The Best TV Shows and Movies New to Netflix, Amazon and More in July

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Every month, subscription streaming services add a new batch of movies and TV shows to their libraries. Here are the titles we think are most interesting for July, broken down by service and release date. Streaming services occasionally change schedules without giving notice.

TV New to Netflix

‘The Sinner’ Season 1
Starts streaming: July 2

Based on an acclaimed novel by the German crime writer Petra Hammesfahr, this moody mystery series has been described by its creator, Derek Simonds, as a “whydunnint.” In Episode 1, we see a seemingly happy housewife (an excellent Jessica Biel) commit a horrific murder on a public beach. In the seven hours that follow, a dogged detective (Bill Pullman) uncovers the tragedies in the perpetrator’s past that drove her to kill. “The Sinner” hits the sweet spot between smart pulp and arty melodrama.
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‘Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee’ Season 10
Starts streaming: July 6

This amiably low-key chat show from Jerry Seinfeld moves from Crackle to Netflix, but the format remains the same: Seinfeld picks up a fellow comic or actor in a cool vintage car, they drive around and talk about showbiz for a bit, and then they settle in at a funky cafe to go a little more in-depth about the art and craft of entertainment. This season’s lineup is typically star-studded, as Seinfeld grabs cups of joe with Dave Chappelle, Ellen DeGeneres, Kate McKinnon and Jerry Lewis, among others.
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‘Somebody Feed Phil: The Second Course’
Starts streaming: July 6

The writer and producer Philip Rosenthal returns for a second season of this surprisingly delightful spin on the food-and-travel show. Affable and curious, Rosenthal and his companions make friends around the world as they sample the cuisines of other cultures. The latest helping of “Somebody Feed Phil” will include trips to Buenos Aires, Capetown, Copenhagen, Dublin, Venice and New York — and plenty of shots of the host looking deliriously happy as he tries something new.
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‘Last Chance U: INDY, Part 1’
Starts streaming: July 20

After two seasons of following the triumphs and travails of the football players, coaches and tutors at East Mississippi Community College, the docu-series “Last Chance U” shifts its attention to a new school, in Independence, Kan.. Once again, the show will follow a group of talented athletes trying to bounce back from the academic, discipline and injury problems that derailed their Division I dreams. But unlike the perennially powerful East Mississippi, Independence Community College is in the middle of a rebuilding process when this season begins.
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Also of interest: “Madam Secretary” Season 4 (July 1), “The Fosters” Season 5 (July 6), ‘Orange Is the New Black’ Season 6 (July 27), “Shameless” Season 8 (July 28) and “Terrace House: Opening New Doors” Part 3 (July 31).

Movies New to Netflix

‘Interview With the Vampire’
Starts streaming: July 1

What could be more diabolical than a vampire child — a shadow being who grows older mentally, but not physically, and will never be able to quench her grown-up physical desires? Kirsten Dunst was 11 years old when she gave her unnerving performance in this film, playing a little undead girl filled with frustration and rage — and stealing scenes from big-name stars like Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt.
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‘Jurassic Park’
Starts streaming: July 1

Before taking in the new “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom,” revisit the original story of a dinosaur-filled theme park gone totally wrong — and get a solid dose of Jeff Goldblum at the same time. As with the park in the original “Westworld” — another creation by Michael Crichton, who wrote the book this Steven Spielberg adaptation was based on — the motivating fantasies of technological supremacy soon pay off in nightmares. The rampant velociraptors, brachiosaurs and triceratops are the stars, but eggheads may appreciate the pop-philosophical discussions tucked in among them.
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‘Menace II Society’
Starts streaming: July 1

The first film by Allen and Albert Hughes, this unblinking look at street life in and around the South Los Angeles neighborhood of Watts is full of empathy for a tough community that has little of its own to spare. Guns, drugs and violence, however are not in short supply. Samuel L. Jackson makes a powerful cameo as a drug dealer who collects the hard way.
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‘Blue Valentine’
Starts streaming: July 5

Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams fall in and out of love over the course of six years in this powerful film, and we follow them from sweet ukulele serenades to bitter disillusion. Gosling and Williams (who received an Oscar nomination for her performance) moved in together to prepare for this movie — planning household budgets, staging arguments — in order to penetrate to the core of their characters. The Method-style prep definitely paid off.
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‘White Fang’
Starts streaming: July 6

Jack London’s beloved 1906 novel “White Fang” has been adapted to the screen multiple times, but never quite as it has in this new animated version, directed by Alexandre Espigares (who won an Oscar for best animated short film a few years ago for helping direct “Mr. Hublot”), and featuring the voices of Nick Offerman, Rashida Jones, and Paul Giamatti. Adopting a style that resembles a painting in motion, Espigares recreates the classically vintage feel of the book, while also covering much of its episodic story, about a strong Canadian pack-dog who gets passed from owner to owner.
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‘How It Ends’
Starts streaming: July 13

Theo James stars in this apocalyptic thriller as a proud husband and father, who hustles to make it home when a sudden global cataclysm makes it seem that the end of the world is nigh. Forest Whitaker plays the hero’s disapproving father-in-law, who joins him on his journey and shares his struggle to navigate the chaos and danger around them. Judging by the trailer, “How It Ends” looks like an intense (and expensive) genre hybrid, combining elements of science-fiction, action-adventure and mismatched-buddy pictures.
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‘An Education’
Starts streaming: July 22

Carey Mulligan plays Jenny, a 16-year-old girl who begins dating the worldlier, thirtysomething David (Peter Sarsgaard) — with her parent’s permission. (This is 1961). Jenny soon feels herself growing into a life of what she thinks is cultured maturity. When David proposes marriage, Jenny accepts and discards her plan to attend Oxford — but soon realizes her mistake. Mulligan gives a luminous performance; as rendered by John de Borman’s cinematography, she actually glows.
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‘Her’
Starts streaming: July 29

The story of a man who falls in love with his computer OS — and why not, if she speaks with the sparkly voice of Scarlett Johansson? She has a name, Samantha, and a Siri-like reserve at first. But then she begins to blossom, and the movie floats up into romance heaven. It’s a love story with a whole new kind of heart.
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Also of interest: “The Boondock Saints” (July 1), “Chocolat” (July 1), “Finding Neverland” (July 1), “Happy Gilmore” (July 1), “Spanglish” (July 1), “The Legacy of a Whitetail Deer Hunter” (July 6), “Gone Baby Gone” (July 12), “Kevin Hart: Let Me Explain” (July 13), “Father of the Year” (July 20), “Bolt” (July 22), “The Bleeding Edge” (July 27) and “Extinction” (July 27).

New Netflix Original Comedy Specials

‘The Comedy Lineup’
Starts streaming: July 3

Netflix’s latest foray into stand-up comedy recalls the early days of Comedy Central, when young comics appeared on the channel throughout the day, performing in short segments on shows like “Stand-Up Stand-Up” and “Comedy Central Presents.” “The Comedy Lineup” brings more than a dozen emerging voices (including Michelle Buteau, Janelle James, Jak Knight, Matteo Lane and Phil Wang) to a small stage in Atlanta for 15-minute mini-specials, assembled into an anthology series.

Also of interest: “Jim Jefferies: This Is Me Now” (July 13) and “Iliza Shlesinger: Elder Millennial” (July 24)

New to Amazon Prime Video

‘The Act of Killing’
Starts streaming: July 1

An unflinching look at the human potential for evil. Here and in his equally superb follow-up, “The Look of Silence,” Joshua Oppenheimer follows sadists who still have the power to terrorize the populace. His chief subject, a former gangster named Anwar Congo, is responsible for upward of 1,000 killings and he’s all too happy to show off his technique. It’s a hard watch, but worth it.
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‘A.I. Artificial Intelligence’
Starts streaming: July 1

Haley Joel Osment gives an uncanny performance as the sweet, sentient robot boy David, who is abandoned by his human “mother” as if he were a broken toy. Also memorable is Jude Law, who is eerily exhilarating as the cyber love man Gigolo Joe. The unsung hero of the story, however, is the long-suffering super-toy Teddy. Together, these robots raise some deep philosophical issues that can also break your heart.
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‘The Brothers Bloom’
Starts streaming: July 1

Even con men can be fooled. In this film, the writer and director Rian Johnson pulls back the curtain on two brother swindlers, Stephen (Mark Ruffalo) and Bloom (Adrien Brody), who are assisted in their shady undertakings by the mostly silent explosives expert Bang Bang (Rinko Kikuchi). The brothers target the rich and eccentric Penelope (a funnier-than-usual Rachel Weisz), but she turns the tables on them — and announces that she wants to become a con artist, too.
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‘The Graduate’
Starts streaming: July 1

Director Mike Nichols and Dustin Hoffman made a splash with this beloved film that was revolutionary in both style and feel. Nichols balances moments of lyricism with fragmentary editing that embodies the lead character’s uncertainty and dislocation. Hoffman is the picture of bourgeois ennui — a young man seemingly incapable of making a decision — while Anne Bancroft is brilliant as the manipulative mother of the girl he loves (and was apparently deemed over-the-hill by Hollywood standards — just 35 when this was filmed).
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‘Mulholland Drive’
Starts streaming: July 1

David Lynch’s surreal dream logic once again raises mostly questions. Is Betty (Naomi Watts) real? Are the events that transpire in the first half of the film an invention of her subconscious? Is she actually Camilla Rhodes? Or maybe Diane Selwyn? The uncertainty of it all is delicious, and Angelo Badalamenti’s rich score is the perfect accompaniment.
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‘NYPD Blue’ Seasons 1-12
Starts streaming: July 1

“NYPD Blue” was revolutionary when it debuted, even if many of its touchstones are commonplace today: The profanity, the shaky-cam cinematography, the flashes of nudity and most important, the central antihero. Solving gritty Manhattan crimes, Dennis Franz’s Detective Andy Sipowicz was a racist, alcoholic, violence-prone cop long before Vic Mackey on “The Shield.” But Sipowicz and his rotating cast of charismatic partners feel true, thanks to raw and rough story lines by co-creator David Milch and his technical adviser, Bill Clark, a former New York Police Department detective.
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‘Jaws’
Starts streaming: July 9

Steven Spielberg had only a single feature and a handful of TV credits to his name when he was handed the task of adapting a pulpy best seller about a killer shark. The famously troubled production, which went weeks over schedule and millions over budget — not least because of the frequently broken mechanical shark — forced the director to rely more on suspense and characterization than on special effects. The rest is cinema history.
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Also of interest: “The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai across the 8th Dimension” (July 1), “All Is Lost” (July 1), “American Psycho” (July 1), “Angel Heart” (July 1), “Angela’s Ashes” (July 1), “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” (July 1), “The Closer” Seasons 1-7 (July 1), “Damages” Seasons 1-5 (July 1), “Dead Man Walking” (July 1), “Pee Wee’s Big Adventure” (July 1), “Pretty in Pink” (July 1), “Stripes” (July 1), the “Twilight” series (July 1), “V for Vendetta” (July 1), “Witness” (July 1), “Zodiac” (July 1) and “The Americans” Season 6 (July 29).

New to Hulu

‘Before Midnight’
Starts streaming: July 1

The director Richard Linklater and his stars (and co-writers) Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy gather again for the third installment of what has become the American narrative equivalent of Francois Truffaut’s Antoine Doinel series: a running story, told over multiple years in multiple films, in which we watch the actors age and evolve as their characters do. In “Midnight,” nearly two decades have passed since our protagonists first fell in love in Vienna, and the film admirably inverts our expectations, asking, What happens after “happily ever after?”
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‘Hustle & Flow’
Starts streaming: July 1

It’s hard out here for a pimp — or at least, it’s hard for DJay (Terrence Howard). DJay aspires to be more than what life has set out for him: He wants to be a rap star. (Howard initially passed on the part because he would have preferred to play a guitar player). To record a demo, DJay assembles a makeshift crew, but to make a real splash, though, he must fall back on the misogyny and violence that defined his first career. The single DJay records (actually recorded by Three 6 Mafia ) won the Academy Award for best original song, the first time a rap group ever won that prize.
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‘This Is Spinal Tap’
Starts streaming: July 1

This mockumentary from Rob Reiner follows the veteran British rockers of Spinal Tap, the “loudest band in the world,” as they tour across America in support of their new album, “Smell the Glove.” “This Is Spinal Tap” catches David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean), Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest) and Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer) on the downslope of their already uncelebrated careers, playing to quarter-full amphitheaters and opening for a puppet show.
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‘In a World …’
Starts streaming: July 9

Film industry misogyny may be the talk of Hollywood trade papers today, but the director and actress Lake Bell addressed it head-on in 2013 with this smart comedy about a voice actress (Bell) who is looking to outdo her famous voice-actor dad and his male protégé in order to score a big gig.
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‘Harlots’ Season 2
Starts streaming: July 11

It’s the 1760s, and two brothels in London are at war. One, led by Margaret Wells (Samantha Morton), is trying to climb up in the world. The other, an upscale establishment led by Lydia Quigley (Lesley Manville), will stop at nothing to hold on to its position. Liv Tyler joins the cast as a wealthy and secretive socialite who could become a valuable ally for Team Wells this season. (The first two episodes drop July 11, with another each following Wednesday.)
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‘Embrace of the Serpent’
Starts streaming: July 20

Director Ciro Guerra tells the story of the two expeditions in parallel, fascinated as much by their reflections of each other as by their eventual, and remarkable, intersection. It’s a film with much to say about a vanishing civilization and the people who wish to either understand it or exploit it (or both), yet it’s short on soapboxing and didacticism; Guerra lets the pictures tell the stories, and they’re more than up to the task. Filmed in stunning black and white, “Embrace” is alternately anthropological, surrealistic and feverishly haunting.
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‘Castle Rock’ Series Premiere
Starts streaming: July 25

Stephen King’s stories are mostly set within a small cluster of towns in Maine, and Castle Rock may be the unluckiest of the bunch — serial killers, a rabid dog and the devil himself have all wreaked havoc there. In this creepy anthology series, a lawyer who was lost for 11 days as a boy comes home to Castle Rock to represent a Shawshank prisoner. Part of the fun is how the show riffs on the King multi-verse with cast callbacks, crossovers and other Easter eggs. (Alan Pangborn!) Deep familiarity, however, is not required. (The first three episodes drop July 25, with another each following Wednesday.)
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Also of interest: “A.I. Artificial Intelligence” (July 1), “The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai across the 8th Dimension” (July 1), “All Is Lost” (July 1), “American Psycho” (July 1), “Angel Heart” (July 1), “Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure” (July 1), “Bound” (July 1), “Braveheart” (July 1), “The Brothers Bloom” (July 1), “Chasing Amy” (July 1), “Clear and Present Danger” (July 1), “Clue” (July 1), “Dead Man Walking” (July 1), “Election” (July 1), “Go” (July 1), “An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power” (July 1), “The Manchurian Candidate” (2004, July 1), “Patriot Games” (July 1), “Pretty in Pink” (July 1), “Witness” (July 1), “UnREAL” Season 3 (July 2), “Borg vs. McEnroe” (July 3), “You’re the Worst” Season 4 (July 6), “Mary Kills People” Season 2 (July 8) and “Better Things” Season 2 (July 14).

New to HBO

‘Being John Malkovich’
Starts streaming: July 1

The screenwriter Charlie Kaufman burst onto the scene with this original, playfully surreal comedy about a portal that allows people inside John Malkovich’s head for 15 minutes at a time. Kaufman and director Spike Jonze delight in playing around in this metaphysical space, while also offering up such absurd creations as an office on Floor 7 ½ and a 60-foot Emily Dickinson puppet. Yet “Being John Malkovich” is sneakily moving, hinging on the common and melancholy yearning of what it’s like to want to escape your own skin.
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‘The Princess Bride’
Starts streaming: July 1

In this delightful comedic fantasy from Rob Reiner, a grandfather reads to his grandson the story of Princess Buttercup and Westley and their quest to reunite before she is forced to marry a rotten king. There’s true love, sword fighting, rodents of unusual size and an astoundingly great cast that includes Andre the Giant, Billy Crystal, Peter Falk, Mandy Patinkin and Robin Wright.
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‘Justice League’
Starts streaming: July 7

The M.V.P.s of this superhero assembly are Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot) and the Flash (Ezra Miller), who have a serious rivalry going for best cheekbones. Joss Whedon, who helped write the script and took over directing late in the production, had attempted his own Wonder Woman film years before, and he may have repurposed some of his earlier ideas here. But the super-speedy Flash — he moves fast, talks fast, and gets all the best jokes — is the most purely Whedonesque of the whole crew. Is this a bad time to talk about how he owes them all brunch?
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‘Sharp Objects’ Series Premiere
Starts streaming: July 8 (new episodes every Sunday)

Camille Preaker (Amy Adams), a self-destructive journalist, returns to her hometown on an assignment that gets under her skin: reporting on the murders of two teenage girls. Based on the novel by Gillian Flynn (who joined the showrunner Marti Noxon in the writers room), this is more character portrait than murder mystery, governed by the gentle rhythms (and sometimes suffocating atmosphere) of small-town life. Most of the tension is near-subliminal, rendered by the director and editor Jean-Marc Vallée with quick flashes of dreams and memories. Virtually everything reminds Camille of past traumas, which she tries to escape with alcohol and self-harm.
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‘Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind’
Starts streaming: July 16

This documentary from Marina Zenovich gives us an intimate look at the comedian using home movies, student films, obscure onstage footage, and never-before-seen show outtakes. Not a lot of insight is offered about Williams’s 2014 suicide — or about his psychological dilemmas. But just watching Robin do what he did so well — freestyle-riffing in all his manic glory — is a pure delight.
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Also of interest: “Away We Go” (July 1), “Barbershop” (July 1), “Blow” (July 1), “Good Will Hunting” (July 1), “Jennifer’s Body” (July 1), “Liar Liar” (July 1), “March of the Penguins (July 1), “Practical Magic” (July 1), “Whip It” (July 1) and “Battle of the Sexes” (July 14).
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Jason Bailey, Monica Castillo, Noel Murray and Scott Tobias contributed reporting.

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