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6 shows to binge on this weekend

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Jane The Virgin. (ShowMax)
Jane The Virgin. (ShowMax)


Cape Town - Comedy, sex, crime and drama - these series have it all. And the movies on the list, not your average chick-flicks, will get you in the mood for Valentine’s Day.

We’ve selected one series and one movie from each of the internet TV platforms available in SA - ShowMax, Netflix and Amazon Prime - for you to stream back-to-back this weekend.

Happy streaming!

1. Jane the Virgin, Seasons 1 - 2

Loosely based on a real Venezuelan telenovela, this satirical comedy centres on a hard-working young Latina girl, Jane, who has vowed to stay a virgin until she marries her detective boyfriend … but then falls pregnant in a modern-day immaculate conception. It turns out that the baby’s father is a man who a) she used to have a crush on; b) owns the hotel where she now works; and c) is married. Gina Rodriguez, who plays Jane, won the Golden Globe in 2015 for Best Actress in a Comedy, and the show has won a slew of awards.

Available on ShowMax.

Watch the trailer here:

2. Klein Karoo

A homegrown romcom about a teacher who’s looking for money to save her recreation centre for the kids in Oudtshoorn whose homes are plagued by alcoholism. The land the centre is on is for sale, and none of the potential buyers care about the fate of the kids. Not even her wealthy fiance is offering to help. But then she meets Frans, a broken-hearted documentary filmmaker who is looking for outreach projects to feature in his latest film. What neither of them is looking for, is love - but they find it anyway.

Available on ShowMax.

Watch the trailer here:

3. American Crime Story: The People vs OJ Simpson

True crime doesn’t get grittier - or truer - than this. This series reenacting the trial of football legend and movie star OJ Simpson for the brutal murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown and a young man in her Beverly Hills home, makes the verdict (because all know how this story ends) even more infuriating. It’s brilliantly cast - Cuba Gooding Jr perfectly captures OJ’s high-pitched rage, David Schwimmer as middle-aged Robert Kardashian is all innocence and fear with pitch-black eyes, and John Travolta as OJ’s defence lawyer rocks the world’s most unbelievable eyebrows.

Available on Netflix.

Watch the trailer here:

4. Before Sunrise

It might look dated now, but the 1995 movie that started Richard Linklater, Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke’s one-of-a-kind romantic-movie trilogy is absorbing, beautiful and one of the best-written films we’ve ever seen. Hawke plays an American backpacker who meets a French student on a train to Vienna, where he’s heading to catch his flight home. The two hit it off and he convinces her to spend his last night in Europe with him. They stay up all night talking about love and relationships and romance, and you’ll feel like you’re eavesdropping on your friends. After Sunset and Before Midnight followed these films two decades later, and answer the question you’ll be left with at the end of this film - did they ever see each other again?

Available on Netflix.

Watch the trailer here:

5. The Man in the High Castle

This Amazon original series is based on a terrifying premise - that the Allied powers were defeated in World War II. Now, in the years after the war, the United States is split into the Nazi-occupied West and the Japanese-controlled East. Amid rumours that the Fuhrer is dying, the possibility of another war bubbles beneath the surface, with the Japanese preparing to invade the West. A young woman living in the West is given a film reel by her sister in a dark alley one night, shortly before seeing her sister murdered by the Japanese army. The woman realises that the films hold the key to freedom, and goes on the run with the reel. Watching this series in the context of contemporary American politics is chilling, to say the least.

Available on Amazon Prime.

Watch the trailer here:

6. Anna Karenina

Director Joe Wright brings his muse Keira Knightley back to our screens in a period drama, this time based on Tolstoy’s classic epic. Knightley plays Anna, the aristocratic wife of a politician who falls in love with a young, wealthy Count, and puts her husband’s career, and her entire way of life, at risk. The costumes and sets that bring 19th-Century Russia to life are breathtaking, and Jude Law as Anna’s husband, with his level gaze and soft-spoken abuse, steals the show.

Available on Amazon Prime.

Watch the trailer here:

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