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paul-quinn27
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Away (2020)
Mawkish and utterly trite ...
I don't know where to start with this mess ...
... is the ad nausea use of the phrase "I'm so proud of you?" - it must used double figures ever episode.
... or the squabbling crew who are would NEVER have passed the rigid psychometric testing in real life?
.. maybe it's the ludicrously over-complicated and seemingly unmaintainable and irreparable water recovery system that, going by the script, NASA knew was doomed to failure from the start?
... possibly be the racial stereotyping of the Chinese as Motherland-obsessed martinets?
... nope! - it's the irritating selfish, over-privileged, molly-coddled, high-maintenance daughter. Homelander and Ramsay Bolton are more appealing characters than this little princess.
I won't be watching Season 2.
The Irishman (2019)
Well crafted movie, but ...
... having read the book a week before viewing the movie, I just couldn't buy into 76-year-old, 5'8" Robert DiNiro as the 6'5" Frank Sheeran, even with all the computer wizardry.
Please don't get me wrong, his acting was, as always, superb, but the physical aspect of his performance was unconvincing.
For example, there's a scene where Sheeran beats up a shopkeeper who has upset his daughter. It should have reflected the brutal violence of Goodfellas, Casino etc, but end up looking like exactly what is ... and stiff old man, with failing relexes raining slow and weak-looking kicks and punches on his victim.
Anytime Sheeran is fleeing a crime scene, it reminds me of that old advert with Italian pensioners playing football.
Apart from that, it was an absorbing film, with Pacino stealing every scene he's in as the highly-strung and narcissistic Jimmy Hoffa.
The Silence (2019)
Poor
This lame duck comes across as a poor attempt to cash in on the success of the superb 'A Quiet Place'.
The initial premise is ok, but the acting is by the numbers - Stanley Tucci looks utterly bored throughout - the script generic and the logic bewildering (jet fighters to combat flying rodents? really?).
There's no sense of a timeline either. Are we to believe that a cult, with severed tongues that appear fully healed and a no apparent credo, has sprung up in matter of days?
Avoid.
A Wrinkle in Time (2018)
Just Awful ...
This mess is as bad a adaptation of a novel as I've seen. I read the book several times as a kid, loved it and was really looking forward to the movie. I hadn't watched any trailers or read any reviews, so I was going into this with an open mind.
My heart sank as soon as I heard the godawful bubble-gum 'music' and I realised straight away that this was going to be another pile of manure, concocted to appeal to as many social demographics as possible.
The young cast, especially the kid who played Meg, a complex (and interesting) character in the book, are terrible, the adult cast even worse.
I can't bring myself to write any more, because that would involve me having recall memories of the time I wasted watching this complete and utter annihilation of a classic.
Avoid.
Les témoins (2014)
Season 2 - Dire *** SPOILERS ***
This cop show looks good and has it's moments, but the otherwise appealing main character's bewildering and completely ludicrous actions scupper what could have been a very good series.
*** SPOILERS ***
Here are a few of the logic defying things that Sandra does in Season 2: -
- Has sex with a stranger in his Range Rover in very well lit car park on two occasions
- Colludes with a very unstable victim in abducting and torturing a suspect
- Hands said victim her service weapon to guard said suspect whilst she explores some tunnels in the darkness
- Is openly rude and defiant to her commanding officer
- Takes a mentally challenged patient out of hospital and leaves her in the car whilst pursuing leads
Any of the above would be enough to get her kicked off the force and possibly indicted.
As for the 'unstable victim' - she has that rare and unique kind of amnesia that allows the sufferer to remember everyday things like driving and putting on make-up, yet renders her unable to remember her kids or any information that might shave several episodes off this tripe.
Dreadful
From Darkness (2015)
Awful
Yet another British triumph of style over substance, with long, agonising looks into the distance and police procedural work that makes no sense at all - e.g. a civilian "consultant" trapising around crime scenes unescorted and unsupervised. It's focal point is the now standard protagonist-with-painful-past who has "history" with a former colleague. Wow, how original.
It's the pacing that did it for me and like that dire series a couple of years ago with Gillian Anderson and Jamie Dornan (so poor that I can't be bothered trying to remember the name), it seems to take forever for the characters to react or respond to any on screen stimuli, even when in mortal danger. Instead we are treated to extreme close- ups of their angst-ridden faces - example ***SPOILER*** the main character breaks into a suspects house, quickly finds irrefutable evidence, then stares at it vacantly for what seems like forever. In REAL life, she would have GTF out of there and called the cavalry.
Avoid.