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Netflix
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My Brilliant Career
TV, Australia, 2026 – out 13 August
Miles Franklin’s beloved coming-of-age novel and feminist classic has been brought to the screen before, with Judy Davis as the bullheaded and fiercely intelligent protagonist Sybylla Melvyn and the late Sam Neill playing her potential suitor Harry in Gillian Armstrong’s acclaimed 1979 film. So the bar is set high – great novel, great film – for Netflix’s new adaptation, starring Philippa Northeast as Sybylla and Christopher Chung as Harry.
Fingers crossed that the creator and co-writer, Liz Doran, doesn’t go crazy with cranking up the bling and raunch, and channels the essence of the source material – a thoroughly pleasurable novel that, despite being written 125 years ago, has prose that still crackles and bounces off the page.
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The Last House
Film, US, 2026 – out 7 August
What if one day you discovered that you could never leave your home, that every door and window were mysteriously sealed? The premise of Louis Leterrier’s horror sci-fi film recalls Luis Buñuel’s surrealistic classic The Exterminating Angel, in which, for reasons never explained, guests of a dinner party are unable to leave their hosts’ home.
That’s probably where the comparisons end, given that the trailer for The Last House signals a much pulpier approach, making it clear that something terrible has happened to the world outside the family of four’s front door. Could it be aliens? Zombies? Hordes of Hare Krishna zealots?
***
Hamnet
Film, US/UK, 2025 – out 22 August
Jessie Buckley’s superb, Oscar-winning performance as Shakespeare’s wife, Agnes, is the beating heart and soul of this achingly sad reimagining of the Bard’s family life and the origins of Hamlet. Chloé Zhao’s richly staged film struggles with pacing issues but, as I have previously written, when it “finally settles into its purpose, it lands with force, mixing personal and social commentary with an interesting reflection on creativity – where it comes from, and what it can cost”.
Honourable mentions: Final Destination (film, out now), Four Weddings and a Funeral (film, 7 August), Ricky Gervais’ Alley Cats (TV, 7 August), Song Sung Blue (film, 8 August), Conclave (film, 9 August), Don’t Say Good Luck (film, 14 August), Shrek (film, 27 August), The Whisper Man (film, 28 August).
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Stan
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Pillion
Film, UK/Ireland, 2025 – out now
Harry Lighton’s well-acted film stars Harry Melling as Colin, a mild-mannered gay man who enters into a relationship with Alexander Skarsgård’s Ray, a charismatic biker immersed in the BDSM scene. It’s been billed as a “dom-rom-com” but I often found it quite sad, with Colin continually bossed about and talked down to by Ray. Reading up on the film afterwards, I discovered the jury is very much out regarding interpretations of the nature of that central relationship. Only one way to decide for yourself …
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Saltburn
Film, US/UK, 2023 – out 12 August
In Emerald Fennell’s delirious psychological drama and social satire, Barry Keoghan’s protagonist Oliver Quick – who accepts an invitation to spend the summer at the county estate of a wealthy friend’s family – functions like an angel of death. After he arrives, bodies start piling up, though many other crazy things happen too, from the consumption of semen-infused bathwater to the humping of soil atop a young man’s grave. Tasteful it ain’t but it is certainly a one-of-a-kind experience.
Honourable mentions: Fightland (TV, out now), John Farnham: Finding the Voice (film, out now), Sleepless in Seattle (film, 4 August), Poster Boy: Becoming Zyzz (film, 5 August), Ladies in Black (TV, 9 August), Jerry Maguire (film, 11 August), Starstruck seasons 1-3 (TV, 12 August), Hancock (film, 13 August), Hotel Mumbai (film, 15 August), Robin Hood: Men in Tights (film, 18 August), Gravity (film, 22 August), The Road (film, 24 August), Brightburn (film, 25 August), Barbie (film, 28 August), Zombieland 1 and 2 (film, 30 August).
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ABC iview
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The Cage
TV, UK, 2026 – out 30 August
In the new series from The Responder creator, Tony Schumacher, two casino employees – cashier Leanne (Sheridan Smith) and manager Matty (Michael Socha) – discover they’re robbing from the same safe. The Guardian’s Lucy Mangan awarded this one full points, describing the show as “an astonishing, deeply angry, deeply moving state-of-the-nation piece merely masquerading as a mesmerising, perfectly paced and plotted thriller”. Sold!
Honourable mentions: Father Brown season 12 (TV, out now), Falling (TV, 16 August), Zog (TV, 22 August).
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SBS on Demand
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The Airport Chaplain
TV, Australia, 2026 – out 26 August
It never dawned on me, until I heard about this new miniseries, that airports have chaplains. I wonder where else men and women of the cloth might do the Lord’s work. Cruise ships? Zoos?
Hugo Weaving – that great, grizzled giant of Australian stage and screen – stars in the eponymous role as an “unorthodox” chaplain who will “bend rules to help passengers”. Does that mean he can minimise plane delays? Smuggle edible food onboard? Get screaming babies to pipe down? Possibly, but he’ll also have to work on saving his job, given that the new terminal manager, Mira (Shabana Azeez), wants to make him redundant.
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Showgirls
Film, US/France, 1995 – out 7 August
Paul Verhoeven’s famously under-rated Vegas-set drama has experienced a critical renaissance, reassessed as a “a #MeToo story with a male gaze” and a “kitsch-classic”. Anchored by the story of Elizabeth Berkley’s drifter Nomi, who arrives in the City of Sin hoping to make it as a dancer, the film vividly portrays the world of strippers – including the ways money is tossed around, and how the men in charge turn their bodies into consumable products.
It’s loud and lurid but also unflinchingly conveys sexist and misogynistic culture; discussions of it these days even include phrases like “the Panopticon of Patriarchy”.
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The Emu War
Film, Australia, 2023 – out 7 August
Gross-out jokes involving a well-endowed emu is the itch you never knew needed to be scratched. The title of this whacked-out comedy from co-directors Lisa Fineberg, Jay Morrissey and John Campbell refers to an actual military operation undertaken in 1932 – though historical accuracy was not quite the driving impulse behind the film, which imagines that our feathered f̶r̶i̶e̶n̶d̶s̶ were well armed and fought back. A must-see it ain’t, but – as I wrote in my review – the film is “sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, and maintains an enjoyably squirrelly momentum”.
Honourable mentions: Carbon: The Unauthorised Biography (film, out now), Hercules in New York (film, 7 August), Black and White (film, 7 August), Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey (film, 7 August), After Us (TV, 9 August), Minx seasons 1-2 (TV, 13 August), Interview with the Vampire seasons 1-2 (TV, 21 August), The Vampire Lestat (TV, 21 August), Babette’s Feast (14 August), Love Lies Bleeding (film, 28 August), Tanna (film, 28 August), Dogma (film, 28 August).
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HBO Max
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The Drama
Film, US, 2026 – out 8 August
Kristoffer Borgli’s much buzzed-about film is a rare example of a production that orbits around an event that never actually happened – though the fallout, the drama, is terribly real. In the days leading up to the wedding between Robert Pattinson’s museum director Charlie and Zendaya’s literary editor Emma, the latter admits to a terrible secret from her past during a boozy night with friends.
This triggers the mother-of-all “what would you do?” predicaments, tensions swelling to nerve-shredding levels as a flummoxed Charlie agonises over what he will do. It’s a genuine original: superbly written, directed and acted.
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The Housemaid
Film, US, 2025 – out now
It doesn’t take long for the relationship between wealthy housewife Nina (Amanda Seyfried) and her new live-in housemaid Millie (Sydney Sweeney) to become very intense as the former becomes increasingly erratic and the latter desperately tries to keep her job. Nina’s super-rich hubby, Andrew (Brandon Sklenar) becomes increasingly significant as the pot boils and things get kind of crazy.
There are lots of skeletons in the closet, lots of shady pasts, lots of secrets to be dredged up. Paul Feig’s direction effectively ramps up the stakes and the script piles on the twists, shifting from a steady first half into a wild and smoking second.
Honourable mentions: Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang (film, out now), Risky Business (film, out now), Pleasantville (film, 8 August), Lanterns (TV, 17 August), The Substance (film, 22 August), Prisoners (film, 22 August), Demolition Man (film, 29 August).
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Binge
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Two Weeks in August
TV, UK, 2026 – out 12 August
This White Lotus-esque psychological drama opens with a remote Greek island ablaze and holidaymakers fleeing by boat before the narrative rewinds to reveal a juicy holiday-from-hell. A fortnight at a luxury villa goes spectacularly awry for a group of old university friends: married couple Zoe (Jessica Raine) and Dan (Damien Molony), out-of-work actor Solomon (Nicholas Pinnock) and his younger wife, Jess (Antonia Thomas), and Nat (Leila Farzad) and her gay best friend, Jacob (Hugh Skinner), whose casual boyfriend Will (Dylan Brady) shows up.
I’ve watched the first three episodes and, while I didn’t like the show quite as much as the Guardian’s Lucy Mangan, I’m still a big fan, appreciating the pacy drama and the group’s relatable interpersonal dynamics.
Honourable mentions: Song Sung Blue (film, 8 August), Hamnet (film, 22 August), Inside Nato: The Battle to Stop Putin (TV, 23 August), Possession (TV, 27 August).
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Prime Video
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Masters of the Universe
Film, US, 2026 – out now
Based on Mattel’s toy line-cum-multimedia franchise, this is a blockbuster with all the bells and whistles, shiny as all get out. It could easily have been clunky but the director, Travis Knight, imbues it with levity and accessibility, conjuring a party mode not dissimilar to the Guardians of the Galaxy movies.
Pacing problems eventually catch up to the story of Prince Adam, heir to the throne of the far-flung fantasy world Eternia, who is also a mightily ripped warrior who will eventually go by another name: He-Man (which, come to think of it, is possibly the stupidest, most hyper-masculine name for a superhero ever coined). A 30-minute trim would have done this film wonders.
Honourable mentions: The Choral (film, out now), Sterling Point (film, 5 August), Goat (film, 9 August), Undertone (film, 16 August), Ready Player One (film, 17 August), The Matrix (film, 24 August), Final Destination (film, 29 August), Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (film, 31 August), Rain Man (film, 31 August), The Silence of the Lambs (film, 31 August), The Rage: Carrie 2 (film, 31 August), Valley Girl (film, 31 August).
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Disney+
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The Shards
TV, US, 2026 – out 6 August
In this adaptation of the 2023 Bret Easton Ellis novel of the same name, co-created by Ellis and Ryan Murphy, Igby Rigney plays a fictionalised version of the author as a teenager, undertaking his final year at an elite Los Angeles private school. Ellis suspects that a mysterious new student, Robert Mallory (Homer Gere), might be connected to a serial killer dubbed “the Trawler,” who is believed to be linked to a satanic cult. So: just your average private-school dynamics. Ryan and Ellis are provocateurs with a penchant for pulp; expect sex, drugs, blood, naked bodies and cranking 80s needledrops.
Honourable mentions: The Secret Life of Pets (film, 1 August), Psycho Killer (film, 5 August), Travis Barker: Louder Than Fear (film, 13 August), Lion (TV, 20 August).
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Apple TV
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Ted Lasso season 4
TV, US, 2026 – out 5 August
Set three years after the events of season three, everybody’s favourite soccer coach (Jason Sudeikis) embarks on what the press materials claim is his “biggest challenge yet”: coaching a newly formed women’s team. This means plenty of new characters and challenges for the eternally optimistic Ted, plus the return of familiar faces including Rebecca (Hannah Waddingham), Roy (Brett Goldstein), Keeley (Juno Temple) and Coach Beard (Brendan Hunt).
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Dark Matter season 2
TV, US, 2026 – out 28 August
I loved the first season of Dark Matter so much that, after wolfing down every episode, I snapped up a copy of Blake Crouch’s novel, on which it’s based, and rapidly devoured that too. The initial MacGuffin is a real doozy: professor Jason Dessen (Joel Edgerton) is kidnapped by a version of himself from another dimension and dumped in a parallel reality. This is enabled by a giant, room-sized cube that allows people to travel between dimensions.
The first season concluded with a satisfying combination of resolution and an open door to more adventures. Season two ventures beyond Crouch’s novel, though the author remains heavily involved, co-writing every episode.
Honourable mentions: Women in Blue season two (TV, 12 August), The Dynasty: UConn Huskies (TV, 21 August).
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