The 13 Best Movies and TV Shows to Watch This Presidents’ Day Weekend

Hopefully y’all’s Valentine’s Day was pleasant. If it wasn’t full with mylar balloons, cheap chocolate, and red roses, I’d like to assume you were at least doing something you love. If you’re reading this, I assume that means watching a movie or TV show. I watched Se7en then went to Beetlejuice the Musical. Analyze that any way you’d like. I also can’t wait to cap off my week with Amélie — a movie I have previously only watched many times on a laptop screen — at my local theater. And because it’s a long holiday weekend, maybe I’ll see it twice, but then again, there’s a handful of other movies out, like a superhero movie set in 2003 and a bonkers J.Lo “cinematic odyssey” that isn’t in theaters but maybe should be. Whatever your speed, consult this list first. —Savannah Salazar

Featured Presentations

Amélie 

It’s been 23 years since Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s romantic quirkfest premiered, which is about how long it takes to grow out your bangs after convincing yourself you could pull off an Audrey Tatou bob. Amélie and her color-saturated Paris are headed back to theaters for a Valentine’s Day rerelease, just in time to talk yourself into another hair mistake. —Alison Willmore

➽ Did I have an Amélie bob in college? Yes. Will I delete my hairstylist’s number before I see Amélie this weekend? Absolutely. My hair is finally shoulder length.

Madame Web

Dakota Johnson’s superhero vehicle is getting lampooned to hell, but honestly, I had a better time watching Madame Web than I did watching both of the Venom movies (a very “the bar is in hell” statement, I know). The viral quote from the trailer isn’t even the movie. It does have an important sequence soundtracked to Brittany Spears’s“Toxic” though, so that’s fun. Morbius couldn’t do that. —S.S.

➽ I wonder if it was doomed the second they parted Dakota Johnson’s bangs.

This Is Me … Now: A Love Story

Jennifer Lopez’s lore on J.Lo is extensive and has basically been waiting to be told in a high-budget “narrative-driven cinematic odyssey,” as the press release calls it. It’s hard to tell what the exact narrative is in This Is Me … Now (which, by the way, features music from her new album of the same name), but she plays a sex/love addict with an imagination that looks like a mashup of Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland and Mortal Engines. —S.S

➽ Co-starring her Leo muse, Ben Affleck, naturally.

Bob Marley: One Love

If J.Lo’s not your speed, there’s a more traditional music movie this week: a biopic of reggae’s most famous voice. Bob Marley: One Love might even be a little too down-the-middle, if the reviews are any indication, but critics seem to dig Kingsley Ben-Adir’s performance. —Eric Vilas-Boas

The Vince Staples Show

This new entry in the barely fictionalized autobiography-comedy genre, written by and starring Staples, evokes the same heightened reality and absurdist feel of Atlanta and I’m a Virgo; Staples described it as “created at the crossroads where David Lynch meets Dave Chappelle.” Sounds weird! But maybe good? —Roxana Hadadi 

Vulture Recommended

Lust, Grudges, Blubbering

➽ 2011’s Wuthering Heights:“The horny, twisted romance Saltburn wishes it was.” (See also: erotic thrillers.)

➽ The Czech New Wave: “The Joke is the story of a young man who is kicked out of the Communist Party and sent to work in the mines after his friends turn on him over a joke he wrote to his girlfriend. As an adult, he has an opportunity to get revenge on one of his former friends. It was banned for 20 years.”

➽ Crying: Specifically, during Weep Week.

TV Graveyard

This Fool

Comedian Chris Estrada’s series being canceled sucks. It’s an absolutely entertaining little streaming comedy about the differences between Julio, a sometimes mopey and mostly straitlaced guy, and his cousin Luis, a charming jokester who’s dealing with life post-prison. The two reconnect and go from non-profit Hugs Not Thugs to running a coffee shop Mugs Not Thugs. Oh, and did we mention Michael Imperioli starred as well? Ugh. Gone too soon. —S.S.

Reality Bites

Love Is Blind season six

Because Netflix knows its audience will riot before long without a new season, Love Is Blind is back, this time with a bunch of hopeful idealists (and some duds) from North Carolina. It’s hard to imagine topping the drama of last season’s “They already knew each other” reveal, but dang it if the show’s not gonna try. —Kathryn VanArendonk

➽ We should mention there’s a new Love Is Blind newsletter on the block. Sign up for all our rants inspired by this new crop of couples.

Grand Finale

True Detective: Night Country

Someone check on Nic Pizzolatto, because the latest season of True Detective, which rules and which he dissed, is doing just fine, having recently eclipsed the viewership numbers for the show’s first season. Night Country wraps up this weekend. —E.V.B.

By Popular (On) Demand

The Iron Claw

The tragic story of the Von Erichs, the famed wrestling family of the ’80s, directed by Sean Durkin (of Martha Marcy May Marlene) is probably one of the more underrated movies of 2023. Where is Zac Efron’s Oscar nom?! But now it’s available on digital platforms, and if you end up watching this with your siblings, prepare to sob heavily. —S.S.

➽ More great movies now streaming: Oppenheimer on Peacock, Bottomson Prime Video, Brittany Spears’s Crossroads on Netflix (for the first time ever!), and 2023’s musical remake of The Color Purple on Max.

Want more? Read our recommendations from the weekend of February 9.

Related

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• The 25 Best Movies on Hulu Right Now
• The 30 Best Movies on HBO and Max Right Now

Savannah Salazar , 2024-02-19 13:00:00

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