Ali G Returns, Gaza Doctors Testify: This Week's New Streaming Films

Sacha Baron Cohen's feature directorial debut, Ali G: Who Iz I?, has arrived on Prime Video after what critics called a perfunctory, slimmed-down theatrical release last weekend. The film leads a batch of nine notable titles newly available on streaming platforms in the United States this week.

What should viewers expect from the new Ali G film?

Anyone familiar with Baron Cohen's hijinks, and particularly Borat 2 and Who Is America?, will recognize the formula. The Film Stage's critics describe a clunky and strained, if sporadically funny, reckoning with modern political and societal ills that feels a little too late to the game to pack a genuinely hilarious punch. As streaming fare goes, one could get much worse. But across his recent projects, Baron Cohen seems content with shooting fish in a barrel.

Where can viewers see the Gaza documentary American Doctor?

Poh Si Teng's American Doctor streams free on Watermelon+ through November 6 only. The documentary follows three doctors — Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, Dr. Thaer Ahmad, and Dr. Mark Perlmutter — working to save lives in the Gaza Strip. Dr. Perlmutter is Jewish, Dr. Sidhwa is Zoroastrian, and Dr. Ahmad is Palestinian. On some trips they are approved to enter. On others they are denied for specious reasons.

Dan Mecca wrote in his Sundance review: "When will this end? When will this bloodshed stop? And when will the United States of America stop supporting it? Filmmaker Poh Si Teng offers a clear-eyed, unrelenting look at the genocide in Gaza with her documentary American Doctor." He added: "Their mission is the mission of all medical professionals: to heal everyone they can."

What else is new on VOD and subscription services?

• Black Zombie (Maya Annik Bedward), on Kino Film Collection. The film reclaims Vodou from the colonial fear-mongering used to demonize Black people worldwide, beyond merely reclaiming the zombie motif from Night of the Living Dead. Critic Jared M. notes that Haitians in 2026 remain cautious about admitting their connection to the religion, and outsiders still claim Haiti's hardships stem from a pact with the Devil.
• The Dog Stars (Ridley Scott), on VOD. The adaptation of Peter Heller's novel follows Hig, "Big Hig" (Jacob Elordi), a mechanic who lost his pregnant wife to the flu virus that wiped out most of the world. He lives with his dog, Jasper, in an airport hangar outside Denver alongside fellow survivor Bangley (Josh Brolin).
• Filipiñana (Rafael Manuel), on VOD. The film pairs Janine (Nour Hooshmand) and Isabel (Jorrybell Agoto) on a posh golf course in the Philippines. What begins as a point of comparison about the Ilocos region becomes a purposeful juxtaposition.
• If I Go Will They Miss Me (Walter Thompson-Hernández), on VOD. The coming-of-age film finds poetic beauty in the housing projects of southern Los Angeles, where planes passing overhead feed dreams of flight. Thompson-Hernández draws on Barry Jenkins, RaMell Ross, Charles Burnett, and Spike Lee, with many non-professional actors in the ensemble.
• Mum, I'm Alien Pregnant (THUNDERLIPS), on VOD. The New Zealand oddity, a Sundance midnight-section highlight, takes its premise — a slacker getting extraterrestrially pregnant — to its ultimate conclusion while voicing fears around physical and emotional changes during pregnancy.
• Never After Dark (Dave Boyle), on VOD. The Japanese production, clearly inspired by Kiyoshi Kurosawa and casting his frequent collaborator Mutsuo Yoshioka, follows a traveling psychic who uncovers dark secrets at a remote house.
• Seeds (Brittany Shyne), on PBS. The cinematographer's debut feature evokes Gordon Parks's black-and-white New Deal-era photographs in a vérité portrait of a disappearing way of life for Black farmers in the American South.

Which additional titles quietly arrived?

Kino Film Collection added The Shiver of the Vampires. Paramount+ added Hanging by a Wire. VOD picked up Forgotten Island, The Stunt Driver, and Verity.

What does this week change for subscribers? Mainly a deadline: American Doctor runs free on Watermelon+ only through November 6, making it the one title in the batch that cannot wait for a later queue.