The Best R Movies to Watch on Netflix (Page 2)

Adam Sandler rarely plays a role straight, but when he does, you know it’s good. In Hustle, Sandler is Stanley Sugarman, a basketball scout stuck in the long game, waiting for his chance to finally coach an NBA team. On a recruitment trip to Spain, Stan discovers a talented but unknown player named Bo Cruz. They […]

Earnest, beautiful, and tender, Luca Guadagnino’s Bones and All is many things: a road trip movie that sweeps the midwest deserts of 1980s America; a coming-of-age story that brings together two outsiders into an understanding world of their own; and a cannibal film that is unflinchingly flesh deep in its depiction of the practice. Bizarrely, […]

Paul Giamatti, man. Ever watched Win/Win? What a performance. I didn’t think he could do any better than that. But here he did. This movie is now on Netflix. It’s about a couple that is trying to have a kid but can’t. Their frustration grows, but so does their willingness to do whatever it takes […]

Is this the most thrilling head-scratcher we’ve seen in a while? No. Is it a rousing take on the feminist cause? Not really. But what Wicked Little Letters lacks in intrigue and relevance, it more than makes up for in entertainment value. Not that anyone needs convincing, but here Colman and Buckley further prove why […]

The movie follows Martha (Vanessa Kirby), a young wife who loses her baby in a failed home birth. She tries her best to trudge through the aftermath of loss, but her coping attempts prove to be near impossible, not least because her husband Sean (Shia LaBeouf) and mother Liz (Ellen Burstyn) continually domineer every aspect […]

A quiet movie about an unpredictable convict who gets enrolled in a wild mustang taming program. These initiatives, common around the country, offer fascinating parallels: both the horses and the inmates are emprisoned, both innately fight against their condition but are actively being made to comply. The central performance by Matthias Schoenaerts is nothing short […]

From Aaron Sorkin, the creator of every liberal’s favorite 2000s political drama, The West Wing, The Social Network, and the master of the “walk and talk”, comes the dramatization of a sadly true American story from the mid-last century. In 1968, different groups from all over the country travelled to Chicago to protest the Vietnam […]

This Eddie Murphy comedy had all the ingredients to be both a famous movie and an award-winner, but neither happened. It tells the true story of Rudy Ray Moore, a comedian who became famous for creating a character called Dolemite, a pimp, and who later attempted to make his own movie based on the same […]

Keira Knightley stars in this incredible true story of an Iraq War whistleblower who remains relatively little-known in the U.S. Katharine Gun was working for the communications office for the British government when she received a memo in the months leading to the war that showed that the U.S. requested illegal wiretapping assistance from the […]

Those who thoroughly and unironically enjoy romantic comedies will find much to like in Players. Sure, it’s formulaic and predictable, at times even unintentionally parodying itself by parading a plethora of romcom tropes and traditions (of course the leads work for a newspaper, and of course, the best friend is secretly in love with the […]

Jailbreak: Love on the Run could be many things depending on where you stand. You could see it as the tragic story of how an inmate successfully seduced his jailer into letting him escape. Or you could see it as the romantic tale of a woman finding her soulmate after years of denying herself companionship […]

The story of how Dave Kroupa excitedly joined online dating sites only to meet a murderous stalker is both distressing and fascinating. You feel for the guy and wonder how a person could commit such heinous crimes. That in itself is a feat: to be genuinely shocked despite the prevalence of true crime documentaries. But […]

True crime stories set in the world of crypto are still relatively unexplored and therefore have a real contemporary edge to them; they feel more relatable because these criminals share the same online spaces we do. Bitconned taps into this with a more casual, carefree energy, but it also brings up the same concerns—namely: how […]

Many films have tackled the violence of racism in the South, but none are as rich and restrained as Mudbound. The epic follows two families, the white McAllans and the black Jacksons, as they live side by side on the same parcel of land in 1940s Mississippi. The McAllans own it while the Jackons till […]

With an urgent subject and plenty of that trademark Netflix polish, Bhakshak is nothing if not watchable and consistently engaging. However, for all of its motivated performances and high production values, there actually doesn’t seem to be much that happens in the film by way of investigation or character development. Much of the plot seems […]

Taylor Tomlinson clearly has more of a writer’s approach to stand-up than a performer’s, for better or worse. On the one hand, every word in this special feels considered (even those that she has to come up with on the spot during audience interactions), with a cadence meant to draw you towards the writing itself. […]

There are a striking number of similarities between Priscilla and director Sofia Coppola’s earlier offering, Marie Antoinette: both revolve around 14-year-old girls hand-picked to be partners to more powerful men in long-unconsummated relationships, and both girls are emotionally cut adrift and forced to live in gilded cages. But where Coppola’s Barbie-pink historical biopic is punkily […]

There’s a very clear target audience for Steve Treviño’s comedy, and for that particular group it’s easy to see his appeal: he says what a lot of married couples probably have on their minds during moments of conflict, but he still doesn’t take any of it too seriously. However, to an outsider, Treviño’s comedy can’t […]

Directed by Indonesian filmmaker Mouly Surya (Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts), Trigger Warning is a technically impressive film that boasts beautiful cinematography and a handful of skillfully choreographed action sequences. Unfortunately, it’s let down by a mediocre and occasionally inconsistent script, as well as a less-than-stellar lead performance by Jessica Alba. Alba’s stunt double […]

Based on a bizarre true story, Woman of the Hour follows Cheryl (Anna Kendrick), a struggling actor, and Rodney (Daniel Zovatto), a serial killer, as they participate in a dating game show. Part of the film is about the tense cat-and-mouse chase that happens between the two, but other parts are less tight. There are […]

The new stand-up special from Pete Davidson won’t win over any skeptics, but there’s something to admire in how the comedian heads straight towards edgy material, tells us he’s going to go there, and still manages to surprise when he follows through. Which is to say Davidson’s audacity might be more impressive than any of […]

Jack Whitehall definitely has funny observations to make about life around him, and he clearly has a writer’s ear for detail-oriented jokes. But he hardly allows his jokes to breathe during this special, constantly over-explaining the point or killing the momentum of a really smart, clever punchline with so many more unnecessary lines after the […]

Compared to recently released age-gap romances The Idea of You and A Family Affair, Lonely Planet feels more mature. Liam Hemsworth’s Owen is a capable financier without any manchild tendencies, and his attraction to Laura Dern’s Katherine has nothing to do, at least explicitly, with age. They like each other simply because they do. They […]

You don’t need to have watched the first Code 8 (released in 2019) to enjoy Part II, which speaks to how this sequel has improved as a piece of sci-fi entertainment—but also hasn’t done anything particularly interesting with its characters or themes. At the end of the day this really isn’t all that different from […]

Spike Lee burst onto the filmmaking scene with this, his groundbreaking debut feature. Low in budget but high in confidence, She’s Gotta Have It fizzes with unadulterated energy and style, from its kaleidoscopic opening montage of stills depicting life in Brooklyn (where the film is set) to the joyous direct addresses of its credits sequence. […]

Just like with its predecessor, it can be surprising how sober Street Flow 2 is. You expect stories about street gang life to be of a certain tone, but these films are more interested in the emotional and philosophical struggle to respond to violence and poverty in a just and proper way. This sequel continues […]

Just in time for Halloween, Netflix has shelled out for a new, high production value doc about demonic possession. It has all the right ingredients: a true story (that of Arne Cheyenne Johnson, also known as the “Devil Made Me Do It” case of 1981), some convincing re-enactments, the air of exclusivity (use of real […]

If it’s been said about one American stand-up comedian, it’s been said about a dozen of them: just because a joke is edgy doesn’t mean it’s brave, nor does it mean it’s actually a well-written joke. Throughout this hour-long special, Mike Epps rambles from one topic to another with little sense of direction, usually resorting […]

Following the success of the Zom 100 manga and anime, Netflix quickly followed suit with a live-action film, which begs the question: why? Why bother, when the freshly released series is barely a month old and already a vibrant interpretation of the comic book it was based from? Why bother, when you’re not going to […]

Set in the capital of Peru, How to Deal with a Heartbreak is a follow-up to the mildly successful romantic comedy How to Get Over a Breakup. The titles are pretty self-explanatory, but where the first film is strictly about romance, the sequel experiments with more tender themes like family and friendship. It features everyday […]

Between Overhaul’s frequently nonsensical blend of truck racing and vehicular heists, and its focus on found families, the comparisons to the Fast & Furious series are undeniable. This also means that this Brazilian blockbuster is also much less engaging than it thinks it is; the stakes don’t feel particularly urgent, and the near indifference of […]

Seemingly engineered in a lab to appeal strictly to romantic comedy enthusiasts who are familiar with every trope, Make Me Believe is charming and enjoyable in the moment, but ultimately does little with its ingredients. The things that it gets right are pretty foolproof: beautiful Turkish locales, steamy PG-rated romance, and a good dose of […]

Pain Hustlers is based on a 2018 New York Times article of the same name exposing a drug company that marketed a fentanyl-based drug. Zanna, the on-screen pharmaceutical start-up, is modelled after Insys: the actual company who pushed a fentanyl-based spray for pain management with the help of sales reps who particularly appeal to a […]

Fifteen minutes into Marry My Dead Body, it becomes clear where this supernatural crime dramedy is going; the only question is if the two-hour runtime is worth it. It has “don’t drop the soap” bits that will cause severe whiplash, and sporadic mentions of misogyny that are just as offensive. As an action film, there’s […]

As far as documentaries go, The Lady of Silence doesn’t deviate much from the true-crime formula. It follows a serial killer in charge of a series of attacks against elderly women from the late 1990s to 2003 in Mexico City. But the show stands out for highlighting just how unfamiliar the Mexican government was with […]

The fact that 10 Days of a Good Man feels so similar to many other hard-boiled detective stories still means there are reliable thrills to be had here for fans of the genre. But twists and turns and a suitably gruff lead performance by Nejat Isler can’t make up for how the film seems so […]