Welcome to What to Watch Right Now, our weekly rundown of the best things to watch right now. The constant stream of shows, videos, and films to watch online can become a sludge to wade through, so here are a few things you can watch courtesy of the Rolling Stone Philippines team. Whether it’s a new film, a video essay, or even a home video release you should own (physical media is now available!), we hope it can ease the burden of selecting which streaming platform to use or discover a new cinematic odyssey.
This week, Cinemalaya 2025 entries such as Open Endings, Republika ng Pipolipinas, and Bloom Where You Are Planted had us returning to the film festival again and again for more. Comedies like No Other Choice, Here Comes the Groom , and The Naked Gun kept us enthralled, while horror stories like Monster: The Ed Gein Story and Good Boy helped us get even more ready for spooky season. For those looking for a Peaky Blinders-esque binge marathon, turn to House of Guiness. And for those who are just looking for a slice-of-life, coming-of-age show, we refer you to the trailer of I Love LA.
‘Good Boy’
A PG-rated film starring a dog, horror’s most burdened character
My hot take is that any time a dog is in a horror film, they serve to pull the heartstrings of viewers. That’s a euphemistic way of saying dogs are in horror films to die, because there’s nothing more pitiful than the demise of a defenseless character. There’s Sam, the German shepherd in I Am Legend, who gets infected by a virus in an attempt to protect his owner Robert Neville; In Silence of the Lambs, Precious, the Bichon Frisé of serial killer Buffalo Bill, is killed by the FBI agent Clarice Starling. And of course, many dogs are shot, axed, and set on fire in David Cronenberg’s The Thing.
Good Boy, however, takes horror’s most burdened character and makes them the protagonist. Good Boy is set from the perspective of Indy, a Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever who begins to see dark ghostly figures in his human’s newly-moved home. Indy is too good for his own good, both as an actor and as a companion who can’t even muster a bark, and there are genuinely effective jump scares that will make even the most grown-up adults wriggle in their seats. The film intelligently plays on the idea that dogs are our protectors, which is great vehicle to explore themes of death and primal fear to a PG audience. —Sai Versailles
‘Open Endings’
An affecting portrait of exes turned friends turned yearners
Charlie (Janella Salvador), Kit (Klea Pineda), Hannah (Jasmine Curtis Smith), and Mihan (Leanne Mamonong) have all been romantically and sexually involved with one another, but these relationships have blossomed into something deeper, ultimately forming them as a group of friends that some people disapprove of (“You’re friends with your exes??”).
Open Endings challenges our notions of relationships, those that exist in the borders between the platonic and the intimate. Is the friendzone really better than romance, whose nature is inherently unstable and volatile? It’s a tale as old as time, but it’s always refreshing to see a modern portrait of intimacy involving sapphic relationships, which is apparent in how warmly the Cinemalaya audience has responded to Open Relationships.
Whether you buy it or not is up to you. But how can you not when these actresses — especially Mamonong, who makes her feature-length debut here — lovingly craft characters who are so authentic they just might be your own messy friends. —Don Jaucian
‘Republika ng Pipolipinas’
A rousing crowdpleaser that scrutinizes the failures of the Philippine government
Renei Dimla’s mockumentary could not have arrived at a better time, especially now that the failures of the government are more magnified than ever. Tired of the Philippine government, farmer Cora (Geraldine Villamil, in one of the best performances of Cinemalaya) establishes her own micronation called ‘Pipolipinas.’ Their plot of land was given by former president Corazon Aquino administration through the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program, but later, another landowner claimed the rights to the land and sold it to the government.
Now, Cora is being evicted from a land that her family has tilled for generations. And for what? A landfill for garbage from South Korea. The comedic treatment of the situation dominates the film, but the heartbreak undercuts everything else. Cora remains steadfast in her plight despite the trials that come her way, and yet we realize this is happening to people today. It’s hard to laugh at Cora’s situation when her story is one of the many stories of land grabbing that is still perpetrated by politicians and wealthy families until today. —Don Jaucian
‘Bloom Where You Are Planted’
A heartbreaking portrait of activists working in the Cagayan Valley region.
Perhaps the best film of this year’s Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival, the documentary Bloom Where You Are Planted, is heartwarming as it is heartbreaking. Filmmaker Noni Abao has made the Cagayan Valley region his home and has set out to tell the stories of the people who live there. His first film, Dagami Daytoy (This Is Our Land), about the effects of large-scale mining in the region, won the Best Documentary at the 32nd Gawad CCP para sa Alternatibong Pelikula.
In Bloom Where You Are Planted, he tells the stories of three activists who have worked with communities in the Cagayan Valley region: development worker Agnes, jailed cultural worker and activist Amanda, and the slain peace advocate Randy. Each portrait is urgent, damning the state’s action to silence activists who just want people to exercise their human rights. Bloom Where You Are Planted expands the portraits of each subject, chronicling not just their community work but the passions that fuel the advocacies they have dedicated their lives to. —Don Jaucian
‘Here Comes the Groom’
Jervi Wrightson (also known as KaladKaren) steals the show with her straight bro impression
Picture this: an ultra-religious, uptight family are en route to their son’s wedding, while a group of drag queens fresh from a beauty pageant are driving on the same road. A sinister solar eclipse crosses the sky, and when the two cars collide, multiple souls get swapped. The slightly transphobic patriarch (Keempee de Leon) swaps with drag queen Wanda (Drag Race Philippines’ Xilhouete), the convent-ready daughter (Maris Racal) switches with Whitney (Awra Briguela), and the groom himself (Enchong Dee) trades places with Whilhelmina (Jervi Wrightson or KaladKaren). Think Freaky Friday, or director Chris Martinez’s earlier soul-swapping comedy of errors, Here Comes the Bride.
Here Comes the Groom is funny, especially since each cast member is clearly delighting in playing their conservative/drag counterparts. Enchong Dee does his best KaladKaren impression, while KaladKaren herself is playing up the straight-boy machismo of a groom woefully unprepared for his wedding day. But all’s well that ends well, because Kuya Kim swoops in to save the day. —Mel Wang
‘No Other Choice’
A dark, absurd comedy on how far someone would go to get the job
For anyone who’s spent weeks, months, or years trying to find work, especially after being wrongfully let go, No Other Choice takes that sinking horror of unemployment to the extreme. Director Park Chan-Wook (Oldboy, The Handmaiden) weaves a dark, messed-up comedy centered on paper industry expert You Man-Soo (Squid Game’s Lee Byung-hun). After dedicating 25 years of his life to a paper manufacturing company, Man-Soo is fired after the company is bought out by American investors (and, as they tell Man-Soo, they had “no other choice” but to let a lot of the old-timers go).
Man-Soo’s perfect life, complete with a two-storey house, devoted wife, and two children, is immediately shattered. After spending over a year in job interviews, Man-Soo hits a breaking point when, after applying for an ideal position, he realizes that he has “no other choice” but to kill off the competition in order to get the job.
If the story doesn’t sound funny yet, that’s because its humor lies in the fact that Man-Soo is a horrible murderer. He’s too mild-mannered, and despite his best efforts to plan out his murders, they usually go immediately awry. No Other Choice, just like many of the director’s other movies, quickly gets messy in the best way, with its unlikely protagonist getting more and more creative with how he handles his competition. No Other Choice releases in Philippine cinemas on October 29. —Mel Wang
‘Monster: The Ed Gein Story’
Grotesque and definitely not for the faint of heart
Like many of Ryan Murphy’s other horror-centric projects — I’m thinking specifically of Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, but Ratched and parts of American Horror Story, too — every grotesque detail in Monster: The Ed Gein Story is amplified to an unbearable degree. The sound of Gein (Charlie Hunnam) taking his axe to a block of firewood sounds too much like the cracking of bones. The infamous serial killer sipping on a milkshake creates a slurping sound that is just a decibel too loud, and the brown sludge in his glass conjures up images of something gross and moist. And when we get to the murders, as well as the sick interior design that Gein is known for, even the most devoted of true crime fans may need to take a minute to look away.
While Gein, in life, was definitely one of the most infamous American murderers of the last century, much of Monster: The Ed Gein Story is based on creative liberties, taken by Murphy and his co-creator, Ian Brennan. The show finds itself in a nebulous purgatory between real facts from Gein’s murder cases and the killer’s alleged hallucinations, and it’s up to the viewer to decide if they can stomach the descent into a mind like Gein’s. —Mel Wang
‘I Love LA’ Trailer
Lena Dunham finds a daughter in Rachel Sennott
Another show about crazy and ambitious 20-somethings navigating life, that’s also an irreverent love letter to a big city? We’ve heard of that one before, and still believe that nothing will ever top Lena Dunham’s Girls. Yet one cannot help but wonder how actress and comedian Rachel Sennott will expand her 2019 Instagram video captioned “The trailer for any movie set in LA.”
The trailer for the upcoming HBO comedy series shows Sennott’s character Maia trying to make it big at a Los Angeles talent agency when her influencer ex-friend Tallulah, played by Grand Army’s Odessa A’zion, shows up at her apartment. “I made her successful. I can do it for other bitches,” Maia says. Joining the cast are Josh Hutcherson as Maia’s boyfriend Dylan and strawberry blonde Leighton Meester as her boss. According to IMDB, Elijah Wood is also set to make an appearance in one episode. Alright, I’ll bite. —Pie Gonzaga
‘House of Guinness’
It’s not Peaky Blinders, but it’s still binge-able
House of Guinness carries Steven Knight’s usual grit and swagger that some (like myself) might find overwhelming, but this time he adds a touch of softness and gives more room to the show’s women, a welcome evolution of his earlier work. The ensemble cast is excellent: Anthony Boyle and Louis Partridge stand out as Arthur and Edward Guinness, co-heirs to the brewery their forefathers made great, while Danielle Galligan stuns as Arthur’s sexually liberated beard, Olivia Hedges.
The show isn’t Knight’s Peaky Blinders, but it’s still a solid, engaging drama. Though based on real members of the Guinness family, it takes enough dramatic liberties that you can’t spoil it by checking Wikipedia. And with its first season ending on a cliffhanger, a second round feels worth waiting for. —Pie Gonzaga
‘The Naked Gun’
Absurdist comedy finds an unlikely icon in Liam Neeson
The blockbuster comedy is an endangered species. Gone are the days when actors like Steve Martin, Eddie Murphy, Adam Sandler, and Amy Schumer can carry a movie at the top of the box office — which makes The Naked Gun, the rebooted Leslie Nielsen franchise classic, starring Liam Neeson such a welcome romp amidst a deluge of comedies that tries too hard to be current at best and tone deaf at worst.
The film also brings us back to a time when comedies could just be silly for the sake of it. The Naked Gun is a masterclass in slapstick. The film captures the same absurdities of the originals, but now with a rapid-fire pace of jokes not seen since the days of Tina Fey’s 30 Rock. The Naked Gun is a movie that feels like it’s for everyone, yet not everyone watched; but financial flops aside, it represents a bright light for what the future of blockbuster comedies can be, if we’re only brave enough to see it. —Jonty Cruz
