can forego the streaming and track down the Collector's Edition DVD release, which includes both versions.
Double-Feature It With...
(2002, Rated PG-13, 102 min.)
Sure, there are plenty of other Godzilla flicks available instantly from Netflix, and you could certainly go the obvious route with one of those. But sometimes you just have to sit back and appreciate the Russian roulette nature of Netflix's "More Like This" function. Fan of classic Japanese monster movies? Why not watch Matthew McConaughey and Christian Bale fight post-apocalyptic fire-breathing dragons while sporting awesome facial hair?
(2006, Not Rated, 90 min.)
Anyone who pays attention to movie ratings has had at least one moment where they were well and truly baffled by the MPAA. Why does one utterance of this profanity merit an R, but a half-dozen of another skate with a PG-13? Why are cinematic simulations of violence and death deemed suitable for younger viewers, while the nude human form must be hidden from impressionable eyes? With This Film Is Not Yet Rated, documentary filmmaker Kirby Dick sets out to make sense of the Motion Picture Association of America's process of rating films. Expect plenty of politics and shady dealings alongside interviews with the likes of John Waters, Darren Aronofsky, Kevin Smith, and more. What's not to love about a documentary about movie ratings that initially got slapped with an NC-17 by the very organization it was critiquing?
Double-Feature It With...
Sick: The Life and Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist
(1997, Unrated, 92 min.)
If you like the cut of Kirby Dick's jib, several more of his documentaries are streaming on Netflix, including Derrida, Chain Camera, and The Story of a Sex Surrogate. Not being familiar with his work myself, this catchily titled flick caught my eye. Dick turns his documentarian's eye on the life of a performance artist who struggled to overcome cystic fibrosis by inflicting pain on himself.
(2003, Rated R, 92 min.)
Elvis didn't die. After having switched identities with an Elvis impersonator in the 1970s, the King (Bruce Campbell) has lived a quiet life during the intervening years, finally winding up in an East Texas nursing home. He's the only one who knows the truth, he's got an unseemly growth on his pecker, and his only friend is a black man who claims to be President John F. Kennedy (they dyed him after the assassination attempt). But despite all the years out of the spotlight, it seems Elvis isn't destined to just fade away in anonymity. You see, there's a mummy sucking the souls out of the nursing home's residents, and it's up to Elvis and Jack (Ossie Davis, in one of his last roles) to put a stop to it. If there was ever a role Bruce Campbell was born to play -- aside from Ash, that is -- it's a cranky, mummy-slaying elderly Elvis, and he doesn't disappoint in the role. He's got great chemistry with Davis, and writer-director Jon Coscarelli wrings every bit of humor out of the Joe Lansdale short story on which the movie is based. You'll never watch a better movie about old Elvis teaming up with black Jack Kennedy to kill a mummy.
Double-Feature It With:
(1979, Rated R, 87 min.)
As far as icons of horror go, Phantasm's Tall Man might not be as well known as Freddy, Jason, or Michael, but the flying spike balls are impossible to forget. Don Coscarelli's horror cult classic spawned numerous sequels over the years, like seemingly every other horror film created during the '80s, and there was buzz about a potential remake floating around a few years back. Good luck finding somebody who can out-Angus Scrimm Angus Scrimm, guys.
(1983, Not Rated, 196 min.)
All four seasons and a Christmas special are available streaming on Netflix, so consider this a blanket recommendation for the whole shebang. Alongside Fawlty Towers, Black Adder is one of the seminal British sitcoms that everybody should watch, whether they like British comedies or not. Rowan Atkinson plays various descendents of the Blackadder family line, whose fortunes rise and fall throughout the course of British history, but whose wit never dulls. Season one casts Atkinson as the cowardly and conniving Duke Edmund of Edinburgh during the Dark Ages and introduces sidekick Baldrick (Tony Robinson), whose good-natured idiocy is one of the show's constants in every timeline. The first year has plenty of hilarious moments, but the show doesn't truly find its stride until the second season, which leaps forward to the Elizabethan era. Richard Curtis and Rowan Atkinson fill every Blackadder's mouth with acrobatic dialogue tinged with venom, and the various Blackadders' insults of the various Baldricks over the years are justifiably legendary.
Double-Feature It With:
(2000, TV-14, 175 min.)
Steven Moffat's star is on the rise these days, with his tenure in charge of Doctor Who's latest regeneration just having launched over in the U.K. Before he was piloting the TARDIS, however, Moffat was creating this Friends-style sitcom...which happens to be funnier than Friends ever was. Don't judge it by the godawful American remake pilot; it's much closer to a dirtier version of How I Met Your Mother, except without the frame story.
(2009, PG-13, 88 min.)
Charlyne Yi's semi-documentary was nominated for a Grand Jury Prize at Sundance in 2009, which is as encouraging a start as a little indie movie could hope for. Short of, you know, actually winning the Grand Jury Prize. Co-writer/actor Charlyne Yi plays herself -- sort of -- a romantic skeptic who starts dating actor Michael Cera, playing himself -- sort of -- and begins questioning the nature of love. The flick earned a so-so critical reception, rating 52% fresh amongst top critics on RottenTomatoes, but our own Katey Rich liked it enough to give it three and a half stars. If you've seen Yi's bit parts in Knocked Up and Semi-Pro, the biggest question this film raises is whether the awkwardness and quirkiness between her and Cera will actually approach lethal levels by the end of the 88-minute runtime.
Double-Feature It With:
(2008, PG-13, 80 min.)
One little-seen indie comedy starring alumni from Arrested Development deserves another. Cera's incestual crush object Alia Shawkat stars alongside Steven Kaplan and William H. Macy in the story of an awkward teen desperate to find a date to the prom after he learns that his school's most nerdy nerd, the Bart of the title, not only has a date, but a hotel room for the "after party" as well.
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