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This controversial Bradley Cooper movie is a big hit on Netflix. Is it worth streaming?

Rachel McAdams and Bradley Cooper in Aloha.
Bradley Cooper, left, and Rachel McAdams star in Columbia Pictures' "Aloha," also starring Emma Stone. Sony Pictures
Two men sit in a helicopter in Aloha.
Sony

The Netflix top 10 lists are far from a perfect way to gauge what you should watch, but sometimes a title appears there that seems intriguing, even if it was largely forgotten when it was first released. Cameron Crowe’s Aloha, which was originally released in 2015, is currently experiencing exactly that phenomenon. If you’re intrigued by the movie, you might want to know a little bit more about it before you decide to take the plunge.

The film follows a military contractor who comes to Hawaii and reconnects with his ex. At the same time, he meets a new woman who serves as his escort across the island. As the two become closer, he begins to feel a connection toward this new woman, even as the two must race to avert a nuclear disaster. It’s primarily a comedy, and here are three reasons you should check it out on Netflix.

It features an incredible cast

ALOHA Movie Trailer (Official HD) - May 2015

Cameron Crowe sure knows how to assemble a cast, and Aloha‘s is incredible. The movie stars Bradley Cooper (Maestro) and Emma Stone (Poor Things), but it also includes Rachel McAdams, Bill Murray, John Krasinski, and Danny McBride, among others. Cooper was at the height of his movie stardom, and he and Stone make for an incredibly solid romantic pairing.

A man and a woman dance at a party in Aloha.
Sony

Stone’s controversial casting as an Asian American woman is probably best left to history, but she has the charisma necessary to lead the kind of movie, and every member of the cast proves more than capable of working in concert with the tone of the movie.

It’s set in lush, beautiful Hawaii

The cast of Aloha
Sony Pictures

Tourism can be expensive. Thankfully, we have movies like Aloha to show us just how beautiful Hawaii can be without having to go there ourselves.

Hawaii itself looks as beautiful as you’ve heard. It’s easy to see why so many people might want to travel there. If you can’t afford to, though, you can always just turn on Aloha.

It’s the kind of love story we don’t get anymore

Rachel McAdams and Bradley Cooper in Aloha.
Crowe has been making various kinds of love stories for basically his whole career, and Aloha is just the director’s most recent example. Although the movie has a more detailed plot about the U.S. military and nuclear payloads in outer space, the movie is really about two people traveling across an island together and slowly forming a connection. Sony Pictures

Crowe’s old-fashioned form of storytelling, which is usually centered around romance, has fallen out of favor in more recent years, but Aloha is the kind of throwback you might be looking for if you feel like modern moviemaking is sorely lacking when it comes to romance.

Joe Allen
Joe Allen is a freelance writer based in upstate New York focused on movies and TV.
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