Hello, Yahoo readers! My name is Brett Arnold, film critic and longtime Yahoo editor, and I’m back with another edition of Trust Me, I Watch Everything.
This week, a pair of exciting new releases hits theaters: The Long Walk, the latest Stephen King book-to-film adaptation, and Spinal Tap II: The End Continues, the long-awaited sequel to the influential mockumentary comedy classic.
Josh Brolin in Weapons. (Courtesy of WB/Everett Collection)
But the real highlight is Weapons starring Josh Brolin and Julia Garner, one of the biggest horror hits of the year and one of the best movies of the year, which is newly available to rent or buy at home, as is the latest feature from one-half of the Coen brothers, Ethan Coen’s Honey Don’t! And on streaming services you’re likely already paying for, a jaw-dropping Charlie Sheen documentary hits Netflix, and the edge-of-your-seat war movie Warfare makes its way to HBO Max.
Read on, because that’s not all, and there’s always something here for everyone.
🎥 What to watch in theaters
My recommendation: The Long Walk
Why you should watch it: The third big-screen Stephen King adaptation of the year is an impressive imagining of an incredibly bleak book that’s long been considered unfilmable due to its brutality, simplicity and the more internal nature of its prose. It’s more heavy-handed and thought-provoking than a purely fun time at the movies — so be warned! — but if you can stomach it, it’s worth your while.
The novel was the first King ever wrote, back in 1967 when he was 19 years old. It wasn’t published until 1979, when it debuted under his short-lived pseudonym Richard Bachman. Set in a dystopian U.S. ruled by a totalitarian regime, a group of young men enter an annual walking contest in which they must maintain a speed of at least 3 miles per hour or risk execution. The contest ends when only one walker remains alive. The winner receives a huge cash prize and a single wish.
Tut Nyuot, Charlie Plummer, David Jonsson, Cooper Hoffman in The Long Walk (WB/Everett Collection)
The original novel was a pointed metaphor about the Vietnam War, and the 2025 film version updates the text for modern times while retaining its messaging about the erosion of the American dream. It’s set in a world where the economy and financial pressures have left citizens no choice but to see this televised reality snuff film as their only way to support their families and put food on the table, all but guaranteeing their own deaths in the process.
It’s deeply upsetting stuff, and the performances by the entire cast, but especially the two leads, Cooper Hoffman, son of Philip Seymour Hoffman, and David Jonsson of Alien: Romulus fame, make you invested in their tragic situation. Mark Hamill is appropriately over-the-top on the villain. The movie doesn’t shy away from showing kids getting killed throughout, and that investment in getting to know these characters renders it all the more horrifying and heartbreaking.
Mark Hamill in The Long Walk. (Courtesy of Lionsgate/Everett Colletcion)
The ending, an area King readers sometimes, quite famously, have issues with, is the one thing that changes from the book, and it’s a smart and impactful one. A Stephen King film hasn’t been this much of a downer since 2007’s The Mist and its famously shocking denouement, but that’s what makes it stick with you more than your average horror flick.
What other critics are saying: It’s getting very good reviews! The A.V. Club’s Jacob Oller calls it “relatable viewing for an entire country afflicted by economic insecurity, unchecked gun violence, and the invasion of a militarized Gestapo.” Frank Scheck at the Hollywood Reporter writes, “While The Long Walk doesn’t entirely escape its narrative limitations, it features generous amounts of the sort of emotion and heart that have marked the best King adaptations. Of course, that doesn’t make it any less grueling.”
How to watch: The Long Walk is now in theaters nationwide.
Bonus not-quite-a-recommendation: Spinal Tap II: The End Continues
Why you should skip it: As far as movies are concerned, Spinal Tap II may seem short at 80ish minutes, but it’s actually the longest Super Bowl commercial ever made. The cast and crew behind This Is Spinal Tap may be present, but it lacks the heart and soul and, most importantly, the laughs that made that film still worthy of being discussed all these years later.
In the sequel, the now estranged bandmates of Spinal Tap are forced to reunite for one final concert, hoping it will solidify their place in the pantheon of rock ’n’ roll. The film should simply be an excuse to spend more time with these hilarious characters, but instead, it’s a depressing exercise in nostalgia that completely wastes the incredible potential of a Spinal Tap legacy sequel, opting to go the lazy route of inserting celebrity cameos in lieu of jokes and relying on callbacks to the original movie instead of writing new gags.
It’s not particularly amusing or fun to treat Spinal Tap like a real band with decades of tensions — I think it could be, but this version simply is not. The improvisational energy that made the original so iconic and influential is still present in fits and starts, but it always feels forced, as if you’re watching a bad live comedy show with the performers flailing and not finding the humor in the moment off of an audience member’s suggestion.
The insistence on including the random guest spots, a bizarre fixation of comedy legacy sequels in particular, mars all the chances for the characters we know and love to interact and be funny. There are a handful of laughs scattered throughout its brief runtime, but not nearly enough to recommend a trip to the theater. If I didn’t know any better, I’d have assumed the creatives behind this movie had never seen the original, because they completely misunderstand what made it work. To quote fictional character Tony Soprano for no good reason, “‘Remember when’ is the lowest form of conversation.”
What other critics are saying: It’s split right down the middle! The Associated Press’s Mark Kennedy writes that the movie “is filled with ghosts. It’s like watching a cover band playing the hits but then realizing it’s actually the original band onstage after all.” Liz Shannon Miller at Consequence, however, dug it, writing, “There’s something beautiful about the fact that they’ve found their way to this moment, after so many decades.”
How to watch: Spinal Tap II: The End Continues is now in theaters nationwide.
💸 Movies newly available to rent or buy
My recommendation: Weapons
Why you should watch it: Weapons is one of the biggest hits of the year, grossing $250 million globally and earning praise from both critics and audiences. When it hit theaters, I dubbed it an instant horror classic. If you missed it in theaters, you can now watch it at home.
The film is writer-director and ex-sketch comedian Zach Cregger’s follow-up to his sleeper hit debut Barbarian and stars Julia Garner, Josh Brolin, Amy Madigan, Austin Abrams and Benedict Wong. The premise is chilling: When all but one child from the same class mysteriously vanish on the same night at exactly the same time, 2:17 a.m., a community is left questioning who or what is behind their disappearance. The movie opens with the kids already missing. A child narrator prefaces the story, immediately setting the tone of a creepy campfire tale. The rest of the movie unfolds from the perspective of several different characters, each getting their own chapter.
Julia Garner in Weapons. (Courtesy of WB/Everett Collection)
I haven’t stopped thinking about Weapons since the credits rolled, and I can’t wait to catch it again now that it’s easily available to stream. It’s one of the best movies of the year. It was also recently reported that Warner Bros. is running an Oscar campaign for the film: Can it become another rare horror movie that pulls that off?
What other critics are saying: It’s beloved! Variety’s Peter Debruge nails it, writing, “Cregger has achieved something remarkable here, crafting a cruel and twisted bedtime story of the sort the Brothers Grimm might have spun.” Mark Kennedy at the AP says, “It will, at the very least, make you feel a little dread when the clock hits 2:17 a.m.”
How to watch: Weapons is now available to rent or buy on Amazon, Apple TV and other VOD platforms.
Bonus not-quite-a-recommendation: Honey Don’t!
Why you should maybe skip it: Drive-Away Dolls was always pitched as the first of three movies in a “lesbian B-movie” trilogy that Ethan Coen, half of the Oscar-winning Coen brothers duo, would be making with his wife, Tricia Cooke, instead of his brother, Joel.
Honey Don’t!, the second film, is here to make good on that promise. Sadly, if you didn’t dig Drive-Away Dolls, there’s really nothing in this one that’s going to change your mind. Even if you did enjoy Dolls, as I did, Honey Don’t! is a serious case of diminishing returns.
Margaret Qualley again stars, this time as Honey O’Donahue, a private investigator tasked with solving a woman’s murder, unraveling a mystery that involves some sort of religious cult. Qualley is terrific in the lead, as are Aubrey Plaza and Charlie Day in their supporting roles, but Chris Evans, who should run away with the movie, is hamstrung by the terribly weak script, despite giving it his all.
The craziest thing about Honey Don’t! is the way it just sort of fizzles out instead of building to a satisfying third-act conclusion. It’s a baffling and disappointing experience, especially if you’re a Coen brothers fan like me. Drive-Away Dolls was a fun-enough silly diversion; Honey Don’t! is a reminder that diversions aren’t meant to last forever.
What other critics are saying: They’re split right down the middle! Nick Schager at the Daily Beast calls it the worst movie of the year, correctly assessing that “Coen and Cooke are so uninterested in plotting that they don’t develop or intertwine their multiple threads.” The AP’s Lindsey Bahr, however, writes that it’s “gory, unapologetically sexual, quippy and dark. It also clocks in at under 90 minutes — they knew just when to get out.”
How to watch: Honey Don’t! is now available to rent or buy on Amazon, Apple TV and other VOD platforms.
📺 Movies newly available on streaming services you may already have
My recommendation: aka Charlie Sheen
Why you should watch it: My jaw dropped within minutes of watching this two-part Netflix documentary released this week, in conjunction with Charlie Sheen’s memoir. The opening anecdote about how Sheen found himself drunk, wearing a commercial airline pilot’s captain’s hat and jacket, sitting in his chair and actually momentarily in control of the aircraft, is a powerful illustration of the power of celebrity and the untouchability that comes with it.
It’s a heartfelt and tragic film that is uncommonly vulnerable and raw and as real as it gets. Sheen’s brothers and father didn’t participate, but his ex-wife Denise Richards does, and her interview is striking in both her openness to discussing their relationship problems and the uncomfortable imagery she conjures up of her looking after him to the point where she’s making prostitutes that he’s brought home sandwiches.
Sheen himself is an open book and doesn’t shy away from any uncomfortable subject. The interviews with his Two and a Half Men costar Jon Cryer and the show’s co-creator Chuck Lorre are sad and insightful.
The documentary itself is a bit torn between gleefully showcasing the salacious details of the actor’s wild and crazy life, as narrated by Sheen himself, and trying to get introspective about the how and why behind it. It’s always compelling even if it starts to feel a little invasive. He’s been sober for eight years now, but the movie isn’t super-interested in that aspect of his life. It’s also strange how fixated on certain lurid sexual details it becomes at the end, which seems irrelevant to the overall journey being depicted, but I suppose it shows where Sheen’s head is at, or what the filmmakers think will earn headlines.
What other critics are saying: Most are similarly mixed. Variety’s Alison Herman calls it “frustrating” in what it chooses to focus on, and Daniel Fienberg at the Hollywood Reporter backs that up, writing, “Sheen has often lost the thread of what a talented actor Charlie Sheen once was and aka Charlie Sheen loses track of that reality as well, to the documentary’s detriment as a rounded portrait.”
How to watch: aka Charlie Sheen is now streaming on Netflix.
Bonus recommendation: Warfare
Why you should watch it: I can’t think of another war movie that puts you in the soldiers’ shoes as well as Warfare does; it’s really that intense and authentic. The movie is based entirely on the memories of the soldiers involved in a surveillance mission gone wrong in insurgent territory. It’s extremely loud, intense and harrowing stuff, focusing on the disorientation of having to continue doing the job as people are dying and things are exploding around them.
The immediacy here — and all that tense waiting — really make it stand out, as does the limited perspective and lack of other establishing details. It stars a cast of fresh-faced young heartthrobs, which really helps sell the idea that these men are really just boys.
What critics are saying: Time magazine’s Stephanie Zacharek wrote that “if a movie can be elegant and brutal at once, this one is.” Though Monica Castillo over at Mashable believes that while the film accurately portrays the “demands on young soldiers, and the merciless reality of combat, I was unsure how to feel about it.”
How to watch: Warfare is now streaming on HBO Max.
That’s all for this week — we’ll see you next week at the movies!
Looking for more recs? Find your next watch on the Yahoo 100, our daily updating list of the most popular movies of the year.
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