What to Watch This Weekend: Other Mommy Skipped the Critics, The Social Reckoning Split Its First Viewers, and the One to See Is a Mahershala Ali Hitman Drama

Two big movies open wide on Friday, and as of early Wednesday, full reviews had posted for neither. Universal is not screening Other Mommy, its Jessica Chastain horror movie, for press at all. Aaron Sorkin's The Social Reckoning has played for early audiences who came out split. Meanwhile, the movie critics actually love has been playing in a handful of cities for two weeks.

Last weekend showed how little reviews can matter. Verity opened at No. 1 with $32.6 million despite poor notices and a C-plus CinemaScore, as Anne Hathaway's year keeps proving, while Digger opened fifth with $8 million, Tom Cruise's lowest start in 19 years. Here is how to spend October 9 to 11.

The one to see: Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother

Mahershala Ali plays Latif, a devoutly religious hitman in Houston whose wife dies suddenly, leaving him to protect his children as forces close in. Bassam Tariq wrote and directed it. Tariq was once set to direct Ali in Marvel's Blade. This is the movie they made together instead, with John Cho, Giancarlo Esposito, and Tramell Tillman in support.

It sits at 96 percent on Rotten Tomatoes across 81 reviews, Certified Fresh, the best score in this weekend's batch. The critics' consensus credits Ali and names Tariq a rising filmmaker, with one warning: some find it relentlessly dark. Amazon MGM opened it in six theaters on September 25 and has been widening it a step at a time since. It is rated R and runs just under two hours. If it is not near you this Friday, it is coming.

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The big swing: The Social Reckoning

Sixteen years after The Social Network, Sorkin directs his own follow-up. Mikey Madison plays whistleblower Frances Haugen, Jeremy Allen White plays Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz, and Jeremy Strong takes over Mark Zuckerberg from Jesse Eisenberg, who turned the part down.

What is new is the first word. Variety's roundup of early reactions pulled out three phrases that sum it up: "a solid sequel," "good, just not great," and "a harsh assessment of Zuckerberg." Matt Neglia of Next Best Picture found the material "neither particularly interesting nor revelatory." Strong's Zuckerberg is the performance people keep bringing up. Sorkin's flat direction is the recurring complaint.

Forecasts put the opening between $6 million and $13 million, well short of the original's $22.4 million in 2010. It is rated R and runs 112 minutes. Full reviews were expected Wednesday, so read them first. If you loved the talk in The Social Network, early viewers say it is intact. If you loved Fincher's precision, make it a matinee.

The scary one: Other Mommy

The weekend's likely winner is the one critics have not seen. Rotten Tomatoes had no reviews logged as of early Wednesday. Rob Savage (Host, The Boogeyman) directs from Josh Malerman's 2024 novel Incidents Around the House, with James Wan producing through Atomic Monster alongside Blumhouse. Eight-year-old Bela (Arabella Olivia Clark) meets something in her closet that looks and sounds exactly like her mother and keeps asking, "Can I go inside your heart?" Jessica Chastain plays both the mother and the thing.

When a studio skips press screenings, it is betting on the trailer over the reviews, and for horror that is often enough. Forecasts run from $15 million to $25 million at Boxoffice Pro up to $28.5 million to $35 million in other tracking, and most of those numbers would put it at No. 1. It is rated R and runs a lean 93 minutes. Wan's other haunted houses are ranked in our Conjuring movies list.

Also opening: a Palme d'Or winner, Chris Rock, and a Western

Fjord (limited)

Cristian Mungiu won his second Palme d'Or in May, 19 years after 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days. Sebastian Stan plays a Romanian man who moves to a remote Norwegian village with his Norwegian wife (Renate Reinsve), until the town accuses them of abusing their children. Neon, the American home of Parasite, Anatomy of a Fall, and Anora, opens it in limited release. It runs 146 minutes and holds 91 percent across 81 reviews, with a consensus that praises "a chilly surface that belies a heated humanity beneath the frost."

Misty Green (limited)

Chris Rock's first film as a director since Top Five stars Rosalind Eleazar as a former Emmy winner fighting for a second act, with Adam Driver, Daniel Kaluuya, and Anna Kendrick around her. Eleazar won a Tribute award at Toronto and is the reason to go. Critics are split on the rest, at 62 percent. A24 opens it in limited release.

Angel and the Badman (wide)

Angel Studios remakes the 1947 John Wayne Western (PG-13), with Zachary Levi as a wounded outlaw and Tommy Lee Jones in support. The few early reviews are lukewarm on Levi as a gunfighter.

The couch picks

Animals (Netflix, Friday). Ben Affleck directs for the first time since Air and stars as a Los Angeles mayoral candidate whose son is kidnapped, with Kerry Washington as his wife and Gillian Anderson and Steven Yeun in support. It also plays in select theaters. No reviews had posted as of early Wednesday.

Matchbox The Movie (Apple TV, Friday). Yes, the toy cars. Sam Hargrave, who directed Extraction, casts John Cena as an undercover CIA agent who drags his childhood friends into a globe-trotting chase, with Jessica Biel and Sam Richardson along for the ride. It is a Mattel and Skydance production, a name that took on new weight this week.

Avatar: Seven Havens (Paramount+, Friday). The Avatar creators' new animated series is set after The Legend of Korra in a world shattered by a cataclysm, where a young Earthbender learns she is the next Avatar and that the title now marks her as humanity's destroyer. Book 1 runs 13 half-hour episodes. Then see where it lands on your TV show tier list.

Two more from our October streaming guide arrive this weekend: Steven Spielberg's Disclosure Day on Peacock Friday, and Damian McCarthy's Hokum, the haunted-hotel movie that made about five times its budget, on Hulu Saturday.

Keep score as you go: add each one to Shortlist, rank it head to head against the movies you already love, and find out whether Sorkin's new one really lands below The Social Network. Our movie tier list guide shows how.

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