From "Inception" to Al Capone: The Best of What's Coming to Amazon Prime in August 2020
There are a lot of good options to pick from.
Amazon Prime Day may have been delayed until some time in the fall, but you can still put that Prime membership to good use in August, with a long list of shows and movies coming to Prime Video.
- “Inception” (August 1.) Christopher Nolan’s latest film, “Tenet,” has been delayed repeatedly, but you can still catch his mind-bending 2010 sci-fi thriller, which recently celebrated its tenth anniversary. The film stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, a spinning top, and a pulsating score by Hans Zimmer.
- “Rain Man” (August 1.) The Best Picture of 1989 starred Dustin Hoffman as an autistic savant and Tom Cruise as his brother. This film featured a famous casino scene and some memorable references to Judge Wapner. The film hasn’t been streamable for a while, but it hits Amazon at the start of August.
- “Four Weddings and a Funeral” (August 1.) This 1994 British romantic comedy, starring Hugh Grant and Andie MacDowell, was the first of a line of movies in that genre from writer Richard Curtis, who went on to write Notting Hill and Love Actually. The film, directed by Mike Newell, got a miniseries adaptation on Hulu last year, but now the original movie comes to Amazon.
- “Margin Call” (August 1.) This 2011 film from director J.C. Chandor was one of the better cinematic treatments of the 2008 financial crisis. If you can get past that it stars Kevin Spacey, the film features a strong cast that includes Paul Bettany, Jeremy Irons and Zachary Quinto, as employees at a Wall Street firm over the course of a twenty-four-hour period.
- “Something’s Gotta Give” (August 1.) The 2003 film from director Nancy Meyers features Keanu Reeves, Diane Keaton, Jack Nicholson, and some very, very beautiful kitchens. It hits Prime at the start of the month.
- “Arkansas” (August 5.) One of the more enjoyable movies to emerge on VOD during the quarantine months, this 2020 crime film is the directorial debut of actor Clark Duke (from “Hot Tub Time Machine”) and stars Liam Hemsworth and Duke as a pair of small-time criminals who end up working for a mysterious crime boss known only as “Frog.” From there the film delves into Frog’s backstory.
- “The Peanut Butter Falcon” (August 6.) Another unheralded indie film, this one came out in 2019. The film stars Shia LaBeouf as a drifter who helps Zak (Zack Gottsagen), a young man with Down Syndrome, go on the road to meet his hero, a professional wrestler. The film also stars Dakota Johnson, John Hawkes and Bruce Dern.
- “Capone” (August 10.) This isn’t just another biopic of Al Capone, but instead follows the mobster’s fallow last days, bumming around a Florida estate while losing his mind to neurosyphilis. The film, starring Tom Hardy as Capone, got a brief release earlier this year and was directed by Josh Trank, the young director of “Chronicle” who was exiled by Hollywood (and fired from a “Star Wars“ movie) after his disastrous “Fantastic Four” film a few years ago.
- “Chemical Hearts” (August 21.) This romantic drama, based on a popular novel called Our Chemical Hearts, stars Austin Abrams and Lili Reinhart as a pair of students in love.
Stephen Silver, a technology writer for The National Interest, is a journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to Philly Voice, Philadelphia Weekly, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Living Life Fearless, Backstage magazine, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver. Image: Reuters