1. Crazy Stupid Love
This is a romantic favorite starring Emma Stone, Ryan Gosling, and Steve Carell. It’s about Cal (Steve Carell) who is a middle-aged man struggling with his marriage – he’s about to get a divorce. Cal is determined to get back into the dating scene but it’s very difficult dating again after being married for so long. He meets Jacob Palmer (Ryan Gosling), a well-dressed and smooth-talking 20 something, at a bar who offers to give him advice with the ladies and Cal agrees. But there is a shocking twist at the end of the movie – you’ll never guess how Jacob and Cal’s lives are intertwined.
2. Behind Her Eyes
This show gave me major Black Mirror vibes and I loved it. This show is about Louise, a divorced single mother, who meets an intriguing man at a bar and has an instant connection with him but the interaction goes south. The next day she finds out her new boss is the man she met at the bar, David Ferguson. Quite an awkward encounter. She learns that he is married and feels very guilty. Later that day she bumps into Adele, who happens to be David’s wife and they develop a friendship in secret. Adele and David are both weird in their own way, David never opens up and Adele seems to have an underlying psychotic issue. Louise finds out the story behind their twisted marriage, the secrets of a house fire, and who David and Adele really are. I binge-watched this show in two days so I highly recommend it!
3. Hotel Cecil
If you’re into true crime this is a great docuseries series to watch. This investigates the disappearance of Elisa Lam from the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles. The Cecil Hotel has been around since the early 1900s and is known for the ominous people and events that go on inside. There have been many deaths because of overdoses, suicide, etc., as well as murders and famous muderers who’ve stayed at the hotel. The hotel is located on skid row in Los Angeles, the most dangerous part of the city. In order to market the hotel in a different way to keep the hotel from going under, three floors of the hotel were renovated and the new part of the hotel was called Stay on Main. Elisa Lam, a 21-year-old from Canada, decided to stay there for a few days but she never checked out. This lead to a full-blown investigation by the FBI and they eventually discovered her body in the water tank on the roof of the hotel. This docuseries investigates the theories behind her death – was it murder or something else?
I know these recommendations are all over the place but I’ve enjoyed each one! I hope these recommendations help you find some new stuff to watch during the pandemic!