on HBO and DVD

Never has a TV show made me feel like such a jerk for being such a sarcastic jerk – but I just can’t help myself when the dialogue of The #1 Ladies Detective Agency gets so simple (seriously, most conversations consist of “He sounds like a good man”, “He is a good man”, “Perhaps a bad man is making him do bad things” “Mma, a very bad man”… and on and on). But still, the show is quite charming in its way, despite the inherent condescension in the script that tends to over simplify its characters.

It’s like an updated Murder She Wrote re contextualized in the incredible, and incredibly shot, location of Botswana. The show was directed by the late Anthony Minghella, and his deep love of warm, epic landscapes is intact; and the costumes are quite inspiring and breathtaking as well. No women can mix pattern, shapes, and looks like the ladies presented here – I started re-mixing and matching my wardrobe in my head as I was watching.

Jill Scott is a sweetheart and one of the few women with girth on television who has a healthy body image, but the real star of the show, as far as I’m concerned, is the sassy wide-eyed little errand boy, Wellington.

It’s not edgy viewing and if you’re an asshole like me you might even find it grating at times, but some night it’s great to tune into a simple mystery show nset in a world few of us are familiar with.

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Posted on January 10, 2010

Holiday of Nightmares

Creepy wet lips, monstrously erect nipples, blood sucking choir boys, voodoo dolls, flying bunny eyeballs, and Papa Lazarou… if you’ve taken my advice before and watched previous seasons of The League of Gentlemen, this will all sound like business as usual – if not, be prepared for the Christmas special of your worst nightmares!!

If you’re the squeamish type and prefer your head filled with sugar plum fairies and such, you may want to skip the stills below/after the jump.

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Posted on December 20, 2009

Lifetime Movie Network Gold

Well, hello there sugar. You in the mood for the kind of scenery chewing actin’ that the lil’ old Lifetime Movie Network was made for? You just itchin’ for the kind of yarn that’s hotter than a junebug on Georgia asphalt? Well, then pull up a chair and grab yourself a glass of sweet tea (something that I’ve learned from both this miniseries and NBC’s To Catch a Predator is always a trap) and settle in for Ann Rule’s Everything She Ever Wanted – a series that begins with a genuine Gone With the Wind-themed weddin’.

Gina Gershon smacks her lips around the role of real life sociopathic southern belle Patricia Allanson (who in reality bears very little resemblance to Gershon) like some sexed up, large titted dog might around a badly written bone. It makes for a much better viewing experience than Ann Rule’s other recent Lifetime event, Too Late to Say Goodbye, where Rob Lowe plays a seemingly perfect husband, but is actually a wife killer.

So imagine my surprise and horror when, after watching for two hours (gathering as many screen shots as possible), the show ended with Gina injecting an old woman in the mouth with poison followed by a “To be continued…” message – and I didn’t record the second half! Lifetime, shame on you for not re-airing this glorious heap of camp and trash. What do we pay you for?! If you think it’s just for the Reba re-runs (now airing in the morning) and decades-old Tracey Gold amnesia dramas (The Perfect Daughter, aired Wed 25th at 2:00), you are sorely mistaken.

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Posted on November 29, 2009

written by Peter Berry (2008)

I wrongly assumed this available-on-Netflix-instant BBC miniseries would be boring and dry, but The Last Enemy is a taut thriller set in a slightly altered modern day where surveillance in the name of protection has become sci-fi-ishly all encompassing.

While the reluctant hero is such a cliche at this point, the archetype is masterfully written and played by Benedict Cumberpatch (a British name if I ever heard one) as an uptight, anti-social germaphobe – perhaps the least likely person to become embroiled in the political mess that his recently killed brother has left behind.

Small mysteries lead to larger ones, and while the series has a bit of a hard time making all the answers satisfying and sustaining the suspense of the first part, it’s over all a truly smart and compelling piece with layers of surprises and intrigue. It’s quite long, so it works perfectly for a hung over Sunday, so long as you have the brain power to follow the action and plot twists.

Click here for the rest of The Last Enemy

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Posted on November 15, 2009

Here's what I wrote back on November 11th: 11/17/08

Getting into The Wire is like joining a cult, anyone whose been there knows that once you tap into season one, hours, nay weeks – even months – of your life will be devoted entirely to the world of Baltimore's rough streets. It's riveting drama and the perfect argument against those people who refuse to watch TV, claiming it's nothing but crap. It's?a show entirely worthy of its hype and word of mouth.

In fact, word of mouth and the release of all the seasons on DVD is what's made this series, which began it's run way back in 2002 so popular lately. More and more people are discovering what at least someone at HBO knew all along. Sure they failed to gain a huge audience for the hailed program, but they did allow it to go on for five years – all of which I am excited to watch. (Like I said this show can take months of your life from you.)

Former homicide detective, Ed Burns and his co-creator (and former journalist) David Simon were clearly inspired by their real life experiences and have written three dimensional characters who feel nothing like the expected television versions of themselves. No cop is on a vengeance kick after losing his wife to a bad guy, even the bad guys aren't bad guys in the typical sense. Some have more honor than the police officers, others are just kids stuck in a losing cycle.

The women are given equally complex and dignified roles. No where is there a boring twenty year old blond girl in charge of a crack team of detectives, a TV trend I've already railed against. Sadly, despite critics constantly calling this one of the greatest television shows ever created, if anyone in the networks saw it, they took no notes from it except that it wasn't an instant success, because nothing since has come close to the complexity, sophistication and greatness of The Wire.

Each season focuses on a different aspect of the city of Baltimore: the projects, the docks, politics, schools, and media, which maintaining some central characters like Avon Barksdale and Stringer Bell – the top men in a drug ring, Detective McNulty and Detective Greggs who try to catch them, and characters like the drug addicted Bubbles and the Robin Hood like Omar who are just trying to make it in a crazy world.

To get into the plots would be unfair to you that have yet to watch it and simply too much to get into here (I recently finished an explosive season three), but I can say that this is a thought provoking and worth while journey with some of the best characters put on the small screen.

RUNNERS UP:
Summer Heights High
Planet Earth
Poirot
Trial and Retribution
Thundarr The Barbarian
Silk Stalkings

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Posted on November 2, 2009