Jack has just turned five, and has spent his entire life in Room. In a room, to be precise -- an eleven-foot-square toolshed where his mother has lived for even longer than he has. Ma's been there for seven years, ever since being kidnapped at 19 by the man she calls Old Nick.
So far as Jack knows, Room is all the world there is. Ma does her best to keep him happy and healthy (and for a woman with at most a year of college, her creative parenting and educational techniques would be the envy of many a teacher), but Jack is becoming more and more curious, and better able to spot the inconsistencies in her stories about the world; Ma knows that she can't possibly keep him content with this life for very much longer.
Donoghue pulls off a lot of tricky things in Room. Jack is her narrator, and she creates a convincing (albeit rather intellectually precocious) 5-year-old boy. Letting Jack tell the story also gives her a way to keep the most horrifying aspects of their lives at some distance; Jack is less horrified and frustrated by their life than Ma is, simply because it's all he's ever known. (Letting Ma tell the story would also have meant a much heavier emphasis on the sexual aspects of her confinement, which would make the telling even harder to take.)
Even more impressive, Donoghue makes Jack's view of his world so convincing that (and I suppose this is a mild spoiler) when he finally discovers our world, the world outside Room, it becomes a genuinely terrifying and alien place. And Donoghue finds ways to twist her plot and advance her story that I never would have expected after the first few pages.
Room is spectacularly well written; the final pages are particularly moving, as we see just how much Jack has been changed by events. Donoghue finds humor in this bizarre life, and the relationship between Jack and Ma is completely convincing, a portrait of a mother's ferocious love and determination to raise her child as normally as possible under the most extraordinary of circumstances.
November 01, 2010
October 26, 2010
BOOKS: One Day, David Nicholls (2010/UK 2009)
The 20-year relationship of Dexter and Emma, which we watch by dropping in on them every July 15, beginning with their first meeting. It's an entertaining story, and Nicholls uses his narrative conceit very cleverly, but there is one major flaw that might ruin the book for you.
That flaw is what Roger Ebert calls an "idiot plot;" that is, a story that would be wrapped up in ten minutes if any of the characters were not complete idiots. In this case, it's clear to us by the end of, say, chapter 2 that Dex and Em are meant to be together, and each of them realizes it even sooner than that. But neither of them ever bothers to say "I love you" to the other (or even "I like you a lot and I think we should start dating"), and so we're dragged through a decade or more of watching the two pine miserably away for one another. Each time circumstances put them in danger of actually connecting romantically, Nicholls forces one of them to jump through some foolish hoop to plant yet another obstacle in their way.
But on the plus side, the characters are immensely likable and vividly drawn, and Nicholls tells his story with great warmth and humor. The final chapters are particularly strong, and the ending is much more moving than I had expected from so relatively frothy a confection. That ending, I think, tipped the balance for me, and got me past my annoyance with the idiot plot to the point where I can mildly recommend the book, but with a strong caveat that your mileage may vary.
That flaw is what Roger Ebert calls an "idiot plot;" that is, a story that would be wrapped up in ten minutes if any of the characters were not complete idiots. In this case, it's clear to us by the end of, say, chapter 2 that Dex and Em are meant to be together, and each of them realizes it even sooner than that. But neither of them ever bothers to say "I love you" to the other (or even "I like you a lot and I think we should start dating"), and so we're dragged through a decade or more of watching the two pine miserably away for one another. Each time circumstances put them in danger of actually connecting romantically, Nicholls forces one of them to jump through some foolish hoop to plant yet another obstacle in their way.
But on the plus side, the characters are immensely likable and vividly drawn, and Nicholls tells his story with great warmth and humor. The final chapters are particularly strong, and the ending is much more moving than I had expected from so relatively frothy a confection. That ending, I think, tipped the balance for me, and got me past my annoyance with the idiot plot to the point where I can mildly recommend the book, but with a strong caveat that your mileage may vary.
Labels:
Books
October 17, 2010
MUSIC: LA Philharmonic, October 17 (Messiaen)
Olivier Messiaen's Turangalila-symphonie is not a work to be tackled lightly. It's a gargantuan piece -- 78 minutes, in today's performance -- for an enormous orchestra, and requires virtuoso soloists on the piano and the ondes martenot. (The what?, you may be asking. I'll get to that.) It's a work of passionate, almost crazed intensity, a wild attempt to depict the whole experience of human love, from the spiritual to the carnal.
And when it's done well, as it certainly was in this performance, it's an exhilirating thrill ride.
Messiaen calls for a very large orchestra, with triple winds and brass, a large percussion section, and an array of keyboard instruments -- celesta, glockenspiel (an odd little keyboard version that looked like a very small harpsichord), piano, and ondes martenot. The ondes is an electronic instrument that can be played from the keyboard to produce separate, distinct notes (but only one note at a time, no chords), or by sliding a ring along a metal rod at the front of the keyboard to produce swooping glissandos. It's got a 7-octave range with a less piercing tone than that of the theremin, and more timbral variation, created mostly through the use of multiple speakers, each of which filters the sound differently. Today's ondes soloist, Cynthia Millar, is the reigning queen of the instrument, and has performed the Turangalila more than 100 times; her fellow soloist, pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet, is also a long-time devotee of the work.
It's not a work that follows traditional symphonic structure. There is a sort of development section late in the work, but the music is largely built around the layering of contrasting ideas, rhythms, and timbres. The low brass blares a series of portentous chords; as they fade away, you start to hear the flurrying dance that the strings have been playing all along; and above it all, the piano chirps away in a variety of imitation birdsongs. (Birdsongs were one of Messiaen's obsessions; his business card described him as a "composer/ornithologist.")
The things that stick with me when I hear unfamiliar music for the first time tend to be unusual moments of orchestral color, and there are some lovely ones here. The piano frequently plays in unison with the celesta and glockenspiel, giving it a brighter, more tinkly sound; a solo clarinet becomes even more hollow and hooty when doubled by the ondes. Messiaen has a particularly interesting way of combining unpitched percussion with the piano. A single woodblock, for instance, will clatter out a rhythm as the piano plays a melody to match, with the two balanced in such a way that the timbre of the woodblock dominates; it creates the illusion that one woodblock is playing a full melodic phrase.
The final seconds of the work are striking. The orchestra builds and builds to a thrilling climax, and at the moment when you expect that last little bit of oomph to hit, that little exclamation point on the final instant, the music instead fades away in an instant. It's as if all that joy, that passion, that delirious ecstasy is just too much to be sustained; it can only implode. It's a magical effect.
This was the first concert I'd heard under Gustavo Dudamel, and he's great fun to watch. He's very lively on the podium, but his energy never detracts from the absolute clarity of his beat and his tempos (and in this work, tempos are changing all the time, both abruptly and through drawn-out ritardando passages). The orchestra clearly loves him, and it's exciting to think how good he could become if he's this good at 29.
This was a concert I won't forget for a long time, an absolutely spectacular afternoon, and the audience responded with a standing ovation that lasted for nearly ten minutes.
And when it's done well, as it certainly was in this performance, it's an exhilirating thrill ride.
Messiaen calls for a very large orchestra, with triple winds and brass, a large percussion section, and an array of keyboard instruments -- celesta, glockenspiel (an odd little keyboard version that looked like a very small harpsichord), piano, and ondes martenot. The ondes is an electronic instrument that can be played from the keyboard to produce separate, distinct notes (but only one note at a time, no chords), or by sliding a ring along a metal rod at the front of the keyboard to produce swooping glissandos. It's got a 7-octave range with a less piercing tone than that of the theremin, and more timbral variation, created mostly through the use of multiple speakers, each of which filters the sound differently. Today's ondes soloist, Cynthia Millar, is the reigning queen of the instrument, and has performed the Turangalila more than 100 times; her fellow soloist, pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet, is also a long-time devotee of the work.
It's not a work that follows traditional symphonic structure. There is a sort of development section late in the work, but the music is largely built around the layering of contrasting ideas, rhythms, and timbres. The low brass blares a series of portentous chords; as they fade away, you start to hear the flurrying dance that the strings have been playing all along; and above it all, the piano chirps away in a variety of imitation birdsongs. (Birdsongs were one of Messiaen's obsessions; his business card described him as a "composer/ornithologist.")
The things that stick with me when I hear unfamiliar music for the first time tend to be unusual moments of orchestral color, and there are some lovely ones here. The piano frequently plays in unison with the celesta and glockenspiel, giving it a brighter, more tinkly sound; a solo clarinet becomes even more hollow and hooty when doubled by the ondes. Messiaen has a particularly interesting way of combining unpitched percussion with the piano. A single woodblock, for instance, will clatter out a rhythm as the piano plays a melody to match, with the two balanced in such a way that the timbre of the woodblock dominates; it creates the illusion that one woodblock is playing a full melodic phrase.
The final seconds of the work are striking. The orchestra builds and builds to a thrilling climax, and at the moment when you expect that last little bit of oomph to hit, that little exclamation point on the final instant, the music instead fades away in an instant. It's as if all that joy, that passion, that delirious ecstasy is just too much to be sustained; it can only implode. It's a magical effect.
This was the first concert I'd heard under Gustavo Dudamel, and he's great fun to watch. He's very lively on the podium, but his energy never detracts from the absolute clarity of his beat and his tempos (and in this work, tempos are changing all the time, both abruptly and through drawn-out ritardando passages). The orchestra clearly loves him, and it's exciting to think how good he could become if he's this good at 29.
This was a concert I won't forget for a long time, an absolutely spectacular afternoon, and the audience responded with a standing ovation that lasted for nearly ten minutes.
Labels:
Music
October 16, 2010
MOVIES: Hereafter (Clint Eastwood, 2010)
To his credit, Clint Eastwood attempts in Hereafter to do several things he's never tried before as a director; unfortunately, he doesn't do any of them very well. The big effects scene that opens the movie looks distinctly low-budget, and the Babel-style bringing together of mulitple storylines is handled in particularly clumsy fashion.
Worst of all, Eastwood attempts (briefly) to give us a glimpse of the afterlife. There are a lot of ways for a director to do that, but all of them call for a visual poetry that Eastwood's prosaic style simply can't provide.
The actors do what they can, but Peter Morgan's script is unusually heavy-handed, wrapping them all in a lead blanket of somber earnestness. Cecile de France is pretty, but an emotional blank as a French journalist; retired psychic Matt Damon has the wounded sincerity cranked up to full blast; George and Frankie McLaren, as London twins struck by tragedy, are the worst sort of child actors, coasting on simpering cuteness. The best impressions are made by supporting players -- Steven Schirippa as a cheerful cooking instructor, Jenifer Lewis as a frantic grieving mother.
As has become his habit, Eastwood scores the movie himself, and you will grow very tired of the plinking little piano theme that accompanies the movie's sadder moments (of which there are a lot).
You don't expect a movie about how we cope with death to be full of laughs, but there's not so much as a smile to break the unrelenting gloom. (Bryce Dallas Howard tries to bring some comic energy to her role as Damon's romantic interest; it doesn't work at all, but at least she's trying.) Hereafter is a movie desperately in need of a sense of humor to break through its hermetic seal of righteous sincerity.
Worst of all, Eastwood attempts (briefly) to give us a glimpse of the afterlife. There are a lot of ways for a director to do that, but all of them call for a visual poetry that Eastwood's prosaic style simply can't provide.
The actors do what they can, but Peter Morgan's script is unusually heavy-handed, wrapping them all in a lead blanket of somber earnestness. Cecile de France is pretty, but an emotional blank as a French journalist; retired psychic Matt Damon has the wounded sincerity cranked up to full blast; George and Frankie McLaren, as London twins struck by tragedy, are the worst sort of child actors, coasting on simpering cuteness. The best impressions are made by supporting players -- Steven Schirippa as a cheerful cooking instructor, Jenifer Lewis as a frantic grieving mother.
As has become his habit, Eastwood scores the movie himself, and you will grow very tired of the plinking little piano theme that accompanies the movie's sadder moments (of which there are a lot).
You don't expect a movie about how we cope with death to be full of laughs, but there's not so much as a smile to break the unrelenting gloom. (Bryce Dallas Howard tries to bring some comic energy to her role as Damon's romantic interest; it doesn't work at all, but at least she's trying.) Hereafter is a movie desperately in need of a sense of humor to break through its hermetic seal of righteous sincerity.
Labels:
Movies
October 09, 2010
MOVIES: Secretariat (Randall Wallace, 2010)
There is not a single moment in Secretariat that will surprise you. That's not just because we all know the story (spoiler alert: the horse wins), but because the obligatory plot points of the Inspirational Sports Movie are ticked off with all the solemn predictability of the Stations of the Cross.
There are a lot of problems here. The dialogue is often hopelessly hackneyed and the movie is weighted down with the same sort of fuzzy, soft-focus Christianity that worked so well in selling The Blind Side last year. John Malkovich is badly miscast; just because he has a reputation for playing eccentrics doesn't mean he's the right choice for every eccentric, and he's not very convincing as a French-Canadian horse-training dandy. (His accent when he slips into French, for instance, is terrible, and it's certainly not the distinctive French-Canadian accent.)
That said, Diane Lane is very good as Penny Chenery, Secretariat's owner, and there's a charming supporting performance from Margo Martindale as the Chenery family secretary. And when that horse comes barrelling down the track, the movie is undeniably exciting. You could easily wait for the DVD; Secretariat certainly isn't a great movie, but if you're in the mood for this sort of thing, it's an awfully effective one in spite of itself.
There are a lot of problems here. The dialogue is often hopelessly hackneyed and the movie is weighted down with the same sort of fuzzy, soft-focus Christianity that worked so well in selling The Blind Side last year. John Malkovich is badly miscast; just because he has a reputation for playing eccentrics doesn't mean he's the right choice for every eccentric, and he's not very convincing as a French-Canadian horse-training dandy. (His accent when he slips into French, for instance, is terrible, and it's certainly not the distinctive French-Canadian accent.)
That said, Diane Lane is very good as Penny Chenery, Secretariat's owner, and there's a charming supporting performance from Margo Martindale as the Chenery family secretary. And when that horse comes barrelling down the track, the movie is undeniably exciting. You could easily wait for the DVD; Secretariat certainly isn't a great movie, but if you're in the mood for this sort of thing, it's an awfully effective one in spite of itself.
Labels:
Movies
October 08, 2010
BOOKS: The Somnambulist, Jonathan Barnes (2007)
Here's a weirdly loopy knockoff of every Victorian genre you can think of, with a few other styles and eras thrown in for good measure. It's equal parts Arthur Conan Doyle, Mary Shelley, Jewish mysticism, and German expressionism; and it manages to be both genuinely frightening and very funny.
It's the story of Edward Moon, a stage magician who frequently assists the London police in their investigations. This time, he and his sidekick, The Somnambulist (a 7-foot-tall, mute, milk-guzzling, apparently unkillable fellow), are investigating the mysterious deaths of two actors, which lead them into a conspiracy involving deformed prostitutes, the bum who lives outside Moon's theater, the poetry of the recently deceased (or is he?) Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and the power of Love.
The opening had me hooked, one of those "Hello, I'm your unreliable narrator" things that I love so:
And the rest of the book more than lives up to the promise of that opening. It's a darkly hilarious mishmash of genres that carefully balances its spectacular horror elements (which really are immensely creepy, particularly in the elaborate battle at the climax) with a gently mocking, affectionately parodic tone. It's Sherlock Holmes meets Wes Craven, Doctor Who meets Edgar Allan Poe -- and it's a fabulously odd piece of entertainment.
It's the story of Edward Moon, a stage magician who frequently assists the London police in their investigations. This time, he and his sidekick, The Somnambulist (a 7-foot-tall, mute, milk-guzzling, apparently unkillable fellow), are investigating the mysterious deaths of two actors, which lead them into a conspiracy involving deformed prostitutes, the bum who lives outside Moon's theater, the poetry of the recently deceased (or is he?) Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and the power of Love.
The opening had me hooked, one of those "Hello, I'm your unreliable narrator" things that I love so:
Be warned. This book has no literary merit whatsoever. It is a lurid piece of nonsense, convoluted, implausible, peopled by unconvincing characters, written in drearily pedestrian prose, frequently ridiculous and willfully bizarre. Needless to say, I doubt you'll believe a word of it.
Yet I cannot be held wholy accountable for its failings. I have good reason for presenting you with so sensational and unlikely an account.
It is all true. Every word of what follows actually happened, and I am merely the journalist, the humble Boswell, who has set it down. You'll have realised by now that I am new to this business of storytelling, that I lack the skill of an expert, that I am without any ability to enthral the reader, to beguile with narrative tricks or charm with sleight of hand.
And the rest of the book more than lives up to the promise of that opening. It's a darkly hilarious mishmash of genres that carefully balances its spectacular horror elements (which really are immensely creepy, particularly in the elaborate battle at the climax) with a gently mocking, affectionately parodic tone. It's Sherlock Holmes meets Wes Craven, Doctor Who meets Edgar Allan Poe -- and it's a fabulously odd piece of entertainment.
Labels:
Books
October 04, 2010
MOVIES: Easy A (Will Gluck, 2010)
The words "teenage comedy" do not exactly give the average moviegoer great cause for optimism these days, but Easy A is an exception. It's a smart, funny movie that doesn't stoop to vulgarity for its jokes, and that allows its characters to be likable and flawed.
Our heroine is Olive (Emma Stone), who tells her best friend Rhiannon (Aly Michalka), that she's lost her virginity to a college man. She hasn't, and that lie leads to another, and another, until Olive suddenly realizes she's lied her way into an image as the school slut. She finds herself even more outcast than before, and Marianne (Amanda Bynes), leader of the school's Christian student group, makes it her mission to get Olive expelled for her behavior.
Olive's currently reading The Scarlet Letter in English class (good lord, are schools still foisting that musty old thing on kids?), and can't help but draw parallels between her own persecution and that of Hester Prynne; she decides to embrace her new image, to the extent of sewing a bright red A on all of her clothes. That, of course, only makes matters worse, and Olive's lies begin to have unfortunate impacts on those around her.
Emma Stone is fabulous as Olive; she's absolutely charming, very funny, and manages to stay likable even in the character's most irritating smart-aleck moments. She's surrounded by a solid cast of supporting players, especially in the adult roles. Patricia Clarkson and Stanley Tucci steal all of their scenes as her neo-hippie parents; Thomas Haden Church and Lisa Kudrow have fine moments as two of Olive's teachers.
Easy A has some of the same bittersweet humor and insight into teenagers that the best John Hughes movies had, and if some of the plot points stretch credulity to its limits -- a high school where people are shocked that someone's had sex? a world in which someone as likable and sexy as Emma Stone is among the ignored and unpopular? -- well, that's the nature of the genre. Make those small leaps, though, and you're in for a pleasant surprise that'll make you laugh a lot.
Our heroine is Olive (Emma Stone), who tells her best friend Rhiannon (Aly Michalka), that she's lost her virginity to a college man. She hasn't, and that lie leads to another, and another, until Olive suddenly realizes she's lied her way into an image as the school slut. She finds herself even more outcast than before, and Marianne (Amanda Bynes), leader of the school's Christian student group, makes it her mission to get Olive expelled for her behavior.
Olive's currently reading The Scarlet Letter in English class (good lord, are schools still foisting that musty old thing on kids?), and can't help but draw parallels between her own persecution and that of Hester Prynne; she decides to embrace her new image, to the extent of sewing a bright red A on all of her clothes. That, of course, only makes matters worse, and Olive's lies begin to have unfortunate impacts on those around her.
Emma Stone is fabulous as Olive; she's absolutely charming, very funny, and manages to stay likable even in the character's most irritating smart-aleck moments. She's surrounded by a solid cast of supporting players, especially in the adult roles. Patricia Clarkson and Stanley Tucci steal all of their scenes as her neo-hippie parents; Thomas Haden Church and Lisa Kudrow have fine moments as two of Olive's teachers.
Easy A has some of the same bittersweet humor and insight into teenagers that the best John Hughes movies had, and if some of the plot points stretch credulity to its limits -- a high school where people are shocked that someone's had sex? a world in which someone as likable and sexy as Emma Stone is among the ignored and unpopular? -- well, that's the nature of the genre. Make those small leaps, though, and you're in for a pleasant surprise that'll make you laugh a lot.
Labels:
Movies
MOVIES: The Social Network (David Fincher, 2010)
I have never been a huge fan of Jesse Eisenberg, mostly because he keeps playing roles that don't seem to suit him well. He's a chilly movie presence, not terribly likable, who seems to be a very smart person, yet he keeps playing lovably bumbling, rather inarticulate guys, and it's simply not convincing. But finally, in The Social Network, he's used correctly, playing Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg, who is both whip-smart and utterly unlikable, and it's a spectacularly good performance.
It's true of any biographical movie, of course, that the actor is never actually playing Famous Person X so much as he's playing "Famous Person X," a version of the real thing whose personality has been shaped and edited for dramatic purposes, but that seems to be particularly true here. The book on which Aaron Sorkin's screenplay is partly based (different interviews with Fincher and Sorkin will tell you different things about the extent to which the book was the source) is an unusually unreliable work of "nonfiction," and both Zuckerberg and the PR folks at Facebook have made it clear that they don't think this version of the story is very accurate.
But setting aside historical accuracy, and judging the finished product solely as a movie, it's top-notch work. The cast spits out Sorkin's famously dense dialogue as it they've been doing it all their lives, and the performances are consistently fine. Eisenberg dominates the movie as Zuckerberg, whose inability to make or sustain friendships doesn't stop him from creating what has become the world's largest social networking site (if the movie has a serious flaw, it lies in pounding this irony home much harder than is necessary); he oozes arrogance and condescension, looking down on everyone he meets. Andrew Garfield, as Mark's best friend, who will ultimately be betrayed, gets all the layers right -- the giddy optimism as Facebook takes off, the immense patience required to be friends with someone so socially inept as Mark, the devastation when he realizes that he's been left behind.
Justin Timberlake turns on all of his considerable charm as Sean Parker, the Silicon Valley golden boy who seduces Mark with dreams of angel investors, venture capital, and someday being a billionaire; it's the liveliest performance in the movie, and should finally put an end to the idea that Timberlake only gets cast in movies for his name value. He's a seriously talented actor. Armie Hammer does fine work (with the help of some seamless technical wizardry) as both of the Winklevoss twins, patrician jocks who may have given Zuckerberg the ideas that he would eventually turn into Facebook; he gets to deliver some of Sorkin's best droll punchlines, and does so with great elegance and style.
I'm a bit baffled by the considerable chatter about the movie as some sort of era-defining document; for all of its flaws, it seems to me that the documentary Catfish says more about how we live in the Facebook era than The Social Network does. And of course, it must be taken with a massive grain of salt -- maybe a whole lick of it -- rather than as an accurate historical portrayal. But it gives us superb portrayals of interesting characters, and a sharp, crisply written story. It's a wildly entertaining movie.
It's true of any biographical movie, of course, that the actor is never actually playing Famous Person X so much as he's playing "Famous Person X," a version of the real thing whose personality has been shaped and edited for dramatic purposes, but that seems to be particularly true here. The book on which Aaron Sorkin's screenplay is partly based (different interviews with Fincher and Sorkin will tell you different things about the extent to which the book was the source) is an unusually unreliable work of "nonfiction," and both Zuckerberg and the PR folks at Facebook have made it clear that they don't think this version of the story is very accurate.
But setting aside historical accuracy, and judging the finished product solely as a movie, it's top-notch work. The cast spits out Sorkin's famously dense dialogue as it they've been doing it all their lives, and the performances are consistently fine. Eisenberg dominates the movie as Zuckerberg, whose inability to make or sustain friendships doesn't stop him from creating what has become the world's largest social networking site (if the movie has a serious flaw, it lies in pounding this irony home much harder than is necessary); he oozes arrogance and condescension, looking down on everyone he meets. Andrew Garfield, as Mark's best friend, who will ultimately be betrayed, gets all the layers right -- the giddy optimism as Facebook takes off, the immense patience required to be friends with someone so socially inept as Mark, the devastation when he realizes that he's been left behind.
Justin Timberlake turns on all of his considerable charm as Sean Parker, the Silicon Valley golden boy who seduces Mark with dreams of angel investors, venture capital, and someday being a billionaire; it's the liveliest performance in the movie, and should finally put an end to the idea that Timberlake only gets cast in movies for his name value. He's a seriously talented actor. Armie Hammer does fine work (with the help of some seamless technical wizardry) as both of the Winklevoss twins, patrician jocks who may have given Zuckerberg the ideas that he would eventually turn into Facebook; he gets to deliver some of Sorkin's best droll punchlines, and does so with great elegance and style.
I'm a bit baffled by the considerable chatter about the movie as some sort of era-defining document; for all of its flaws, it seems to me that the documentary Catfish says more about how we live in the Facebook era than The Social Network does. And of course, it must be taken with a massive grain of salt -- maybe a whole lick of it -- rather than as an accurate historical portrayal. But it gives us superb portrayals of interesting characters, and a sharp, crisply written story. It's a wildly entertaining movie.
Labels:
Movies
September 30, 2010
TV: No Ordinary Family (ABC, Tue 8)
Parenthood meets The Incredibles.
A suburban family survives a plane crash in Brazil, only to find that they've all developed superpowers. Father Jim (Michael Chiklis) has super-strength (he's essentially a non-orange version of Chiklis as The Thing in the Fantastic Four movies); mother Stephanie (Julie Benz) has super-speed. Teenage daughter Daphne (Kay Panabaker) can read minds, and son JJ (Jimmy Bennett) goes from being a poor student to being a brainiac.
The tone is a little uneven. Much of the family stuff has the earnest dramatic tone of the average family soap opera, but there are moments that are pushing for the high whimsy of something like Pushing Daisies (the musical score is overbearing in this regard). But the sense of humor generally works, particularly in the scenes between Jim and his best friend George (Romany Malco). And the special effects are quite good by TV standards, even Stephanie's speed, which can be a very tricky thing to pull off well -- remember how poorly it was done in The Bionic Woman a couple years back? -- is convincingly presented.
There's a troubling plot twist at the end that raises fears of the show going wholeheartedly down the Heroes rabbithole of elaborate, incomprehensible conspiracies with far too many characters, but if the show can avoid that trap, it could be a lot of fun.
A suburban family survives a plane crash in Brazil, only to find that they've all developed superpowers. Father Jim (Michael Chiklis) has super-strength (he's essentially a non-orange version of Chiklis as The Thing in the Fantastic Four movies); mother Stephanie (Julie Benz) has super-speed. Teenage daughter Daphne (Kay Panabaker) can read minds, and son JJ (Jimmy Bennett) goes from being a poor student to being a brainiac.
The tone is a little uneven. Much of the family stuff has the earnest dramatic tone of the average family soap opera, but there are moments that are pushing for the high whimsy of something like Pushing Daisies (the musical score is overbearing in this regard). But the sense of humor generally works, particularly in the scenes between Jim and his best friend George (Romany Malco). And the special effects are quite good by TV standards, even Stephanie's speed, which can be a very tricky thing to pull off well -- remember how poorly it was done in The Bionic Woman a couple years back? -- is convincingly presented.
There's a troubling plot twist at the end that raises fears of the show going wholeheartedly down the Heroes rabbithole of elaborate, incomprehensible conspiracies with far too many characters, but if the show can avoid that trap, it could be a lot of fun.
Labels:
TV
TV: Law & Order: Los Angeles (NBC, Wed 10)
There's really not much to say here. If you're still enjoying any of the 57 earlier versions of the Law & Order franchise, then this will give you exactly what you're looking for. If, on the other hand, you think that the franchise wore out its welcome around the time Sam Waterston left Law & Order: Original Recipe, you won't find anything here to change your mind.
Labels:
TV
BOOKS: How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe, Charles Yu (2010)
This lovely little novel starts off well enough, as a pleasantly smart-alecky story about a time-machine repairman (who also happens to be named Charles Yu); between clients (to the extent that "between" means anything when you live in a time machine), he travels from place/time to place/time searching for his missing father. There are, eventually, the obligatory time travel paradoxes, one of which involves the future Charles handing the present Charles a book and telling him that it contains all the answers. The book, of course, is Charles Yu's How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe.
And if the book were just that, it would be an amusing diversion. But while you're not looking, the novel sneaks up on you and becomes a poignant, melancholy meditation on memory -- which is, after all, its own sort of time machine -- and its cousins, nostalgia and regret.
The writing is a joy to read, and often caught me off guard with the beauty of its insights. I love, for instance, this paragraph:
And if the book were just that, it would be an amusing diversion. But while you're not looking, the novel sneaks up on you and becomes a poignant, melancholy meditation on memory -- which is, after all, its own sort of time machine -- and its cousins, nostalgia and regret.
The writing is a joy to read, and often caught me off guard with the beauty of its insights. I love, for instance, this paragraph:
Hitting the peak of your life's trajectory is not the painful part. The painful day comes earlier, comes before things start going downhill, comes when things are still good, still pretty good, still just fine. It comes when you think you are still on your way up, but you can feel that the velocity isn't there anymore, the push behind you is gone, it's all inertia from here, it's all coasting, it's all momentum, and there will be more, there will be higher days, but for the first time, it's in sight. The top. The best day of your life. There it is. Not as high as you thought it was going to be, and earlier in your life, and also closer to where you are now, startling in its closeness. That there's a ceiling to this, there's a cap, there's a best-case scenario and you are living it right now. To see that look in your parents' faces at the dinner table at ten, and not recognize it, then to see it again at eighteen and recognize it as something to recognize, and then to see it at twenty-five and to recognize it for what it is.This is a marvelous little jewel of a book.
Labels:
Books
September 28, 2010
BOOKS: Last Call, Daniel Okrent (2010)
Okrent's history of Prohibition is everything a good volume of history for the layman should be. It's informative and educational without being overly academic and entertaining without reducing the story to fluff.
Okrent draws connections between Prohibition and other issues that aren't always obvious to those of us who aren't experts on the period. I had never realized, for instance, that the Prohibition movement is the reason we have an income tax. At the beginning of the 20th century, roughly 1/3 of the Federal government's income came from liquor taxes; Prohibition's advocates knew that they couldn't achieve their goal without first providing a source of income that would make up for that lost revenue. Their solution was the income tax, which also played a large part in the eventual repeal of Prohibition; wealthy Americans saw Repeal as a way to eliminate the tax on their personal and corporate income. (That part of the equation never did happen, providing an early lesson in how hard it is to turn off a government's revenue source once it's started flowing.)
We also meet fascinating people who were major figures of their day, but have been largely forgotten over time. Wayne Wheeler was the head of the Anti-Saloon League, one of America's first major lobbying groups; it was Wheeler, in fact, who coined the term "special interests" as it's now used in politics. Or how about assistant attorney general Mabel Walker Willebrandt, who for most of the 1920s was responsible for enforcing the Volstead Act (the legislation that established the rules and regulations for Prohibition), making her the most powerful woman in the country? And of course, there's an enormous cast of politicians, gangsters, bootleggers, clerics, activists, and agitators working on both sides of the issue; Okrent has a fine gift for the colorful details that bring them all to life.
There's unexpected humor in some of the ways that people circumvented Prohibition. I particularly reading about a product called Vine-Glo, which was essentially a large brick of powdered grape juice. It came with instructions to reconstitute the juice by adding water. Those instructions went on to warn the user not to add sugar and yeast, or to leave the juice in a dark place, or to let it sit too long before drinking. Why, if you were foolish enough to do all of those things, your juice might ferment into wine.
This is a marvelous book.
Okrent draws connections between Prohibition and other issues that aren't always obvious to those of us who aren't experts on the period. I had never realized, for instance, that the Prohibition movement is the reason we have an income tax. At the beginning of the 20th century, roughly 1/3 of the Federal government's income came from liquor taxes; Prohibition's advocates knew that they couldn't achieve their goal without first providing a source of income that would make up for that lost revenue. Their solution was the income tax, which also played a large part in the eventual repeal of Prohibition; wealthy Americans saw Repeal as a way to eliminate the tax on their personal and corporate income. (That part of the equation never did happen, providing an early lesson in how hard it is to turn off a government's revenue source once it's started flowing.)
We also meet fascinating people who were major figures of their day, but have been largely forgotten over time. Wayne Wheeler was the head of the Anti-Saloon League, one of America's first major lobbying groups; it was Wheeler, in fact, who coined the term "special interests" as it's now used in politics. Or how about assistant attorney general Mabel Walker Willebrandt, who for most of the 1920s was responsible for enforcing the Volstead Act (the legislation that established the rules and regulations for Prohibition), making her the most powerful woman in the country? And of course, there's an enormous cast of politicians, gangsters, bootleggers, clerics, activists, and agitators working on both sides of the issue; Okrent has a fine gift for the colorful details that bring them all to life.
There's unexpected humor in some of the ways that people circumvented Prohibition. I particularly reading about a product called Vine-Glo, which was essentially a large brick of powdered grape juice. It came with instructions to reconstitute the juice by adding water. Those instructions went on to warn the user not to add sugar and yeast, or to leave the juice in a dark place, or to let it sit too long before drinking. Why, if you were foolish enough to do all of those things, your juice might ferment into wine.
This is a marvelous book.
Labels:
Books
September 26, 2010
TV: My Generation (ABC, Thu 8)
Each year, during my "watch everything" fall TV marathon, I allow myself one show that I give up without watching the entire first episode. This year, the not-so-coveted "Because Life Is Too Damned Short" Award goes to My Generation. It's presented as a documentary. Ten years ago, we're told, the senior year of nine students at an Austin high school was documented; now the documentary folks are back to see what they've made of their lives.
Each character is reduced to an on-screen label -- The Jock, The Wallflower, The Brain, The Nerd -- and what little dramatic interest there is comes from seeing how their 28-year-old selves have failed to live up to their 18-year-old dreams, and how they've paired off over the last decade. (It doesn't appear that anyone's found a partner who wasn't part of the original nine, which is weird, because they certainly seemed to have been parts of very different high school cliques.)
None of the actors are at all convincing as 18-year-olds. It makes you wonder why projects like this always start with high school seniors and work up from there; the 18-28 gap is a big one, and a tough one to fake. It would be much easier, I would think, to find actors who could pull off a 40-50 split, or even a 25-35.
The offscreen voice of the documentarian/questioner is that of Elizabeth Keener, who sounds so much like her sister Catharine that it's extremely distracting.
Boring with a capital BORE.
Each character is reduced to an on-screen label -- The Jock, The Wallflower, The Brain, The Nerd -- and what little dramatic interest there is comes from seeing how their 28-year-old selves have failed to live up to their 18-year-old dreams, and how they've paired off over the last decade. (It doesn't appear that anyone's found a partner who wasn't part of the original nine, which is weird, because they certainly seemed to have been parts of very different high school cliques.)
None of the actors are at all convincing as 18-year-olds. It makes you wonder why projects like this always start with high school seniors and work up from there; the 18-28 gap is a big one, and a tough one to fake. It would be much easier, I would think, to find actors who could pull off a 40-50 split, or even a 25-35.
The offscreen voice of the documentarian/questioner is that of Elizabeth Keener, who sounds so much like her sister Catharine that it's extremely distracting.
Boring with a capital BORE.
Labels:
TV
TV: Outsourced (NBC, Thu 9:30)
Outsourced returns us to the "laughing at vs. laughing with" problem that Mike & Molly raised earlier in the week. This time, the focus of the awkward laughter is India.
Our hero is Todd Dempsey (Ben Rappaport), who's been sent to India to manage the call center for a novelty company. He has a motley crew on the phones, who are utterly ignorant of American culture, and thus not very good at selling "add-ons," the related products that callers didn't know they wanted. Todd is sadly unaware of Indian culture himself -- even the idea that cows are sacred seems to be new to him -- so we've got a classic culture-clash comedy in the making.
At its best, Outsourced is a reasonably entertaining comedy. There's an interesting relationship between Todd and his assistant manager, Rajiv (Rizwan Manji), who figures that it doesn't much matter whether Todd succeeds or fails; either way, he's headed back to America, leaving Rajiv to take over his job. Diedrich Bader is amusing as Charlie, manager of another call center, who's clearly meant to be such an Ugly American that we forgive Todd his relatively mild lapses and insensitivities.
But there's a lot of crude ethnic humor here, too. Indians have funny names! (A character named Manmeet is the butt of most of those jokes.) The cities are crowded! ("It's like Frogger, but with real people," says Todd of the local traffic.) The food gives you diarrhea!
And it's a bit annoying that the show also has one more call center manager in the form of Tonya (Pippa Black), a sexy Australian; she's obviously meant to be Todd's romantic interest, and the clear implication is that it wouldn't do for him to be attracted to an Indian woman.
So, even more than Mike & Molly, the show is a very uneven mess, with enough offputting stuff that you feel a little bit queasy about enjoying even the stuff that actually is funny. But there are hints of something more interesting and complicated here, especially in the notion that Todd needs to learn about India just as much as his staff needs to learn about America. If the writers can get past the obvious ethnic humor, Outsourced could turn into something worth watching.
Our hero is Todd Dempsey (Ben Rappaport), who's been sent to India to manage the call center for a novelty company. He has a motley crew on the phones, who are utterly ignorant of American culture, and thus not very good at selling "add-ons," the related products that callers didn't know they wanted. Todd is sadly unaware of Indian culture himself -- even the idea that cows are sacred seems to be new to him -- so we've got a classic culture-clash comedy in the making.
At its best, Outsourced is a reasonably entertaining comedy. There's an interesting relationship between Todd and his assistant manager, Rajiv (Rizwan Manji), who figures that it doesn't much matter whether Todd succeeds or fails; either way, he's headed back to America, leaving Rajiv to take over his job. Diedrich Bader is amusing as Charlie, manager of another call center, who's clearly meant to be such an Ugly American that we forgive Todd his relatively mild lapses and insensitivities.
But there's a lot of crude ethnic humor here, too. Indians have funny names! (A character named Manmeet is the butt of most of those jokes.) The cities are crowded! ("It's like Frogger, but with real people," says Todd of the local traffic.) The food gives you diarrhea!
And it's a bit annoying that the show also has one more call center manager in the form of Tonya (Pippa Black), a sexy Australian; she's obviously meant to be Todd's romantic interest, and the clear implication is that it wouldn't do for him to be attracted to an Indian woman.
So, even more than Mike & Molly, the show is a very uneven mess, with enough offputting stuff that you feel a little bit queasy about enjoying even the stuff that actually is funny. But there are hints of something more interesting and complicated here, especially in the notion that Todd needs to learn about India just as much as his staff needs to learn about America. If the writers can get past the obvious ethnic humor, Outsourced could turn into something worth watching.
Labels:
TV
September 25, 2010
TV: Blue Bloods (CBS, Fri 10)
Blue Bloods is an unusual hybrid of genres; think of it as Law & Order: Brothers & Sisters.
Tom Selleck is Frank Reagan, New York City police commissioner; his father, Henry (Len Cariou), was commissioner before him. Oldest son Danny (Donnie Wahlberg) is a veteran detective; youngest son Jamie (Will Estes) has just joined the force. Their sister Erin (Bridget Moynihan) isn't a cop, but hasn't strayed too far from the field; she's an assistant district attorney. And a third brother was also a cop, recently killed in the line of duty.
So we get police procedural stuff -- Danny and his partner search for a kidnapped 9-year-old who's diabetic and needs to be found quickly so that she can get her insulin shot -- and family drama stuff -- the family squabbles over Sunday dinner about Danny's tactics in finding that girl.
Both halves of the show are done quite well, and the blend works better than I'd have expected. This is a good solid piece of entertainment, and if it's able to tap into the loyal CBS audience for procedurals and the family soap opera audience, it should be around for a while.
Tom Selleck is Frank Reagan, New York City police commissioner; his father, Henry (Len Cariou), was commissioner before him. Oldest son Danny (Donnie Wahlberg) is a veteran detective; youngest son Jamie (Will Estes) has just joined the force. Their sister Erin (Bridget Moynihan) isn't a cop, but hasn't strayed too far from the field; she's an assistant district attorney. And a third brother was also a cop, recently killed in the line of duty.
So we get police procedural stuff -- Danny and his partner search for a kidnapped 9-year-old who's diabetic and needs to be found quickly so that she can get her insulin shot -- and family drama stuff -- the family squabbles over Sunday dinner about Danny's tactics in finding that girl.
Both halves of the show are done quite well, and the blend works better than I'd have expected. This is a good solid piece of entertainment, and if it's able to tap into the loyal CBS audience for procedurals and the family soap opera audience, it should be around for a while.
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TV
TV: The Defenders (CBS, Wed 10)
No relation to the early-60s courtroom show of the same name, which starred E.G. Marshall and Robert Reed.
This one features Jim Belushi and Jerry O'Connell as scrappy Las Vegas defense attorneys, working hard to grow their small firm; it is a major moment for them when their first billboard goes up. They'll take any case they can get (there are frequent references to an unseen partner who specializes in adult film law), and in the pilot, they've actually gotten hold of a murder case. That case plays out in an interesting way, with a twist involving jury instructions that I hadn't seen before, and there's a nice turn from guest star Stephen Root as the judge; making him a frequent guest would be a smart move.
Neither Belushi nor O'Connell is an actor of great range, but The Defenders casts each solidly in his comfort zone. Belushi is the middle-aged shlub, still trying to adapt to his recent divorce, who is both more competent and less dissolute than a first glance would suggest; O'Connell is the cocky young ladies' man (I am less persuaded of O'Connell's sex appeal than he seems to be, but de gustibus non est disputandum and all that). There's also a newly hired associate (Jurnee Smollett, who needs to tone it down a notch) who worked her way through law school as a Vegas stripper, which it is clear will be the source of many laffs.
The tone is on the lighter side here, and the balance between the more madcap antics of its characters and the relatively serious courtroom stuff isn't always successful, but that sort of thing can be worked out with time. The bigger problem is that the show feels rather generic. These are characters we've seen before, and in more interesting versions. Like its timeslot rival The Whole Truth, it's a perfectly adequate show that will satisfy lots of people, but it's got nothing special enough to make me anything more than an occasional viewer.
This one features Jim Belushi and Jerry O'Connell as scrappy Las Vegas defense attorneys, working hard to grow their small firm; it is a major moment for them when their first billboard goes up. They'll take any case they can get (there are frequent references to an unseen partner who specializes in adult film law), and in the pilot, they've actually gotten hold of a murder case. That case plays out in an interesting way, with a twist involving jury instructions that I hadn't seen before, and there's a nice turn from guest star Stephen Root as the judge; making him a frequent guest would be a smart move.
Neither Belushi nor O'Connell is an actor of great range, but The Defenders casts each solidly in his comfort zone. Belushi is the middle-aged shlub, still trying to adapt to his recent divorce, who is both more competent and less dissolute than a first glance would suggest; O'Connell is the cocky young ladies' man (I am less persuaded of O'Connell's sex appeal than he seems to be, but de gustibus non est disputandum and all that). There's also a newly hired associate (Jurnee Smollett, who needs to tone it down a notch) who worked her way through law school as a Vegas stripper, which it is clear will be the source of many laffs.
The tone is on the lighter side here, and the balance between the more madcap antics of its characters and the relatively serious courtroom stuff isn't always successful, but that sort of thing can be worked out with time. The bigger problem is that the show feels rather generic. These are characters we've seen before, and in more interesting versions. Like its timeslot rival The Whole Truth, it's a perfectly adequate show that will satisfy lots of people, but it's got nothing special enough to make me anything more than an occasional viewer.
Labels:
TV
TV: The Whole Truth (ABC, Wed 10)
"I've looked at law from both sides now..."
That's the conceit of this courtroom drama, in which we bounce back and forth between the offices of the prosecutor and the defense attorney before arriving at the trial in the final act.
For the prosecution, Kathryn Peale (Maura Tierney). She's a tough, no-nonsense broad, constantly barking at her multicultural staff of underlings.
For the defense, Jimmy Brogan (Rob Morrow). He's a lawyer with a heart, who spends a lot of time negotiating the disputes among his multicultural staff of underlings.
They're not only frequent rivals (and how is the show going to explain why this particular pair of lawyers keep coming up against one another in a court system as large as New York's?), but old friends as well, who studied for the bar together. There's a strong suggestion that they dated for a while, and it seems that the romantic tension never entirely went away.
The leads are reasonably well cast, though Tierney makes the stronger impression. Morrow has handicapped himself by giving Brogan a fast-paced speaking style that the actor can't quite handle; he often seems right on the verge of tripping over his own tongue.
The show's gimmick, which gives it its title, is the post-verdict coda, which reveals to us who the real culprit was. In the pilot, this scene was a bit frustrating, not because they'd failed to leave clues pointing us to character X, but because they'd never given X any motive, and they didn't explain to us exactly how X had done it.
The "here's what really happened" coda is a variation on a similar gimmick used in Justice, an earlier courtroom drama from producer Jerry Bruckheimer, who's also the producer here. The two shows also share actor Eamonn Walker, who was one of the sidekick attorneys on Justice and plays a similar role (in Tierney's office) here. They should have given the character the same name and thrown in a line about him having moved from Los Angeles; would have been a cute inside joke for the six people who remember Justice.
The tone and style are very straightforward, with not much room for humor, though perhaps future episodes will feature somewhat lighter cases that allow more of that. The Whole Truth is a perfectly acceptable courtroom show, but I didn't find anything in it that was unusual or distinctive enough to keep me watching on a regular basis.
That's the conceit of this courtroom drama, in which we bounce back and forth between the offices of the prosecutor and the defense attorney before arriving at the trial in the final act.
For the prosecution, Kathryn Peale (Maura Tierney). She's a tough, no-nonsense broad, constantly barking at her multicultural staff of underlings.
For the defense, Jimmy Brogan (Rob Morrow). He's a lawyer with a heart, who spends a lot of time negotiating the disputes among his multicultural staff of underlings.
They're not only frequent rivals (and how is the show going to explain why this particular pair of lawyers keep coming up against one another in a court system as large as New York's?), but old friends as well, who studied for the bar together. There's a strong suggestion that they dated for a while, and it seems that the romantic tension never entirely went away.
The leads are reasonably well cast, though Tierney makes the stronger impression. Morrow has handicapped himself by giving Brogan a fast-paced speaking style that the actor can't quite handle; he often seems right on the verge of tripping over his own tongue.
The show's gimmick, which gives it its title, is the post-verdict coda, which reveals to us who the real culprit was. In the pilot, this scene was a bit frustrating, not because they'd failed to leave clues pointing us to character X, but because they'd never given X any motive, and they didn't explain to us exactly how X had done it.
The "here's what really happened" coda is a variation on a similar gimmick used in Justice, an earlier courtroom drama from producer Jerry Bruckheimer, who's also the producer here. The two shows also share actor Eamonn Walker, who was one of the sidekick attorneys on Justice and plays a similar role (in Tierney's office) here. They should have given the character the same name and thrown in a line about him having moved from Los Angeles; would have been a cute inside joke for the six people who remember Justice.
The tone and style are very straightforward, with not much room for humor, though perhaps future episodes will feature somewhat lighter cases that allow more of that. The Whole Truth is a perfectly acceptable courtroom show, but I didn't find anything in it that was unusual or distinctive enough to keep me watching on a regular basis.
Labels:
TV
September 24, 2010
TV: Undercovers (NBC, Wed 8)
J.J. Abrams returns with a 21st-century, high-tech update of Hart to Hart, in which a charming couple toss off breezy, romantic banter while traveling around the world on spy missions.
The couple is Steven and Samantha Bloom (Boris Kodjoe and Gugu Mbatha-Raw). They met while both working for the CIA; they never worked as partners, but found that the stresses of the job made it difficult to maintain a romantic relationship. So they left the CIA and founded a catering company. Five years later, they're struggling a bit to make ends meet, and the marriage is starting to go a bit flat.
That's when Carlton Shaw (Gerald McRaney, who does annoyed frustration with underlings as well as anyone) shows up. He's a career CIA guy who wants Steven and Sam to go back into the field together to rescue agent Leo Nash (Carter MacIntyre), who went through training with Steven before becoming Sam's partner. The Blooms agree to take on this one case to rescue their friend, and are given an eager young partner (Ben Schwartz, quite funny as an obsequious suckup) to provide logistical support.
So we're off for a terrific globetrotting caper, with exciting fight scenes, nifty spy gadgets, and a fair amount of suspense. And in the process, Steven and Sam find that working together is rekindling their romance. "Watching you for the past couple of days," Steven says, "reminds me of you."
Now, for a moment of pure shallowness: Boris Kodjoe and Gugu Mbatha-Raw are, in addition to being absolutely charming leads who are capable of handling the dramatic moments, the light banter, and the action scenes with equal grace, also happen to be two of the most spectacularly beautiful people on the planet. I mean, damn, this is a gorgeous couple. And if someone wanted to leave Boris Kodjoe under my Christmas tree this year, I would not object.
There are hints that some sort of Big Mystery story arc is in the works; the fact that MacIntyre is a regular member of the cast suggests that the Blooms' previous connections to Leo will be at the heart of that mystery. I hope they don't get carried away with that; this show will work perfectly well as a caper-of-the-week adventure, and doesn't need to be weighted down by massive mythology.
Best drama pilot of the year so far.
The couple is Steven and Samantha Bloom (Boris Kodjoe and Gugu Mbatha-Raw). They met while both working for the CIA; they never worked as partners, but found that the stresses of the job made it difficult to maintain a romantic relationship. So they left the CIA and founded a catering company. Five years later, they're struggling a bit to make ends meet, and the marriage is starting to go a bit flat.
That's when Carlton Shaw (Gerald McRaney, who does annoyed frustration with underlings as well as anyone) shows up. He's a career CIA guy who wants Steven and Sam to go back into the field together to rescue agent Leo Nash (Carter MacIntyre), who went through training with Steven before becoming Sam's partner. The Blooms agree to take on this one case to rescue their friend, and are given an eager young partner (Ben Schwartz, quite funny as an obsequious suckup) to provide logistical support.
So we're off for a terrific globetrotting caper, with exciting fight scenes, nifty spy gadgets, and a fair amount of suspense. And in the process, Steven and Sam find that working together is rekindling their romance. "Watching you for the past couple of days," Steven says, "reminds me of you."
Now, for a moment of pure shallowness: Boris Kodjoe and Gugu Mbatha-Raw are, in addition to being absolutely charming leads who are capable of handling the dramatic moments, the light banter, and the action scenes with equal grace, also happen to be two of the most spectacularly beautiful people on the planet. I mean, damn, this is a gorgeous couple. And if someone wanted to leave Boris Kodjoe under my Christmas tree this year, I would not object.
There are hints that some sort of Big Mystery story arc is in the works; the fact that MacIntyre is a regular member of the cast suggests that the Blooms' previous connections to Leo will be at the heart of that mystery. I hope they don't get carried away with that; this show will work perfectly well as a caper-of-the-week adventure, and doesn't need to be weighted down by massive mythology.
Best drama pilot of the year so far.
Labels:
TV
TV: Shit My Dad Says (CBS, Thu 8:30)
I'm sorry, I refuse to be bothered memorizing the string of characters that CBS wants to use because they think that American sensibilities are too sensitive to be exposed to the word "shit" on a regular basis. If I thought that the show were going to be around for years, I might bother, but this show is so wretchedly awful that if there is any justice in the world, it'll be gone by Thanksgiving.
This one is based on a popular Twitter feed in which a guy posts all the lovably cranky and eccentric things his father says. That might be amusing in 140-character bursts, I suppose, but as the basis of a series, it doesn't work. William Shatner (playing "my dad") is forced to speak entirely in tweet-sized punchlines, none of which work very well. Oh, there are one or two that get a mild laugh just from shock value or absurdity ("Son, if it looks like manure and smells like manure, it's either Wolf Blitzer or manure."), but there's virtually no actual humor to be found here. There's just Shatner, who might do well in a sitcom that was more carefully constructed around his specific talents and quirky rhythms, but flounders in a show this generic; he hasn't been given a character to play that's any deeper than Grumpy Old Man.
And it's possible to write Grumpy Old Man characters with more depth than this; just think back to Stacy Keach in Titus. (Then think about how much better -- well, less awful, at any rate -- this show would be if Stacy Keach were the star. Or Martin Sheen or Tom Selleck or Harvey Fierstein or any moderately competent actor of an appropriate age. Jesus, you could haul Ernest Borgnine out of the home and he could do a better job of it than Shatner's doing.)
As for the other actors in the show, the less said, the better. Their characters are even thinner than Shatner's, and they exist only to say things that Shatner can respond to with another clumsy zinger, and to look shocked when he does.
Will the show die the quick death that it deserves? Well, it's got a nice comfy timeslot between The Big Bang Theory and CSI: Original Recipe, so it could hang in for a while.
The really scary thing? This is the second version of the pilot, which was reshot when the actor playing Shatner's son was recast. Which means that there exists, somewhere in the world, a version of the show that is even worse than this. The mind boggles.
This one is based on a popular Twitter feed in which a guy posts all the lovably cranky and eccentric things his father says. That might be amusing in 140-character bursts, I suppose, but as the basis of a series, it doesn't work. William Shatner (playing "my dad") is forced to speak entirely in tweet-sized punchlines, none of which work very well. Oh, there are one or two that get a mild laugh just from shock value or absurdity ("Son, if it looks like manure and smells like manure, it's either Wolf Blitzer or manure."), but there's virtually no actual humor to be found here. There's just Shatner, who might do well in a sitcom that was more carefully constructed around his specific talents and quirky rhythms, but flounders in a show this generic; he hasn't been given a character to play that's any deeper than Grumpy Old Man.
And it's possible to write Grumpy Old Man characters with more depth than this; just think back to Stacy Keach in Titus. (Then think about how much better -- well, less awful, at any rate -- this show would be if Stacy Keach were the star. Or Martin Sheen or Tom Selleck or Harvey Fierstein or any moderately competent actor of an appropriate age. Jesus, you could haul Ernest Borgnine out of the home and he could do a better job of it than Shatner's doing.)
As for the other actors in the show, the less said, the better. Their characters are even thinner than Shatner's, and they exist only to say things that Shatner can respond to with another clumsy zinger, and to look shocked when he does.
Will the show die the quick death that it deserves? Well, it's got a nice comfy timeslot between The Big Bang Theory and CSI: Original Recipe, so it could hang in for a while.
The really scary thing? This is the second version of the pilot, which was reshot when the actor playing Shatner's son was recast. Which means that there exists, somewhere in the world, a version of the show that is even worse than this. The mind boggles.
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TV
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