What’s Streaming
RAFIKI (2019) Stream on Criterion. Not only is this love story controversial in Kenya, where “Rafiki” was filmed — it is illegal. The movie itself is illegal, too; it was banned in Kenya two weeks before its premiere at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival, where it was the first ever Kenyan film to be shown.
Living in a country where gay sex is criminalized, Kena (Samantha Mugatsia) and Ziki (Sheila Munyiva) begin a romantic relationship rooted in struggle and dissent. They are also the daughters of two men running against each other for a seat in the county assembly, making their love especially forbidden. “Rafiki” is “sharp at rendering the hesitancy of their flirtation,” Ben Kenigsberg wrote in his review for The New York Times, “as well as the forces — parental expectations, religion, an ever-watchful gossip — arrayed against them.” It is a debut film from the director Wanuri Kahiu.
ARKANSAS (2020) Stream on Amazon. Clark Duke is a writer, producer and the director of this Southern crime film based on a novel by John Brandon. He also plays Swin, the counterpart to a low-level drug dealer named Kyle (Liam Hemsworth). “Less a mob thriller than a ruminative drama about a life built around orders and betrayals,” Devika Girish wrote in her review for The Times, “Arkansas” shifts between the antics of Kyle and Swin and the back story of their elusive boss, Frog (Vince Vaughn). John Malkovich also makes an appearance as Ranger Bright, who works for Frog and intercepts the duo on an interstate mission gone wrong.
BEFORE SUNRISE (1995) Stream on HBO Max. What do you do if you think you’ve met your soul mate — a French student named Céline (Julie Delpy) — on a train passing through Europe? If you’re Jesse (Ethan Hawke), an American traveler, you ask her to get off the train with you in Vienna and spend the day together, fully knowing you’ll have to part ways the next morning.
In “Before Sunrise,” directed by Richard Linklater, “there’s more than romantic love in the air,” Janet Maslin wrote in her review for The Times: “There’s also the exhilaration of making contact with a kindred spirit, of instant conversational intimacy between two strangers whose paths could lead them anywhere.” Jesse and Céline do meet again, nine years later, in BEFORE SUNSET (2004) — also available on HBO Max — before they make a final appearance in BEFORE MIDNIGHT (2013).
What’s on TV
BIG BROTHER 9 p.m. on CBS. “Big Brother” returns for its 20th year and its 22nd season on TV. An “All-Star” cast, which includes winners and fan favorites from previous seasons, will live together in a house filled with video cameras and microphones. A different contestant will be voted out of the house every day, and the last contestant left will win $500,000. This season, the show will forgo its usual studio audience to reduce the spread of Covid-19.
