The TV shows and films to stream this April

Dancing with the grandkids, a Sunday afternoon at the cinema and a new addictive TV series are what’s in store this month.

Wednesday 

My granddaughters are watching this, I really enjoyed it and we are all learning “the Dance”. Wednesday Adams the daughter of the Adams family is now in her teens and following an incident, involving the water polo team and some piranhas is sent to her mother’s school Nevermore- a school for misfits and outcasts.

Jenna Ortega stars as Wednesday Adams, her cold emotionless nature combined with her psychic abilities make it difficult for her to make friends but are useful in solving unexplained murders. It’s a bit gory and scary in parts, (but so very well done) so younger viewers may need supervision and debriefing. 

Thing (the disembodied hand) accompanies Wednesday to Nevermore where the world’s nicest roommate Enid Sinclair (Emma Myers), who happens to be a werewolf is waiting and hoping to become a best friend. There is a huge cast with some great characters, the town sheriff, his son, the school principal, mean girls, a romantic interest and many others.  Catherine Zeta-Jones is just lovely as Morticia and the relationships between the characters develop as the series unfolds. 

The “Wednesday dance” is in episode 4, when Wednesday attends the school dance and although it makes up less than three minutes of the entire series it quickly became iconic. Choreographed by Ortega in only a couple of days, it has been copied underwater, on ice skates, by Lady Gaga and by mums on Tik Tok.   

Tim Burton who directed Beetlejuice, Sleepy Hollow, Edward Scissorhands and Alice in Wonderland among his many works,  is one of the executive producers and directed four of the eight episodes in season one.  With school holidays just around the corner, Wednesday might be just the boredom buster or wet weather stand-by solution we need.

Wednesday is available for streaming on Netflix.

Fisherman’s Friends: One and All

There is a group of men from Cornwall, five of whom are crab or lobster fishers who got together 30 years ago and started singing sea shanties.  In March 2019 a modest movie about them became a sleeper hit.  “The film’s success was like the second coming of the band,” says Jon Cleave, a founding member of the real-life Fisherman’s Friends in an NME interview. The 10-member “buoy band” even had to stop performing in Port Isaac, their home village in Cornwall, because several thousand fans were turning up every time.

The film’s sequel, Fisherman’s Friends: One and All, will most likely boost the band again. James Purefoy plays the lead singer who is drinking heavily and not coping after his father’s death.  He is ready to give it all away but is tempted back by the opportunity to play at the Glastonbury festival.  Maggie Steed plays his mum and in another real-life anecdote that made its way to the screen hatches an innovative plan to get the Fisherman’s Friends invited to Glastonbury, (the real Fisherman’s Friends did actually play the Pyramid stage at Glastonbury in 2011). 

It’s a heart-warming story and the addition of Aubrey Flynn, (Imelda May) enriches the story music company staffer Gareth (Joshua McGuire) provides levity as he attempts to bring the band into line with education and training required by the record company,  (one gentleman of certain age telling another, “to put a sock in it Germaine Greer “ made me snort-laugh!).

Cornwall is a pretty place and the scenery in the film is enough to have me planning a visit.  If you enjoy the sound of a well-harmonised group or love a sea shanty the movie is a must.  If you are looking for a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours and escape,  Fisherman’s Friends: One and All is in cinemas now.  Stay for the credits to see footage of the real band and their videos at Glastonbury which is interspersed with the credits.  

Poker Face

Charli (Natasha Lyonne) is a woman with an incredible ability to detect when someone is lying and manages, while on the run from casino security boss Cliff, (Benjamin Bratt) and driving her beat-up but incredibly chic Plymouth Barracuda, to find herself solving yet another mystery, with a different group of people and in a different place each episode. 

Poker Face is a very American, mystery-of-the-week style of show created by Rian Johnstone. Season One has 10 episodes, (I’m only up to 4) and has been renewed for a second season.  It has been compared to Columbo and some of the other older TV shows when all the star needed was an hour to tell the story and solve the mystery.  That is what happens in Poker Face– a couple of threads that carry through but in theory, you could watch any show in any order and it is really addictive.

Poker Face is available for streaming on Binge.

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