Once upon a time the hostage comedy “Airheads” mashed together Brendan Fraser, Steve Buscemi and Adam Sandler.
The majority of Netflix subscribers have decided they’ll gladly take streaming over those pesky, slow-to-arrive, usually-of-better-quality-if-your-internet-sucks DVD and Blu-ray discs. And because of that we’re all at the mercy of whatever is on there, whatever that may be.
Indeed, rather than look for desiring a specific title — a new-ish movie you meant to see in theaters, a classic of your childhood or something truly adventurous — subscribers, when they invariably don’t find said titles, settle on something else. You wanted to watch “Out of Africa,” but it’s not there, so instead you’re watching “Archer.”
The good news is that each month brings a flood of new titles. The bad news is each month also brings an exodus of other titles, which may or may not return. February is no different. Along with the second season of Netflix-grown hit “House of Cards” and the final eight episodes of “Breaking Bad,” one can also finally watch “M*A*S*H,” the superior Robert Altman movie, not the show. Ditto “Airplane!” — the first, plus its lesser sequel — plus another ZAZ-related product, “The Naked Gun.” “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” is always a good way to kill three hours, and if you’ve never seen “Sunset Boulevard,” you can do it whenevs.
Then again, you can also bring up a rash of less esteemed titles, ones you probably forgot existed, and for a reason. Thanks to technology, rather than wait for the disc of “Goodfellas” to arrive, you can settle for “Airheads,” a 1993 hostage comedy starring Brendan Fraser, Adam Sandler and Steve Buscemi. Or the Kelsey Grammar-led submarine comedy “Down Periscope.” Or “Leap of Faith,” a severely misguided Steve Martin religious huckster drama. Or “Star Trek V: The Final Frontier,” the series’ arguable nadir. (That’s the one with a flying Spock.)
Perhaps you’d like to see what in the world America of the 1980s was thinking when it crowned Paul Hogan a brief mega-star? Well, you can’t stream “’Crocodile’ Dundee,” but you can get your grubby mitts on “’Crocodile’ Dundee II.” So you’ve got that going for you.
Want to see more of probable Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey? You can do no better than “Failure to Launch.” (A non-sarcastic note: Zooey Deschanel is fantastic in that, back when she hadn’t oversaturated the marketplace with her saucer-eyed, bangs-heavy whimsy.)
All this said, it is nice that you can watch “Harold and Maude,” plus the car chase classic “Dirty Mary Crazy Larry.” And who knows? Maybe Danny Boyle’s 1997 angel assassins fantasy “A Life Less Ordinary” ages well after nearly 20 years (!!). But probably not.
Meanwhile, you still can’t stream “Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations.”
The full list of February additions is here:
– Airheads
– Airplane!
– Airplane 2: The Sequel
– Bubba Ho-Tep
– City of Men
– Cocoon: The Return
– Crocodile Dundee 2
– The Dancer Upstairs
– Death Wish 2
– Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry
– Down Periscope
– Everything or Nothing: The Untold Story of 007
– Failure to Launch
– Flashdance
– From the Terrace
– The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
– The Hard Way
– Harold and Maude
– Heartbreakers
– Home of the Brave
– Intersection
– Leap of Faith
– A Life Less Ordinary
– Marathon Man
– MASH
– The Naked Gun
– North Dallas Forty
– Patriot Games
– Queer as Folk
– Star Trek V: The Final Frontier
– Sunset Boulevard
– The Usual Suspects
– Ingenious (February 12)
– House of Cards: Season 2 (February 14)
– Breaking Bad: Season 5 (February 24)
