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susanelizabethbaker
Reviews
The Darkest Hour (2011)
Dismal at best
There have been so many movies (and even T.V. shows) involving "Winnie" Churchill, have involved stirring visuals, stirring speeches, but I just want to direct you to the IMDB writer who decided that this was best reported as a 2011 release (The Darkest Hour(2011)) because, let's face it, a bad re-creation of Churchill standing down is just the beginning of the madness.
Pick another movie about WWII. Almost any other movie about WWII. Some of my favorites include The Great Escape, The Great Dictator. and Casablanca, but ymmv.
While You Were Sleeping (1995)
Subversively calming
It's a screw-ball romantic comedy worthy of all of the heritage of the genre.
Having said that, it's also a pleasant antidote to war porn masquerading as "high art" and to actual porn, because it's a wonderful reflection on the importance of kindness in the world.
Sandra Bullock is delightful, 'natch. Bill Pullman is enchanting, and Peter Gallagher is... engaging... as a man in a coma.
Watch this is you just want to find a speck of decency in a scary world.
Vikings (2013)
What a crock of (fill in the blankness of the emptiness of faux-Odin and faux fighting...)
I binge-watched for a week because I've been sick in bed, this week before Christmas, and, now that I'm getting better, the realization of just how hollow and perfunctory the tropes are, I'm ashamed that I thought it might be.
Others have noted that it lacks "historical" merit.
When I was at my worst with pneumonia, I laughed until I almost choked with Pneumonia because I saw a zipper pull. So, yeah! to those who disdain its historiocity.
When I felt desire to live, it flagged in front of sexual acrobatics that made me feel cheapened by watching.
When I began to feel better, the battles fought purely for "victory" (because, let's be honest, where is the victory, where is the "honor" in lying in a sick bed), feeling ashamed of being reduced to watching badly choreographed "battles" that are sped up so that the sound track -- imagine, if you can, watching "violent" scenes without a sound track -- then try it for this show.
I can guarantee that you'll start laughing at a bunch of the "sounds" you took for "violent hits" and will start to see how the actors survive from one episode to the next.
This show isn't about gods or "destiny."
It's about glorifying a forgotten ideal of race that I know quite well, for my parents were also Brunhilde and Loki, but I have forsaken both for...
... the real world and... wikipedia.