Hi everyone! With the library being closed due to the coronavirus, people will not be able to obtain any new DVD releases for the time being. That doesn’t mean there aren’t still a lot of great movies available to watch for free with your library card! We offer access to streaming movies via the Kanopy and Hoopla services, with each offering apps for Roku, AppleTV, and other smart-TV devices to make it easy to enjoy quality movies without having to leave your living room! Here are some highlights of the many films recently added to each service.
ASH IS PUREST WHITE
Originally scheduled to screen 4/6 at the library, canceled due to the coronavirus, but available to stream at home!
Qiao (Zhao Tao) is in love with Bin, a local mobster. During a fight between rival gangs, she fires a gun to protect him. Qiao gets five years in prison for this act of loyalty. Upon her release, she goes looking for Bin to pick up where they left off.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“This is one of Zhangke’s peak achievements: pure cinema, and a story of the underworld unlike anything you’ve seen before.” – Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune
“Exquisite and ferocious.” – Justin Chang, Los Angeles Times
“Ash is Purest White is a tremendous, funny, heartbreaking, sprawling vehicle for Zhao, and what a gift it is to see her exploring the furthest reaches of those talents.” – Rory O’Connor, The Film Stage
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming
MIDSOMMAR
Dani (Florence Pugh) and Christian (Jack Reynor) are a young American couple with a relationship on the brink of falling apart. But after a family tragedy keeps them together, a grieving Dani invites herself to join Christian and his friends on a trip to a once-in-a-lifetime midsummer festival in a remote Swedish village. What begins as a carefree summer holiday in a land of eternal sunlight takes a sinister turn when the insular villagers invite their guests to partake in festivities that render the pastoral paradise increasingly unnerving and viscerally disturbing.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“If there was one thing last year’s occult shocker Hereditary taught us about its deviously gifted writer-director, Ari Aster, it’s not to trust him in the slightest. Think Midsommar, his much-hyped follow-up, looks like Aster’s answer to The Wicker Man? Well, it is, kind of – but that’s not to say you’ll come anywhere near predicting its singular, warped response.” – Tim Robey, The Telegraph
“A savage yet evolved slice of Swedish folk-horror, Ari Aster’s hallucinatory follow-up to Hereditary proves him a horror director with no peer.” – Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out
“Every shot in Midsommar is such a feast for the senses that you’re happy to go wherever it takes you — a sunshine-and-flowers-filled waking nightmare.” – Vince Mancini, Uproxx
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming
THE LAST BLACK MAN IN SAN FRANCISCO
Jimmie Fails dreams of reclaiming the Victorian home his grandfather built in the heart of San Francisco. Joined on his quest by his best friend Mont, Jimmie searches for belonging in a rapidly changing city that seems to have left them behind. As he struggles to reconnect with his family and reconstruct the community he longs for, his hopes blind him to the reality of his situation.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“A lyrical, visually stunning tone poem to loss, lies, reclamation and making peace with the past, The Last Black Man in San Francisco virtually defies conventional description. To see it is to believe it, even when it doesn’t strictly make sense.” – Ann Hornaday, Washington Post
“It’s not a movie for admiring in freeze frame; it’s the kind you fall into with your whole heart and emerge from feeling, for two hours at least, what it is to fully be transported by the magic of film.” – Leah Greenblatt, Entertainment Weekly
“Jimmie’s story is a slow ballad, a tragic ode, a dirty limerick, a wistful lament and a heartbreaking elegy. It’s a tribute to the notion of home that we all carry. This is one of the year’s best films.” – Odie Henderson, RogerEbert.com
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming
THE TOMORROW MAN
Ed Hemsler spends his life preparing for a disaster that may never come. Ronnie Meisner spends her life shopping for things she may never use. In a small town somewhere in America, these two people will try to find love while trying not to get lost in each other’s stuff.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“If you cherish the rare opportunity to watch magnificent actors as perfect as Blythe Danner and John Lithgow giving it all they’ve got, in a film about grown-ups, then the line starts here.” – Rex Reed, The Observer
“The Tomorrow Man is not one of these high-dramas with something profound to say about human natures. It’s more a chance to watch two veteran actors in John Lithgow and Blythe Danner do what they spent their entire lives doing, and that’s act and act real damn good. They find that right balance between being normal and quirky to turn out a grounded performance.” – Alan Ng, Film Threat
“Quirky, tender and hopeful, The Tomorrow Man doesn’t necessarily depict a romance or relationship that everyone will immediately relate to, but Jones’ kindness and generosity as a storyteller encourages his audience to treat these characters empathetically.” – Todd Gilchrist, The Wrap
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming
LADY MACBETH
Rural England, 1865. Katherine (Florence Pugh) is stifled by her loveless marriage to a bitter man twice her age, and his cold, unforgiving family. When she embarks on a passionate affair with a young worker on her husband’s estate, a force is unleashed inside her so powerful that she will stop at nothing to get what she wants.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“Oldroyd’s brilliance (and Pugh’s) is to probe this age-old archetype — the Gothic antiheroine, the adulteress — and find pathos and cruelty. It’s also to uncover the complex web of hierarchies — of race and class, as well as gender — that ensnare and empower her.” – Maia Silber, Washington Post
“Cleverly, it gives us enigmatic backstory hints that may or may not help explain the sudden direction change the film takes in its third act, leading to a denouement of toxic ingenuity. And of all it driven by the sensuality and rage of Pugh’s performance.” – Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
“If you can adjust to the idea that you’re not meant to sympathize with anyone, Lady Macbeth is quite a film.” – Alissa Wilkinson, Vox
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming
THE CONSPIRATOR
The Conspirator is a period drama based on true events following the assassination of President Lincoln. Mary Surratt is the only woman among a group charged with conspiring to kill the president. Frederick Aiken is an idealistic young war hero who reluctantly defends Surratt and in the process comes to believe she is innocent.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“No matter where your political leanings lie, the great thing about The Conspirator is that Mr. Redford is wise enough to let the audience decide what the parallels are. See it, enjoy a ripping good yarn and learn something.” – Rex Reed, The Observer
“Redford proves that at 75 he can still choose meaningful projects and deliver them with intelligence.” – Steve Persall, Tampa Bay Times
“The cast is uniformly outstanding, a pleasure to watch. It’s a more toned-down role for the often-fiery McAvoy, and it suits him.” – Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming
THE CAT O’ NINE TAILS
A newspaper reporter and a retired, blind journalist try to solve a series of killings connected to a pharmaceutical company’s experimental, top-secret research projects and in so doing, both become targets of the killer.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“Structurally and thematically, Dario Argento’s The Cat O’ Nine Tails is an improvement over The Bird With the Crystal Plumage, even if the film’s non-linear convolutions of plot may purposefully distract. Set against a backdrop of genetic research and espionage, Argento’s formal obsession with allusions to seeing and sightlessness is on fierce display.” – Ed Gonzalez, Slant
“…stunning set pieces and camera work.” – Adam Smith, Empire
“Typically over-the-top murder mystery from Argento, neglecting its rather straightforward plot about a series of killings connected with a genetics research institute in favour of gruesome set pieces, bravura camera-work and set design (one character has some truly amazing wallpaper, seemingly spattered with blood), heavy symbolism, and a strong sound-track by Ennio Morricone. Reason doesn’t come into it; gorgeous, grisly style is all.” – Time Out
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming
LEGALLY BLONDE
Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon) has it all. She’s the president of her sorority, a Hawaiian Tropic girl, Miss June in her campus calendar, and, above all, a natural blonde. She dates the cutest fraternity boy on campus and wants nothing more than to be Mrs. Warner Huntington III. But, there’s just one thing stopping Warner (Matthew Davis) from popping the question: Elle is TOO blonde. So, when Warner packs up for Harvard Law and reunites with an old sweetheart from prep school, Elle rallies all her resources and gets into Harvard, determined to win him back.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“Thanks to Ms. Witherspoon’s artful portrayal of a winning, if beachless, Gidget, I found Legally Blonde very enjoyable.” – Ed Epstein, Wall Street Journal
“Blondes may or may not have more fun, but in this one case, they certainly provide more fun.” – Stephen Hunter, Washington Post
“Guilty of inciting a near-laugh riot thanks to an irresistible leading lady whose comic instincts are as impeccable as her manicure.” – Susan Wloszczyna, USA Today
Available Formats:
Hoopla Streaming
CHARLIE BARTLETT
Charlie Bartlett, a wealthy, intelligent 17-year-old, has been kicked out of nearly every boarding school in town and is now enrolled in the local public high school, headed by the reluctant Principal Gardner. Initially struggling to find a place in the new school, Charlie eventually establishes himself as the supportive listener who dispenses well-needed advice, and the occasional prescription, to mixed-up teens. As intuitive Charlie befriends and emotionally influences nearly every student at Western Summit High, the entire school begins to transform into a very different place.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“Yelchin delivers one of those performances that pop eyes… It’s a breakthrough role.” – Kirk Honeycutt, The Hollywood Reporter
“Rollicking story of a rich kid whose wildly successful bid for popularity has him playing drug-distributing shrink to an entire high school boasts pitch-perfect faceoffs between upstart Anton Yelchin and alcoholic principal Robert Downey Jr. that could fuel a chemistry lab.” – Ronnie Scheib, Variety
“A refreshingly entertaining character study that refuses to dumb down its youthful cast or bury their concerns in service of a catchy soundtrack.” – Claudia Puig, USA Today
Available Formats:
Hoopla Streaming
YENTL
A Jewish girl disguises herself as a boy to enter religious training.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“Miss Streisand excels in all departments.” – Bob Thomas, Associated Press
“It has a distinctive and surprising spirit. It’s funny, delicate, and intense — all at the same time.” – Pauline Kael, The New Yorker
“Perhaps because we see so few musicals at all, the Streisand model seems welcome on any terms. But there is also a great deal of warmth in the picture, and it has what one-man shows do when they are working right: It has conviction, and a sense of the artist’s vision. This movie was not made by committee, and hence it is free in a way that few American films are.” – Bill Cosford, Miami Herald
Available Formats:
Hoopla Streaming
COLOR OUT OF SPACE
After a meteorite lands in the front yard of their farm, Nathan Gardner (Nicolas Cage) and his family find themselves battling a mutant extraterrestrial organism as it infects their minds and bodies, transforming their quiet rural life into a technicolor nightmare.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“The addition of Cage to the already heady cinematic brew definitively puts it over the top, making it the kind of cult movie nirvana that was its apparent destiny from the moment the cameras started rolling.” – Peter Sobczynski, RogerEbert.com
“Color Out of Space is a delightful surprise. The film’s success is best viewed through the lens of Nicolas Cage’s increasingly deranged performance, which always entertains as it heightens, but never at the expense of servicing the story and elucidating just how dangerous the Color is.” – Tom Jorgensen, IGN
“It takes a lot for a movie to out-bonkers Cage on this kind of form. Color Out of Space manages it in style.” – Phil de Semlyen, Time Out
Available Formats:
Hoopla Streaming
BEIRUT
A U.S. diplomat (Jon Hamm) flees Lebanon in 1972 after a tragic incident at his home. Ten years later, he is called back to war-torn Beirut by CIA operatives (Rosamund Pike) to negotiate for the life of a friend he left behind.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“The performances are strong and the story is absorbing; a smart diversion for adult attention spans.” – Leah Greenblatt, Entertainment Weekly
“This is an enjoyably pacey spy picture, unfolding against the backdrop of a country that has imploded. It’s a film in which smiles are masks and conversations are loaded with double meanings.” – Wendy Ide, The Observer
“Increasingly tense and benefiting from a well-thought-out script by Tony Gilroy, it finds a slim opening for heroics in a place where all parties are tainted.” – John DeFore, The Hollywood Reporter
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming | Hoopla Streaming
DOUGH
Curmudgeonly widower Nat Dayan (Jonathan Pryce) clings to his way of life as a Kosher bakery shop owner in London’s East End. Understaffed, Nat reluctantly enlists the help of teenager Ayyash (Jerome Holder), who has a secret side gig selling marijuana to help his immigrant mother make ends meet. When Ayyash accidentally drops his stash into the mixing dough, the challah starts flying off the shelves and an unlikely friendship forms between the old Jewish baker and his young Muslim apprentice. Dough is a warmhearted and humorous story about overcoming prejudice and finding redemption in unexpected places.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“Pryce and Holder are perfectly suited to the roles and form an authentic chemistry that excels above workplace formalities.” – Jared Mobarak, The Film Stage
“Dough is sweet, often funny and always nonthreatening, a movie for those who wish the intractable realities of the world would just disappear.” – Neil Genzlinger, New York Times
“…always essentially entertaining and warm in its observations of hope rekindled through simple relationships.” – Tom Keogh, Seattle Times
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming
10 THINGS WE SHOULD DO BEFORE WE BREAK UP
After Abigail (Christina Ricci), a single mom of two, becomes pregnant following a one-night stand with Ben (Hamish Linklater), the unlikely pair try to make a go of it.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“It’s refreshing to see romance looked at in such an authentic, yet still entertaining manner. As such, it brings to mind films by the great Nicole Holofcener.” – Alex Saveliev, Film Threat
Available Formats:
Hoopla Streaming
TUSCALOOSA
Alabama, 1972. As Billy falls for a patient at his father’s mental asylum, his best friend becomes involved in a radical civil rights movement against Tuscaloosa’s power elite.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“…the film offers compelling performances by its two leads and enough provocative elements to make it worthy of attention.” – Frank Scheck, The Hollywood Reporter
Available Formats:
Hoopla Streaming
ROLLERBALL
In a corporate-controlled future, an ultra-violent sport known as Rollerball represents the world, and one of its powerful athletes is out to defy those who want him out of the game.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“One of the most forward looking science fiction tales of the 70’s.” – Rick Sanchez, IGN
“With a fantastic stunt team, a gamely macho star and some wonderful editing, Rollerball is so convincing, urban legend had it there were fatalities during the shoot.” – John Bleasdale, CineVue
“Director Norman Jewison’s Rollerball remains a poignant and unusually prescient vision of our world as defined by Walmart and Exxon-Mobil.” – Slant
Available Formats:
Hoopla Streaming
LOW TIDE
Alan, Red, and Smitty spend high summer on the Jersey Shore roving the boardwalk and getting into trouble. But the discovery of good old fashioned treasure sets the friends on an escalating course of suspicion and violence in this atmospheric thriller.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“This is an old-fashioned hybrid of a thriller and a coming-of-age narrative that explodes when a fortune gets dropped into it. Think of it as an adolescent The Treasure of the Sierra Madre with echoes of ’80s adventure classics like The Goonies and Stand by Me.” – Brian Tallerico, RogerEbert.com
“In addition to establishing a tangible sense of place, McMullin impresses by putting together such a strong ensemble and eliciting from them the performances he does. He’s a very visual director, jump-starting scenes with an unexpected extreme-closeup of some kind before allowing audiences to get their bearings — a strategy that subconsciously reinforces the notion that we can never get too comfortable in this otherwise familiar genre.” – Peter Debruge, Variety
“Kevin McMullin displays a piercing awareness of the tensions that drive the dynamics of adolescent outsiders.” – Chuck Bowen, Slant
Available Formats:
Kanopy Streaming
WILLOW CREEK
Set in Humboldt County, California, Willow Creek centers on Jim (Bryce Johnson, Pretty Little Liars) a Bigfoot believer whose idea of a romantic getaway is to head deep into Six Rivers National Forest in Northern California, video camera in tow, trying to shoot his own Bigfoot footage at the site of the Patterson-Gimlin film. That 1967 fragment of footage purporting to show Sasquatch striding along a dry riverbed became a key artifact in the cryptozoology community, and Jim dreams of nothing more than setting foot on the actual location where it was shot. His long-suffering girlfriend, Kelly (Alexie Gilmore, World’s Greatest Dad), agrees to tag along for the ride, despite the fact that she thinks Bigfoot has about as much chance of being real as leprechauns. The two stop off first in Willow Creek, the Bigfoot capital of the world and home to an annual Bigfoot festival, where various locals talk to Jim’s camera, warning them to keep out of the woods, singing ballads about Bigfoot, and generally enjoying their 15 minutes in the spotlight while Jim and Kelly have a blast, cracking wise amidst all the touristy Bigfoot kitsch on display. But when they strap on packs and head into the forest via a two-hour drive down a dirt road, they start to feel like they might be in over their heads. Well, Kelly does, at least. Jim, as he approaches what he considers hallowed ground, is in heaven.
Description and score provided by Metacritic.
“Willow Creek is a movie to believe in.” – Jamie Graham, Total Film
“What is scarier than an unexplainable, unidentifiable sound in the pitch-black woods, miles from civilization? Willow Creek makes the case that the answer is nothing.” – Brian Tallerico, RogerEbert.com
“Willow Creek does everything a little bit better than others of its kind. It’s a little wittier, a little more insightful, a little more imaginative, a little scarier.” – Scott Tobias, The Dissolve