Joey’s Home Movies For the Week of July 6th – ‘The Drama’ Stirs Up More Controversy and ‘Dead Man’s Wire’ Wants to Stir Up Some Anti-Capitalist Anger

Welcome back to my Home Movies! Today, we have one of the more discussed early year releases hitting shelves in The Drama, alongside one of the more slept on in Dead Man’s Wire. This week also features a notable new release in Fuze, as well as a high profile Criterion Collection release in The Elephant Man. What is is coming out? Read on to find out…

Joey’s Top Pick

Dead Man’s Wire

Dead Man’s Wire is a really good throwback thriller, one I wish more people had given a chance to. What it’s doing, too few films ultimately do anymore. So, the very existence of this flick is noteworthy, though it being good and able to bring up some anti-capitalist rage, is just a bonus. I spoke to director Gus Van Sant right here about the movie, and that’s a conversation worth watching, so definitely check that out. My review of the film (here) began like so:

Once upon a time, Hollywood knew how to make a thriller. Conspiracy thrillers, crime thrillers, political thrillers, studios put out top tier efforts of all stripes. Now? Not so much. To see one of these on the big screen is a rare occurrence. So, the fact that Dead Man’s Wire not just exists, but is good, really does hammer home how much the genre is missed. Having played the festival circuit in late 2025, the film is now hitting theaters here in early 2026, and while it’s a modern work (albeit a period piece), there’s an undeniable throwback quality to it as well.

Dead Man’s Wire isn’t necessarily what you would call fun, but it does have an off-beat nature and a messiness that harkens back to a different era of filmmaking. You always feel like you’re watching ordinary people in an extraordinary circumstance. The movie allows them to have unusual edges to them, in a way that filmmakers rarely would attempt these days. The result is that, even when characters are staying relatively still, your heart can still race and your pulse can pound.

Also Available This Week

All You Need Is Kill

The Butcher’s Blade (TV)

Dark Shadows (4K SteelBook)

Doctor Who: Peter Davison Complete Season Three (TV)

The Drama

The Evil Dead (4K SteelBook)

Fuze (interview with director David Mackenzie and star Sam Worthington here)

Strange Journey: The Story of Rocky Horror

Criterion Corner

The Elephant Man

From The Criterion Collection: “With this poignant second feature, David Lynch brought his atmospheric visual and sonic palette to a notorious true story set in Victorian England. When the London surgeon Frederick Treves (Anthony Hopkins) meets the freak-show performer John Merrick (John Hurt), who has severe skeletal and soft-tissue deformities, he assumes that he must be intellectually disabled as well. As the two men spend more time together, though, Merrick reveals the intelligence, gentle nature, and profound sense of dignity that lie beneath his shocking appearance, and he and Treves develop a friendship. Shot in gorgeous black and white and boasting a stellar supporting cast that includes Anne Bancroft, John Gielgud, and Wendy Hiller, The Elephant Man was nominated for eight Academy Awards, cementing Lynch’s reputation as one of American cinema’s most visionary talents.”

Stay tuned for more next week…