Sinners, Happy Gilmore 2 and More

Ryan Coogler and Michael B. Jordan’s vampire sensation “Sinners” was named one of Variety’s best movies of 2025 so far: “It’s a throat-ripping vampire movie. And a simmering, layered portrait of a small-town Mississippi Delta community in 1932… it’s exhilarating to take a ride in a popcorn fantasy this heady, where the forces of evil add up to an oppressive destiny. Coogler has vowed that there will be no sequel, but the Marvel-style post-credits teaser leaves you wanting and imagining one.”

“Christopher Landon crafts a pulpy surveillance mystery that gives way to something giddy and exciting,” reads Variety’s review of “Drop,” the Blumhouse thriller starring Meghann Fahy as a widowed mother whose first date takes a nightmarish turn when she begins receiving threatening text messages. “The film’s complicated setups are executed with a deft and capable hand. Although set in a fine dining establishment, it’s a junk-food thriller fried to near-perfection, balancing the tensions of kidnapping, conspiracy and murder with those of a nerve-wracking first date. It’s crisp and delicious.”

One of the summer’s most anticipated sequels is Adam Sandler’s “Happy Gilmore 2,” which streams exclusively on Netflix. The comedian is back in the title role alongside original cast members Julie Bowen, Christopher McDonald and Ben Stiller. Newcomers include a host of celebrity cameos, from Bad Bunny to Travis Kelce, Margaret Qualley, Benny Safdie and more. Sandler’s daughters, Sadie and Sunny, also appear. Professional golfers John Daly, Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy, Bryson DeChambeau are set to face off against Sandler’s Happy, whose uncontrollable rage is back on the course. 

The official logline for “The Old Guard 2” reads: “Andy (Charlize Theron) leads immortal warriors against a powerful enemy threatening their group. They grapple with the resurfacing of a long-lost immortal, complicating their mission to safeguard humanity.” The supporting cast includes Kiki Layne, Matthias Schoenaerts, Marwan Kenzari, Luca Marinelli, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Veronica Ngo, Henry Golding, Uma Thurman and Kamil Nozynski. Victoria Mahoney directs with a script from Leandro Fernandez, Greg Rucka and Sarah L. Walker.

Billed as a “one-of-a-kind cinematic experience,” Miley Cyrus’ “Something Beautiful” is a collection of music videos for the songs off her latest album of the same name. The project was released in theaters last month for special one-night-only screenings and is now set to stream exclusively on Hulu this month. Cyrus said of the film: “’Something Beautiful’ is my dream project come true — fashion, film and original music coexisting in harmony. My co-creators are all geniuses in their own right: from the masters of sound, Shawn Everett and Alan Meyerson, to one of cinema’s most unique directors, Panos Cosmatos serving as a producer. Each collaborator has used their expertise to make this fantasy a reality.”

Idris Elba, John Cena and Priyanka Chopra Jonas headline Prime Video’s original action comedy “Heads of State.” The official synopsis reads: “UK Prime Minister Sam Clarke (Elba) and U.S. President Will Derringer (Cena) have a not-so-friendly and very public rivalry that jeopardizes their countries’ relationship. But when they become the targets of a powerful and ruthless foreign adversary, they are begrudgingly forced to rely on the only two people they can trust: each other. Allied with the brilliant MI6 agent Noel Bisset (Chopra Jonas), they must go on the run and find a way to work together long enough to thwart a global conspiracy that threatens the entire free world.”

Paul Rudd and Jenna Ortega are the stars of A24’s dark comedy “Death of a Unicorn,” which debuted at SXSW earlier this year and had a spring theatrical release. From Variety’s review: “Debuting director Alex Scharfman offers an amusingly dark take on one of the most beloved (and least seen) fantasy creatures in cinema, filling a unicorn-shaped hole in contemporary filmmaking… Scharfman’s script cleverly taps into any number of frustrations swirling in the zeitgeist, using Ortega’s appropriately indignant character to illustrate how enlightened millennials feel ignored and unheard by their elders.”

“The Bear” Emmy winner Ayo Edebiri stars in A24’s “Opus” as an up-and-coming journalist who gets the chance to accompany her boss on an assignment to profile a reclusive pop star, played by John Malkovich. But the singer’s compound proves to be a much darker cult than expected. Juliette Lewis, Murray Bartlett, Amber Midthunder, Stephanie Suganami, Young Mazino and Tatanka Means co-star.

Rungano Nyoni earned rave reviews for “On Becoming a Guinea Fowl,” which A24 released in theaters earlier this year. The official synopsis reads: “On an empty road in the middle of the night, Shula stumbles across the body of her uncle. As funeral proceedings begin around them, she and her cousins bring to light the buried secrets of their middle-class Zambian family, in filmmaker Rungano Nyoni’s surreal and vibrant reckoning with the lies we tell ourselves.”

David Cronenberg’s “The Shrouds” stars Vincent Cassel as the entrepreneur behind a new technology that allows relatives the chance to view their loved ones’ remains. When the project is vandalized, Cassel’s character falls down a rabbit hole of conspiracies that bring him back to the death of his beloved Becca (Diane Kruger). Cronenberg developed the movie in the wake of his own wife’s death, with many critics hailing it as one of his most personal efforts to date.

Adam Elliot’s stop-motion “Memoir of a Snail” earned an Oscar nomination earlier this year for best animated feature. From Variety’s review: “Though the stop-motion aspect will undoubtedly get the most attention, ‘Memoir of a Snail’ is foremost a feat of screenwriting — one viewers would do well to take more seriously than Elliot does (his writer-director credit appears scrawled on a toilet lid in a junkyard-set opening-credits sequence). The movie is composed of wall-to-wall narration, as protagonist Gracie eloquently (if somewhat naively) describes how she wound up retreating from society.”

Music video director Fleur Fortuné makes a compelling feature debut with “The Assessment,” about a near-future where parenthood is strictly controlled. Elizabeth Olsen and Himesh Patel star as a couple who undergo a seven-week assessment to determine whether they are suitable to adopt a child. Alicia Vikander is their unconventional interviewer, who throws one surprise after another at them. From Variety’s review: “Fortuné ably balances the cerebral with the emotional. The film may depict a society losing touch with humanity, but is unusually affecting when it shows no lack of it of its own.”

From National Geographic, “Jaws @ 50” is “the authorized documentary celebrating the film that redefined Hollywood, 50 years after its premiere. Alongside Steven Spielberg, the documentary charts the extraordinary journey from Peter Benchley’s bestselling novel to one of the most iconic films ever made. Featuring rare archival footage and interviews with acclaimed Hollywood directors, top shark scientists, and conservationists, the documentary uncovers the behind-the-scenes chaos and how the film launched the summer blockbuster, inspired a new wave of filmmakers, and paved the way for shark conservation that continues today.”

For family audiences, the premiere of “Zombies 4” on Disney+ is likely to be the movie event of the month. The synopsis reads: “A new adventure dawns for zombie/cheerleader power couple Zed and Addison when their summer road trip takes an unexpected detour — landing them in the middle of a monster rivalry: Daywalkers vs. Vampires. Tensions flare when Zed and Addison find themselves acting as camp counselors between the two opposing supernatural factions.”

Tyler Perry writes, directs and stars in the latest Madea movie, “Madea’s Destination Wedding,” which debuts on Netflix amid the streaming success of Perry’s other Netflix movie, “Straw,” with Taraji P. Henson. The cast includes Cassi Davis Patton, David Mann, Tamela Mann, Taja V. Simpson, Diamond White, Jermaine Harris and Xavier Smalls. The official synopsis reads: “Brian and his ex-wife Debrah are shocked to learn their daughter Tiffany is engaged to a rapper she met on a yacht—and the wedding is in two weeks. Madea and her crew head to the Bahamas, stirring up chaos and heartwarming fun.”

Written and directed by Cazzie David and Elisa Kalani, “I Love You Forever” stars Sofia Black-D’Elia in a romantic comedy about a woman who finds herself in an emotionally abusive relationship. Ray Nicholson, Jon Rudnitsky and Raymond Cham Jr. co-star. From Variety’s review: “In the whip smart millennial-skewing film where you’re old if you’ve been caught using a third-generation iPhone, there’s something charmingly antiquated about the scene filmmakers Cazzie David and Elisa Kalani set around Mackenzie, a law student who has a pair of bickering best friends to constantly amuse her and a personal life punctuated by Jessica Simpson and Michelle Branch needle drops.”

Dito Montiel’s crime comedy “Riff Raff” centers on a former criminal thrown into turmoil when his family incites a long-needed reckoning. The ensemble cast includes Jennifer Coolidge, Gabrielle Union, Pete Davidson, Lewis Pullman, Ed Harris and Bill Murray. From Variety’s review: “Next to Pullman, Michael Covino is perhaps the movie’s most alluring presence, as a vicious, violent character who ties the movie’s various threads together.”

The unconventional Robbie Williams biopic “Better Man,” in which a CGI chimp stands in for the British pop star, streams on Prime Video this month at no extra cost to subscribers. Variety’s Peter Debruge wrote in his review that the CGI monkey “gimmick works, distinguishing the project from so many other cookie-cutter pop-star hagiographies.“Robbie Williams played by a digitally animated chimpanzee [is] an outlandish choice. For anyone complaining that the industry plays it too safe, this is your movie. The risk-taking is excellent.”

“Wicked” made its streaming debut on Peacock in March and now becomes available on Prime Video this month at no extra cost to subscribers. The musical, which tells the story of what happened before “The Wizard of Oz,” earned 10 Academy Award nominations and $727 million at the worldwide box office. “Wicked” stars Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba and Ariana Grande as Glinda, and both of them picked up Oscar nominations for their performances. The two characters form an unlikely friendship that is soon threatened after they encounter the Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Jeff Goldblum). Michelle Yeoh, Jonathan Bailey, Ethan Slater and Peter Dinklage also star.

With Steven Spielberg’s “Jaws” celebrating its 50^th anniversary this summer (see above for the streaming debut of an authorized documentary on the blockbuster), it’s a perfect time for the film to arrive on Netflix. From Variety’s original review: “Getting right to the point, ‘Jaws’ is an artistic and commercial smash. Producers Richard D. Zanuck and David Brown, and director Steven Spielberg, have the satisfaction of a production problem-plagued film turning out beautifully. Peter Benchley’s bestseller about a killer shark and a tourist beach town has become a film of consummate suspense, tension and terror.”

With “Sinners” mania taking hold of Hollywood, it’s a great time to go back to where it all started as Michael B. Jordan and director Ryan Coogler’s first collaboration, “Fruitvale Station,” returns to Hulu this month. Jordan stars in the true story of Oscar Grant, a young man in San Francisco who was killed by a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) police officer. From Variety’s review: “Coogler’s film isn’t the flashiest, but in its carefully observed, unvarnished portrait of middle-class African-American life and its acute sense of injustice, it makes a major impression.”