What’s Streaming This Week (10/25 – 11/1)

Welcome to When To Stream’s Weekly Preview! Every week, we take a closer look at the major film streaming releases scheduled to launch in the next 7 days. As always, release dates are subject to change.

Another note: We provide links to digital pre-orders (when available) and do receive a very small commission for any purchases made from this website. If you’d like to support our work, and you’re looking to buy through any of our digital partners, we’d appreciate it if you’d click through.

Here are this week’s highlights:

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Tuesday, October 27th, 2026

THE DOG STARS – $24.99 Sale / $19.99 Rental

Cast: Jacob Elordi, Josh Brolin, Margaret Qualley, Benedict Wong, and Guy Pearce

Synopsis: After the world’s population has been ravaged by a pandemic, a man lives a lonesome existence in a Colorado airplane hangar with his dog and a dour gunman he has befriended. When a mysterious transmission comes through on the radio while he’s flying his old Cessna, it sparks a hunt for the provenance of the sound.

What we like:

• This post-apocalyptic thriller directed by Ridley Scott is based on Peter Heller’s 2012 novel of the same name. Screenwriter Mark L. Smith adapted the novel and retained Heller’s emphasis on loneliness, nature and the struggle to remain humane after civilization collapses.
• Although the premise involves a pandemic and a devastated civilization, Scott and the filmmakers have emphasized that the movie is about human relationships and survival, rather than undead monsters.
• While the story is set in Colorado, much of the production took place in Italy, including extensive outdoor and aerial photography.

What we don’t like:

• We hate to see a filmmaking legend like Ridley Scott endure flop after flop, but it’s been over a decade since he’s had a crowd-pleasing hit. This one was neither a hit (not even $15M domestic) nor a crowd-pleaser (C+ CinemaScore).

FILIPIÑANA – $12.99 Sale / TBD Rental

Cast: Jorrybell Agoto, Carmen Castellanos, Teroy Guzman, Carlos Siguion-Reyna, Isabel Sicat, Nour Hooshmand

Synopsis: While working at an elite country club outside Manila, a 17-year-old Ilocana worker uncovers the violent truths of her workplace, her country, and her own past after attempting to return a lost golf club to the club’s president.

What we like:

• This dark comedy was written and directed by Rafael Manuel in his feature film debut, which expands upon his 2020 Silver Bear-winning thesis short film.
• The film premiered at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Special Jury Award for Creative Vision. It was selected as the Philippine entry for the Best International Feature Film at the upcoming 99th Academy Awards.
• The film has been described as highly controlled and visually inventive, with reviewers comparing its atmosphere to filmmakers such as Michael Haneke and David Lynch.

What we don’t like:

• Some audiences and reviewers found the formalist, slow-burn storytelling hypnotically tense, whereas others criticize it as tediously slow or detached. The film did decent art-house box-office, earning about $423K domestically. We’re excited to check it out.

FORGOTTEN ISLAND – $29.99 Sale / TBD Rental

Cast: H.E.R., Liza Soberano, Dave Franco, Jenny Slate, Manny Jacinto, Dolly de Leon, Jo Koy, Ronny Chieng, and Lea Salonga

Synopsis: Jo and Raissa find themselves stranded in the mystical world of the forgotten island of Nakali. They discover that their only way home might come at the expense of a lifetime of shared memories.

What we like:

• Unlike many recent animated movies, Forgotten Island isn’t based on an existing franchise, book, or toy line. It was developed as an original story at DreamWorks Animation by directors Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado. Crawford previously directed The Croods: A New Age and Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, while Mercado co-directed Forgotten Island as his feature directorial debut.
• The film deliberately mixes animation styles, with influences ranging from anime and manga to street art, video games and classic cartoons.
• The story incorporates Filipino cultural details and mythology, using elements such as Tagalog, Filipino music, karaoke and Filipino pop culture.
• The film drew attention for including a formal disclaimer in its end credits explicitly prohibiting the use of the film for data mining or AI training, which directors Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado championed as a stand for human-driven artistry. Bravo!

What we don’t like:

• The film struggled financially, grossing roughly $63 million worldwide against an $80 million production budget despite positive critical reception (96% on Rotten Tomatoes).

GHOST IN THE CELL – $14.99 Sale / TBD Rental

Cast: Abimana Aryasatya, Almanzo Konoralma, Aming Sugandhi, Arswendy Bening Swara, Bront Palarae, and Dimas Danang Suryonegoro

Synopsis: Director Joko Anwar plunges viewers into a high-security prison ruled by feuding gangs and a tyrannical warden. The arrival of a new inmate kicks off a series of mysterious gruesome murders that leave its victims on morbid display. The hapless inmates trapped in the prison must overcome their rivalries to unmask an invisible, otherworldly enemy. No one is safe as the cells cage in the horrors and a ghost roams the prison with murderous intent.

What we like:

• A wild Indonesian horror-comedy that combines prison thriller, supernatural horror, splatter, action and political satire. It’s written and directed by Joko Anwar, one of Indonesia’s most celebrated genre directors.
• The film has been categorized as body horror, monster horror, psychological horror, splatter, dark comedy, prison drama and satire. Something for everyone.
• Beneath the outrageous violence, Anwar takes aim at corruption, cronyism, institutional brutality, political hypocrisy, private militias and the corrupting influence of money.
• Production information says the filmmakers constructed a detailed prison set from scratch and used more than 100 performers to create the feeling of a functioning prison population.

What we don’t like:

• It doesn’t seem like Anwar is a box-office draw yet in the US. The film had a limited release in theaters and only grossed about $30k. This one should help grow his fanbase.

NEVER AFTER DARK – $16.99 Sale / TBD Rental

Cast: Moeka Hoshi, Kurumi Inagaki, Kento Kaku, Mutsuo Yoshioka, Bokuzō Masana, and Tae Kimura

Synopsis: A wandering medium who guides restless spirits out of the world of the living encounters a grotesque apparition with powers that defy her experience. She soon finds that her greatest adversary is not the supernatural, but the living.

What we like:

• American filmmaker Dave Boyle wrote, directed and produced this fresh twist on Japanese horror (J-horror). The film premiered at the 2026 South by Southwest Film & TV Festival, where it won the Midnighter Audience Award. It also received the Grand Jury Prize for a Feature Film at the Overlook Film Festival.
• The ghostly spirit in the film, played by Mutsuo Yoshioka, is credited under the unsettling name “The Gaping Mouth Man.”
• Critics have raved about this one, it currently sits at 98% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.

What we don’t like:

• The film shifts from a conventional Japanese ghost story/exorcism premise into a gritty, brutal crime thriller, which polarized some viewers who found the genre pivot unexpected and less than satisfying.

THE STUNT DRIVER – $14.99 Sale / TBD Rental

Cast: Jay Baruchel, Laurence Leboeuf, Dan Bakkedahl, with Ben Foster and Ed Helms

Synopsis: Set in the mid-seventies, The Stunt Driver recounts the true underdog story of Canada’s Ken Carter, the world champion stunt driver who battles personal demons and public doubt to attempt what everyone considers impossible – a mile-long jump across the St. Lawrence river in a rocket car.

What we like:

• This historical comedy was written, directed, and co-produced by Michael Dowse, who’s best known for the 2011 hockey comedy Goon.
• Jay Baruchel, known for BlackBerry, Goon and This Is the End, takes on the titular role playing Ken Carter, who tried to ride a rocket-powered car roughly one mile across the St. Lawrence River.
• The film draws on the National Film Board of Canada’s 1981 documentary The Devil at Your Heels. That documentary followed Carter’s five-year effort to organize his rocket-car jump. Rather than recreating every historical sequence with computer-generated imagery, the production licensed footage from the original documentary.

What we don’t like:

• Carter’s obsession with daredevil performance continued beyond the famous river-jump attempt. He died in 1983 at age 45 during a separate stunt in Peterborough, Ontario, when his car overshot a ramp.

VERITY – $24.99 Sale / $19.99 Rental

Cast: Dakota Johnson, Anne Hathaway, and Josh Hartnett

Synopsis: Lowen Ashleigh gets hired by Jeremy Crawford to ghostwrite novels for his bestselling author wife Verity, who’s unable to finish after an accident. Lowen uncovers Verity’s disturbing truths while residing at the Crawfords’ home to work.

What we like:

• This thriller adapts one of Colleen Hoover’s most controversial novels, which in 2018 became a major word-of-mouth hit partly because of its disturbing revelations and deliberately ambiguous ending.
• Michael Showalter directed the film, and his previous work includes The Big Sick, The Eyes of Tammy Faye and The Idea of You.
• After previous Hoover adaptations Reminders of Him, It Ends With Us, and Regretting You, this one gets a major star-power upgrade: Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson, and Josh Hartnett headline here.

What we don’t like:

• Reviews heavily criticized Dakota Johnson’s flat and detached portrayal of ghostwriter Lowen Ashleigh (these names Hoover comes up with!), with audiences arguing she failed to capture the unhinged intensity of the book’s protagonist. Like the novel, the film ends ambiguously, which probably helped it receive a polarizing C+ CinemaScore from opening weekend audiences…the lowest score for any Colleen Hoover film adaptation to date.

Also Streaming Tuesday:

CONCESSIONS

THE LOST ONES

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Wednesday, October 28th, 2026

HANGING BY A WIRE – Paramount+

Director: Mohammed Ali Naqvi

Synopsis: On a Tuesday morning in August 2023, a group of kids set off for school, climbing into a makeshift cable car for the journey across a mountain pass in northwest Pakistan. What happened next would make headlines around the world. Suddenly, 900 feet above the ground, two cables snapped, putting the teenagers in mortal danger.

What we like:

• From acclaimed Pakistani filmmaker Mohammed Ali Naqvi, who previously worked on documentaries including Among the Believers, Insha’Allah Democracy and The Accused: Damned or Devoted?, as well as Netflix’s Turning Point.
• The filmmakers deliberately approached it like a thriller. Naqvi has described the movie as a survival story designed to unfold largely in the present tense, with decisions and rescues happening against an escalating clock.
• Critics have responded very positively. Rotten Tomatoes currently lists an 87% Fresh critics score, with reviewers particularly praising the film’s suspenseful editing and ability to maintain tension even though viewers know the basic outcome of the rescue.

What we don’t like:

• Reviewers point out that the film sidesteps broader infrastructure audits, such as how other similar makeshift cable systems across the region are or aren’t being retrofitted to prevent a recurrence. Quite frankly…they look terrifying.

MINIONS & MONSTERS – Peacock

Cast: Allison Janney, Christoph Waltz, Jeff Bridges, Jesse Eisenberg, Zoey Deutch, Bobby Moynihan, Phil LaMarr, with Trey Parker and Pierre Coffin

Synopsis: This is the rambunctious, ridiculous and totally true story of how the Minions conquered Hollywood, became movie stars, lost everything, unleashed monsters onto the world and then banded together to try and save the planet from the mayhem they had just created.

What we like:

• The story takes place in 1927 Hollywood, where our lovable scamps the Minions dream of becoming movie stars by making their own monster movie…only to unleash real monsters instead.
• Pierre Coffin, who co-directed the original Despicable Me films, once again directed the movie while providing the distinctive voices of all the Minions.
• It pays tribute to pioneers like the Lumière brothers and George Méliès, while spoofing silent comedy icons such as Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Harold Lloyd. Unsurprisingly…critics loved it! It earned an 89% Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

What we don’t like:

• With this Minions movie bringing our beloved yellow fellas in to the early part of the 20th Century, online debate naturally turned to whether the Minions served Hitler. Let’s break it down:
  1. The Premise: Minions are hardwired to serve history’s most evil villains (such as Dracula and Napoleon).
  2. The Timeline Problem: Fans realized this logic implied the Minions should have worked for World War II dictators during the 1930s and 1940s.
  3. The In-Universe Fix: The 2015 Minions film placed the characters inside an isolated cave during that entire historical era.
  4. The New Tribes: Minions & Monsters introduced separate groups of Minions active during other eras like the 1920s.
• The Final Verdict: When questioned if these splinter groups broke the rule, Coffin admitted he tried to dodge the query, but explicitly stated canonically, the Minions never served Adolf Hitler. We believe him!

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Friday, October 30th, 2026

BIG BABY – Shudder

Cast: Adam Marcinowski, Brandon Scott, Krsy Fox

Synopsis: Nightmares of a maniac killer in a baby mask inspire a horror writer’s new script. As his life begins to spiral out of control, he discovers Big Baby’s murderous rampage may be more than just fiction.

What we like:

• Big Baby began as a fictional movie within director Spider One’s 2022 film Allegoria. Audiences responded so enthusiastically to that brief segment that they encouraged him to turn it into a full-length feature.
• The writer-director, whose real name is Michael Cummings, is also the frontman of industrial rock band Powerman 5000. He’s the brother of filmmaker and musician Rob Zombie.
• Pop icon Cher is one of the film’s executive producers, alongside her son Chaz Bono, who also appears in the movie. Cher had previously worked with Spider One and Krsy Fox on their horror film Little Bites.

What we don’t like:

• Brainstorm Media gave Big Baby a limited U.S. theatrical release, but did not report grosses. We’re assuming it did not do much business in theaters, though it should get a huge bump in visibility when it hits Shudder.

Also Streaming Friday:

THE GENTLEMAN THIEF

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Saturday, October 31st, 2026

Sunday, November 1st, 2026

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