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kasey_coff
Reviews
Black Work (2015)
Clumsy, contrived - poorly done.
The actors - most of whom have some sterling roles behind them - are good, but have been given such a lousy script and apparently banal direction that they can't develop much by way of characters.
The plot is full of "I saw that coming" coincidences. This looks very much as if the endpoint was someone's bright idea, and whatever had to be shoehorned into the script to get to that ending was done. Nothing seems to develop from the characters or their actions.
Nothing realistic about the story - the officer was working undercover, and what unfolds from that is not believable.
I watched this on a rainy Saturday afternoon. Even then with nothing much else to do it was a waste of three hours.
Bottom line: don't bother.
The Gallows Pole (2023)
Waste of talent...
Waste of talent: good actors, great settings, gripping story - all the better for being historic rather than fiction - and the production team threw it all away.
I can deal with the anachronisms ("Gi'us five, mate") and the overload of obscenities, but there's some element of loose cannon to it all - improvisation? Ad libbing? Vague direction? Script that's more guideline than dialogue? - that does not work.
Twenty minutes in, I gave up.
FWIW: I'm so done with this "let's film in the dark" trend. Yes, I know they had low lighting in pre-electric days. Yes, I know it's supposed to set the tone / mood. But for gawd's sake, could we not see what's going on? If you're going to use 21st-century rock music, can you not use 21st-century filming techniques?
The Body Farm (2011)
I gave it 4 stars...
...mostly because it had promise.
Pluses:
--the actors: most of them are well-known and their performance history is pretty good, overall.
That's pretty much it for the pluses.
The minuses:
--the scripts: formulaic, a patchwork of elements from other (better) series, laden with cliches; most of the episodes telegraph the solution well before the conclusions.
--the characters: no matter how good the actors, there's only so much they can do with two-dimensional characters, for example, Hale, the "angry" cop... Oggy, the quirky oddball...
the direction: elementary, amateurish; again, there may be only so much a director can do with weak scripts, but they should be able to give the actors some guidance. Directing doesn't show here. It looks more as if the actors were left to their own devices.
--the setting: the idea of a body farm is not in itself a problem. I don't know if there is such a place in the UK, but I know of at least one in the US. The problem with this particular setting is it's dirty. The "house" has paint peeling from the walls, clutter everywhere, from dirty dishes to wadded clothing to open shelving with who-knows-what. The "mortuary" is separated from the live-in area by a plastic curtain. Hardly ideal for a forensics lab.
Even worse, technical aspects of investigation and analysis are sorely lacking. A character says "Suit up" as the team prepares to enter a crime scene, only to show them dressed in paper booties and plastic gloves, and nothing else. Hairnets? Masks? Full-cover suits? Nah, why bother. If cross-contamination doesn't happen at the scene itself, it surely will back in the lab, where they lean over bodies, dropping hair, skin cells, their own DNA, whatever.
A real shame that the production team wasted the budget and some decent actors on this piece of drivel. As I said, I gave it four stars because it had potential. Sadly, that potential dwindled as of the first episode, and was never recovered.
The Loch (2017)
Waste of cast and setting...
The real flaw is the script: predictable, mediocre, uneven at best.
It's a shame because the cast is good; they do their best with the lines they're given. The setting - in a fictional town along Loch Ness - is superb.
The gaping holes in the plot and the thinly-disguised red herrings will enable viewers to arrive at the conclusion long before the drawn-out banal story-line gets you there.
I gave this four stars for the casting and setting - the script and story are more like one star, if that.
Getting On (2013)
Quirky, funny, with flashes of real life...
I find myself identifying with the 'oldsters' in the show as much as anything. There are some genuine insights, both from the staff of the hospital dealing with the seniors and from the seniors themselves, looking out from the inside.
The show is well cast and the characters are becoming more developed as time passes; the seasons are short for this program and that limits the screen time the writers can devote to the characters, but even so they are becoming more real with each episode.
The writing is spare and deft. The jokes are subtle, rather than belabored; sometimes you have to think fast.
Dry and witty with the occasional belly laugh and some tender, wistful moments - I suppose it is a dark comedy, but semisweet rather than bitter. Give it a fair trial.
World Without End (2012)
What a mess--!
Ken Follett wrote a story set in the 14th century.
The mini-series "World Without End" is set in the 14th century.
With the exception of some of the characters' names, any similarity between the book and the television production ends there.
Cast: considering what they were given as dialogue the actors were the real highlight; they certainly rose above the material.
Design: well-done, at least insofar as big-budget TV goes. The sets had the right appearance, the costumes conveyed the era.
Direction: the director is Michael Caton-Jones. He's done several things, notably Memphis Belle and Rob Roy. I've never found his directing especially inspired, but it's adequate.
Plot: ah, now we come to the crux of the matter. The screenplay was done by John Pielmeier. I was less than pleased with the treatment he gave Pillars of the Earth (Follett's "prequel" to World Without End) but ultimately the changes he made worked, and were understandable given the realities of budget and running time.
I have no idea what Mr Pielmeier did with Ken Follett's World Without End, because it surely isn't what was filmed.
The changes from the book are numerous - if you're a fan of the novel, I don't think you'll enjoy this screen adaptation. Changing the storyline is acceptable. That's what Hollywood (or, in this case, a coalition Canadian / German / British production team) does. Condensing 1000 pages or more into a few hours of airtime means sacrificing something, whether it's eliminating subplots or combining characters.
Bringing a book to film can be done without sacrificing dramatic quality - consider Shogun, or the more recent Game of Thrones series. Equally, it can be done with complete mediocrity - like World Without End.
Stories can follow a book closely or diverge widely, but if a plot is well-done, ultimately it can stand alone - The Bridge on the River Kwai has a quite different conclusion from what Pierre Boulle wrote. Even the title was changed: the film is The Bridge ON the River Kwai, while the novel is The Bridge OVER the River Kwai. Good mini-series can be made from whole cloth - Rome carries two seasons with nothing more (!) than some historical data and a lot of creativity.
Pielmeier reduces strong characters to two-dimensional cardboard cutouts, disregarding literary integrity altogether. His treatment of Caris's aunt and cousin, to name but two, is disgraceful, painting them as evil and without any redeeming qualities. They hardly stand out in this sea of black-or-white silhouettes. The climactic scenes at the end are downright laughable.
World Without End is a good read, and pitiful television. Whether you're a fan of the book or not, don't waste your time.