Reviews

With so many people watching on iView and giving episodes ten out of ten, I thought that at some of those people would put their opinions into a user review, yet I find that I am the first one.

Those not of the Islamic faith might be put off by a series that dramatises the political struggles for control of an Australian mosque. I struggled to stay interested in the characters for the first two episodes. I hoped to be enlightened but I found myself being confirmed in my attitudes towards both the religion and the nationalities who follow it.

The acting is of a high standard, especially considering that many are not very experienced.

The pace is very slow. The subtitles often get lost in the background which is not good if you don't speak Arabic.

This is a series that might be better placed on SBS. This is not suitable for prime time on a Sunday night and I expect that the ratings will show that.

This is a comedy by Americans, for Americans. Just like Americans ruin great British comedies with remakes, this saccharine versions of Cyrano with a happy ending (!) is a parody.

My greatest night in the theatre was at the Sydney Opera House with John Bell playing Cyrano in the Louis Nowra translation. The original Rostand play was not a simple comedy and it wasn't about someone with a big nose. It has even been played without a nose prosthesis because it is basically about self-image. No matter how great a poet and swordsman Cyrano is, he believes that his appearance is a total turn-off for women. The final scene of the play invariably has the audience in tears.

I like several of Steve Martin's movies but this is just stupid, unsubtle trash. I'm embarrassed that an Australian directed it.

Perhaps the sequel could involve re-writing "Macbeth" or "King Lear" with a happy ending. (After seeing this, I produced a send-up of American cinema in which "Oedipus Rex" ends with a happy family gathering.) Not all American movies are superficial but this one certainly is.

This is one of the most unrealistic stories that has every been dramatised.

It seems unlikely that the DI would ever have been promoted to that rank.

It is totally unlikely that any DI would tolerate being spoken to by a DS in that way.

It is totally unlikely that a DS would retain her rank, let alone her job, if she behaved like this one.

The character of Frederika shows complexity. I was impressed with the range of acting shown by Hermione Corfield, whom I hadn't seen before. She is a young actor with a big future in diverse character roles.

This series doesn't take itself too seriously so, with due suspension of belief, it is possible the enjoy it without being too picky about such things as correct police procedure and glaring holes in the plot.

A second series is probably not justified but I am betting on there being one.

Other reviewers seem to have missed the point of this series.

This is the story of an incompetent female policewoman who has been promoted above her level of capability to maintain the quota of females in senior positions. Her boss, being also female, has ensured that a woman, any woman, wins a DCI position, even though an eminently capable male, DCS McAndrew, wants the job. In the "water police", somewhere between Glasgow and Norway, Annika is out of her depth, spending more time looking for a male partner and mothering her teenage brat than doing her job. This part is true to life.

Annika clearly has mental issues as she often talks to people who aren't there, in stumbling part-sentences. She only makes an arrest if the perpetrator is male and her team has made up for her lack of ability.

The team, of course, consists of the usual multi-ethnic, multi-sexual people, just as the real water police are (NOT).

Nicola Walker plays the only part that she can play: Nicola Walker, an actor with a limited range. She stands out from the rest of the cast in being generally intelligible. The rest mumble in some Nordic / Celtic dialect that really should have subtitles.

"Wake in Fright" was a ground-breaking film of the 1970s, bringing jarring realism to the screen. This woke nonsense is typical of the drivel being dished out around the world these days in the guise of entertainment. Three episodes is all that I could stomach. All the stars that I have given are to the producers for raising the issue of how unfairly males are treated in promotion contests.

After three episodes, I think that I am getting the message from Tony Ayres. Other reviews seem to miss the point. Very few people predicted what the fires were going to be like. We have always had bush fires in Australia. The RFS has fought them with a fair degree of success. What those fire fighters faced in 2019-20 was, to use the word of the year, "unprecedented".

The young fire fighters in the first episode were behaving like typical teenagers until they came face to face with the reality of surviving. I found this episode to be the best so far, not knowing whether or not they would survive.

The uncertainty of knowing where loved ones were and the loss of communication was the focus of the second program. I found this part a little too slow. I felt like I was living the experience in real time.

Property owners in the third part were typical of people who have been told how to prepare their homes in the event of a bush fire. As with the fires in Victoria a few years earlier, the fires were too intense for preparation to make any difference. I thought that the ending was not satisfying.

This series has exceeded my expectations. "The Newsreader" was a hard act to follow on Sunday nights but "Fires" has proved to be a worthy successor.

Kitty Flanagan is an enigmatic actor who tells us little about her personal background. Those who watched "Utopia" will know what a great character actor she can be, with good direction and a good script. Unfortunately, "Fisk" does not have a good script and this must be blamed on Flanagan who is listed as one of the writers, with another Flanagan, (perhaps a sister?) sharing the indiscretion.

I have watched Kitty Flanagan do her stand-up routine. It is one of those modern routines that relies on smut in the mistaken belief that a modern audience will be tickled by crudity. "She writes her own material" is usually an indication that the result will be poorer than if the material were provided by a professional comedy writer. "Fisk" is no exception.

The situation for this sit-com is novel and promising. It has "MELBOURNE" written all over it (so Sydney people will not find it half as funny - think Graham Kennedy). The supporting cast is strong, excepting for the token Asian actor, Aaron Chen, who really is out of his depth. Why is Julia Zemiro wearing a fat suit?

I would like this series to succeed because I have so much respect for Flanagan's talent but I fear that it is not going to get any better (having watched three episodes).

I ran a restaurant for a few years in NSW. Obviously, things are slack in South Australia. It appears that one can run a Michelin Star restaurant out of a domestic kitchen. No need for stainless steel benches and coving on a tiled floor. It is also acceptable to wander around the kitchen with cow dung on your boots. Apart from that, a promising story-line was spoiled by ham acting from people who should (and probably do) know better. I remember seeing Peter Carroll on stage in the one-hander "The Christian Brothers" decades ago. He is one of Australia's finest stage actors but he should not bring over-the-top staginess into a TV role. Similarly, "Easton West" is a cardboard replica of a real chef. Natalie Abbott shows her lack of experience and rushes her lines (we need subtitles). My initial enthusiasm for this series dropped each week. It suffers from poor direction and a script that must have been written by a 15 year-old.

Why does Graham Cole (a.k.a PC Stamp) get top billing?Dave Johns and Alison Steadman are the only major characters and they do a fine job with a script that lacks originality or plot. I was expecting a major incident to launch the story but it never happened. There is, of course, great care to achieve racial balance and this adds to the impression that the whole movie is calculated and formulaic. Anyone familiar with the book / film "Our Souls at Night" will see the similarities. There must be an untapped market for love stories involving aged baby-boomers but this attempt covers old ground. It is tedious and just runs out of steam. Very disappointing.

This movie seemed to slip under the radar in Australia when it was released, though it is a very fine production. The cast, headed by Miranda and Barry Otto, give good impressions of their characters, though Barry Otto might be accused of over-doing the grumpiness. That type of officious, hyper-critical person was common in the 1930s (and later). The title suggests that the lighthouse is situated on South Solitary Island which lies off the northern NSW coast near Coffs Harbour, an idyllic spot. The setting of the movie is anything but idyllic, the locations being the windswept capes of Victoria, subject to the fierce Roaring Forties. There is no obvious plot; nearly two hours is spent examining the relationships between Meredith and the other members of the lighthouse crew. The long shadow of World War 1 hangs over the characters, all of whom have major personality problems and psychological defects. There is a hiatus between two major incidents which confused me for a time. Perhaps there is a pile of film on the cutting room floor that would have covered the time between Meredith being sprung by Netty and the scene with the launch heading out to sea. We are left to fill in a lot of gaps here and we can only guess at the turmoil that occurred. Viewers will find it difficult to identify with any of the characters. There is no hero though we might have some sympathy for the hardship endured by all people who used to work in such isolated places.

This is a "lovely" movie. Everyone is "nice". It is like the wonderful confections that are the centre of the story. I don't need to warn of spoilers in this review because there is nothing in the "plot" to give away. From the first ten minutes, the viewer can guess what is going to happen in the following hour, expecting a twist that never comes. This is so politically correct and sweet that it is frightening. Is this where movies are headed? Are we going to have (female) directors who have nothing to say and say it with a smile? There is no edge to this story. My 5 stars goes entirely to the actors. As expected, Celia Imrie, Shelley Conn, Bill Paterson and Penry-Jones give thoroughly professional performances, almost as though someone is paying them. I can't imagine that any of them did this with a view to achieving social justice or changing the political landscape. " ..... and they all lived happily ever after."

What a contrast there is among the reviews so far posted about "Operation Buffalo"! Were all these people watching the same show? I have a suspicion that the 1/10 reviews were written by ASIO agents, keen to avoid the scrutiny of the public (as usual). It is a light satire, set in a cringe-worthy period of Australian history in which politicians routinely doffed their caps to Englishmen (who would have happily let them be over-run by Japanese in 1944). There are very serious issues to consider in this series: nuclear war, treatment of aboriginal people in the vicinity of the nuclear tests, lack of protection for the soldiers who "volunteered", political intrigue, blackmail, cover-ups, all of which were true to at least some degree. The Wilcox MP character is clearly Richard Casey who spent much of his career trying to knife Menzies PM. Lachlan MP is based on Philip McBride. Both of these worthless pollies were knighted by Menzies and pushed sideways, leaving Menzies to rule as a dictator. There were times when I laughed uncontrollably in Episode 4 but the humour is generally subtle. There is a dark side to the plot but the writing takes the viewpoint of the soldiers involved and they probably didn't appreciate the danger they were in. Before "This Day Tonight" and the standard of investigative journalism that we have today, ordinary people were unaware of the egregious lack of talent of their leaders. There were Reds under every bed and King Ming was keeping us safe. We were part of an empire on which the sun never set, well didn't set for very long. If you didn't live through this period, you could not appreciate this series fully.

Drawn by the trailer, I approached this movie expecting perhaps too much. It was not very humorous and neither was it particularly novel. The concept is fine but the execution (no spoiler intended) didn't quite succeed. I see that Waititi has been nominated for awards for adapting the screenplay. I am now reading the book, "Caging Skies" and there is some similarity with the film but many differences. The focus is on different characters. The book is far from being a comedy. In "Caging Skies", Adolf Hitler does not appear as an imaginary friend. Johannes is much older, 14 - 20. The film uses only the first half of the book. There are many scenes that are not in the book. The characters are stereotypical, as in the TV series "Hogan's Heroes" but the leads, especially Jo Jo and Scarlet Johannsen, are excellent. This is a quirky movie and quite enjoyable but less than it might have been.

Fabienne, an ageing French film star (Catherine Deneuve) has written an autobiography which disappoints her colleagues and puzzles her screen-writer daughter (Juliette Binoche). It appears to be a work of fiction "based on a true story". (Think "The Moon's a Balloon" by David Niven). But what is "the truth"? Is it how we remember the past or is it immutable? As Rudi Giuliani would say "Truth isn't true"? There isn't much plot development but the character depth is wonderfully exposed. Who was loyal? Who was faithful? The acting is outstanding, as one would expect, seeing the cast list. Particularly impressive is the bilingual dialogue, especially from Binoche who seems to speak both English and French as a native. Also outstanding is the child actress playing Binoche's daughter. This is a thought-provoking work, a tour de force by mature (and junior) professionals.

When so many reviewers call a show "gripping", I get suspicious. Some people are racist by praising anything, no matter how poor, that features aboriginal actors. This mini-series has a lot of positives but there is no way that it deserves a '10 star' rating. Deborah Mailman is better suited to comedy roles but her work here is good. Several other aboriginal actors also show their experience and talent. That said, there is a lot of 'wood' in the supporting cast. Rachel Griffiths is the 'Big Name' star and does well as a conservative version of Julia Gillard. 'PC Garfield' is a bit hammy, as usual. William McInnes reprises a role he played in another political drama. Many plot lines are based on recent events in Australian politics (though nothing can match the reality of Australian politics). The main problem with the production is credibility. As another reviewer pointed out, there are too many implausible events. There have been a few very good TV series with aboriginal themes in recent years but this one, though interesting, is not quite good enough.

I was not aware that this was a remake. In any case, enough changes seem to have been made so that it stands along. Isobel, an American ex-pat, works in a poor orphanage in India. On day, she learns that a rich woman in America wants to give the orphanage a lot of money but a condition is that Isobel has to visit New York to meet the donor. As the story unfolds, the inter-relationships of key people are examined and it becomes clear that this donation is more than just charity. The great strength of the plot is the way the personal needs of each character are examined. The writing is excellent and, as the movie progresses, the motivations are revealed, not always to the credit of the character. The "do-gooder" perhaps is not as likeable as the rich but controlling millionaire(ess). The female characters generally are shown to be self-serving in different ways. Those who like "Spiderman" and "Star Wars" should stay away from this movie. Ignore the unfavourable reviews if you like literary films that explore character flaws in depth.

In 1988, Lord Montague of Beaulieu visited Australia for the National Veteran and Vintage Car Rally. As he entered the dining hall one night, an expat Pom stood up from the table and came to attention in deference to His Lordship. The way you react to that story will be an indicator of how you will react to the movie "Downton Abbey". The cast is first rate. The acting is highly professional. The settings are meticulously correct to period. The question is: "Why are English people making movies like this?" Is it, perhaps, that they are aware that they are minor players in the world and, after Brexit, will be even more insignificant? Do English people look fondly of the 19th Century as a time when God was an Englishman and all was right with the world. (This is set in the early 1920s but 19th Century attitudes still prevail.) Several audience members chuckled knowingly when various servants didn't "know their place". It all made me very uncomfortable. Some say that the class system (which is fundamental to Downton Abbey) is the single most significant cause of the decline of England. It seems curious to celebrate it. If you still feel compelled to salute His Lordships, then this is the movie for you. If, like me, you have little regard for the English upper class, then you might still enjoy this movie as a satire in the same vein as many Monty Python sketches.

I wasn't going to review "The Farewell" as it seemed adequately covered by other viewers. Then I read the other reviews and noticed something remarkable: the people who were of Chinese heritage rated it lower in general than did people of European heritage. This was confirmed when I saw the movie with a friend who is Chinese, who has similar tastes to mine in just about all other areas. She also was disappointed in "The Farewell", though she was the one who wanted to see it in the first place! It appears that many Chinese people don't recognise the subtle differences in the way Asian families deal with such matters as death, education, wealth creation and professional status. It all seemed quite hum-drum to my friend but I found that the movie showed insight, subtly pointing out the cultural differences.

I was not going to review this movie as I noted that those who enjoyed it as much as I did had already said what I wanted to say and there were a lot of reviews. The great thing about this movie is that it works on so many levels. Some reviews indicate that the viewer has only found one level. Superficially, it is just a simple love story with predictable events and predictable outcomes. On another level, it is a brilliant send-up of materialism as typified by so many Chinese people, both in China and in Australia (and elsewhere). If a Chinese family has wealth, they feel obliged to show in with as much extravagance as possible, (he says, drawing a long bow and painting with a broad brush). This especially applies to those families who have come from poor peasant backgrounds and "made good". The most important theme in this movie is the tension between love and financial status. This is not confined just to the Chinese community, of course. The negative reviews of this movie reflect more on the character of the reviewer than the quality of the production.

I have become hooked on this medical drama. Unlike other reviewers, I only see the medical professional and public hospitals from the patient's point of view. I can understand why some in the medical profession would find this series confronting: the level of bullying of junior staff by their seniors, the level of male chauvinism among the surgeons, the arrogance, the "faces of Janus" when dealing with patients. Maybe some of the medical procedures are not quite correct but, Dr.Patel, perhaps hospitals in reality aren't quite correct either! The several sub-plots make this series a cut above the sentimental soap operas that usually frequent this genre: the health of the main characters, the professional pressure to "bury their mistakes", the elicit affairs between senior staff and those whom they supervise, the "glass ceiling" that seems to prevent women from becoming senior surgeons, the nepotism that ensures that the children of senior medical staff follow in their parents' footsteps. While many series have multi-cultural casts simply to be politically correct, "Pulse" reflects the true multi-ethnic make-up of Australian hospitals. Highly recommended.

No other country's film industry can match the British for historical authenticity in period films. So often in this charming movie, I asked myself "How did they create that scene?" I am too young to have experienced WW2 but I remember the war films of the 1950s and I have seen some of the propaganda films of the war years. The mood of the these films is captured perfectly in "Their Finest" (silly title - their finest what?) I would have given 10 / 10 except for one significant weakness. We in the post-9/11 world are used to viewing CCTV film of bombs exploding and we know the extent of the damage to expect. There are scenes in this movie where bombs are supposed to be raining down, yet the damage is little more than one would expect from a large fire-cracker. If a bomb drops on a building, it is unlikely in the extreme that one person will be killed instantly while others standing nearby are totally uninjured. The acting reflects the style of the period beautifully, and comically. Bill Nighy is perfect and everyone else plays their part with enthusiasm. There is a touch of "Monty Python" in the stiff upper lip characters. The story has several engaging sub-plots and touches on a number of issues including feminism, British / USA relations, the changing nature of marriage, and politically-motivated lying. This is a record of how we were 75 years ago. Pity that we smoked so much.

Surely a more cynical film has never been made than this one. I didn't see "Red Dog" (1) but my wife raved about it. Having time to kill, I chose to see the "prequel". It was soon obvious that the film was a calculated tear-jerker. All the politically correct boxes were ticked, especially the Aboriginal sub-plots. The film is aimed at the pre-teen market. The inclusion of Lang Hancock as a crusty old lovably character must have been an attempt (successful?) to get some funding from his daughter, Gina Rinehart. I would rate this 1/10 but the photography deserves a point. Some talented actors were wasted in the production. Did they see the script before signing their contracts or are they really desperate for work?

The first rule of writing is "Write about what you know." This episode continues the tradition of total disregard for historical accuracy. I can hear the producers saying "No-one will notice that". Anyone of my age will know that the Redex / Ampol car trials did not have more than half of their entrants driving Vanguards. I had to laugh at a preview: "Fast women, fast cars" - (show Series 1 Elephant Standard Vanguard, surely the slowest car every built). At one point during a post Mortimer examination, a doctor confidently identifies the marks on a dead man's chest as having been caused by a Vanguard or a Holden. No doubt her medical training involved dropping cars on people and learning the bruising patterns thus produced. At the climax, the villain lowers a jack, allowing a Holden to trap the good doctor and threaten his life. In truth, these cars had enough ground clearance to permit a mechanic to slide underneath without the car being on a jack. There were other examples those mentioned above give the general idea. I guess Stuart Page, the writer, is under 30 and thinks that everyone who is likely to watch the show is as ignorant as he is about cars.

There was every reason to be optimistic about this series. The concept of a Chinese family in Australia, facing the same problems as any other family, could have demystified the cultural differences. The problems started with casting and acting standards. It is a two-edged sword: cast an Australian-born Chinese and you just get an Australian with an Asian face, thus lessening the effect of culture. Choose a Chinese-born actor and you get someone who is trying to act in their second (or third) language, unable to express the nuances of the words. The scripts were good, except for the embarrassing sexual references. There was a hint that Benjamin is "gay" but perhaps we will have to wait for another season to see if that line is followed. There were anomalies aplenty. Why, for example, would two women who are old friends speak to each other in English when both have difficulty with the language? Subtitles were used elsewhere; why not for that scene? Talking of subtitles, there is not much point having white printing on a white background. There were promising sub-plots but others reminded me of Alf Garnet / Archie Bunker and many other politically correct anti-racists shows. In summary, this show suffered from poor production standards.

This series mirrors the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, only the sex of the child and the location of the crime have been changed. What a great opportunity to show how the police blundered, how wrong leads were followed, how the parents became suspects, how sections of the media sensationalised the situation without the slightest regard for the truth or the feelings of those involved! What a lost opportunity! The script writers of "The Missing" chose to rehash every cliché ever seen in British suspense dramas. e.g. Irish father dashes around, accusing everyone and causing trouble. Parents sight their child in a crowd, only to find that it is a case of mistaken identity. Police car chase is foiled by other drivers who seemingly ignore the "lights and music". I could go on. James Nesbit has become a walking cliché. It has got to the stage that, as soon as his name appears on a cast list, one can predict the scenes that are to follow. That said, some of the acting is first class and the difficulties of such as case are well demonstrated. It is just such a pity that the script writers just rolled out so many unoriginal scenes. Perhaps a close study of the actual people and events surrounding the McCann case could have provided them with the necessary stimuli to produce something more plausible. Is it mot the case that truth is stranger than fiction?

Australia now has several ex-PMs, all of whom are open to ridicule and make the news for the wrong reasons. If the cartoonists can find humour in the lives of former prime ministers, why couldn't the writers of this series? The premise on which the series in based should have provided lots of good ideas. Instead, we have appalling over-acting and quite stupid story lines, far removed from the hilarious reality that the real ex-PMs provide. Consider what the writers of "Yes Minister" could have done with such a scenario. Where that series had wit and satire, this show has slapstick. After two episodes, the writers were burnt out.