Writer/director Eliza Hitman’s painfully insightful portrait of a teenager’s journey to terminate an unwelcome pregnancy resonates with the bleakness of director Cristian Mungiu’s 2007, “4 months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days”; “Never Rarely Sometimes Always” unveils the trauma, bullying of “Autumn” (presciently depicted by first time actor Sidney Flanigan), a pregnant small town Pennsylvania high schooler and her cousin “Skyler” ... Read More »
“INSPECTOR MORSE” (1987-2000): John Shaw, (1942-2002) is impeccable as a detective solving crimes in the elite environs of Oxford, England. “Morse” is the embodiment of a quintessential Renaissance man: cultured, sublimely well-read, inebriate of Opera, savant culprit decimator; for all his indurate instincts in the world of criminality, he is hopelessly naïve when his heart “lightly turns to love”; Shaw’s ... Read More »
For years Amazon Prime has serviced my rousing, perpetual interest in detective investigations, serial killers (in another life I was either a victim or perpetrator), forensic science; loving the elimination process, exclusion of the obvious, excavating the mendacious. I have suggested some of these in the past, but they are worth repeating, especially at this unsettled time: “SPIRAL” (French: English ... Read More »
Vivarium: an enclosure adapted or prepared for keeping animals under seminatural conditions for observation or study; from its inception we recognize that “Gemma” (Imogen Poots) and “Tom” (Eisenberg) are stepping into a parable concocted by writer/director Lorcan Finnegan, in which they are the observed specimens; infused with bludgeoning metaphors: “Yonder”, suburbia of cloned homes, an address, number “9”, inescapability, release ... Read More »
Watching these two stunning biographical tales, it was shocking the commonalities these two women shared despite being over a century apart in age. “Self Made” based on the life of Sarah Breedlove/Madame C. J. Walker (1867-1919), the first self-made, female, African-American, millionaire, depicted royally by Octavia Spencer; “Self Made” is an examination of ambition and fortitude in an ambiance fraught ... Read More »
HBO has long been a harbinger of quality, innovative entertainment (“Game of Thrones”, “Boardwalk Empire”, “Veep”, “Curb Your Enthusiasm”, etc.); here are a few recent programs that are binge-worthy distractions, from an enforced, monotonous, interminable confinement: “THE OUTSIDER”: filmic interpretation of Stephen King’s creepy, compelling story about the invasion of evil, assuming identities of the innocent; Cynthia Erivo is supernatural ... Read More »
AMAZON PRIME has three films that were running in theatres the day of the apocalypse; you may now purchase them. “THE INVISIBLE MAN”: THREE & 1/2 ... Read More »
Skipping platitudes, metaphors; distractions are of extreme importance; many of you have requested suggestions of what to view, as an escape from an uninvited reality. In calmer times I have written posts on the plethora of choices gifted to viewers with streaming capabilities. Reducing redundancy, you may check the past, before investing in future enticements: “Potpourri of What to See ... Read More »
“Dr. Shaun Murphy” (“The Good Doctor”) depicted with inimitable skill by Freddie Highmore, is outrageously wonderful, a one-of-a-kind character, functioning brilliantly with autism; his diagnostic acuity, unparalleled; hilariously unfiltered, personally and professionally. Rarely can I state that I love a character unconditionally; Dr. Murphy, claims that ardor. Director Simon Fellows in “A Dark Place” gifts actor Andrew Scott the license ... Read More »
Our priorities and expectations have been seriously transformed; this applies to home entertainment; what, in the past, was instantaneously dismissed, now is given more license, case in point, is director Danis Tanovic’s, “The Postcard Killings”, starring dimpled Jeffrey Dean Morgan as “Jacob Kanon” a New York detective whose daughter and son-in-law have been grotesquely slaughtered in London; the slayers send ... Read More »
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