Opinion/New on Prime

Best new movies and shows on Amazon Prime Video New Zealand: July 2025

Your guide to everything landing on Amazon Prime this month.

By Eliza Janssen|25 Jun 2025

Each month, new films and TV shows are added to Amazon Prime Video’s New Zealand library. Eliza Janssen presents her picks for titles worth watching. For the full list of everything arriving on the platform, scroll down.

Top picks: TV

Ballard: Season 1 (July 9)

Nothing can squash Bosch, as Prime Video’s elongated relationship with Titus Welliver’s heroic cop proves. In this refreshing new spin-off, his colleague Detective Renée Ballard takes centre stage, saddled to a crumbling cold case division within the LAPD and following in her mentor’s footsteps when it comes to the uncommon empathy she shows each long-forgotten victim.

Maggie Q should be a capable lead in continuing to bring Michael Connelly’s crime novels to the screen, unspooling a historic thread of secrets that begin with a murdered John Doe. Expect conspiracy, corruption, and presumably a few guest appearances from now-retired old mate Hazza.

The Chosen: Last Supper (July 13)

The fifth season of this Biblical drama is about to play the greatest hits for us: Judas, some paltry bits of silver, the biggest downer hang-out of all time. Depicting Jesus Christ’s life and death through the eyes of those closest to him, the faithful yet tormented disciples, The Chosen has taken its time to convey every nook and cranny of the Easter story, all culminating in this properly Da Vinci climax.

Even if you know how the story goes, seeing it depicted through fresh characterisation and intimate period detail can offer new insights.

The Summer I Turned Pretty: Season 3 (July 16)

Summer isn’t meant to last forever: that’s what gives the season its liminal, romantic power. In the third and final instalment of this sweet series based on the YA novels by Jenny Han, Lola Tung’s lovesick protagonist Belly is finishing her junior year of college, but none the wiser as to which Fisher brother has her heart: Jeremiah, her current “soulmate,” or her first love Conrad.

Last season featured some heartbreaking turns related to the boy’s mum Susannah, and that intergenerational family story will loom large over this final chapter.

Top picks: Movies

Blue Velvet (July 1)

This month, an auction was held to sell off many of the late, great director David Lynch’s personal belongings, some props and early scripts from this groundbreaking noir amongst them. My goodness, it would’ve been cool to purchase Lynch’s own coffee machine, or perhaps a spent can of PBR, the revolting fingerprints of Dennis Hopper’s villain Frank Booth still lingering on the metal.

Blue Velvet represents Lynch at his most typical, blending the wholesomeness of mid-century small town life with the most sordid and nightmarish cruelty imagined on American screens. Kyle Maclachlan and Isabella Rosselini play twisted, updated takes on the boy detective and the femme fatale, with 50s music and a surreal criminal underbelly drawing us down into a suburban rabbit hole.

Heads of State (July 2)

A larger-than-life action comedy with a muscular cast to match, this goofy effort from the director of Nobody feels like it could’ve been released in the early 1990s. Considering that Prime Video already premiered another Die Hard-esque thriller featuring an idealised ass-kicking President last month, maybe debris-blasting dreams of cool badass virtuous world leaders are just a popular fantasy of the moment. Can’t imagine why.

John Cena plays the POTUS and Idris Elba plays the UK PM, both targeted by a powerful enemy and reliant on the skills of Priyanka Chopra’s secret service agent to save both of their countries—nay, the entire world! At its best it should be brainless fun, probably entirely apolitical and packed with presidential one-liners.

Better Man (July 26)

Just when you begin to worry that the musical biopic is out of ideas, along comes a movie like Better Man—which makes the ingenious decision to cast a mo-cap monkey as the troubled pop star at its centre. Even better, the film itself never smugly acknowledges that Robbie Williams is being portrayed as an ape. After so many banger songs reimagined with striking, depressing visuals, you even forget that he’s less than human.

Directed by Aussie filmmaker Michael Gracey, the movie feels special not just because of its central monkey business gimmick, but also because of its raw emotional storytelling. Daddy issues, controlling music industry shenanigans and substance addiction are not new ideas in this genre, but Williams’ excoriating self-awareness and shame build to the kind of climax you’ve never seen before: of a monkey battling copies of himself in the audience of his biggest gig ever, the lyrics “let me entertain you” sounding like a desperate plea.

All titles arriving on Prime Video New Zealand in July

July 1

Abominable
The Addams Family
Blue Velvet
Creed
Creed II
Downton Abbey
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
Into the Blue
Into the Blue 2: The Reef
Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again!
Rocky
Rocky II
Rocky III
Rocky IV
Rocky V
Rocky Balboa
Romcon: Who the F**k is Jason Porter: Season 1
The Secret Life of Pets
Trolls
Trolls: World Tour
Twister
Warfare