Now Streaming: iHOSTAGE, Unnerving Dutch Hostage Thriller

Never lose your AirPods.

iHostage
The film is now streaming on Netflix.

Beyond the tabloid-sounding title, Bobby Boermans' intense Dutch thriller recreates an armed stand-off in an Amsterdam store in 2022.

Cloaked in camouflage and wielding weapons, with explosives taped to his body, the mysterious man (Soufiane Moussouli) takes only one person hostage inside an Apple Store. Every other customer quickly fled outside or took refuge in an upstairs cafeteria or an employees' storage closet.

The unlucky hostage, Ilian (Admir Sehovic), is a Bulgarian who returned to the Netherlands to earn money for his family back home. On a quick trip to buy replacement AirPods, he finds himself tethered to an apparent lunatic.

Directed by Bobby Boermans, who also helmed the tense, terrorist-themed narrative series The Golden Hour, as well as this year's military action drama Invasion, the inciting incident happens within the first 10 minutes. Brutally brisk, even when the film pauses to allow for brief conversations, it's always simmering, and remains gripping throughout.

It may help to not be familiar with the true-life events; since I was not, it held my attention throughout, building up a rather uncomfortable knot in my stomach.

Lazarus
The first three episodes are now streaming on Max. Subsequent episodes debut every Saturday at midnight on Adult Swim before streaming next day on Max.

Recently, I quite enjoyed the animated series Common Side Effects on Adult Swim and Max, which revolved around the discovery of a cure for every pain on Earth -- even death.

Created by Shinichiro Watanabe and set in 2052, Lazarus posits that a universally-popular miracle drug that appears to cure every pain on Earth is, in truth, intended to end humanity by killing everyone who has taken the drug. Unless, that is, someone can somehow find the drug's creator, Dr. Skinner, who has gone underground.

Featuring the contributions of action supervisor Chad Stahelski (John Wick) and a propulsive musical score, Lazarus is fast and funny, with astoundingly intricate sequences and a lead character, Axel, who breaks out of prison for fun and finds himself part of a team of super-criminals who are bent on finding the mysterious Dr. Skinner on behalf of an equally mysterious organization.

The action is as good as I hoped -- even though it's animated, it feels like much of it could be created in live-action -- and Axel provides a good dose of irreverent humor. It's perfectly slated as a late night series.

In the U.S., it's only available in English-dubbed versions, which is a downer. On the plus side, it's very good dubbing, and doesn't distract from the hyper-active narrative or the rowdy characters.

I, Jack Wright
The first two episodes are now streaming on BritBox. Subsequent episodes debut every Thursday.

More sedate, yet entirely engaging, I, Jack Wright follows along merrily as a British family fairly well implodes after the titular character dies under mysterious circumstances.

Jack Wright is an incredibly wealthy owner of a brick-making company (?!), who is on his third wife, Sally (Nikki Amuka-Bird), with whom he has two teenage children. The opening sequence, which is shot like a true-crime documentary by director Tom Vaughan, shows Sally in prison, along with other family members shot in different locations. So we know something is up, whereupon the series rewinds to the night of Jack Wright's death.

Created and written by Chris Lang, whose true-life comic mystery The Thief, His Wife, and the Canoe I quite enjoyed, I, Jack Wright establishes the various family members briefly yet memorably, making it easy to follow and guess at their motivations. Some are easy to guess, such as John Simm as the sketchy and unlikable son Gray, who keeps getting punched in the face by a debut collector.

Others, however, will have to wait before their true colors are shown, which begins with Episode 2. Everyone is quite angry, and everyone wants what they believe to be theirs, so there's a lot of squabbling and shouting.

Anytime I see people fighting about money, it's always funny to me, which, I suppose, is one advantage of living a modest lifestyle.

Now Streaming celebrates independent and international genre films and television shows that are newly available on legal streaming services.