Steamy Streaming This Week
For Hot August Nights
Looking for something to watch this weekend? PROVOKR‘s got you covered, and you can interpret that statement however you’d like. Here’s our picks for the most provocative selections to check out on a hot August night.
Don’t Look Now
At the time of its release in 1973, Don’t Look Now was surreal, complex, uncomfortable, and dangerous. Today, casual audiences only know it for its shockingly explicit sex scene, between leads Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland. Regardless of its (deserved) infamy, true cinephiles still champion the film as a landmark achievement in psychological horror. Don’t Look Now is unflinchingly frank in its depiction of a couple’s grief following the loss of their child, combined with an occult plotline straight out of a Hammer horror flick. Modern horror classics like Hereditary and The Babadook certainly owe a tip of the hat to the uncompromising nature of Don’t Look Now.
Haven
Stephen King is red-hot right now; despite the unfortunate fate of The Dark Tower, which was met with poor reviews and a dismal box office reception, It turned the tables with an unforeseeable level of critical and commercial success. Meanwhile, on the television front, Castle Rock is Hulu’s biggest hit since The Handmaid’s Tale.
We recommend Haven, a supernatural procedural which aired on Syfy from 2010 to 2015. Starring Emily Rose (Uncharted) as an FBI agent sent to the town of Haven to combat supernatural threats, the series should feel comfortable to fans of The X-Files, Twin Peaks, and Lost. Stream it on Netflix, and see how many Easter Eggs/allusions to King’s works you can spot!
The Sinner
The new season of USA‘s anthology crime series is just getting started, but the first season is currently streaming on Netflix, so if you missed it the first time around, now’s your chance to see what all the fuss is about. Jessica Biel was nominated for an Emmy for her breakthrough performance as a woman who seemingly snaps and commits an unprecedented act of heinous violence… But Detectives Harry Ambrose (Bill Pullman) and Dan Leroy (Dohn Norwood, Hell on Wheels) are determined to find out the truth.
The two seasons tackle completely different cases, though both Bill Pullman and Dohn Norwood appear throughout the series (though Norwood is relegated to guest star status in year two). For fast-paced drama with intimate stakes and a rousing mystery, it’s hard to go wrong with The Sinner.
Cocktail
Tom Cruise is one of the hottest actors of all time, right up there with the likes of Gregory Peck or Cary Grant. While its commonly shrugged off as kitsch or corny, we have to stand up for one of our favorite Tom Cruise movies, 1988’s Cocktail, based on the book by Heywood Gould.
Cruise stars as Brian Flanagan, a blue collar bartender with dreams of glory and riches, who claws his way to the top with the help of a jaded mentor (Bryan Brown), a wealthy socialite (Lisa Banes), and the love of his life, Elisabeth Shue. It’s a bit silly at times, but the melodrama is well-earned, and the characters leap off the screen like comic book archetypes come to life. It has an infectious energy that’s impossible to ignore. It’s trashy, but it’s far from trash, and the result is nothing short of charming and captivating. Plus, it features a rare acting performance from Ellen Foley, one of the most underrated rock and roll singers of the era.
