Keep an eye out for... a free documentary shorts festival, a new streaming platform and more
Maverick Life tunes in to pick this month’s best new shows and series coming to a small screen near you.
LONGSHOTS FILM FESTIVAL
Film festivals around the world are starting to leave the virtual space, but there are still a few gems to be found online. One of them is the LongShots Film Festival.
The festival is being hosted online on BBC Reel. It’s free to view, showcasing 13 documentary shorts, each submitted from a different film festival. The films will be available for viewing until 22 September.
BRITBOX
South Africa welcomed a new streaming platform in August – BritBox, a video-on-demand service offering an extensive range of new and classic British programming.
It includes new series such as McDonald & Dodds and Line of Duty, famous British staples such as Downton Abbey and Doctor Who, and timeless classics including Fawlty Towers and Black Adder.
If you like your comedy dry and silly and your drama stoic and polite, perhaps BritBox will serve you better than America’s streaming giants.
NETFLIX
This month sees the start of the new seasons of a number of Netflix staple series:
Money Heist, the record-shattering Spanish suspense thriller, is finally ticking towards its end. Volume 1 of Part 5 will be released on 3 September.
The final season of Lucifer, an urban fantasy dramedy about the devil ditching hell to run a LA nightclub, will air on 10 September.
Season 3 of Sex Education, a coming-ofage comedy about the socially awkward son of a sex therapist, starts on 17 September.
The second season of Blood & Water, a mystery teen drama set in Cape Town with dark undertones of human trafficking, comes out on 24 September.
Blood Brothers: Malcolm X & Muhammad Ali comes out on 9 September. It is a documentary featuring never-before-seen archival footage about the two legendary icons inspired by the book Blood Brothers by Randy Roberts and Johnny Smith.
Schumacher will be out on 15 September. It’s been seven years since the seven-time Formula 1 world champion’s accident, and his family are finally ready to talk about it, sharing interviews and previously unreleased footage of the complex, highly private German athlete.
The Chestnut Man, out on 29 September, is a creepy Nordic noir psychological thriller by Danish scriptwriter Søren Sveistrup, creator of the successful TV series The Killing.
Tudum, out on 25 September, is Netflix’s first free virtual “global fan event”. The title is a playful reference to the sound you hear when you launch Netflix.
Starting at 6pm South African time, guests will join stars from 70 new and returning Netflix titles for a hype fest of exclusives and first-looks.
The event will be livestreamed on Netflix’s YouTube channels, Facebook and Twitch. Find out more on Tudum.com.
APPLE TV
Jon Stewart is getting back in front of the camera for the first time since Trevor Noah succeeded him on The Daily Show in 2015. Apple describes The Problem with Jon
Stewart as “a multiple season, one-hour, single-issue series that will explore topics that are currently part of the national conversation and his advocacy work”.
The show will air in September, but a release date is yet to be announced.
Foundation (24 September) is a series based on the eponymous book trilogy by legendary science fiction author Isaac Asimov.
Who knows what a visionary such as Asimov would feel about his greatest work being produced by a conglomerate that stunts its own products to force consumers to buy additional adapters and upgrades, but if there’s anyone with the budget to pull off this gargantuan project, it’s Apple.
AMAZON
The Voyeurs is being released on 10 September. A young couple develop a habit of spying on the residents directly opposite their apartment and inadvertently get roped into a deadly scandal. Sound familiar? Earlier this year, Maverick Life reviewed The Woman in the Window, a psychological thriller with a similar premise.
The Voyeurs follows a developing trend of suspense films with subtle thematic links to Covid-related anxieties.
Everybody’s Talking About Jamie (17 September) is a charming film adaption of the London West End musical about an aspiring teen drag queen.
It plays neatly into the playbook of the indie, queer, coming-of-age crowdpleaser and packs a wallop of cheeky fun.
SHOWMAX
In the Same Breath is being released on 6 September. Chinese-born American filmmaker Nanfu Wang delves into the parallel misinformation campaigns by US and Chinese authorities during the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic to shape the public narrative around Covid-19, and the devastating consequences of the confusion this caused.
Obama: In Pursuit of a More Perfect Union (8 September) is a documentary following the personal and political journey of America’s first black president.
Timed to coincide with his 60th birthday, it takes a personal view of the Obama administration and how his hopes for America have panned out.