The week between celebrating the holidays and ringing in the new year likely feels hectic. Need a way to slow down and relax before 2026 arrives? Hunker down, get cozy and stream a movie.
Film critic Ty Burr of the subscription newsletter “Ty Burr’s Watch List” shares his recommendations for the best films to stream in the comfort of your own home.
Film critic Ty Burr’s picks
“A Little Prayer” (2023)
Available to rent on YouTube, Amazon Prime Video, and Apple TV.’
Click here for host Robin Young’s interview about the film with actors David Strathairn, Jane Levy and Celia Watson, and writer-director Angus MacLachlan.
“It stars David Strathairn as a middle-American guy. He runs his own sheet metal business with his son. He’s a decent man, and he realizes that parts of his family are falling apart and failing. And in that failing, some of his own past failings come up.
“David Strathairn is a wonderful actor who rarely gets a lead role like this. And it is so heartening to see him in this role, especially as he plays off Jane Levy as his daughter-in-law, because they’re two kind people in a rougher world than either of them expects, and they have a bond that is human in a way that movies rarely, rarely show.”
“Eephus” (2024)
Available to stream on MUBI with a subscription.
“This is about the last [baseball] game on a town field in rural Massachusetts. The last game in October before they close it for the season, tear it down, and put a new middle school up.
“It’s about two teams of middle-aged guys who’ve been playing local ball, and it’s about America as seen through those middle-aged guys playing local ball. The entire movie just takes place over the course of the game, which stretches into the twilight.
“It is about as simple a movie as can be. In my mind, it’s about as perfect a movie as can be.”
“It Was Just an Accident” (2025)
Available to rent on Apple TV and YouTube.
“This is actually a fascinating and really entertaining movie in a dark way. It’s a kind of a black comedy. It’s made by an Iranian director, Jafar Panahi, who has been imprisoned. The movie is based on his own experiences. It’s about a working man in Iran who thinks he has met his former torturer, but he never saw the man because he was blindfolded, but he heard the man’s wooden leg.
“He kidnaps this man, and is about to kill him, and the guy says, ‘It’s not me. I’m just a guy with a wooden leg.’ So, the guy who’s kidnapped him says, ‘Well, I guess I gotta go round up some other people who knew him. Everybody ends up in a van traveling around Tehran trying to figure out what to do.
“It’s a dark comedy, but through that comes just the agony and the drama of living in a police state in ways that I think certainly resonate in Iran and may begin to echo at home.”
“Train Dreams” (2025)
Available to stream on Netflix with a subscription.
“It is about one small anonymous man’s life. He’s a logger. He works on the railroad. At one point, he’s married with a kid. It’s a movie that’s told with great grace and simplicity, and, later in his life, he meets and sort of sparks up a friendship with a forest ranger played by Kerry Condon.
“I love this movie. It’s one of those movies that is both micro and macro at the same time, that just focuses on one small person while giving you a glimpse of the universe.
“Good Fortune” (2025)
Available to rent on Apple TV and YouTube.
“I mean, after all the heavy stuff, you need to laugh, especially these days. This is a very goofy comedy, directed [by] and starring Azi Ansari, about a man who [is] burdened with student loans, is living out of his car, is just living the American nightmare that was supposed to be the American dream.
“He ends up having a guardian angel that allows him to switch places with a rich tech bro. And the guardian angel is played by none other than Keanu Reeves … and the tech bro is played by Seth Rogan. And there you have three very different flavors in one movie.
“It’s, as I say, a silly movie with some points to say about what it’s like to be young and trying to make a living today in America. But it also just has its share of belly laughs.”
This interview was edited for clarity.
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More recommendations
“Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery” (2025)
“Nouvelle Vague” (2025)
“Left-Handed Girl” (2025)
“Weapons” (2025)
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Emiko Tamagawa produced and edited this interview for broadcast with Mark Navin. Grace Griffin produced it for the web.
This article was originally published on WBUR.org.
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