What to watch this weekend January 24, 2025: Movie awards contenders
We have some suggestions if you’re looking for a movie to watch on streaming this weekend. This is a particularly notable version of this weekly list as we move from featuring movies that could hypothetically compete for Oscars to actual, confirmed Oscar nominees. Our list includes a top pick that’s a current awards contender that recently became available for home viewing; three other new releases on streaming, in descending order of Oscar nominations; and a recommendation of a past Oscar winner that would make for a nice double feature with the top pick—got all that? Let’s go!
Top pick: A Real Pain
Kieran Culkin and Jesse Eisenberg are nominated for Best Supporting Actor and Best Original Screenplay, respectively. Culkin is a formidable frontrunner to win, having won his category at the Golden Globes amid several other precursors. The actors play cousins David (Eisenberg) and Benji (Culkin), whose lives have gone in different directions and are both dealing with their own emotional problems. They take a trip across Poland together in honor of their recently deceased grandmother, who escaped the Holocaust. It’s a tricky tone to balance, but it thrives thanks to Eisenberg’s clever script and both actors’ performances.
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“The movie is really kind of an attempt at me working through these questions of: What pain is valid? My character’s pain is so meaningless on the scale of historical trauma, and [Benji’s] pain is darker and deeper than mine, and yet on the grand scale of mass genocide, it’s meaningless as well,” Eisenberg told Gold Derby. “I was just trying to pose these questions to the audience without being so explicit and dogmatic. You can take these two characters and put them at the forefront of this tour and these questions are just implicitly asked in a way that feels like it has kind of a light touch.”
A Real Pain is available to stream on Hulu and Disney+.
Other picks: The Wild Robot
This Best Animated Feature nominee is a strong contender to win the category, with its only meaningful competition coming from Flow, and it’s also nominated for Best Score and Best Sound. The DreamWorks production tells the story of a robot from another planet (voiced by Lupita Nyong’o) that crash-lands in the wilderness. She has to care for a baby gosling (voiced by Kit Connor), which she raises as her own, preparing him to learn how to fly. It’s a moving film about motherhood, animated beautifully. It’s now streaming on Peacock.
Gladiator II
Ridley Scott’s sequel to his 2000 Best Picture winner couldn’t match its predecessor’s impact, but it did manage to snag a nomination for costume design (Janty Yates and Dave Crossman). The sequel stars Paul Mescal as Lucius, the son of Russell Crowe’s Maximus, and puts him in a plot that mirrors the first film pretty closely, with him returning to Rome to right wrongs committed by the city’s corrupt leadership. It’s available to stream on Paramount+.
Saturday Night
Director Jason Reitman’s dramedy about the first-ever episode of Saturday Night Live (back when it was just called Saturday Night) missed out on being an awards contender. However, it’s still an entertaining film that turns the production of a live sketch comedy show into a nail-biting thriller. Gabriel LaBelle, as Lorne Michaels, leads the ensemble cast. Addition stars include Cory Michael Smith as Chevy Chase, Lamorne Morris as Garrett Morris, and Nicholas “Cousin Greg” Braun as Jim Henson and Andy Kaufman. Netflix doesn’t usually add movies on Saturdays, but it’s making an exception for Saturday Night.
After you watch A Real Pain, rewatch this: The Social Network
Three-time Academy Award winner and National Film Registry inductee The Social Network is particularly relevant at the moment for two reasons: One, the current awards season ascent of star Jesse Eisenberg, and two, the film’s subject, Mark Zuckerberg, has found himself on the receiving end of several poor headlines in recent weeks. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross won their first Academy Award for composing The Social Network’s unforgettable score, and they somewhat surprisingly missed out on being nominated for their Challengers score this year. And beyond that, there’s never a bad time to watch The Social Network. It can be found on Prime Video.
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