If you want to hang ten on a crystal-blue wave or skate near a sunny beach, don’t go outside — just log on to Hulu.
The popular streamer just added a slew of new movies in March, and Watch With Us has selected a couple set in sunny California.
The action flick Point Break is already a bona fide classic, but you may not have heard of the skateboard drama Lords of Dogtown starring Heath Ledger.
If the sun and sand aren’t your thing, then Watch With Us recommends getting into the game with Dodgeball, a zany comedy featuring one of Ben Stiller’s best comic performances.
‘Lords of Dogtown’ (2005)
In the late 1970s, a trio of Southern California teenagers — Tony Alva (Victor Rasuk), Stacy Peralta (John Robinson) and Jay Adams (Emile Hirsch) — are local heroes due to their skateboarding skills. When Zephyr Surf Shop owner Skip Engblom (Heath Ledger) recruits them for his pro skating team, they become famous. But as their popularity grows, so do the tensions within the group that threaten to tear them apart. Is their room enough for all of them in the nascent world of competitive skateboarding?
A pair of classic comedy movies has come home to Hulu, and they’re both better than many of the modern comedies in theaters. There’s Something About Mary may be pushing 30, but this is one gross-out rom-com that never seems to get old. Thank You! You have successfully subscribed. Subscribe to newsletters Enter your email […]
Based on real-life events, Lords of Dogtown’s story isn’t all that earth-shattering. The familiar rise-and–fall beats are all there, along with the disappointed mentor and backstabbing friend tropes. But the movie is worth watching for its recreation of a time, place and scene that seldom appear in mass media. Now an Olympic sport, skateboarding in the ‘70s was a step above criminal activity, and it’s hypnotic to watch the “Z-boys” struggle to find acceptance in a sporting world that views them as thugs.
Lords of Dogtown is streaming on Hulu.
‘Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story’ (2004)
Peter (Vince Vaughn) owns a small gym, Average Joe’s, that’s about to go under to a bigger and flashier rival, Globo Gym. In need of $50,000 to save his gym from foreclosure, he enters a dodgeball tournament in the hopes of winning and collecting the grand prize money. But even if Peter and his team advance to the final, they’ll have to overcome one major obstacle — White Goodman (Ben Stiller), who owns Globo Gym and wants to put Peter and Average Joe’s out of business for good.
Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story is as silly and good-natured as its subtitle. Underdog sports movies are catnip to audiences, and Dodgeball adds some very well-placed jokes to make it consistently funny and entertaining. Stiller hams it up as the over-the-top villain Wyatt, which is really the only way you can play that character, while the film’s stacked supporting cast features comedy veterans like Rip Torn, Justin Long, Office Space‘s Gary Cole and more. When William Shatner appears as the all-powerful Dodgeball Chancellor, you don’t bat an eye — of course, Captain Kirk would be in a movie this ridiculously fun.
Dodgeball is streaming on Hulu.
‘Point Break’ (1991)
A gang of masked vigilantes is robbing banks in Southern California, and newbie FBI agent Johnny Utah (Keanu Reeves) thinks the culprits are off-the-grid surfers who ride the waves in Venice Beach. But as Johnny goes deep undercover and wins the trust of their leader, the bleached-blonde bro Bodhi (Patrick Swayze), he begins to question his loyalty to his job and the law. Is Bodhi’s seductive yet dangerous way of life for the by-the-books Johnny?
Point Break could’ve been a routine, throwaway action flick — just take a look at the awful 2015 remake for all the mistakes it could’ve made — but with the intelligent direction by future Oscar winner Kathryn Bigelow, it becomes something more: a crime heist masterpiece right up there with Heat, a bromance that doesn’t snicker at the genuine bond forged between the two male leads and a meditation of what it means to connect with nature through surfing.
It’s March, which means it’s Moira Rose’s favorite season — “awards.” The 98th Annual Academy Awards is scheduled to take place on March 15, and Hulu is celebrating all month long with a slew of great movies and series for your viewing pleasure. Watch With Us has compiled a complete list of the new movies […]
Point Break is deep, man, but it also offers superficial pleasures, too, like a never-better-looking Southern California in the ‘early ‘90s, Gary Busey as Reeves’ whacked-out partner, kinetic action sequences that really pop, a jawdropping skydiving sequences that will rip your heart out of your chest and Swayze’s chill performance as a zen-like dude who just wants to live his life without sacrificing his soul to a corporation.
