3 Underrated Max Movies (HBO) You Should Watch This Weekend (October 4-6)

Are you ready to dance with the devil in the moonlight this weekend? The long-awaited sequel Joker: Folie à Deux is hitting theaters, and it’s safe to assume that fans of the original won’t be too happy with this one, which emphasizes awkward musical interludes and banal courtroom drama over violence shocking that made the first one so popular.

If you’re not in the mood for this movie, well, there’s always HBO and Max. The Joker’s streaming home is full of hits, and we’ve picked three underrated films that deserve your time and attention this weekend. Relax, none of them involve gruesome murders to the tune of In my own way.

We also have guides to the best movies on Netflix, best movies on Hulu, best movies on Amazon Prime Video, best movies on Max, And the best films on Disney+.

Interview with the Vampire (1994)

The film version of Interview with the Vampire has always had a bad reputation. Even before it was made, people criticized the casting of the all-American Tom Cruise as the very European, very decadent vampire Lestat. Even the author of the book, Anne Rice, was against it! Today, it has been overshadowed by the AMC series adaptation, which some consider one of the best shows on television right now.

I like the movie, though, and I think Cruise’s florid performance is worth watching. The film follows the transformation of Louis (Brad Pitt, still in his himbo phase) as he is seduced into becoming a vampire by Cruise’s murderous Lestat. Along the way, the duo adopts a child, Claudia (a superb Kirsten Dunst), into the vampire family, who is ultimately torn apart by Louis’ reluctance to kill, Lestat’s casual cruelty, and Claudia’s desire to have a figure kindergarten.

Directed by Neil Jordan, Interview with the Vampire nails the debauchery of 19th-century New Orleans and old Europe, and the picture keeps moving along nicely. Pitt makes a sad sack of Louis, everyone mumbles and cries, but Cruise, Dunst and a long-haired Antonio Banderas as a lecherous vampire take over.

Interview with the Vampire is streaming on Max..

The Perfect Host (2011)

David Hyde Pierce is famous for his role as Niles on the long-running and much-loved NBC sitcom. Spawn. But Pierce is also a respected actor in film, television and stage, and he got a rare starring role in the underrated thriller. The perfect host.

Pierce plays Warwick Wilson, an urbane man who is cooking dinner at his home one evening when he is interrupted by a stranger, John, who is running from the cops. Desperate, John takes Warwick hostage, needing the man’s help to escape the police. But Warwick is not the man he appears to be, and as the film progresses, John may have landed in a different kind of prison, from which there is no escape.

The perfect host is streaming on Max..

Gremlins 2: The Next Generation (1990)

Did the world need a Gremlins continued in 1990? Probably not, but we still got one, and thank goodness we did. Gremlins 2: the new batch is this the true rarity: a sequel that does not surpass the original but creates a unique path on its own. It’s deeply strange and very funny, and it’s the closest thing to live-action. Looney Tunes film, because the madness is pushed to 100%.

Gremlins 2 follows the original film’s protagonists Billy, Kate, and, of course, Gizmo, as they now inhabit a large skyscraper resembling Trump Tower in New York. Gizmo gets wet, and soon an army of Gremlins, which will eventually include a Lightning Gremlin and a Slutty Female Gremlin, invade the high-tech building. Billy and a small group of humans must take back the building and save the city from a Gremlin invasion.

This movie is crazy; it’s all non-sequiturs and pop culture references (if you ever want to see film critic Leonard Maltin get his just desserts, this movie is for you), but he still finds time to invest in his human and non-human characters. Quentin Tarantino is a fan, and after watching it, you will be too.

Gremlins 2: the new batch is streaming on Max..