The 15 best movies added to Netflix in November

Another month passes on as we close in further towards the end of 2020. It is time to bid goodbye to the horrors and scars of the last month and look forward to brighter and better things as we approach the most festive time of the year.

While the most of this year has been spent repeating the mundane tasks of everyday and seemingly living the same day over and over again; Netflix has been quite active in presenting us with fresh content starting every new month.

This November, as we set our sight firmly towards Christmas and the New Year, Netflix has also decided to join in and switch up in offering us with tons of new content that reflect the prevailing festive mood.

Bask in the change with these new film entries on the popular online streaming platform. Here are the fifteen best movies you can expect to binge on Netflix in November.

Best films added to Netflix in November:

15. The Next Karate Kid (Christopher Cain – 1994)

Yep, before she won the Oscar for her role as the not-quite-underdog amateur boxer in Million Dollar Baby, Hillary Swank truly broke out in the industry with her performance as Julie Pierce in the penultimate instalment of the crazed ’90s martial-arts movie franchise The Karate Kid.

Even though it never reached quite the heights of the initial Karate Kid films, there is still something immensely satisfying about cheering the run-down underdogs coached by Mister Miyagi beat the shit out of their notorious opponents.

With old-school rock music, teenage romance and likeable characters (Mister Miyagi, we love you!): The Next Karate Kid is one nostalgic time-capsule that will take you back to those glorious growing-up days.

14. Mile 22 (Peter Berg – 2018)

Mark Wahlberg stars in this pumped-up action-thriller about the CIA operative James Silva leading a small but lethal paramilitary team on an urgent and dangerous mission.

In a race against time, they must transport a foreign intelligence asset from an American embassy in Southeast Asia to an airfield for extraction – a distance of 22 miles. With the city’s military, police and street gangs soon joining in to reclaim the asset, Mile 22 makes for an extremely exciting watch.

13. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 (Cody Cameron, Kris Pearn – 2013)

The sequel to 2009’s Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, this popular-with-the-younger-generation kid’s film returns following Flint Lockwood as he realises that the FLDSMDFR is still functioning and is creating food-animal hybrids. To put an end to it, Flint joins hands with his friends and sets out to save the world.

With its lovable characters, goofy premises, really creative food backgrounds and animals, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 is both fun and delightful.

12. Yes Man (Peyton Reed – 2008)

We can never tired of watching the good-old wacky comedies of Jim Carrey, can we?

Here in Yes Man, Carrey plays a bank loan officer who has become increasingly withdrawn since his divorce from his former wife Stephanie. Soon, after attending a motivational “Yes!” seminar which encourages its attendants to seize the opportunity to say “Yes!”, Carl meets inspirational guru Terrence, who forces a reluctant Carl to promise to answer “Yes!” to every opportunity, request, or invitation that presents itself.

The film is based loosely on the 2005 memoir of the same name by humorist Danny Wallace. Also starring Zooey Deschanel and Bradley Cooper, Yes Man was a box-office success, grossing more than $200 million worldwide.

11. Dolly Parton’s Christmas on the Square (Debbie Allen – 2020)

The seasonal cheer comes to a screeching halt when a cold-hearted woman tries to sell her hometown’s land. Can music, magic and memories change her mind?

This new Netflix Original, Dolly Parton’s Christmas on the Square is a 2020 feel-good comedy musical starring Dolly Parton, Christine Baranski, Treat Williams and Jenifer Lewis that will be coming on 22nd November.

The holiday musical, which features 14 original songs from the singer, enjoys a story revolving around a Scrooge-like woman planning to sell a small town against the wishes of the local people. With the situation looking fire, angel Dolly arrives to step in.

10. Shawn Mendes: In Wonder (Grant Singer – 2020)

Shawn Mendes: In Wonder is a personal portrait of singer/songwriter Shawn Mendes’ life, chronicling the past few years of his rise and journey.

According to the streaming giant, the documentary “follows Shawn Mendes’ journey toward self-discovery, after the physical and emotional demands of his rise, and his last world tour, pushed him towards a personal and musical reckoning.”

In the trailer, Mendes says, “This isn’t a story about a famous musician. This is a story about a guy growing up.”

9. Casper (Brad Silberling – 1995)

Another film that is sure to remind us of our childhood days, Casper tells the memorable story of the titular friendly ghost befriending the daughter of a paranormal expert hired to exorcise the ghosts from the mansion of Carrigan Crittenden.

With Christina Ricci in her first major role, Casper made extensive use of computer-generated imagery to create the ghosts, and it is the first feature film to have a fully CGI character in the lead role.

It goes for a much darker interpretation of the Friendly Ghost in comparison to the comics, cartoons, and films of the previous years, especially with its theme of death, most notably providing the character with a tragic backstory that addresses his death.

8. Ocean’s Eleven (Steven Soderbergh – 2001)

Steven Soderbergh’s ensemble comedy-heist starring Hollywood big names which included the likes of George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts, Matt Damon and Andy Garcia, Ocean’s Eleven follows friends Danny Ocean (Clooney) and Rusty Ryan (Pitt), who plan a heist of $160 million from casino owner Terry Benedict (García), the lover of Ocean’s ex-wife Tess (Roberts).

Soderbergh reportedly relished the opportunity “to make a movie that has no desire except to give pleasure from beginning to end.”

He added: “This is the kind of film technically that people like Steven Spielberg and David Fincher and John McTiernan do with both hands tied behind their back. Not me. It was a struggle for me. Halfway through this film, I was wondering what I had gotten myself into.”

7. Boyz n the Hood (John Singleton – 1991)

Gritty and powerful, John Singleton’s Boyz n the Hood drew up an extremely heart-wrenching portrayal of how it is like for black people to grow up in Los Angeles. It shows that through the lives of three childhood friends, Darrin, Tre and Ricky, struggle to cope with the distractions and dangers of growing up in a Los Angeles ghetto.

Singleton initially developed the film as a requirement for application to film school in 1986 and sold the script to Columbia Pictures upon graduation in 1990. During writing, he drew inspiration from his own life and from the lives of people he knew and insisted he direct the project. The film became a critical and commercial success and was nominated for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay at the 64th Academy Awards, making Singleton the youngest person and the first African-American to be nominated for Best Director.

6. Snowden (Oliver Stone – 2016)

Based on the books The Snowden Files by Luke Harding and Time of the Octopus by Anatoly Kucherena, the film stars Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Edward Snowden, a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) subcontractor and whistleblower who copied and leaked highly classified information from the National Security Agency (NSA) beginning in 2013.

Highly controversial, director Oliver Stone said this about the difficulties encountered during the making of the film: “It’s a very strange thing to do [a story about] an American man, and not be able to finance this movie in America. And that’s very disturbing if you think about its implications on any subject that is not overtly pro-American.

“They say we have freedom of expression, but the thought is financed, and thought is controlled, and the media is controlled. This country is very tight on that, and there’s no criticism allowed at a certain level. You can make movies about civil rights leaders who are dead, but it’s not easy to make one about a current man.”

5. Whose Streets? (Sabaah Folayan – 2017)

A documentary film about the killing of Michael Brown and the Ferguson uprising, directed by Sabaah Folayan and co-directed by Damon Davis, Whose Streets? premiered in competition at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival, then was released theatrically in August 2017, for the anniversary of Brown’s death.

It focuses on seven main characters, particularly Hands Up United’s co-founder Tory Russell, Brittany Ferrell, a nurse and young mother, and David Whitt, a recruiter for civilian organization Cop Watch.

4. Easy A (Will Gluck – 2010)

One of the more popular films to get an entry on Netflix this month, the Emma Stone-starred sex-comedy Easy A is sure to be your “Pocketful of Sunshine” during of the business end of the rather gloomy 2020.

Emma Stone plays Olive, who lies to her best friend about losing her virginity to one of the college boys. When a girl overhears their conversation, her story spreads across the entire school like wildfire.

Director Will Gluck’s favourite film is Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Easy A has multiple homages to it in the film (Olive’s shower Mohawk, “never had one lesson”), among many other John Hughes references.

3. Platoon (Oliver Stone – 1986)

One of the most significant war films of all-time, Oliver Stone’s Platoon was nominated for eight Academy Awards at the 59th Academy Awards and won four including Best Picture, Best Director for Stone, Best Sound, and Best Film Editing. Stone wrote the screenplay based upon his experiences as a U.S. infantryman in Vietnam, to counter the vision of the war portrayed in John Wayne’s The Green Berets.

Starring Tom Berenger, Willem Dafoe, Charlie Sheen, Keith David, Kevin Dillon, John C. McGinley, Forest Whitaker, and Johnny Depp, it is the first film of a trilogy of Vietnam War films directed by Stone, followed by Born on the Fourth of July and Heaven & Earth.

The film, based on Stone’s experience from the war, follows a U.S. Army volunteer (Sheen) serving in Vietnam while his Platoon Sergeant and his Squad Leader (Berenger and Dafoe) argue over the morality in the platoon and the conduct of the war.

2. V for Vendetta (James McTeigue – 2005)

Written by the Wachowski’s, the James McTeigue directed V for Vendetta is based on the 1988 DC/Vertigo Comics limited series of the same name by Alan Moore and David Lloyd.

Set in an alternative future where a Nordic supremacist and neo-fascist totalitarian regime has subjugated the United Kingdom, the film centres on V (played by Hugo Weaving), an anarchist and masked freedom fighter who attempts to ignite a revolution through elaborate terrorist acts, while Natalie Portman plays Evey, a young, working-class woman caught up in V’s mission and Stephen Rea portrays a detective leading a desperate quest to stop V.

It has been seen by many political groups as an allegory of oppression by government; anarchists have used it to promote their beliefs. David Lloyd stated: “The Guy Fawkes mask has now become a common brand and a convenient placard to use in protest against tyranny – and I’m happy with people using it, it seems unique, an icon of popular culture being used this way.”

1. A Clockwork Orange (Stanley Kubrick – 1971)

Stanley Kubrick’s radioactively outrageous thesis on violence, A Clockwork Orange was based on Anthony Burgess’ 1962 novel of the same name. The plot follows Alex, a psychopathic delinquent, who is imprisoned for murder and rape. To reduce his sentence, he volunteers for an experimental therapy conducted by the government, but it goes askew.

The film is considered a landmark in the relaxation of control on violence in the cinema. A Clockwork Orange remains an influential work in cinema and other media. The film is frequently referenced in popular culture, which Adam Chandler of The Atlantic attributes to Kubrick’s “genre-less” directing techniques that brought novel innovation in filming, music, and production that had not been seen at the time of the film’s original release.