Current Watching

[erwin]

Current Watching

Saw the Portuguese film Sangue do meu Sangue ('Blood of my Blood') at the weekend. I haven't seen many Portuguese films, I must admit - they usually have a whiff of either pretentiousness or amateurishness about them, or both. But this one is very good.

It's a bit like a Mike Leigh film - an ensemble cast, occasionally simultaneous dialogue, obscured characters in scenes, beautifully choreographed group scenes ... and apparently, it was built up by the actors as they went along, starting from the basic premise of a mother's unconditional love for her daughter, and what happens when she finds out that the daughter is having an affair with a married man.

The acting is uniformly excellent (especially the wonderful Rita Blanco as the mother, Anabela Moreira as her sister Ivete, and Nuno Lopes as a particularly evil drug dealer). You get to see the seamy/humble side of Lisbon. And it's an involving story.

There are two versions in cinemas here, one of 2.5 hours and one of 3.5. I saw the shorter one, and just as it was ending, an old couple came in early for the next performance. They made such a song and dance about finding their seats that I !@"#£$§%& missed the last few lines of the film. I might go and see the long version, now.

Catch it if you can (only in festivals or film clubs outside Portugal, though, I should imagine).

[hobbes]

Current Watching

I've just managed to finish the entire X Files as I only ever saw the odd episode when it was on originally. Turns a bit shit for the last season doesn't it?

If you want a bloody good laugh though, try Wilfred. Low budget Australian show about a guy and his girlfriend's dog. Only the dog is a man in a dog suit. It's pretty slow and dark but terribly terribly funny.
It's also been remade in America with Frodo, Randy Hicky and the same Australian guy playing Wilfred. It's much shinier and higher budget than the original, but actually just as funny, if not funnier as Frodo is a better actor than the original guy.

[hobbes]

Current Watching

The Guardian guide mentioned this series and wondered why it only lasted two series.

I thought that about Better Off Ted.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Current Watching

Turns a bit shit for the last season doesn't it?

That was a bit of an issue locally. Duchovny insisted on moving the show to LA, which meant that many of the people who'd worked on the show from the beginning were replaced. The locations too were radically different of course. The continuity and ambiance of the series changed dramatically as a consequence.

[Antepli Ejderha]

Current Watching

Film festival in Istanbul at the moment, saw Tomboy a French film which was ok and the excellent Habemus Papam, an Italian film. Got a few more lined up this week including Tyrannosaur.

[Felicity, I guess so]

Current Watching

I saw Tomboy and was impressed, but it'd have been more impressive if the trailer, that I'd seen 4 times in preceding weeks, hadn't given away the chief plot 'twist'.

So if you're going to see it-DO NOT WATCH TRAILERS/READ REVIEWS ETC

[hobbes]

Current Watching

That was a bit of an issue locally. Duchovny insisted on moving the show to LA, which meant that many of the people who'd worked on the show from the beginning were replaced. The locations too were radically different of course. The continuity and ambiance of the series changed dramatically as a consequence.

It's also that Scully turned from a good character into a feeble, credulous and weepy idiot and was then largely replaced by Reyes who was even worse.
I feel a bit sorry for Robert Patrick - he was pretty good in it for the last couple of seasons, but without the Mulder & Scully dynamic it was all over really.
The finale 2-parter was shockingly rubbish. Really really abject. So much so it meant that after watching 9 seasons in 4 months, I had no sense of satisfaction, just irritation.* Whereas when I watched the last of West Wing or Sopranos I felt like I was losing something.

And don't get me started on the Lone Gunmen spin off.

*The same can be said for Battlestar Galactica which went to shit in the last 7 or 8 episodes.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Current Watching

Yeah The Lone Gunmen and Millennium were, so some of those involved locally thought, attempts to rebuild the X-Files success. Others believed they were just a kind of "Thanks... see ya," parting gift from the producers.

[Antepli Ejderha]

Current Watching

Felicity, I guess so wrote:

I saw Tomboy and was impressed, but it'd have been more impressive if the trailer, that I'd seen 4 times in preceding weeks, hadn't given away the chief plot 'twist'.

So if you're going to see it-DO NOT WATCH TRAILERS/READ REVIEWS ETC

SPOILER

Thought the name of the film gave away the twist but while watching it I did forget about that to be fair. The Turkish name of the film, Erkek Fatma or Boy Fatma also gives it away to the same extent. Not as much as Brokeback Mountain though as the pirated copies called it Poof Cowboys in Turkish.

[imp]

Current Watching

Has there been a thread of any kind on The Guard? And if not, why not? Five shiny gold stars.

[Felicity, I guess so]

Current Watching

I really liked it and it was a word-of-mouth success at the Tyneside cinema, staying around week after week.

I thought it got the balance just right between knowing/self-conscious parody of the genre, and real laugh-out-loud comedy drama. Largely cos Gleeson is just great.

[Felicity, I guess so]

Current Watching

Thought the name of the film gave away the twist

I thought that too, and went so far as to look up what it was called in France. 'Tomboy', as it happens, but that doesn't actually mean anything in French.

[Ek weet nie]

Current Watching

imp wrote:

Has there been a thread of any kind on The Guard? And if not, why not? Five shiny gold stars.

Really? Gleeson is fantastic but it is cliche ridden, smug and suffers issues with a lot of the supporting cast.

[Antepli Ejderha]

Current Watching

Saw Tyrannosaur in the previously mentioned film, smells a lot like a Ken Loach film, deeply disturbing yet likable at the same time.

[imp]

Current Watching

@ ek weet nie:

It's been a ground rule of otf film for the past decade that any picture a single user might really enjoy will be subject to a knowing and pithy tripartite putdown from an aficionado. Apart from the Dr Who thread, it makes this part of the board usually worth avoiding.

Cliche-ridden? Care to elaborate? Two unlikely cops working together, but that's just a scenario, not a cliche in itself, and it's well executed. The script itself I thought was as excellent as the overall acting. The plot of the drugs delivery seemed to be consciously weak as a way of emphasizing that wasn't really the point of the film at all.

Smug? You'll have to explain what you mean by that.

Issues with the supporting cast? Wouldn't know about that. Were they underpaid? Didn't get as good a caravan as Gleeson?

[Lucia Lanigan]

Current Watching

I really enjoyed it. Fewer Tarantino mannerisms and it would have got full marks from me too.

Caught up with Fresh Meat, the Peep Show team's latest, recently. It's excellent, they're on top of their game.

[Heliotrope]

Current Watching

My current watching usually doesn't mean something just released or even just aired (thanks, DVR). Last week I caught up with the Paradise Lost documentaries, which I think HBO shoehorned into its schedule in late August after the West Memphis 3 were released.

I have to admit that I didn't know very much about the case, just vaguely remembered the press about it after the murders and during the trials, but I was compelled to read up about it after seeing the movies. Can't say that the first one would have made me an advocate for them immediately, but the stuff I read later mentioned things that were uncovered only later, like the juror misconduct and the hair evidence. There is a part of me, though, that is still wondering if any of them will be the next Jack Henry Abbott.

[Reed John]

Current Watching

Once the college football season is over, I'm going to get rid of cable for a while. I can watch hockey on the web. What else do I really need?

Has anyone else noticed that Boardwalk Empire, while historically fascinating, well-acted, and impeccably designed is also really boring? Like so many of these HBO shows with 10 different subplots it moves at a glacial pace. I've lost interest.

I do like How to Make it in America. It's the only show about New York that feels like it's really made in New York. But it's not that great that I'll miss it.

[Ginger Yellow]

Current Watching

I wouldn't go so far as to call it boring, but it's certainly not as gripping as the Sopranos. The multiple subplots are certainly a problem. Each of them is potentially very interesting in its own right, but only a handful at most get any progression in a single episode. This episode we get a bit more on Chicago, the next we get some Chalky White, the next we get some Van Alden, and so on. So it feels very laconic, with little of the sense of looming cataclysm that you'd expect.

[Reed John]

Current Watching

There just doesn't feel like there's that much "at stake" in each scene or even in each episode.
****spoilers****
Something did blow up (literally) in last night's episode but the implications of that weren't explored yet and I'm not sure when they will be.

I find the Van Alden subplots to be going nowhere in particular. He drowned that guy at the baptism? No consequences for that? When??

I was hoping the Gretchen Mol character would suffocate the Commodore with a pillow, just to, you know, move the fucking plot along, but no. She just smacked him a few times. Smacked him a few times for raping her when she was 13 25 years ago. WTF.

Chalky White is smoldering very slowly. It seems like he's had the same damn conversation with Nucky in every episode about dealing with the KKK and Nucky just telling him to cool it.

And when are the guys in NYC going to kill Arnold Rothstein. I like how he's played as a bit of an well-to-do prick - which I believe he was in real life, and Luciano, Lansky, et al threw him out of a window, as I recall. That should happen soon, shouldn't it?

[Amor de Cosmos]

Current Watching

@ GY

I kinda like that about it, the moments of violence seem all the more shocking and the characters have a latent but threatening unpredictability. I suppose comparisons with the Sopranos are inevitable but Boardwalk Empire is much more artificial/theatrical. It's more like The Shield in that respect.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Current Watching

Shouldn't we say SPOILER!!!!!!!!!!!!

was hoping the Gretchen Mol character would suffocate the Commodore with a pillow, just to, you know, move the fucking plot along, but no. She just smacked him a few times. Smacked him a few times for raping her when she was 13 25 years ago. WTF.

Surely the point is that he's now under her control. She could torture him, assault him, or do anything she likes with him forever. More importantly she's also running his affairs, or in a position to. Theoretically she's now Nucky's local competition. I think this moves the plot forward in a substantial way.

[Reed John]

Current Watching

***********spoiler**************
That's true, but I felt like the story could have made that point more succinctly and moved along. As it is, it took about 45 minutes from the stroke to her taking command like that. If this were a film, we wouldn't tolerate things going so slow. Perhaps it felt like forever for me, because I was doing a hard workout on my rowing machine while I watched the episode.

The subplot with Jimmy's wife and the guy from Wisconsin with the facial wounds seems to be dragging to nowhere in particular and lately I find that I don't give a shit about Kelly MacDonald's character. She seems to be treading water. The shot of her adding to her secret stash harkens to an earlier episode where another woman told her that she should make hay while the sunshines so to speak and get ready for the day her sugar-daddy kicks her out. But I feel like it's probably going to be another five or six episodes at least until we see that subplot pay off.

The scenes with Chalky and the young man who is courting his daughter was interesting. I'm sure it's not a coincidence that both he and Chalky's wife have lighter skin. That was an interesting picture into how class and racism operated (and still often does, I'm told) within the segregated black community. Indeed, I think he's the most interesting character on the show.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Current Watching

If this were a film, we wouldn't tolerate things going so slow.

This raises a whole bunch of issues — like what "too slow," or too fast for that matter actually means in a filmic context, what's the yardstick?

That aside Boardwalk Empire isn't a two hour film in any case. It's a long-form TV series which will evolve over years, literally, and the most successful examples of the form take that into account. They don't lend them selves to continuous visual jolts but they do lend themselves to slowly emerging character and plot developments.

I've noticed that sometimes the early episodes of a season — not only Boardwalk Empire — take a while to frame the story arc which can be a bit tiresome. The latest season of Breaking Bad which ended last week, was like that. Kind of marking time until the pieces were in place then it really hit high gear and stayed there. In the long run patience is usually rewarded — except in the case of that tedious espionage show AMC ran last year, it was so boring I've forgotten its name already.

[Reed John]

Current Watching

I forgot the name of it too. It was both tedious and hard to follow.

I got bored of Mad Men early in the second season and then changed my mind and got back into it. But I'm not sure Boardwalk Empire has enough interesting going on episode to episode to keep me occupied while I'm waiting for the plot to develop. Not enough that I'll miss HBO.

I think maybe I'm just sick of television in general. It's about time given how much of my life I've wasted/spent on it.