Filmmaker Ari Aster is offering his own unique take on the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic with his new film Eddington, which opens in theaters this weekend.
Aster is best known as a horror director for his films like Hereditary and Midsommar, but he’s recently moved away from the horror genre, like with 2023’s Beau Is Afraid, and now Eddington, which is being billed as a “Neo-Western satirical black comedy film.” Joaquin Phoenix stars as the sheriff in the small town of Eddington, New Mexico, who runs for mayor against the town’s current mayor, played by Pedro Pascal. Strict COVID protocols and incendiary politics lead to an explosive town-wide standoff, with everyone picking sides. The Eddington cast also includes, Luke Grimes, Deirdre O’Connell, Micheal Ward, Austin Butler, and Emma Stone.
Cinephiles have been eagerly awaiting the Eddington release since the movie premiered at Cannes Film Festival in May, despite the mixed response from critics. Read on to find out what we know about where to watch the Eddington movie and when we expect to be able to watch the Eddington movie streaming on HBO Max.
Eddington will only available to watch in a movie theater, when it opens in the U.S. in theaters on Friday, July 18. You can find a showing near you via Fandango. The Eddington movie is not yet available to watch online or on streaming.
Eddington is not streaming on Netflix and likely will not be on Netflix in the U.S. any time soon, due to the fact that the film is an A24 release, and the 2023 deal between A24 and Warner Bros. Discovery, brings all A24’s previous and upcoming theatrical releases to the Warner Bros. streaming service Max. (Formerly known as, and soon to once again be known as, HBO Max.) If you want to watch Eddington at home, you’ll have to wait for the film to be available to buy or rent on digital platforms, or wait for it to stream on Max.
If you’re new to Max, you can sign up for as low as $9.99/month with ads, but an ad-free subscription will cost $16.99/month.
If you want to stream even more and save a few bucks a month while you’re at it, we recommend subscribing to one of the discounted Disney+ Bundles with Hulu and Max. With ads, the bundle costs $16.99/month and without ads, $29.99/month.
Eddington is not yet streaming on Max. Right now, the movie is only in theaters. That said, we do expect to see Eddington streaming on Max eventually—thanks to the A24 and Warner Bros. deal—but we’re not sure when.
The A24 deal is a “Pay-1 deal,” which means A24 movies will start streaming on Max in the “Pay 1 window,” meaning that Max will be the first “TV channel” to pay for the rights to Eddington, after the film has been released on digital and home media. One recent A24 title, Opus, began streaming on Max on July 11, about four months after its release in theaters, and about three months after its release on digital.
If Eddington follows a similar release strategy, you might see Eddington on digital in about a month, around August 2025, and streaming on Max in about four months, around mid-to-late November 2025.
This is all speculation. The A24 digital and streaming releases have varied by title. If you want to watch Eddington right away, you can catch the movie in U.S. theaters on Friday.