We recommend: The best new movies and TV series
Editor’s note: Football fans, here’s a Netflix three-episode docuseries on Ronaldinho. Fans of gambling, math or Vijay Varma, there’s Matka King on Prime Video. Rajkummar Rao is a frantic middle-class man again in Toaster. Men who fantasise about beating up other men can catch Bob Odenkirk in Normal. Euphoria has a third season, Beef has another. And finally, David Attenborough to remind us it’s not all that bad.
New releases
Ronaldinho: The One and Only (Portuguese, English)
In 2020, Ronaldinho somehow found himself in a prison in Paraguay, leaving the football world puzzled. He’d entered the country using a fake passport and was subsequently arrested and jailed for a month. Within days though, as you’d expect, video footage of the buck-toothed genius playing football with his fellow inmates emerged. He was, as he always is, grinning from ear to ear.
He opens up about that difficult period in his life on Ronaldinho: The One and Only, a three-episode docuseries that looks at the Brazilian superstar’s journey from precocious teen star to global sensation, setting the world alight with his trademark Brazilian flair and the joie de vivre with which he played the game.
Widely considered one of the greats of the game—with World Cup and Champions League successes as well as being awarded the Ballon d’Or—his story is one of contrasts: the high stakes, big money world of football pitted against a player’s desire to express himself and play with joy and infectious enthusiasm and smile on his face.
Where to watch: Netflix
Matka King (Hindi)
This is how systems change: it takes one insane person carrying a highly transmittable delusion geometrically progressing with the common ratio being a superpower folie à deux. Huh? Well, this is a show economists might like—but so could binge watchers of the highly addictive SonyLIV’s Scam 1992: The Harshad Mehta Story.
Brij (Vijay Verma), based on real-life gambling innovator Ratan Khatri of Mumbai, starts a new way to play the game, his chemical X being transparency. What Khatri did in the ‘60s was take away the control on cotton-rate betting from traders with insider knowledge and the whims of the New York Cotton Exchange and made gambling a legit contest of luck. The rightly named Brij bridges disparate factions and individuals eager to make a quick buck through his ‘matka’ gambling.
All this lore has been wrapped into a rags to riches story palatable for the intelligent OTT viewer by director Nagraj Manjule (Sairat, Fandry) and co-writer Abhay Korrane (Rocket Boys). The cast includes Sai Tamhankar, Kritika Kamra, Jamie Lever, Siddharth Jadhav, Gulshan Grover, Kishore Kadam and more.
Where to watch: Prime Video
Bhoot Bangla (Hindi)
Akshay Kumar must have been gritting his ample teeth seeing upstart Kartik Aaryan run away with the franchise he had launched in 2007 with one of his most important collaborators Priyadarshan. Aaryan’s success with Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 and 3, alongside the surprise 2018 hit Stree, launched the frenzy over horror comedies among Mumbai’s film studio executives.
Kumar, remembering he’s the OG, has shown up to grab some of the remaining pie with Bhoot Bangla, directed by Priyadarshan. This might appeal to willing or reluctant connoisseurs of brain-rot.
Where to watch: Theatres
Toaster (Hindi)
Rajkummar Rao is a weapons-grade miser, a personality only a dyed-in-the-wool Mumbaikar would understand. Ramakant (Rao) is so maniacal about saving every penny, he has driven everyone around him up the wall. Sanya Malhotra plays his wife, Shilpa, who handles PR and marketing for their wobbly marriage.
The plot takes off when Rao charges in to retrieve a toaster he had gifted at a wedding that is later called off. The screenwriters then reveal that the toaster may have been used in a murder. Two hours of shenanigans ensue, co-starring Archana Puran Singh, Upendra Limaye, Jitendra Joshi, Abhishek Banerjee and Farah Khan. On that note, Farah, please make a film!
Where to watch: Netflix
Normal (English)
TL;DR: Better Call Saul star Bob Odenkirk is an angry old man fighting bad guys just as he did in the 2021 film Nobody and its sequel Nobody 2 (2025).
The actual story: Derek Kolstad, 52, a Midwesterner from Wisconsin, moved to California at 24 to become a part of Hollywood as a writer. Struggle, struggle. After having a couple of his action film scripts turned into (released) productions, he managed to sell a script called Scorn, which eventually became John Wick, a story of a retired badass triggered to return and cause mayhem.
Then, there was no stopping Kolstad. After finding a muse (and moneyspinner) in Keanu Reeves, he found his next in Bob Odenkirk—of a slightly more challenging age and physique to fit into the action-hero mould. But Kolstad knows what to do.
Cherry on top: Normal is directed by the exceptionally talented British filmmaker Ben Wheatley, always ready to up his game and jump genres as can be seen in his filmography: Kill List, A Field in England, Free Fire, Meg 2: The Trench.
Where to watch: Theatres
Lee Cronin’s The Mummy (English)
Close on the heels of horror film impresarios Jason Blum and Jordan Peele, here comes Lee Cronin who has put his name on the line in the title hoping it does a John Carpenter for his career. The lost daughter of a television reporter returns after eight years to the family entombed with a pulse. What gives? Of course, she is carrying a demon inside.
Where to watch: Theatres
Balls Up (English)
Dumb fun. Mark Wahlberg, the brash salesman, and Paul Walter Hauser, the kooky inventor, work at a marketing firm. They are trying to promote a "full-coverage" condom that aspires to touch beyond its job profile. They travel to Brazil to secure a sponsorship deal tying the product to the FIFA World Cup. However, they get drunk, make a public mess, and then, national enemies one and two are running for their lives. Even the cartel gets involved.
Where to watch: Prime Video
Mary’s Got Money Troubles (English)
She is the daughter of a working-class waitress and a pro-wrestler who’d get bloodied on television for chump change. She has dropped out of college. She is an aspiring writer. She has mounting bills. She has a new baby. And she will do anything to come out on top, including being a camgirl.
She is played by Elle Fanning of Sentimental Value. Her parents are Michelle Pfeiffer and Nick Offerman. The main man is creator David E Kelley, responsible for The Practice, Goliath and Big Little Lies.
Where to watch: Apple TV
A Gorilla Story: Told By David Attenborough (English)
Isn't David Attenborough's voice the best ASMR the internet can give? Man turns 100 in May. Here he is with gorillas. It's not difficult to be happy.
Where to watch: Netflix
Fresh off the big screen
Assi (Hindi)
Frequent collaborators Anubhav Sinha and Taapsee Pannu take on rape culture not using a focused story but a sprawling two-hour narrative involving every player imaginable: the survivor, their family, the lawyers, the cops, possibly the intelligence agency, and a vigilante. We may have missed a few, but worth watching for discourse value and the huge ensemble cast that includes Naseeruddin Shah, Md. Zeeshan Ayyub, Kani Kusruti, Kumud Mishra, Revathy, Seema Pahwa and more.
Where to watch: Netflix
One more chapter
Euphoria S03 (English)
Euphoria is a series about having too many friends, inviting too many of them into your life, sleeping with more than half of them, usually under the influence, and keeping the phone on way more than necessary. Although a teen drama, there are life lessons for viewers of every age here. Zendaya, who broke through with this series, is still the headliner. Season three arrives after a full four years. Sam Levinson has auteurial control over the whole product, which is a rarity in contemporary prestige television. New episodes every Sunday.
Where to watch: JioHotstar
Beef S02 (English)
It is easy to end a beef. Walk away. Switch off your phone. Travel to Timbuktu for a month. Learn painting. Get married to a plant. Find a new romance. Start a Substack. Ramakrishna Paramahansa wrote, there are as many opinions as there are paths.
Then why stay stuck in a beef and drag it till kingdom come?
Creator, writer and director Lee Sung Jin must know a thing or three better than us about having beef. The first season, starring Steven Yeun and Ali Wong, had a road rage incident escalate into something apocalyptic. The new season pits two couples against one another. Oscar Issac and Carey Mulligan play the rich couple. Cailee Spaeny and Charles Melton play the poor one. The former has employed the latter. The former is stuck in an unhappy marriage. The latter has a less unhappy marriage. Perhaps the idea is to fight each other and rekindle sex lives?
Where to watch: Netflix
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