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With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options—not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves–each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit platforms. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

Bungalow (Ulrich Köhler)

Ulrich Köhler remains underseen—even by the standards of Berlin School brethren Christian Petzold and Maren Ade—and a 4K restoration of his 2002 debut Bungalow comes at the right time: its story of isolation, frayed connections, and romantic infatuation foreground an only idyllic-seeming summer getaway. 18 years on, not a shred of it feels dated or resolved, down to a conclusion that puts one in mind of ’70s American classics.

Where to Stream: Grasshopper Film

Czechoslovak New Wave

A period of creative fervor and political deconstruction like few others in cinema, Czechoslovak New Wave is now getting a spotlight on The Criterion Channel. Selections includes Black Peter (Miloš Forman,...

With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options—not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves–each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit platforms. Check out this week’s selections below and an archive of past round-ups here.

A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood (Marielle Heller)

It sounds almost too perfect: Tom Hanks as Mr. Rogers, the beloved children’s entertainer. Of course, who else could it be, really? It is so seemingly predestined, in fact, that Hanks’s first onscreen appearance as Fred Rogers elicits knowing laughter from the audience. Yes, Tom Hanks playing Mr. Rogers looks and sounds exactly how you would imagine. Marielle Heller’s A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, however, is much more than an obvious biopic. It’s not really a biopic at all. Nor is it a rehash of 2018’s much-heralded documentary profile of Fred Rogers, Won’t You Be MyNeighbor?...

Hard-hitting Venice Film Festival competition movie The Painted Bird has been selected by the Czech Film and Television Academy as the Czech Republic’s international Oscar entry.

Described as an “evocation of wild, primitive Eastern Europe at the bloody close of World War II,” director-producer Václav Marhoul’s black-and-white 35mm Holocaust feature follows the journey of The Boy, entrusted by his persecuted parents to an elderly foster mother. The old woman soon dies and The Boy is on his own, wandering through the countryside, from village to farmhouse. As he struggles for survival, The Boy suffers through extraordinary brutality meted out by the ignorant, superstitious peasants and he witnesses the terrifying violence of the efficient, ruthless soldiers, both Russian and German.

Adapted from the novel of the same name by Jerzy Kosinski (Being There), the dark drama prompted a number of walk-outs at Toronto and Venice due to its tough subject matter.

There’s a reason director Jan Nemec’s name isn’t immediately conjures in superficial conversations on the Czech New Wave, despite his haunting 1964 debut Diamonds of the Night being one of the movement’s first major offerings. Described as “the movement’s bitterest aesthete” and by film historian Peter Hames as the “enfant terrible” of his peers, Nemec had neither the eventual Hollywood success of colleagues such as Milos Forman or Ivan Passer, nor international awards glory such as the Oscar winning The Shop on Main Street (1965) from Jan Kadar and Elmar Klos. Such is the price to pay for the revel.…...

Oscar-winning actor to receive award and introduce new David Lowery film.

Casey Affleck will receive the festival president’s award at this year’s Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (June 30 - July 8).

The actor, who won an Oscar for Manchester By The Sea this year, will also introduce the cinematic poem A Ghost Story at the Czech Republic-based event, together with writer/director David Lowery.

The festival president’s award is given to actors, directors, and producers who have contributed to the development of contemporary world cinema.

Kviff President Jiří Bartoška said: “We regard Casey Affleck as one of the most intriguing actors in contemporary American film and are honored to welcome the filmmakers during the presentation of A Ghost Story.”

Last month it was announced that the festival would also celebrate the work of Ken Loach, Paul Laverty, James Newton Howard, Václav Vorlíček, Kenji Mizoguchi and Jiří Brdečka.

Further events taking place at Karlovy Vary this...

Director Ken Loach, his longtime writing partner Paul Laverty, and composer James Newton Howard will receive top honors at this summer’s 52nd Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.

Loach and Laverty, the team behind “I, Daniel Blake,” will be awarded with the Crystal Globe for Outstanding Artistic Contribution to World Cinema. The festival called Loach and Laverty “pioneers of British social realist film with a humanitarian message.”

Read More: 2016 Karlovy Vary Iff Awards Winners: ‘It’s Not the Time of My Life’ Takes Top Prize

Howard, who has composed the scores to films like “Pretty Woman,” “Batman Begins,” and “The Hunger Games,” will also receive the Crystal Globe, and is set to take part in an opening night concert at Hotel Thermal that he will personally conduct. The Czech National Symphony Orchestra will perform the world premiere of his score for the 2018 sequel to “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

Kenji Mizoguchi, Jirí Brdecka tributes planned for 52nd edition.

The 52nd Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (June 30 - July 8) will present a Crystal Globe for outstanding contribution to world cinema to British director Ken Loach.

The award will be shared with his long-time screenwriter Paul Laverty. The pair have collaborated on twelve feature films and two shorts, including The Wind That Shakes The Barley and more recently the Palme d’Or and Bafta-winning I, Daniel Blake.

Loach has a long and fruitful relationship with the Karlovy Vary festival. In 1968, his feature debut Poor Cow won a special jury prize and best actress for its star Carol White. A year later, his second film Kes won the festival’s Crystal Globe, and he has been a guest at the festival on numerous occasions since.

Poor Cow

Karlovy Vary will also celebrate the work of composer James Newton Howard, whose credits include Pretty Woman, The Sixth Sense, [link...

Director Ken Loach, composer James Newton Howard, director Kenji Mizoguchi and cinematographer Jiří Brdečka will be the subject of tributes at the 52nd Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, Kviff organizers announced on Tuesday. The annual festival, which takes place in the spa town outside of Prague, Czech Republic, will also premiere a restored version of Ján Kadár and Elmar Klos’ 1966 film “The Shop on Main Street,” which won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Those tributes are among the first batch of programs announced for the festival, which will run from June 30 through July 9. Also Read: Ken...

★★★★★ The creeping grip of fascism has been a regular source of inspiration for filmmakers for decades, both in explicit reference to the Second World War and in more nuanced portrayals of corruptive ideology. It could be argued that the current political climate, across Europe and in the USA, illustrates with alarming perspicuity the continued urgency of such work. In a world of condoned bigotry and the rise of right wing groups, the slippery slope of quiet acceptance that ensnares Tóno (Josef Kroner) in Ján Kadár and Elmar Klos' The Shop on the High Street is of lamentable but undeniably pertinence.

Ján Kadár and Elmar Klos’s 1965 film The Shop on Main Street, which was the first film from Eastern Europe to win an Academy Award, celebrates it’s 50th anniversary this year. The Laemmle Town Center 5 in Encino, CA will be holding a special one-night-only showing of the 128-minute drama on Tuesday, June 9, 2015 at 7:30 pm. Scheduled to appear in person are film director Ivan Passer and Michal Sedlacek, Consul General of Czech Republic in Los Angeles.

From the press release:

The Shop On Main Street (1965) was the first film from Eastern Europe ever to win an Academy Award. Fifty years ago this powerful Czech drama won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language film. Directed by Ján Kadár and Elmar Klos, it was one of the key films in the Czech New Wave that flourished in the 1960s, before the Soviet invasion of 1968 stamped out this vital movement. Josef Kroner...

MOSCOW -- The Czech Film and Television Academy has chosen Bohdan Slama's Something Like Happiness as the country's Oscar entry for best foreign-language film, the Czech Film Center said Tuesday. Slama's film -- which won the San Sebastian film festival's Golden Shell for best film and Silver Shell for Ana Geislerova as best actress -- is the Czech director-screenwriter's third feature film. "A moving story about a fragile relationship between two young people which gradually grows into true love, the cast and atmosphere are reminiscent of Slama's successful debut 'Wild Bees' which brought the filmmaker several awards at international festivals," the Czech Film Center's Jana Cernik said. Nine Czech films have won a place at the Oscars since 1965 with three taking the prize -- The Shop on Main Street (directors Jan Kadar and Elmar Klos, 1965); Closely Watched Trains (Jiri Menzel, 1967); and Kolya (Jan Sverak, 1996).