As the weather changes and the allure of staying inside all comfy-cozy with a blanket on a couch gets brighter than an orange pumpkin, your desire to stream dope movies on HBO Max may get bright, too. To help you out with your autumnal viewing habits, we've gone through every new movie coming to the streaming service and given you seven top-tier choices. These films have something for everyone, whether you're in the mood for a blockbuster sci-fi epic, a chamber drama, or an uproarious comedy.
So sit back, relax, and enjoy the seven best movies coming to HBO Max this October 2021.
All the President's Men
Director: Alan J. Paluka
Writer: William Goldman
Cast: Robert Redford, Dustin Hoffman, Jack Warden, Martin Balsam, Hal Holbrook, Jason Robards
Gripping, thorough, and wracked with unorthodox suspense, All the President's Men is an American classic, a testament to the ideals of truth and justice through the weeds of beyond difficult work. Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman are Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein of the Washington Post, who are in the middle of investigating President Richard Nixon's burgeoning Watergate scandal. This investigation takes them through all kinds of terrifying conspiracies, eccentric personalities, and work, work, work. It's simply one of the finest films we've got, an entertaining piece of highly watchable cinema that still says a whole lot about how our society should hold itself accountable.
Blazing Saddles
Director: Mel Brooks
Writers: Mel Brooks, Norman Steinberg, Andrew Bergman, Richard Pryor, Al Uger
Cast: Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Slim Pickens, Alex Karras, Mel Brooks, Harvey Korman, Madeline Kahn
Blazing Saddles is like watching one of those plate-spinning acts, marveling at how they keep so many disparate elements moving at once, and laughing uproariously as they all crash down intentionally. The Mel Brooks classic is a loving genre pastiche of the western, an incendiary satire on race relations, a ribald sex comedy, and a fourth-wall shattering, Looney Tunes-esque destruction of the elements of film we take for granted. It's chock-full of iconic comedy performances, aesthetically imaginative set-pieces, and one of the catchiest theme songs you'll ever hear. Ride along, little doggy.
Doubt
Director/Writer: John Patrick Shanley
Cast: Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Viola Davis
Sometimes, you just wanna watch an extraordinary cast say lines extraordinarily. Doubt, an adaptation of a play from the playwright himself, John Patrick Shanley, casts Philip Seymour Hoffman as a progressive Catholic priest accused of something heinous, Meryl Streep as a brittle nun who's convinced of his guilt, and Amy Adams as a sensitive nun who has her, well, doubts. Watching this power trio catapult themselves into this rich text, featuring a helpfully cinematic boost by DP extraordinaire Roger Deakins, makes for exhilarating and devastating viewing. And when Viola Davis comes in for her one-scene wonder, my goodness; it's just one of the best screen performances you'll ever see. Breathtaking stuff for fans of "very good actors."
Dune (2021)
Director: Denis Villeneuve
Writers: Jon Spaihts, Denis Villeneuve, Eric Roth
Cast: Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Stellan Skarsgård, Dave Bautista, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Zendaya, Chang Chen, Sharon Duncan-Brewster, Charlotte Rampling, Jason Momoa, Javier Bardem
Have you heard of this one? I guess Dune is some kind of super-influential, acclaimed science fiction book getting a blockbuster film adaptation featuring an absolutely star-studded cast like Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Dave Bautista, Jason Momoa, and Javier Bardem. I guess its director Denis Villeneuve's newest giant-scale, giant-ambition science fiction film after Arrival and Blade Runner 2049, and I guess it comes after a much-maligned David Lynch take in the '80s. And I guess it's getting rapturous early reviews, some of which are calling it an essential work of science fiction filmmaking. I guess you're gonna watch this one or whatever.
Lincoln
Director: Steven Spielberg
Writer: Tony Kushner
Cast: Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, David Strathairn, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, James Spader, Hal Holbrook, Tommy Lee Jones
Playing something like a combination of All the President's Men and Doubt, Lincoln is a prestigious biopic about one of our most prestigious presidents (Abraham Lincoln) from one of our most prestigious directors (Steven Spielberg), writers (Tony Kushner), and actors (Daniel Day-Lewis). But the resulting film is a ton more prickly, suspenseful, and funny than the one you're imagining in your head. It's an ode to resistance, to self-confidence in one's values, and to changing the world one mind at a time. It's also a deeply sharp satire about the raucous weirdos you found in Congress even then, and the lengths underwent by the somewhat honest politicians to make even a modicum of progress. Oh, yeah, and Day-Lewis gives a once-in-a-lifetime performance or whatever.
Moonrise Kingdom
Director: Wes Anderson
Writers: Wes Anderson, Roman Coppola
Cast: Bruce Willis, Edward Norton, Bill Murray, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton, Jason Schwartzman, Bob Balaban
One of Wes Anderson's most emotionally driven, vulnerable, and even scariest pieces of filmmaking, Moonrise Kingdom is a splendid, eccentric, and unpredictable ode to young love and anti-authoritarianism. Jared Gilman and Kara Hayward are the children who realize their feelings for each other are stronger than any island-secluded tenets of order and structure, as represented by the usual Anderson ensemble cast of Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman, Tilda Swinton, and more. But for my money, the MVP performance comes from Anderson newcomer Bruce Willis, whose arc is rendered with equal parts sensitivity and ferocity. It's a wondrous, unorthodox performance from a star who tends to know what works about him too well, an unpredictable yet sturdy emotional anchor to an unpredictable yet sturdy film.
Six Degrees of Separation
Director: Fred Schepisi
Writer: John Guare
Cast: Stockard Channing, Will Smith, Donald Sutherland, Mary Beth Hurt, Bruce Davison, Ian McKellen
If you're a Will Smith fan but haven't seen his early film breakthrough performance in Six Degrees of Separation, rectify that immediately. Smith plays a young hustler who cons his way into the lives of the upper-class Stockard Channing and Donald Sutherland with a keen understanding of how race, class, and educational politics affect our daily interactions. It's a gripping, funny, sad tale of shifting allegiances and understandings, with exceptional performances all around.