Spy Movies You Should Check Out
Plus: What's new to streaming this month and mini-reviews of A Quiet Place Part II
It’s a jam-packed DYLA this week, folks. First, we recommend a few spy movies you may not have seen. Then, we drop the best of what’s new to streaming this month. Finally, we have mini-reviews for new releases A Quiet Place Part II and Bo Burnham’s Netflix special Inside.
There are so many worthwhile spy movies out there, but we thought it would be useful to recommend some that don’t feature James Bond, Jason Bourne, or Ethan Hunt. Check out our picks below and make sure to subscribe if you haven’t!
Billy recommends…
Sneakers (streaming on HBO)
Sneakers came out before we even knew the Ocean’s franchise needed a reboot. This movie somehow became an afterthought over the years and I am not sure why. We had old Hollywood mixed with what should have been the face of new Hollywood. Sadly, the one person that could have made this an all time recommendation for all dads died too early for a movie like Sneakers to fully take off.
River Phoenix was cast in this movie to be ushered into the new era as the face of the movie industry. He works perfectly with all timers Robert Redford and Sidney Poitier. The sadness brought by the “maybe” of Phoenix’s career is squashed because the energy in this movie is unmatched. I once posed a question on social media to try and answer what movies have good energy and I somehow forgot this ensemble spy/heist comedy. From beginning to end I am fully invested. Not because anything with the script or direction is all that new or exciting, but the actors bring a charisma that is untouched.
Ensemble crime movies have seemingly been ingrained in Hollywood since its inception. About once a decade a movie comes along that allows established actors to usher in new talent through a lens that showcases everyone’s talents. A reminder of why certain actors are great and an awakening of why certain actors need to keep getting hired. Use your streaming wisely and throw on Sneakers. Or you can call Kathy Rock because I’m pretty sure she has the VHS at her house.
Drew recommends…
The 39 Steps (streaming on Amazon Prime and HBO Max)
Released over 85 years ago, Alfred Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps is an incredibly entertaining spy film, not to mention massively influential on so much espionage fiction to come. Like so many Hitchcock movies, it’s twisty, pulpy, and self-aware. As the main character Richard Hannay says, “Beautiful, mysterious woman pursued by gunmen. Sounds like a spy story.”
The 39 Steps is a classic example of a Hitchcock wrong man thriller, in which an everyman is framed or wrongly accused of a crime and drawn into a broader conspiracy. In this case, Hannay is falsely accused of the murder of a counter-espionage agent. He flees to Scotland where he tries to both clear his name and stop a spy organization from stealing British military secrets. The 39 Steps is perhaps the best of Hitchock’s early works, coming two decades before hits like North by Northwest (a wrong man thriller with Cary Grant), Rear Window, Vertigo, and Psycho.
Another aspect that makes this one so fun to watch has nothing to do with spycraft. While Hannay is on the run he becomes entangled (and eventually handcuffed) with an attractive blonde named Pamela, who is skeptical of his innocence. This makes for great back-and-forth between a mismatched pair, which has been done time and again throughout film history. At one point, Hannay tells Pamela, “There are 20 million women on this island and I’ve got to be chained to you,” a line that may have launched a thousand rom-coms. The espionage plotline makes this one of the great spy films ever, but it’s the amusing and enjoyable chemistry between Robert Donat (playing Hannay) and Madeleine Carroll (playing Pamela) that keeps The 39 Steps feeling so fresh several decades later.
Hanna (streaming on Peacock)
Not every spy movie needs to feature a James Bond-esque figure. Hanna is focused on a young girl raised in the wilderness by her ex-CIA father to be a trained assassin. This unlikely 2011 genre mash-up of espionage, assassin, and coming-of-age story is one of the more underrated spy-adjacent movies to come out this century.
Starring the incomparable Saoirse Ronan as Hanna, the young actress completely owns this role of a teenage girl figuring out how to live in the real world after spending most of her life learning to kill and survive. As she leaves her father (Eric Bana) for the outside world, she’s hunted by a CIA operative (a menacing Cate Blanchett), who makes it her personal mission to take out Hanna because of state secrets her dad possessed before he went into hiding. Anyway, don’t think about the plot too deeply, and just enjoy Ronan’s performance and the style on display.
Directed by Joe Wright, known mostly for period dramas like Pride and Prejudice and Anna Karenina, Hanna has fleet action sequences, a unique score, and a sense of escapist fun. It’s a different kind of international spy movie with a 16-year-old girl in the Bond role.
What’s New To Streaming In June 2021
Netflix
Bad Teacher
Million Dollar Baby
Stand By Me
The Big Lebowski
Silver Linings Playbook (June 17)
Amazon Prime
Adaptation
Ali
Burn After Reading
Dodgeball
Fight Club
Signs
Step Brothers
Take Shelter
The Wrestler
We Own the Night
Hulu
50/50
Across the Universe
Batman Begins
The Big Chill
The Blair Witch Project
The Dark Knight
Face/Off
Little Women (1994)
Revolutionary Road
Silence
Slumdog Millionaire
Something’s Gotta Give
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Weekend at Bernie’s
Gone Girl (June 15)
HBO and HBO Max
The Aviator
Dr. Strangelove
Eyes Wide Shut
The Green Mile
Harry Potter
Jerry Maguire
Miss Congeniality
National Lampoon’s Vacation
Sherlock Holmes
True Romance
The Wedding Singer
Clueless (June 5)
The 40-Year-Old Virgin (June 12)
Recent Release Mini-Reviews
A Quiet Place Part II (in theaters now)
Drew: Another very lean and expertly constructed horror-suspense piece from Jim Halpert. There was reason to be at least a little worried about John Krasinski going back to the well after such a successful first outing. Fortunately, he’s proven now that he has serious filmmaking chops.
A Quiet Place Part II is the rare horror sequel that feels like the next chapter instead of a repeat of the original. The scares and thrills, indebted to masters like Hitchcock and Spielberg, are all remarkably well-staged. I’m so glad they waited to release this in theaters, because both of these movies work like gangbusters in that setting. Once again, the sound design and use of silence is impeccable. I don’t think I even want to watch them at home because it may flatten the experience.
But what keeps me invested in the A Quiet Place universe is the emotional component. Emily Blunt, Millicent Simmonds, and Noah Jupe all have such a confident handle on their performances, even with so little dialogue and backstory, that makes the audience not just root for them, but get terribly stressed when they are in peril. We can’t bear to see bad things happen to this family. (And the addition of Cillian Murphy was brilliant. He’s made for movies like this.) Krasinski is committed to displaying the beating heart of this story of a family clinging to each other. I love how Part II advances the themes of the original, with the kids learning to operate independently of their parents. Count me in for the next chapter. - 4 / 5 Apples
Billy: A Quiet Place Part II’s sweater game is on par with Knives Out. - 4 / 5 Apples
Bo Burnham: Inside (streaming on Netflix)
Billy: Still digesting what I watched, but I’m glad this wasn’t released while we were still fully quarantined. It would have sent me into a full state of anxiety.
And now going to have to try and not ruin recommending this special by explaining why I was moved. Instead just know that I laughed as much as I teared up and was enthralled from start to finish. 5 / 5 Apples
Drew: How did a brilliantly talented entertainer like Bo Burnham spend the last year while so often confined to his home? Apparently making a masterpiece of a comedy special. Inside is clever, smart, depressing, and reflective all at once. It’s an entrancing trip inside Burnham’s conflicted, strange, and self-aware mind, where he comments on the internet, social ills, and his own psyche. Inside looks amazing (he’s learned a lot since directing the coming-of-age comedy Eighth Grade) and the songs are legit catchy. This is one of the best pieces of art to come out of the pandemic, full stop. - 4.5 / 5 Apples
Links
Movie theaters may be making a slow comeback after seeing the industry ravaged by the effects of the pandemic. A Quiet Place Part II made $57 million last weekend, the biggest box office opening in well over a year.
The full lineup for the Cannes Film Festival in July was announced this week. It includes new films from Wes Anderson, Sean Penn, and Sean Baker in competition.