Best new movies and series arriving on NOW in March 2023

Every month, a new slate of titles is added to NOW’s library of films and TV shows—and Lillian Crawford picks the very best among them to watch. For the full list of everything arriving on the platform, scroll down.

Top Picks: TV

95th Academy Awards (March 13)

The biggest event of the movie calendar is soon upon us, available to watch live on NOW in the wee small hours of March 13 from midnight and on catch-up thereafter. After experiments with having no host and multiple hosts, the ceremony will bring back comedian Jimmy Kimmel to solo host the show which celebrates the greatest movies of the past twelve months.

The frontrunners include Everything Everywhere All At Once, celebrating historic nominations for Asian actors across the acting categories, German-language war drama All Quiet on the Western Front, Irish comedy The Banshees of Inisherin, and TÁR with a celebrated lead performance from Cate Blanchett. The nominations also include a number of blockbuster hits and sequels, including Avatar: The Way of Water and Top Gun: Maverick, with plenty of surprises bound to ensue on the night.

Succession: Season 4 (March 27)

One of the most hotly anticipated television series of the year starts streaming on NOW at the end of March, the fourth and final season of Jesse Armstrong’s Succession. Following the dramatic twist at the end of the third season, the future of Logan Roy’s company Waystar Royco is more uncertain than before with Logan’s children seemingly banding together in a coup against their father.

With the regular all-star cast set to return, lead by Brian Cox, Jeremy Strong, Kieran Culkin, Sarah Snook, Alan Ruck, and Matthew Macfadyen, they will be joined by Alexander Skarsgård and others towards the finish line. It’s a bold choice to end such a successful series so soon, although it will undoubtedly allow Armstrong and the writing team to end on a strong note.

White House Plumbers (TBC)

Due to arrive on NOW at some point in March 2023 is a new five-part mini series based on the 2007 book Integrity by Egil and Matthew Krogh. It tells the story of how the men behind Watergate working for President Richard Nixon, E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy, managed to topple Nixon’s presidency in the process of attempting to protect it.

The two men are portrayed in the series by Justin Theroux and Woody Harrelson, with the supporting cast including Domhnall Gleeson, Lena Heady, Judy Greer, and Kathleen Turner. The series is set to dramatise an aspect of the Watergate Scandal which has not been depicted on film before, steered by a staggeringly starry cast.

Movies

Elvis (March 3)

The latest film from Australian director Baz Luhrmann has everything we’ve come to expect from him in droves—a dizzying mise-en-scène, rapid editing, and plenty of bold musical numbers. In many ways he’s the perfect director to capture the frenetic energy of Elvis Presley’s career, albeit at breakneck speed. At the film’s heart, Austin Butler turns in a remarkable performance as Presley which has seen him already win a BAFTA for Best Actor and an Oscar nod.

By contrast, Butler’s co-star Tom Hanks has been nominated for a Razzie for Worst Supporting Actor for his slimy performance as Presley’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker. It’s certainly over-the-top, but marries well with the larger-than-life nature of Luhrmann’s vision, making him an interesting foil to Butler’s more authentic impersonation of the titular superstar. It’s certainly a spectacle worth watching.

To Leslie (March 12)

There’s been a lot of controversy around this film, with Andrea Riseborough securing a surprise Oscar nomination for Best Actress following a huge social media campaign to draw attention to her performance. Although the Academy investigated the nomination due to some of the strategies involved, the nomination has stuck, and if nothing else it’s wonderful that Riseborough is being recognised on a more mainstream platform.

Perhaps as a result of the film’s sudden spotlight, it’s making its way onto NOW just in time for the Oscars ceremony. The independent movie follows Leslie Rowlands, a West Texas woman who wins her local lottery which she uses to support her addictions to drugs and alcohol. It’s a bold and heavy film deftly handled by Riseborough in the lead.

Call Jane (March 18)

Released in cinemas in 2022, Call Jane stars Elizabeth Banks as a housewife with a life-threatening pregnancy in 1960s America. In order to get the abortion she needs to save her life, she turns to an underground network of women who are able to help her, based on the real group The Janes who supported women in Chicago prior to the legalisation of abortion in the United States.

Co-starring Sigourney Weaver and Kate Mara, the film has been used to increase awareness for the importance of safe abortion services following the overturning of Roe v. Wade in America. In a time when the rights to abortion are once again being thrown into question, films like Call Jane are able to do real activist work in attempting to change the tide.