THE OUTPOST | Stream from 21 JuneThe Outpost is Rotten Tomatoes’ second-best-reviewed Action and Adventure film of 2020, with a 93% critics rating. As the critics consensus says, “Told with gripping realism, The Outpost is a thrilling technical feat and a worthy tribute to military heroes.”
As members of a small team of American soldiers outnumbered by the Taliban in Afghanistan, Teen Choice Award winners Orlando Bloom (The Lord of the Rings, Pirates of the Caribbean) and Clint Eastwood’s son, Scott Eastwood (Suicide Squad, Fast and Furious 8, Pacific Rim: Uprising) co-star with Caleb Landry Jones (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri).
The Outpost was nominated as Best Action Movie at the 2021 Critics Choice Super Awards, where Landry Jones was also nominated as Best Actor: Action
RICHARD JEWELL | First on Showmax | Stream from 3 June 2020
Named one of the American Film Institute’s Movies of the Year in 2020, Richard Jewell is the true story of the security guard who became a hero after finding the device at the 1996 Atlanta bombing, but then became the FBI’s number one suspect, vilified by press and public alike, his life ripped apart.
Paul Walter Hauser won the National Board of Review’s Breakthrough Performance Award as the title character, with Kathy Bates (American Horror Story) nominated for an Oscar and Golden Globe as his mother, and Sam Rockwell (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri) winning Best Supporting Actor at the Faro Island Film Festival as his lawyer. Golden Globe winner Jon Hamm (Mad Men, Good Omens, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt) and Teen Choice nominee Olivia Wilde (House M.D., TRON: Legacy) co-star.
Directed by four-time Oscar winner Clint Eastwood (Million Dollar Baby, Unforgiven)
THE HIGH NOTE | Stream from 17 June
2020 music drama The High Note sees a superstar singer and her overworked personal assistant presented with a choice that could alter the course of their respective careers.
The High Note stars Golden Globe winners Dakota Johnson (The Social Network, and the Fifty Shades movies) and Tracee Ellis Ross (Black-ish, Girlfriends), who was nominated for a 2020 People’s Choice Award and a Black Reel Award for her role as R&B singer and mega-star Grace Davis. BAFTA nominee Kelvin Harrison Jr. (Waves, The Trial of the Chicago 7), Critics Choice nominee Bill Pullman (The Sinner, Independence Day), rapper Ice Cube and Emmy-winning comedian Eddie Izzard co-star.
OUR TOWNS | First on Showmax | Stream now
Amidst the turbulence and division of recent years in America’s history, HBO’s documentary feature Our Towns finds a different story: the tale of eight towns across the US where the rise of civic and economic reinvention is transforming communities.
Presented by journalists James and Deborah Fallows, based on their bestselling book Our Towns: A 100,000-Mile Journey into the Heart of America, this panoramic yet intimate view of small towns across the United States has an 88% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with Washington Post saying, “As an exercise in sincerity, fellowship and earnest inquiry, it might be the most subversive movie in circulation right now.”
Our Towns is directed by Oscar nominees Steven Ascher and Jeanne Jordan (So Much So Fast, Troublesome Creek: A Midwestern).
THE DAY SPORTS STOOD STILL | First on Showmax | Stream now
The HBO documentary film The Day Sports Stood Still tells the story of the unprecedented sports shutdown in March of 2020 and the events that followed. Emmy-winning director Antoine Fuqua (What’s My Name: Muhammad Ali, Training Day) chronicles the abrupt stoppage due to Covid-19, how top athletes made their voices heard in the cultural and political reckoning on racial injustice in America, and the complex return to competition as the sports world tries to find its new normal.
The documentary captures a broad swath of voices and experiences, exploring how the pandemic pressed pause on their careers, but also changed their lives in dramatic and surprising ways. The film features everyone from an NFL Super Bowl champion who volunteers in the ER, to a defending WNBA champ who decided to sit out the 2020 season to focus on protesting racial injustice.
BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE…
Also catch these modern classics this month
THE DARK KNIGHT TRILOGY | 10 June
The all-star cast of Christopher Nolan’s unforgettable The Dark Knight trilogy – Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, and The Dark Knight Rises – includes Oscar winners Christian Bale (The Fighter), Heath Ledger (Brokeback Mountain), Michael Caine (The Cider House Rules), Gary Oldman (Mank, Darkest Hour), Anne Hathaway (Les Misérables), and Morgan Freeman (Se7en). The trilogy racked up three Oscars, and is still regarded as among the best superhero franchises of all time. Also catch the DC blockbusters Man of Steel, starring Henry Cavill, and Green Lantern, starring Ryan Reynolds.
GRAVITY | 24 June
Led by Sandra Bullock and George Clooney, Gravity isone of the most successful sci-fi films of all time, with a worldwide gross of $723m in 2013 and seven Academy Awards, including Best Director for multi-Oscar winner Alfonso Cuarón (Roma, Children of Men).
A SHERLOCK HOLMES DOUBLE-FEATURE | 21 June
Robert Downey Jr. plays the ultimate eccentric genius detective, Sherlock, opposite Jude Law as Watson, in Guy Ritchie’s 2009 film, Sherlock Holmes, which was nominated for two Oscars and became the 8th-biggest movie of the year, grossing over $520m worldwide. Also catch the 2011 sequel, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.
Read the SAMDB review of Gravity
BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN | 3 June
Directed by Oscar winner Ang Lee (Life of Pi, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) and adapted from the short story by Annie Proulx, the groundbreaking 2005 drama Brokeback Mountain won three Oscars and is still considered a cinematic milestone for LGBTQIA+ representation in the mainstream media. It stars Jake Gyllenhaal and the late Heath Ledger, who were both nominated for Oscars for their roles.
THE BLIND SIDE | 3 June
Sandra Bullock won an Oscar for her performance in sports drama The Blind Side, alongside Teen Choice nominee Quinton Aaron (Halfway), Oscar winner Kathy Bates (Richard Jewell, American Horror Story), Golden Globe nominee Lily Collins (Emily in Paris) and Grammy-winning country music icon Tim McGraw. Directed by BAFTA nominee John Lee Hancock (Saving Mr. Banks), this biographical story of a homeless boy who became an All-American football player grossed over $300m worldwide in 2009.
Also catch Bullock starring opposite Hugh Grant in the classic romcom Two Weeks Notice, which saw her nominated for the 2003 Teen Choice Awards for Choice Movie Actress and Choice Movie Hissy Fit.
WE’RE THE MILLERS | 17 June
A small-time drug dealer enlists a fake family in a bid to smuggle drugs across the US border in the blockbuster comedy, We’re the Millers, which grossed over $270m worldwide and won two MTV Movie Awards, as well as a Teen Choice Award for Emma Roberts, who co-stars with Jennifer Aniston (Friends, The Morning Show).
Read the SAMDB review of We’re The Millers
WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN YOU’RE EXPECTING | 3 June
Nominated for a People’s Choice Award for Favourite Comedy and for six Teen Choice Awards, What to Expect When You’re Expecting’s ensemble cast includes Oscar nominee Anna Kendrick (Love Life), Emmy winner Chris Rock (Fargo) and nominee Elizabeth Banks (The Hunger Games), and Golden Globe nominees Jennifer Lopez (Hustlers), Cameron Diaz (There’s Something About Mary), Matthew Morrison (Glee), and Dennis Quaid (Far From Heaven).
BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE…
From 7 June 2021, also look out for two Oscar nominees – Blood Diamond, with Oscar winners Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Connelly, and Eraser, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger – as well as the award-winning medical disaster thriller Outbreak, starring Oscar winners Dustin Hoffman (Tootsie, Rain Man), Morgan Freeman (Se7en) and Cuba Gooding Jr (Empire). For even more movies, go here. Browse everything coming to Showmax this June here.
