What To Watch This Weekend: ‘One Battle After Another,’ ‘Slow Horses,’ ‘Dead Of Winter,’ And ‘The Lowdown’

HOLLYWOOD, CA — From bathrobe-clad revolutionaries to snowbound survivors, this week’s new releases dive into ideological collapse, espionage burnout, buried histories and blizzard-bound malaise — all streaming or hitting theaters near you.

Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” detonates with paranoia and emotional wreckage. Leonardo DiCaprio stars as Bob, a washed-up radical whose unraveling blends slapstick with sorrow, while newcomer Chase Infiniti brings riveting force as his daughter Willa. Inspired by Thomas Pynchon’s “Vineland,” the film is a psychotropic thriller woven with strands of surveillance, extremism and emotional entropy.

Season 5 of Apple TV+’s “Slow Horses” finds Slough House’s misfit spies back in the crosshairs. Coordinated terror attacks rock London, propelling Jackson Lamb (Gary Oldman) and his disgraced team into action. With new cast additions and returning favorites, the series continues to trade polish for grit — proving that the “slow horses” are still MI5’s last line of defense.

FX’s “The Lowdown” Season 1 blends pulpy noir with pointed social commentary. Ethan Hawke stars as Lee Raybon, a disheveled journalist digging through Tulsa’s buried truths. Created by Sterlin Harjo, the series peels back layers of mystery while confronting systemic injustice.

And in theaters, “Dead of Winter” delivers a frostbitten survival thriller set in rural Minnesota. Emma Thompson stars as a grief-stricken loner who stumbles upon a kidnapped young woman held hostage in a remote cabin. With its stark visuals and stripped-down tension, the film is a chilling meditation on mercy, justice and the human instinct to endure.

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Ready to dive in? Scroll down for the full lineup — and step into the shimmering world of storytelling, where every frame is an escape.

What To Watch This Weekend

“One Battle After Another”

Leonardo DiCaprio, Chase Infiniti, Sean Penn; directed by Paul Thomas Anderson

Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” is a volatile, politically charged thriller that explores the emotional wreckage of ideological collapse. Leonardo DiCaprio stars as Bob, a bathrobe-clad former revolutionary whose unraveling blends slapstick with sorrow — a nod to the Dude from “The Big Lebowski,” but shaded with desperation. His performance is one of his most unexpected and layered in years, capturing a man caught between absurdity and anguish.

Inspired by Thomas Pynchon’s “Vineland,” the film follows Bob and his daughter Willa — played by Chase Infiniti in her feature film debut — as they navigate a landscape haunted by surveillance, extremism and emotional fatigue. Anderson’s direction is a masterclass in tonal balance, seamlessly blending action, drama and tragicomedy with precision. The ensemble cast — including Teyana Taylor, Sean Penn and Benicio del Toro — further elevates a story already brimming with tension.

Rather than offering tidy resolutions, the film immerses viewers in the chaos of ideological entropy. It’s a psychotropic thriller that trades clarity for emotional intensity, inviting interpretation over exposition.

For viewers open to its fractured rhythm and thematic heft, “One Battle After Another” delivers a hypnotic, unsettling experience. DiCaprio’s layered performance anchors a genre-bending epic that detonates from the first frame — and that alone is worth the ride.

Check out Patch’s full review of “One Battle After Another.”

“Slow Horses” Season 5

Gary Oldman, Christopher Chung; directed by Jeremy Lovering

Across four seasons, Apple TV+’s “Slow Horses” has redefined the spy genre — swapping sleek espionage tropes for raw, character-driven drama. Led by Gary Oldman’s brilliantly grim Jackson Lamb, the team at Slough House — a purgatory for disgraced intelligence officers sidelined by failure or scandal — stumbles into conspiracies that expose the agency’s moral decay.

Each season escalates — from kidnapping plots and Cold War ghosts to personal betrayals and psychological unraveling. The fall of promising MI5 agent River Cartwright (Jack Lowden), the abduction of steadfast office administrator Catherine Standish (Saskia Reeves), and the haunting legacy of former spymaster David Cartwright (Jonathan Pryce) form the emotional spine of a series that trades polish for grit.

Season 5 picks up in the wake of Slough House’s latest crisis, delivering a blistering blend of espionage, satire and emotional grit. Coordinated terror attacks rock London, propelling the misfit agents into the spotlight again — whether MI5 likes it or not.

Oldman’s Lamb remains the show’s brilliant heart, while Roddy Ho (Christopher Chung) steps forward with unexpected depth. New cast additions — including Nick Mohammed and Victoria Hamilton — inject fresh tension, while the returning ensemble continues to shine.

Darkly funny and fiercely intelligent, Season 5 confirms that the “slow horses” aren’t merely cleaning up MI5’s mess — they’re the last ones left who care enough to fix it.

“The Lowdown” Season 1

Ethan Hawke, Peter Dinklage; created and directed by Sterlin Harjo

“The Lowdown” is a gritty, genre-blending drama that mixes pulpy noir with pointed social commentary. Created by Sterlin Harjo, the FX series follows Lee Raybon (Ethan Hawke), a disheveled journalist who digs through Tulsa’s buried histories with a flask in one hand and a file folder in the other.

Raybon is a compelling hybrid — part weary moral compass à la Philip Marlowe in “The Long Goodbye,” part chaotic charm of Doc Sportello in “Inherent Vice.” He’s a “truthstorian,” a term coined by the show to describe his obsessive pursuit of uncomfortable truths, especially those tied to systemic corruption and racial injustice.

Across eight episodes, the series peels back layers of mystery while weaving in echoes of the Osage murders and Tulsa’s legacy of violence. Harjo’s direction is playful and sharp, supported by a standout ensemble that includes Keith David as a retired civil rights lawyer, Kaniehtiio Horn as a tribal archivist with secrets of her own, and Peter Dinklage as a slippery political fixer.

“The Lowdown” is a stylish, soulful ride that lingers long after the credits roll, anchored by Hawke’s magnetic, career-highlight performance.

“Dead of Winter”

Emma Thompson, Judy Greer; directed by Brian Kirk

“Dead of Winter” is a lean, atmospheric thriller that finds tension in isolation and humanity in survival. Directed by Brian Kirk, the film unfolds in rural Minnesota during a punishing blizzard.

Emma Thompson plays a grief-stricken loner who stumbles upon a remote cabin, only to discover a kidnapped young woman held hostage by a desperate couple. Thompson’s performance is riveting. She imbues the role with steely grace, portraying a woman hardened by loss but driven by empathy — evoking the moral clarity of Marge Gunderson from “Fargo,” with a darker, more haunted edge.

Laurel Marsden delivers a raw, emotionally charged performance as the captive, capturing both the terror and resilience of someone fighting to survive. Judy Greer surprises with a chilling turn as one half of the captor duo. Marc Menchaca and Brían F. O’Byrne round out the cast with restrained menace, with O’Byrne especially unsettling in his coiled intensity.

Originally titled “The Fisherwoman,” the film was shot in Finland and Germany, lending it a stark, icy visual palette that amplifies the claustrophobic dread. The snow-covered wilderness becomes a character in itself — unforgiving, isolating and eerily quiet.

With its blend of psychological tension, survival stakes and a touch of Midwestern quirk, “Dead of Winter” is a compelling thriller. It’s a story of resilience, sacrifice and the thin line between mercy and justice — a frostbitten tale that lingers long after the storm.