THIS WEEK ON A.FRAME

With the games in Tokyo officially underway, we thought we’d wrestle the baton away for a moment and highlight some Olympics-related movie recs—all currently available to stream.

First, there’s Visions of Eight on Criterion, which tasks eight different directors—including John Schlesinger and Miloš Forman—with capturing the 1972 Munich games. Another great one on HBO Max and Criterion is prolific sports doc director Bud Greenspan’s 16 Days of Glory , which covers the 1984 event in L.A. in sumptuously cool detail. Finally, on Showtimeand VOD, there’s I, Tonya , starring Margot Robbie as bumbling criminal figure skater Tonya Harding, if you’re in the mood for something a little icier to kick things off.

And—drum roll please—the results are in for our A.frame favourite summer movie poll. The champ—by a wide margin with 47% of the votes—is The Sandlot . The runner-up, no slouch at 18%, is a little flick about a homicidal fish wreaking havoc off the summertime Atlantic coast. Thanks to everyone who participated. We’ll have more polls coming down the pike very soon.

Now on to your weekend.

Your weekend list

Catch it in theaters: Old
Oscar-nominated director M. Night Shyamalan returns this week with Old, a pressure-cooker piece of tropical horror featuring Gael García Bernal, Eliza Scanlen and Ken Leung. The premise: A group of vacationing beachgoers begin to fear for their lives when they realize they’re suddenly aging at warp speed. They need to get to the bottom of it quick, too, because years have dwindled down to minutes, and they don’t have a whole lot of time. Looks like a fun one, a real nail-biter right down to the wire. In theaters nationwide.

PLUS: In the spirit of Old, here’s our certified A.frame list of some other great time-bending movies.

Also in theaters: Ailey
Legendary dancer and choreographer Alvin Ailey, founder of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, gets the much-deserved documentary treatment in this compelling portrait from director Jamila Wignot. Ailey died of AIDS complications in 1989, but his company has continued to operate, and Wignot puts the scope of his achievements in cultural and historical context as she documents the making of a new show, Lazarus, staged in his honor in Philadelphia. For anyone interested in Ailey or the history of modern dance, this doc is well worth a trip to the theater.

Pick it up on Blu-ray: La piscine
Here’s another good one to toss into the summer movie mix: La piscine is noir master Jacques Deray’s steamy 1969 thriller featuring then real-life couple Alain Delon and Romy Schneider, whose idyllic vacation on the French Riviera is threatened—no, not by a mysterious time-warp—but rather by the arrival of an old friend and his young daughter, spurring a very French tangle of jealousy and suspicion.

Also: If you dig that one, don’t sleep on Éric Rohmer’s The Green Ray—another classic in the French psychosexual summer vein, now streaming on Criterion.

Dog days at Cannes
The biggest breakouts at this year’s Cannes Film Festival? Three springer spaniels named Rosy, Dora and Snowbear, without a doubt. At a quirky awards ceremony held to recognize the best onscreen canine performances, the scruffy trio fetched the coveted Palm Dog prize(yes, you read that right) for their work in The Souvenir: Part II . Tilda Swinton, who appears alongside them in the movie and also happens to be their real-life owner, was present to accept the leather collar on their behalf. Somehow still Cannes’ best-kept secret, the Palm Dog has been rewarding good dogs for great performances for 20 years now. Past champs include Brad Pitt’s pit bull Brandy from Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, the charismatic band of strays in White God and—because animated pups are also eligible—Dug the golden retriever from Up.

Two thumbs up
A new eight-part miniseries podcast called Gene and Roger is taking up residency on The Big Picture, and so far, it’s a smart and sweeping primer on the two icons of film criticism. Host Brian Raftery does a remarkable job tracking how Siskel and Ebert turned movie reviews into such a staple of American media, speculates on how they’ve shaped the way we talk about film, and even indulges us a bit in the drama of their healthy rivalry. Listen to the first two episodes now.

Don’t trail behind
We’re getting closer and closer to more of the year’s most anticipated movie events, like the release of long-awaited projects from Ridley Scott and Denis Villeneuve. New trailers are helping to hold us over—catch up on some of the best that surfaced in the past few days.

Cousins (this week on Netflix)
Naked Singularity (Aug. 6)
John and the Hole (Aug. 6)
Malignant (Sept. 10)
The Last Duel (Oct. 15)
Dune (Oct. 22)
Jackass Forever (Oct. 22)

One (or two) more for the road: In addition to new VOD releases this week of How It Endsand Zola, we couldn’t resist hipping you to one more new release, Charlatan, Agnieszka Holland’s biographical drama—shortlisted this year for Best International Feature—about a controversial Czech healer. Now in theatres and virtual cinemas.