It is time for a round up of the year for new films seen on streaming services other than Netflix, this month.

Starting with Amazon Prime:

The Calendar Killer
Berlin is in the grip of a serial killer who contacts people and demands that they kill their partner by a specified date, or they will be killed themselves. Klara (Luise Heyer) receives a phone call and is give that ultimatum. Klara rings a telephone safety helpline and speaks to Jules (Sabin Tambrea) hoping that he will help her evade the killer. Despite Adolfo J. Kolmerer’s thriller only being available in a dubbed version, I was impressed by how he builds tension and atmosphere. The twist, though, is obvious and a little nonsensical.
Rating: 6 out of 10

The Killer’s Game
Dave Bautista stars in this action comedy with a very familiar plot. He plays a hitman who is diagnosed with a terminal illness and takes out a hit on himself, only to later find out that the diagnosis was incorrect. J.J. Parry’s movie bombed so badly at the US box office, that it has been released straight to streaming here. Whilst it is not great, and Bautista is more believable as a killer than as love interest for Sofia Boutella’s dancer, it is not as bad as it’s reputation suggests. There are some pleasingly bloody kills and amusingly over the top performances from the supporting cast.
Rating: 6 out of 10

Over on Sky, Sky Movies subscribers can see Steffan Haars comic horror, Get Away. It that has the considerable talents of Nick Frost (who also wrote the screenplay) and Aisling Bea in the lead roles. They play a couple who go on holiday with their kids to a remote island only to find that it is inhabited by killers. This starts really well as the unsuspecting couple turn up in the sinister location and there are some decent one liners throughout, but it generally gets less funny as the gore increases.
Rating: 5.5 out of 10

Blood for Dust can be rented on the usual services, and stars Scoot McNairy plays Cliff, a travelling salesman struggling to earn enough to keep his and his family’s heads above water. When he meets someone from his past, Ricky (Kit Harrington), he agrees to get involved in smuggling cocaine. I am increasingly finding that US indie crime movies are going for a bleak aesthetic in an attempt to portray the desperate lives of the characters. However, without a decent script, specifically without any levity in it, the effect is soporific. Director Rob Blackhurst and his co writer Davux Ebeltoft need to take lessons from a master of the genre like Jeremy Saulnier. The versatile McNairy does his best with the material though.
Rating: 4.5 out of 10

Finally, on Paramount Plus, is Star Trek: Section 31. I have never seen an episode of the Star Trek TV show in any of its iterations. I did get into the original run of films, and the cliché that the even numbers are good and the odd bad was certainly true. I did not like the first attempt to re-boot the franchise, and now we have another spin off premiering on this streaming service. Michelle Yeoh stars as Emperor Philippa Georgiou, a character she has already played in the TV show Star Trek: Discovery, who joins a secret division of the Starfleet called Section 31 who have to protect the United Federation of Planets. This feels more like a Marvel movie than a Star Trek one. The rag tag team that Philippa assembles was reminiscent of the dismal Guardians of the Galaxy. Also, the prologue and occasional flashbacks look like Dune out takes. Yeoh is not an actress I have ever really warmed to and she makes no impression here, in this tedious adventure.
Rating: 2.5 out of 10