Five things to stream this weekend: Puss in Boots grants your kid’s wish, plus Leonard Cohen comes home

Do you feel like you’re drowning … but you haven’t even left your couch? Welcome to the Great Content Overload Era. To help you navigate the choppy digital waves, here are The Globe’s best bets for weekend streaming.

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish (on-demand, including Apple TV, Google Play)

This image released by DreamWorks Animation shows the characters Perrito, voiced by Harvey Guillen, left, and Puss in Boots, voiced by Antonio Banderas, from the animated film "Puss in Boots: The Last Wish" by director Joel Crawford. (DreamWorks Animation via AP) — Puss in Boots streams on Apple TV and Google Play.DreamWorks Animation/Universal Pictures via AP

The other week, my three-year-old son was home sick with a days-long fever, his only comfort being his BunBear (that’s his stuffed bear that also kinda sorta resembles a bunny) and repeated viewings of the new Puss in Boots sequel, which is now available on-demand despite still playing theatres. (Thank distributor Universal Pictures’ pandemic-hastened deal to move its lower-end performers to digital services a mere 17 days after premiering.) My little guy is all better now, and I think at least a little of his recovery can be credited to The Last Wish, a movie that goes above and beyond the obligations of contemporary animated fare. Highly stylized, featuring a true ear-worm of a song (Fearless Hero), and jammed with full-throated vocal performances from Antonio Banderas (as the title kitty), Florence Pugh (as a cockney Goldilocks) and an unhinged John Mulaney (as mob boss Little Jack Horner), this Puss is entertaining enough to distract kids for hours (hours!) on end, while not making parents feel bad about failing to invest in human babysitters.

Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song (Crave)

HALLELUJAH: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song (Documentary). Leonard Cohen with his Guitar ready to go out on Tour. Circa late-2000s. Courtesy of the Cohen Estate — Leonard Cohen, circa late-2000s.Courtesy of the Cohen Estate / Mongrel Media

Definitely not for children – at least those who aren’t already penning mournful poetry – is this Canadian documentary tracing the long legacy of Leonard Cohen’s greatest song. As my colleague, The Globe and Mail’s resident Cohen expert Brad Wheeler, wrote in his review of the film when it hit theatres this past summer, little of Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine’s doc will be new to aficionados, but “mainstream audiences will appreciate the context and the pairing of song and subject: Hallelujah mixes sex and spirituality, as did the libidinous Buddhist.”

Shiva Baby (Netflix)

SHIVA BABY (2020). Emma Seligman’s Shiva Baby focuses on twentysomething Danielle (Rachel Sennott, pictured), a perennial student who’s been lying to her supportive but overbearing parents about her faltering academic career. Then again, she has a lot of secrets she’s keeping, including her relationship with an older man, Max (Danny Deferrari), who also gives her money. Hauled off to a shiva by her parents, she’s mortified to encounter her embittered ex Maya (Molly Gordon), followed by other people who make things increasingly more awkward for Danielle. Much to her chagrin, she finds out that many of them have secrets of their own. Courtesy of TIFF — Rachel Sennott in Shiva Baby.Courtesy of TIFF

Emma Seligman’s cheeky first feature, 2020′s Shiva Baby, is a take-it-or-leave-it proposition. First of all, it’s a cringe comedy, a satire of the genre that will amuse some viewers and leave others slinking out of the room with embarrassment for a protagonist trapped in a decidedly uncomfortable spot. And second, it’s a relentless parody of North American Jewish types that some will delightedly recognize and others will find so broad as to be offensive. Still, this is Seligman’s home turf – she grew up Jewish in Toronto and the film is set in a similar community in Brooklyn’s Flatbush neighbourhood – and the send-up is affectionate, and ultimately winning.

Hammer (CBC Gem)

HAMMER (2019). A father, Stephen Davis, left, (Will Patton) faces a personal crisis when he discovers his estranged son, Chris Davis (Mark O'Brien) fleeing a botched drug deal. The two men embark on a violent odyssey that grapples with themes of fatherhood, family and fate. Credit: Sara Fost Pictures — Will Patton and Mark O'Brien in Hammer.Sara Fost Pictures

Chronicling one very bad day in the lives of a troubled Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., family, Christian Sparkes’s 2020 thriller Hammer traces a vivid, teeth-grinding path of destruction. The tightly edited, frequently dark film benefits greatly from its two lead performers: Mark O’Brien as a ne’er-do-well criminal son and Will Patton as his exasperated father. Both radiate nervy energy like it was the most natural thing in the world, which in Hammer’s anxiety-inducing case, I guess it is.

Rain Man (Paramount+)

RAIN MAN (1988). Tom Cruise, Dustin Hoffman. (c) United Artists/ Courtesy: Everett Collection.
Credit to Everett Collection — Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man.United Artists / Courtesy of the Everett Collection

Continuing my quest to run through Tom Cruise’s filmography in the lead-up to this summer’s new Mission: Impossible sequel – last week was The Firm (Netflix) and A Few Good Men (CTV app) – I revisited Barry Levinson’s 1988 drama. First impressions: It is astounding to think that such a small-scale, character-driven film could have once been the No. 1 film of the year. Second: My goodness, this film could not be made today, at least certainly not with whatever amalgamation of traits and tics that Dustin Hoffman was working with in portraying the autistic Raymond, who is essentially kidnapped by his younger brother, Charlie (Cruise), in a half-cooked scheme to claim an inheritance. Despite its many dated elements, though, Rain Man retains its central power: a dynamic pairing in Hoffman and Cruise, and an ending that deftly avoids easy answers.