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Twin Peaks: The Return: Part 8 (2017)
If you liked Eraserhead, you'll love this, if not........... turn off
So far I have loved this series, as I've said in a previous review, I love weird and this episode is about as weird as it can get.
So, early on Agent Cooper is shot, then brought back to life, maybe, by some ghostly figures, that's about as normal as this episode gets. After which it plunges into the weird and absurd, that's not to say i didn't enjoy it. A lot of it has the feeling of a pop video for the soundtrack music with totally unrelated to the story visuals. Then H Bombs and scenes reminisce of Eraserhead, nothing making any sense but hey, so what, that's Twin Peaks for you.
I doubt the rest of the series is like this so will enjoy and forgive Mr Lynch for this episode, I could be wrong though.
Twin Peaks: The Return (2017)
Ignore the bad reviews, Why? read on
First of all let me say I checked a lot of the bad reviews, those giving one or two stars, I stopped after ten. Why? you may ask, well all of them bar one had only ever reviewed this title, what does that tell you? The one exception was hitch-34 who had reviewed more but every single one was negative, again what does that tell you? I understand a lot of 9 or 10 reviews are also planted to increase the rating but also reviews like this are planted to bring it down.
So how do you trust any rating? well I suppose you can't but I will say I have enjoyed this series so far, OK only 4 episodes in as am watching the box set. I love weird stuff, it doesn't have to make sense or to have everything explained, that's part of the attraction. I love bizarre and this delivers just that.
I love Mr Lynch's stuff, especially Eraserhead, so you get where I am coming from. I love this, if you don't after 3 or 4 episodes then turn off, if you got to number 8 and are still complaining you're are just a professional whinger and shouldn't be allowed to put a review here.
The Man Who Haunted Himself (1970)
Roger Moore actually acting
I've never been a big fan of Mr Moore, he's played himself in just about everything bar this great slice of 70's cinema. I actually saw this in a cinema back in the day and loved it so much so that whenever it crops up on TV I still watch it. He actually acts in this other than being the Saint in everything else.
The melt down of his original character as the doppelganger appears to take over his life shows that Mr Moore could act if he wanted to. It was also interesting to see how empty the elevated section of the M4 looked, if it were filmed now there would probably be a traffic jam.
Ignore the negative reviews, of course it would have better production values today but the story is solid and grips the audience. An interesting concept which has been redone many times since but this is one of the originals, I recommend it.
Liar (2017)
Riddled with clichés
I had high expectations that for once the woman would be the bad guy and the man the victim. Too much to hope for, men are constantly being portrayed as the bad guy, rapist, paedophile, wife beater, bully, thug etc, etc or a weak individual subjugated by his wife or girlfriend. As someone else has pointed out Andrew is neither desperate nor stupid, he wouldn't have needed to rape when Laura was obviously attracted to him and if they didn't have sex that night, they would have eventually. He also wouldn't have come on to DI Harman whether he was guilty or not, again not that stupid. He's a good looking intelligent man and I'm sorry but it just doesn't gel. The only reason for this drama is to beat men once again, written I note by men who probably want to waive their feminist flag to show how modern they are. On top of that we have all the other clichés, black and white couple, female DI with wizened old male sidekick oh and of course the DI is a lesbian, I mean how many more clichés can they cram into it? Will Andrew's son be gay? Stupid, stupid, stupid, banal and unbelievable, I'm surprised an actor of Ioan Gruffudd's calibre agreed to be involved, he hardly needs the work or the money. Danny Webb, once again, is the best thing in it.
This is an update to my previous review having now had to endure the final 2 episodes, my wife enjoyed it. So skipping past the absurd part when Laura kidnaps Andrew and he doesn't make a complaint even when the lesbian detective turns up and he has the evidence still inside him. On to the last episode when she steals his phone, he knows it's gone and may have something incriminating on it but does nothing to cover his tracks.
The entire premise of this series is let's, yet again, beat the male population. I feel sorry for young women who watch this being led to believe that this is how all men act. The ending was unclear although I suspect it was the lesbian detective's lover who did it.
What really frightens me is, according to IMDb, there is a second series planned. Will it address the situation and have the woman as the liar, shouting rape falsely? As if!
Lucifer (2016)
Loved it but........
What I really love about this show are the one liners that Tom Ellis gets that really make me laugh out loud.
What I don't like is the obligatory drop dead gorgeous female detective who just stepped off the catwalk. Seriously she is so pure Lucifer is unable to manipulate her like he does every other human, He can also get shot when he's near her, well not in the pilot when he takes half dozen without any ill effects but by the 4th episode he's no longer immortal, that is simply stupid. OK so they want to keep up the fact that he is the devil from her but for how long? So why do American producers always put these dolly birds in these parts? I wouldn't care if they cast someone overweight and less good looking as long as they can act the part.
So for that reason I've knocked a couple of stars off. Sure it is yet another buddy cop show as some of the negative reviewers have stated. However what can you do new these days? So the elements that make any show a success or failure rest on the characters and the actors who play them, Tom Ellis is simply wonderful and I am so glad he used an English accent (Despite being Welsh)instead of a cod American one.
Jericho: Crossroads (2006)
2 Dozen V 5,000 Hmmm
Up until now I have enjoyed this series, OK I can suspend the belief of fallout passing by, seeing less than 100 of the so called 5,000 inhabitants of the town and at least the never ending supply of booze. However the idea of a couple of dozen mercenaries being a problem to a town of 5,000 is simple absurd. Why when they said they were on government business no one asked to see any kind of authorisation. Also, knowing how dangerous this handful of bandits are why didn't they just kill them all when they had them surrounded? I don't mind suspending belief to a certain extent but this was a step too far.
Pathfinders: In the Company of Strangers (2011)
An Insult to the real Pathfinders
If I could give it a minus vote it would be minus ten.
In the trivia section here on IMDb it says it was the largest outdoor set, really? I mean it looks like it was filmed in my back garden. OK I know this action is set at night but some scenes were so dark I thought my TV was on the blink. So many close ups in fact the whole of the action was in close ups, just a face or a gun or even in some cases a soldiers belt I mean what the....... Was the acting bad? difficult to say with so much close up shots you could only judge on the script which is dire.
Others have pointed out the obvious filming of US houses and landscape so I won't repeat. I tried to make it to the end but couldn't, sorry but this is an insult to the real Pathfinders.
Monsignor Renard (2000)
Prime for a remake
Of all the TV series dealing with WW2 this one stands out as being very different. For a change Monsignor Renard deals with the everyday lives of a small Northern French village seen through the eyes of it's priest. The Germans are not all seen as the Nazi brutes of common perception, neither are the all the French brave resistance fighters. These are human stories showing how the conquering Germans learned to live with the conquered French and visa verse.
The acting is spot on, I've read that John Thaw was considered wrong for the part, no way, he shines throughout. Spot a young Dominic Monahagn who has gone on to Hollywood stardom in the Lord of the Rings saga amongst others.
It's a shame a second series was not commissioned, IMDb says it was because of low ratings for the first but I think it was more due to John Thaw's declining health, he died in 2002 less than two years after the series was screened.
The premise is still a good one and could be revived for a remake with more than one series. Come on, there must be a production company out there willing to take it on.
Fargo: Somebody to Love (2017)
Yet another fab Fargo
I'm somewhat amused by the one star reviews of, especially LaLaLandsucks who slags off every season of Fargo. I mean if you didn't like series one then why would you watch series two let alone series three? After checking all La's reviews it is quite obvious he/she hasn't actually watched any of them and is just a serial slagger. The only film he/she appears to like, giving a top review to 'Transformers, The Last Knight', a total pile of rubbish, as the greatest movie ever made, are we expected to take this review seriously? So mdfaraone wasted 10 weeks of his/her life, how come? I mean if you didn't like it after 2 or maybe 3 episodes why carry on other than to leave this bad review? Anyway I enjoyed all three series of Fargo, albeit the first was undoubtedly the best Ewen McGregor was excellent and as for the talented David Thewlis he completely stole the show. In fact there wasn't one bad performance from any of the actors. I hope there is another series and the dissenters don't bother this time.
13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi (2016)
The Magnificent Seven, sorry six, what a lot of Bull****
I looked through a lot of the previous reviews before I watched this film and was curious to note that all the 8-10 star reviews came from the USA and the 5 or less came from other countries. Without a doubt this is another typical gung-ho, slice of US propaganda, aren't the US wonderful and we can beat any mother***** who tries to take us on movie. I don't know how close to the truth this film is, I find it difficult to believe six guys with a never ending supply of ammunition could hold off and beat what looked like an army of terrorists. OK I know it's based on a true story but maybe that truth as been stretched somewhat. I mean why even make a film about it in the first place except to tell the world once again how Americans always win the war (I mean look at what they have done with history and WW2) or even if they didn't but let's make it look like they did (see any film about Vietnam). Having said all of that, if you are looking for another shoot 'em up movie in the genre of 'Black Hawk Down', Rambo and the like then this is for you. I give it 5 stars for that and that alone. Suspend your belief and enjoy the action. Once last question, did Alexia Barlier's character actually exist or has she just been crow-barred in because there has to be a female of some consequence in there as well? As she seemed superfluous to me.
Strange Report (1969)
Can't recommend this enough
When this series first hit the screens in late 1969 I was living in bedsitter land Earls Court without a TV so missed it completely. It was only recently whilst searching IMDb for Anneke Wills who had fired my schoolboy libido when she was in Doctor Who that I came across it. I managed to score a copy of the complete series on DVD and watched all the episodes over a couple of days. This is a ten star series, well written and well-acted by all concerned, especially Anthony Quayle as Adam Strange. I love watching these series from the 60's, especially the locations as I know London from that time so well. My next move is to get all the Dept S and Jason King box sets, Peter Wyngarde had a flat in the house next to mine and drove a Jenson which he parked outside, try doing that now. It also good to see the mini-skirted Anneke Wills amongst the other swinging sixties actresses including the lovely Elaine Taylor who my father once danced with on the Isle of Wight when we had a holiday there and she was doing a summer season on Sandown pier. I think he was a bit enamoured with her, well who wouldn't be. Episodes also feature some rising stars including john Thaw, Ian Ogilvy, Rosemary Leach and Martin Shaw. It is well worth getting the DVD which has been lovingly restored and looking like it was filmed recently. There are some interviews with Martin Shaw and Zienia Merton plus short documentaries with Anneke Wills and Kaz Garas. It's just a shame the cast decided they didn't want to do a second series in the United States. I can't recommend this series enough.
Spectre (2015)
Go back to the 50's/60's
It must have been easy for all the actors involved to learn their lines, there weren't that many, it was all action and very little dialogue.
James Bond was a product of the fifties, stories written by a man who had lived the spy life in the forties so knew what he was talking about. The Connery years were without doubt the best as they were set int the time of the novels, I've read them, in the sixties, all by the way. The character of this a the most recent films is not a of that period so the only connection to James Bond is his name, M and Q otherwise it could be any spy movie.
Now they are talking about having a black Bond or even worst a female, Whaaaaat? Bond is a naval commander of the 40's/50's and would have been neither. This just PC gone mad.
Don't get me wrong, the film is very entertaining, fab special effects but little story or good dialogue. Some good performances, especially Ralph Finnes and Rory Kinnear, the females being instantly forgettable, especially the now PC Miss Moneypenny. Daniel Craig is Daniel Craig, neither good or bad, just average.
So if they want to make a fab Bond movie go back and read the Flemming novels and set it in the 50's or 60's when there was a cold war. Write a good story, and there have been some books, eg, Colonel Sun by the wonderful Kingsley Amis would be perfect. And get someone with the sex appeal and humour of Connery.
A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Eleven stars or more
There were two reasons I went to see this film at the Warner West End the week it was released, in no particular order, 1. Stanley Kubrick, I had been mesmerised by 2001, having seen it in Cinerama, if only I could see it again in this format. I'd seen Paths of Glory and Sparticus but being very young at the time I didn't associate these two great films with Kubrick. So a new film by this director was a must to see.
2. Malcolm McDowell, 'If' was a very surreal experience that I can watch, like 2001 and Clockwork Orange, time after time. So the combination of the two was a match made in heaven. It is a shame that McDowell didn't go on to be a huge star, sometimes being reduced to C list productions that weren't worthy of his talent.
Kubrick's style and attention to detail have been copied many times since but as far as I am concerned he is up there as one of the greats. The fact that he never won an Oscar as best director is another travesty of Hollywoood.
I don't need to give a breakdown of the story line here, if you don't know by now you never will. The violence is tame now compared to hundreds of other more recent films but that is not what you watch it for.
It's simply a masterpiece of film making.
It's up there in my top ten of the greatest films ever, if I could give eleven I would.
Hawaii Five-0: Ka Haunaele (2016)
Jerry's Sister, really?
Trust me, I really like this new version of Hawaii Five-O. I especially love the banter between Steve and Danny which reminds me a lot of Starsky and Hutch. I also like the other regular characters, especially the gorgeous Grace Parks who was the best thing in Battlestar Gallactica as well.
Jorge Garcia is a definite plus, it was sad to see Alcatraz canceled after only one series, he plays these computer geeks so well. However this episode featuring his so called sister must be a joke, even the massive burger man quipped about DNA. I appreciate Hollywood doesn't do ugly women but to feature a beauty as Jerry's sister is a beauty too far. I mean every female cop in this series (and every other US series) are straight off the cat walk, just like every one in real life.
It's getting a bit tedious.
We'll Meet Again (1982)
Shame there was no second series
I remember this series fondly from the early 80's when it was first broadcast, I agree with most of the reviews written here however jehaccess6 I have to point out to you that Susannah York was only 4 years younger than Michael Shannon so not a considerably younger man.
As for drbetteridge, a one star review, was it because your husband enjoyed it so much, was there something on another channel you would have preferred to watch? For your information regarding the American accents, some of the actors portraying them were in fact American, Michael Shannon, Lou Hirsch, Richard LeParminter, so you don't know anything about accents and I really thought Christopher Malcome was American at the time. As for the Brits, I'm sorry but that is exactly how they were in the 40', especially in rural England, most of them really hadn't been much further than the end of their roads. I've lived in the country and even now days a lot of them still haven't been any further so you really don't know what you are talking about.
The Yanks were really shocked at the way of life in England it really was like landing on another planet so this is a accurate depiction of the times. Sure it was low budget but then so were most UK TV productions of the time. It is well written and well acted, so if you have never watched ignore the one star review and and treat yourself. It really was a shame there wasn't a second series, I really never understood why
Essex Boys: Law of Survival (2015)
Not the worst, not the best
I have to confess I approached this film with very low expectations having read the one star reviews here on IMBb. I had a mixture of confirmation and surprise. Sure it doesn't have the production values of the Sean Bean film with a similar title but one star is a bit harsh. Sure it was filmed on camcorders with a very small budget but if you have Sean Bean I'm sure you can command a bigger one. Having said that I've always thought SB was a wooden, one dimension actor who adds very little to anything he's in.
There are a couple of faces in Jesse Birdsall, who gives the best performance, and Ross Boatman from 'London's Burning' but special mention should go to Canadian actor Megan Lockhurst who also turned in a good believable performance.
So if you are expecting something similar to the SB film then of course you will be disappointed but if want a slice of Essex, this is maybe not the only way.
London Spy (2015)
Mind numbing
I was really looking forward to seeing this, such a wonderful cast I was expecting something along the lines of John LeCarre but instead all I seemed to get was a promo video for homosexuality! I have no problems with gay people I just don't need to see naked men (or women) writhing together on my TV. If that is your thing then it is not to be missed. It seems to be compulsory to have gay relationships in a series these days, I mean Cuffs has two, one of each.
Apart from that it was mind numbingly boring, I managed to hang in for three quarters of this first episode still hoping to see something to do with spying but no. There seemed to be no plot other than the respectable Ben Whishaw chasing a piece of tail.
Maybe it gets better but frankly I don't care the first episode has turned me off completely.
From Darkness (2015)
Not as bad as others day
My biggest gripe of this series, as well as a number of other recent crime/police shows is the obsession of having a woman as the boss copper. I can't remember the last time a man was the top cop,I mean woman are constantly bemoaning that they can't get the top jobs but in TV land they have all of them in the police.
OK whinge over. I have to say I basically enjoyed this series, thankfully they didn't drag it out to 6 or 8 episodes like some others I could mention. The main thing I didn't really understand was why it was important to bring Claire back from retirement after all those years, they didn't need to. Performances were very good from the two main leads and the Scottish scenery was as nice relief from Manchester, I mean who would willingly live there? Yes it could have been better, pace could have been faster certainly but at least the identity of the murderer wasn't obvious. It isn't awful like a lot of other reviews just not as good as we expect from Auntie Beeb.
Didn't see the ending coming either.