This Week in Streaming (July 11th)

The Beekeeper (Prime) Jason Statham stars as a retired special forces agent who just wants to spend time in his apiary. But when his elderly landlord (Phylicia Rashad) commits suicide after becoming the victim of a phishing scheme, he blows open a Tech Bro conspiracy that reaches the highest echelons of power. In addition to offering masterful scenes of The Stath wailing on that whiny kid from The Hunger Games, the film is a smart dissection of deplorable anger wrapped in an unbridled retro 80s action package. 

Shark Week (Discovery and Max) The dog days of summer’s favorite cable tradition has survived the streaming era with John Cena serving as the MC of its 36th edition. Enjoy new entries at the pinnacle of infotainment like Alien Sharks: Ghosts of Japan, Monster Hammerhead Species X, and Mothersharker: Hammertime. Sure, there was a time when the Discovery Channel exuded class, but, at this point, we don’t have the luxury of saying no to a national unifier this ingrained in the American psyche. 

In a Violent Nature (AMC+ and Shudder) One of the early summer’s most inventive movies makes its streaming debut far too soon. Told from the POV of a Gollum just trying to get his locket back from some annoying twentysomethings camping out on the logging land where he grew up, the film has no qualms about having as much in common with the deliberately paced European art films of Béla Tarr and Chantal Akerman as Freddy and Jason. While it doesn’t hold back on the carnage, it poses the ethical quandary of why we consume such abhorrent violence as entertainment in the first place.