New to Netflix: Beatdowns, Scooby-Doo In China, BARAKA And Coen Brothers

Contributing Writer; Toronto, Canada (@triflic)
Welcome to this week's entry for New To Netflix! Not that we are actually new to Netflix, we're just happy, able, and willing to help you find out what kind of 'Twitch-y' material is coming to the big red virtual envelope in the streaming room.

This week there is Michael Jai White on directing and starring duties in his MMA entry to the Never Back Down series of films; there is Hark Tsui CGI mystery adventure starring Andy Lau; there are the two Ronald Fricke films that span decades and continents; the most underrated of Coen Brothers' films as well as a documentary on the cult of their now most popular and enduring film.

New In The USA: INTOLERABLE CRUELTY

Next only to Raising Arizona, this film is the Coen Brothers' purest screw ball comedy, a genre that is as neglected by modern audiences as it is misunderstood. By now the Brothers are fully in the mode of taking the piss out of mega-star George Clooney, and they saddle him here with more than one 'big speech movie moment' while also having him bit repeatedly by Catherine Zeta-Jones' dog. Marriage, loyalty and other myths get stomped, hard, in this movie that is compulsively rewatchable.

Much like their remake of The Ladykillers, these so-called 'lower-tier' Coen films get knocked by audiences simply because the vocal detractors often judge the directors against the yardstick of their own work, rather than the usual 90%-of-everything-is-junk cinema out in the multiplex.

Bonus: Geoffrey Rush belting out a Simon & Garfunkel tune in the opening moments is rather sublime in its ridiculousness.

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