ye7 Five International Movies to Stream Now
Stream it on Amazon Prime Video.
A sexual-harassment allegation sends a mostly male theater troupe into a tizzy in Anand Ekarshi’s whip-smart Malayalam drama, which distills into a microcosm the contortions of a society unable to deal with misbehaving men and the women they victimize. “Aattam” takes its time in setting the stage, introducing us to the Arangu troupe — comprising 12 men and just one woman — on the eve of a big performance, featuring English theater scouts in the audience. In the preshow banter of the group, performed with fantastic naturalism by the actors, everyday sexism becomes apparent. It comes into sharp focus at their after-show party in a resort, where comments about the dressing and drinking habits of the sole heroine, Anjali (Zarin Shihab), circulate.
No one is overtly lewd, and when Anjali reveals the next morning that one of the men groped her in the middle of the night, they all jump into action. A meeting is called, and a long debate ensues. The men hit all the classic points — where is the proof; what about the fact that she was drunk; should someone’s career be ruined over one “mistake” — but Ekarshi also threads in various other elements: jealousies among the actors, secret crushes and affairs, class differences and a major career opportunity that throws everyone’s moralities into confusion. The irony of a council of men making a decision about a woman’s plight is front and center, but the film allows each character fullness and complexity, so that their failures emerge not as personality shortcomings but as the structural outcome of a deeply misogynistic society.
‘Octopus Skin’Stream it on Tubi.
This elliptical feature by the Ecuadorean filmmaker Ana Cristina Barragán opens with a tangle of limbs in close-up — which limbs, and whose, only becomes clear a few moments later, as a wider shot reveals a pair of adolescent girls in tight embrace, touching each other with what could be curiosity, eroticism, familial affection or a mix of it all. This visual gesture repeats throughout the film: We see things in tactile intimacy — a hand stroking the wrinkled skin of an animal; faint traces of bodies in bright blue water — before their shapes and contours emerge in view. It’s a powerfully wordless way to convey the inner worlds of the protagonists of “Octopus Skin,” three feral siblings who live on a remote island with their mother, closed away from the larger world.
When finally, a serendipitous encounter with a boat leads the siblings across the water to a city, it’s as if the central formal maneuver of the film — moving from cryptic close-up to revelatory wide shot — is borne out in the narrative. Suddenly, the three teens’ limited universe, composed solely of things they know through touch and sense, explodes open, as they take in colors, sounds, people and a profusion of talk. “Octopus Skin” is a beguilingly enigmatic film that never lays all its cards on its table — the setting and the back story of the characters remain a mystery throughout — and yet conjures a vivid and tragic tale of coming-of-age through echoes, suggestions and lingering whispers.
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