‘Nyad,’ ‘The Killer’ & More Star-Studded Netflix Films to Stream in November

A trio of top-notch dramas debut on Netflix. Expect to see them competing during awards season.

It’s called the Mount Everest of swims: 110 brutal miles from Cuba to Florida roiling with deadly box jellyfish and violent storms. In 2010, 60-year-old marathon swimmer turned sports journalist Diana Nyad (Annette Bening), became obsessed with being the first to conquer it without a shark cage. Her four-year journey, accomplished with support from her best friend and coach, Bonnie Stoll (Jodie Foster), is chronicled in Nyad (premieres Friday, November 3). Bening dove deep into research and became close to the woman she portrayed. “She showed exemplary endurance,” Nyad said of Bening. “She worked for a year to get ready for this, and it showed. —Kate Hahn

(Credit: Netflix)

In the psychological thriller The Killer (premieres Friday, November 10), director David Fincher (Se7en, Zodiac) gives audiences access to the mind of a hired murderer. “You are inside this guy’s head,” said Fincher about the nameless central character. The twist is that the assassin (Michael Fassbender, above left) expresses — in intimate voiceover — insight into the credos he lives by. Inspired by an acclaimed French graphic novel series, the film follows the yoga-loving hitman, whose latest job goes awry, leading him to become entangled in a global manhunt. His control-freak existence is upended, and his icy, detached demeanor gets tested. —Christopher Wallenberg

(Credit: Netflix)

The 1963 March on Washington, best remembered for Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech, drew 250,000 people to the capital to rally for racial equality. But director George C. Wolfe hopes to right a different wrong in Rustin (premieres Friday, November 17), about veteran civil rights activist Bayard Rustin (Colman Domingo, above), who co-conceived the massive peaceful protest and miraculously brought it together in eight weeks. “He is a role model for what it means to be an American,” said Wolfe of his passion project’s subject. —Ileane Rudolph