I love Tubi.

As a 1980’s teenager growing up in the Australian outback town of Alice Springs, we had three primary video stores to choose from: Murray Neck Retravision, Plains Video and Mega Movie. Murray Neck was the Netflix of the group. That is, it had all the new releases and was considered as the top-tier of Alice’s video rental stores. Plains Video was the one I most often frequented, as it was cheaper than Murray Neck’s and had a larger range of older, popular movies. The last option was Mega. This is where you went for the weird, the sketchy and the indescribable. If it was a film that had fallen through the cracks for whatever reason, it landed at Mega. Many of films were downright unwatchable, but, if you persevered, you might stumble on an unheralded or forgotten gem. Tubi is the Mega Movies of streaming. I will joke that it is the spot for the worst movies by the best actors. Seriously, have you ever seen Tom Hanks’ 2016 film, A Hologram for the King? 

  Anyway, one of its’ strongest categories is documentary. A few years back, I happened upon The Search for Weng Weng. This 2007 Australian doc illuminates one of the most fascinating corners of global cinema, the James Bond inspired series of Filipino action films of the 1980’s, that starred the 2’9” Ernesto de Guzman de la Cruz, aka Weng Weng, as the leading man. I found it to be incredibly compelling, and my mind was blown by one wildly unexpected interview that is included in the film. I’m not going to spoil any of it. Go and check it out on Tubi.

I do have to wonder how (more) warped my brain would have become had I access to Tubi as a teenager. In any event, I’m glad there still exists a place out there in the world where these unloved films can find some eyeballs. After all, there is a lid for every pot … even if that pot is quite dented.