Reviews

I started binge watching it on Netflix and was engrossed in it for the first couple seasons. And I laughed my a** off a couple times, despite the occasional strong foul language and unbelievably explicit sex scenes, most of which I fast-forwarded through. But somewhere around season 4 or 5 the story became muddled, and the character of Nancy became weak, completely spineless and let's people walk all over her...definitely NOT an attractive trait in a lead character, and definitely not the Nancy from previous seasons.

I'm now midway through season 6 and it has taken a complete nose dive. The writing is awful, the scenes drag on and on...though the directing probably has something to do with it (but the writing really got bad). The sixth season is just painful to watch. It's like the writers had no idea what to do and just came up with filler in order to stall. Not sure if I can watch the rest of it. It just falls completely flat.

There's something really compelling about this movie: I thought it was very well cast, well directed and well played by all. It keeps you on the edge of your seat wondering what the big secret of this "family" is; I assumed they were spies or something. Once I found out, I thought what they do for a living was pretty implausible--as if they would network with enough people in their community to cause such measurable spikes in sales of consumer goods, let alone generate enough income to justify their lavish cover lifestyle. But if you can get past that, it works really well, and thematically is about how little we really know the people around us, even (or especially) our neighbors.

I really liked the character arcs--that's what makes this movie work so well in my opinion--especially that of the "son" being gay. That was definitely unexpected and takes the story to new depths. Overall it was kind of American Beauty-esque both in theme and how we follow each character and get to see them for who they really are. In fact it seems to pay homage to American Beauty in more than one or two ways. On the one hand that seems like a cheap rip off, but on the other hand, overall the film works and has enough original and good elements to keep you interested. Plus AB is my all time favorite movie so I don't mind at all.

I thought this film had a rare depth and I was really invested in the story & characters from the first frame to the credits. A really well made film. Oh and p.s., casting Lauren Hutton was a master stroke on an already superb cast.

The director presented a fairly superficial glimpse of Margaret Thatcher that barely grazed the surface of some of her key moments in office without a proper story ever taking root, all told rather unflatteringly in flashback in her senior years while in the throes of dementia.

I'm not really sure that there was enough material in her life to make for a compelling movie, but this one wasn't. The only reason to watch this movie is because of Meryl Streep. She nailed it. She really was Margaret Thatcher, but even a great actress like Meryl Streep can't save a film when the story isn't there.

Then they had her talking to her deceased husband who appeared rather haphazardly as an apparition that she would talk to. It left me feeling that the writer should not have taken the creative license to do that. It seemed kind of random and didn't serve any purpose other than to fill up screen time. I only kept watching to see if it would get any better, and it didn't. Sorry to be so blunt but if I'm going to spend two hours of my time watching a movie, it had better be worth it, and this one wasn't in my opinion.

After reading some other reviews which criticize this show, I agree that the writing is at times trite and repetitive to the point of being downright tiresome after one or two episodes. But no sooner do I roll my eyes and think "is this the best the writer could come up with?", Hyacinth does something that makes me laugh out loud--like when she climbs a wall in a stranger's back yard, or is in the back of a parked truck when the driver gets in and drives off, leaving a frantic Hyacinth trying to get his attention (to no avail), or gets drunk off gooseberry wine ("wooseberry gine", as she puts it).

So yes, the writing of this show is often dull and repetitive, an yes Hyacinth Bucket drives everyone around her absolutely crazy, but despite this, there's something eminently likable about her, endearing even. As an American, the British sense of humor seems quite dry and restrained by comparison. But once you immerse yourself in that world, you see how hysterical some of her antics can be. I guess Hyacinth Bucket is Britain's answer to Lucille Ball. It's definitely worth checking out this show!

I don't know why this film garnered an average 7 star review (as of this post). First of all, the movie was way way WAY too long for the subject matter. At least 30 minutes could have been cut, easily. Even still, the material as written was not suitable for a feature film; a TV movie perhaps. Maybe it was DW's performance that was lacking, but his character was pretty superficial and didn't have an arc worthy of a motion picture. So he's a man who gets drunk all the time…yeah and??? What's the big dramatic premise in that?

He doesn't seem to be on any particular journey (except from addiction to sobriety, but again, who cares?), therefore the audience has no reason to care about him or his predicament. I was completely indifferent to what happened to him. Then they threw in these random characters that didn't seem to serve any purpose to the story, such as the drug addict whom he meets in the hallway at the hospital and later has sex with.

I just didn't think this film was worth watching. I only did because it was on Netflix streaming. If I had paid money to see it in the theater, I'm sure I'd have felt cheated. They took what happened to the Alaskan Airlines flight off the coast of CA several years ago (the jackscrew failed due to inadequate maintenance) and tossed it in with an alcoholic pilot and some randomly stuck in characters; again I ask, who wants to see a pilot get drunk? It obviously wasn't the reason for the crash, and he was able to save the plane in spite of being drunk. This leaves only his personal battle with alcohol addiction as the sole dramatic driving force if the story, and that alone just isn't enough to carry a film. Two thumbs down.

I recently re-discovered Wings while browsing on Netflix, and I'm so glad I did! I had forgotten all about it but I used to like watching it back in the 90s. There's something about the show that makes me yearn for something, like a stable life on a picturesque island with close-knit friends. Some of the episodes really crack me up, like one from season 2 where Faye loses in a tennis tournament and walks through the airport smacking things with her tennis racket, and hits a pet cage with a cat in it, making the cat shriek--she cracks me up! I just finished watching the episode from season 2 where Joe & Brian's long lost mother returns for a visit--the scenes between her & Joe made me tear up, it really tugged at my heartstrings! I'm really glad to have re-discovered this little gem of a show!

I was searching on Netflix for something I hadn't seen and passed over this title many times. I didn't think a movie about a drug would interest me much, but there wasn't much else to see so I watched this. Lo and behold, I was pleasantly surprised, at least throughout MOST of it. I thought that Brad Cooper was perfectly cast, along with the entire cast in this thriller that managed to be original when I thought I'd seen it all. There were plenty of nail-biting moments at every turn. Lots of intrigue and unanswered questions that kept me wanting to know more. I'd have to watch it again to give it a fine-tooth-comb review, but there were a couple weaknesses that stood out. For one thing, I kept wondering why, after being stalked and chased by mysterious bad guys, no one ever thought to simply go to the police? It seems highly unlikely that a man wielding a knife chasing a woman through central Manhattan--even onto the ice skating rink at Rockefeller Center--would not arouse the authorities or bystanders or someone to intervene. It just didn't seem plausible. Then there was the high-security apartment that he bought for $8.5 million. He shelled out all that $ for all that protection, yet the bad guys were still somehow able to break in using power tools, without the police or a concierge ever having been called? (I know, Brad Cooper took out his cell phone at this point and got a "no service" message...but still, I couldn't help but think that a pad with so much alleged security wouldn't have had a panic button or safe-room. It just seems totally implausible and therefore a plot weakness).

Nevermind that the powers obtained by taking the drug seemed Chuck-Bartowski-like. Even that I could have bought had the other plot weaknesses at least been tidied up. But they weren't.

There was room to play around with and develop the relationship between Brad Cooper and De Niro, and the ending...honestly it sucked. It was like drinking a diet coke, it just tastes wrong and doesn't satisfy at all. This movie for me fell flat because of the lame unsatisfying ending. The strong points were the action, intrigue and performances, but those elements alone can't carry a picture whose story isn't fully fleshed out. I think they forgot to finish the script. Overall, this film had a lot of promise but in the end failed to deliver. I found it disappointing because of an under-developed plot and too many questions left unanswered.

This movie ALMOST did it for me. It was kind of slow to set up, with some stereotypes that seemed like representations of other stereotypes from other movies. Natalie Portman nailed the character of the girl who has intimacy issues but tries to deny it, until things suddenly get serious, then it really hits her that she might have lost Adam and the chance at something real. The scene towards the end where they meet outside the hospital...I started to tear up a little and get misty eyed...but then the dialogue suddenly turned very corny ("if you come one step closer, I'm not gonna let you go") which suddenly made the whole scenario unreal so it lost me. With some re-writing, this could have been a really touching story with a lot of truth to it. But instead they settled for some trite re-hash and a patchwork movie that didn't quite seem to know what it was as a story or genre. Very disappointing because despite the cookie-cutter beginning, this movie had me hooked but then lost me.

Of the reviews I just read on here, it seems that no one realizes that this was based on a true story, the Pam Smart case. She was a woman who manipulated her teenage lover into murdering her husband for her, so that she could be free to pursue the life she wanted. While certain events in the movie are dramatized, from what I know, it follows what actually happened pretty closely. It's based on the book written by Joyce Maynard.

Well I tried to post with just the above written, but IMDb wouldn't let me. They said I must write a minimum of ten lines of text. So here they are. I don't know what else to say about the film really, it was so long ago that I saw it. But everyone who wrote a review it seemed evaluated it as if it were a made-up story, which it was not. It really happened. She's serving a life sentence in prison in upstate NY for the murder of her husband. True story.

I saw Central Station at a little art house theater in NYC (the Quad), and was astounded at how beautiful a picture it was. I was sobbing at the end. I told a friend about it, said that he had to come with me to see it. He asked what it was about and I told him and he wasn't at all enthusiastic about seeing it, but I dragged him anyway and at the end, sure enough, tears were streaming down his face (we were two guys in or 20s then if that says anything about how powerful this film is) and he looked at me and said "we have to see movies like this more often." I bought it on DVD and have watched it a few times since, and I think that every single time, the ending still makes me emotional, just so sad because I wanted Dora and Josue to stay friends, somehow remain in one another's life. The story, the tone of the film, the acting--everything about it meld together to create a work that is simply fascinating and beautiful in it simplicity. A rare find.