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The White Lotus (2021)
Absolutely Hilarious
Not only is the first season a fresh, brilliant comedy, but it gives us a peek at what it's like to be in the service industry. We get to see what a pain it is to serve clients at a resort.
The writing is witty, clever, shocking at times and screamingly funny. The writer really understands human nature, including teens. The acting is outstanding with fantastic casting choices.
This is an example of what can be achieved in a TV series when excellent writing, directing and acting come together.
White Lotus would make my top list of the all time best series. Very rarely is a TV show this good.
Dumplin' (2018)
Not Worth Watching
This film had some cute, endearing scenes, but for the most part was painful to watch. It had a typical liberal message to force down the audience's throats. This message was about fat acceptance. Problem with the FA movement is that being overweight is not something to celebrate or accept.
Truth is, there are deadly risks associated with being morbidly obese. My neighbor, who weighs 400 lbs and is diabetic, is currently in the hospital having her leg amputated. This is not something to aspire to.
It would have been a better film had the obese stars gone on a diet and exercise program to lose the weight for the pageant rather than defiantly keeping themselves fat.
Add to this PC theme were the Dolly Parton songs playing constantly. Made me want to tear my hair out.
The Alec Baldwin Show (2018)
He's the Trump of Talk Show Hosts
Alec Baldwin is such an egomaniac he just assumed he would be amazing as a talk show host. He was wrong. He talks too much, asks stupid questions--not the juicy ones we want to hear the answers to--then cuts off the guest in mid-sentence. He's itching to jump in and take over the conversation.
It isn't really a show about getting to know famous people, it's a platform for Alec to be on television.....and not surprisingly, it's boring.
Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath (2016)
Riveting and Revealing
It's interesting to learn about the bizarre, inner world of Scientology. Leah Remini doesn't disappoint with her interviews of former members. Here are some of the shocking revelations from this first episode:
1) Children are separated from their parents and forced to work as young as 12 yrs old. Scientology parents agree to this.
2) Rape of children (by church members) is not reported to authorities because it would make the church look bad.
3) Scientologists have to pay for their own punishments, like hours of auditing.
4) Like the Gestapo, church members rat each other out to church leadership with "Knowledge Reports." (Leah got one from Katie Holmes for her "bad" behavior at her wedding.)
5) Leah stepped into hot water with the church at Tom Cruise's wedding when she had the audacity to ask where leader David Miscavige's wife was. She apparently didn't have a high enough ranking to ask such a question.
6) The church insists their members "disconnect" from their family members who quit the church. The church member will then write fake "I'm doing great. Don't wish you were here" letters so their family won't file missing police reports on them.
7) Leah spent more than $3 million on Scientology.
8) When a member wants to quit and leave wherever they are in the org, it's like they've been kidnapped and they literally have to sneak out.
I've always thought it was a freaky organization. I've seen footage of Tom Cruise and other Scientologists saluting humongous photos of LRH, with his liver lips and blackened teeth. (The real test of a Scientologist, when LRH was alive, was how long they could withstand a one-one-one with his fetid breath.)
Leah has real guts to speak out so bluntly and candidly against such a rich, powerful, and scary organization. The church responds by disparaging her---even though when she was in active in Scientology, and giving them her hard earned cash---she received Commendations. Now that she's not a paying member, and she's revealing what it's really like to be a Scientologist, suddenly she's a big loser.
I believe her, and all the other former members, and commend them for speaking out.
Magic Mike XXL (2015)
I'm Embarrassed for the Actors
This film was so lame, badly written and just plain awful, I'm embarrassed for the poor actors. It's just sad to see such fine actors like Tatum and Manganiello reduced to having to take roles like this.
Now you could probably let the bad "story" and dialogue slide if you got to see a lot of eye candy, but no. The film is supposed to be about hot male strippers---but we rarely see any of them naked (well, in a thong, close enough)! And when we do, the lighting is so dingy, the audience would have to wear night vision goggles to make out anything. The director also miscast a huge, ugly oaf as one of the strippers. Unbelievable. We want to see prime filet naked, not Shrek! What we do see a lot of---instead of hot naked guys---are the guys fully clothed blabbering about B.S.
NOTE to future directors of male stripper movies: we want to see the hot actors naked. A. Lot. In good lighting. Thank you.
Hysteria (2014)
Boring and Lame
SPOILER ALERT: Supposed to be some kind of take on the Salem Witch trials, but it's badly done. The writing is very poor, lame plot devices, long pauses with people staring off into space, not clear about the relationship of the characters leaving the viewers to figure it out. A couple teens having seizures becomes a national panic requiring a press conference. Huh? Since when would that be even in the news?
If Amazon wants to compete with Netflix, they're going to have to do a lot better than this. (FYI writers of Hysteria: Hysteria and Conversion Disorder are not the same conditions. Might want to consult with a medical expert before you do a show about a medical/mental condition.)
Hand of God: Pilot (2014)
Painful
Watching the Hand Of God pilot was like being tortured. It was gloomy, depressing, painful, and worse---not entertaining.
SPOILER ALERT: The premise isn't great to begin with. It's about a judge who goes insane after his son shoots himself in the head, and he thinks god is talking to him through his comatose son---and he sees things no one else does. The judge gets baptized and becomes "born again" by a con artist preacher. The judge heads out to seek vengeance on the rapist of his daughter-in-law with his "god/son" giving him pointers along the way, like having blood crawl in the direction of the rapist. Ugh.
I'm admittedly not a big fan of the character-seeing-things-that-aren't-there style of story telling. The only show that pulled that off successfully was Rescue Me.
Extant (2014)
One of the Worst Series on TV
Even Halle Berry can't save this lame, cliché, just plain awful series.
The pilot started with an interesting premise, and grabbed my attention, but the show quickly became predictable and not at all believable. There are so many things that don't add up. In addition, the characters don't behave normally. Their behavior is so abnormal at times it's almost laughable.
SPOILER ALERT: For instance, when Ethan, the only human-like robot child in existence gets a bomb planted in him by the skeezy boyfriend of one of his developers, you'd think everyone would be frantic to disarm it. Nope. They stand around wringing their hands, but don't call the bomb squad. And let's not get started on how this terrorist leader boyfriend was allowed free and unfettered access to this very unique. one-of-kind robot to put a bomb inside him. It's not believable, and it's lazy storytelling.
This show just needs to be canceled already.
The Counselor (2013)
Barely Worth Watching
All the A-list talent in this movie is wasted in a sea of confusing, abstract dialogue and an odd, slow moving storyline.
At times the dialogue is fantastic, other times bizarre, as if it were written by more than one person and one of them doesn't know how actual people speak to one another. It was boring (and not believable) to have a drug cartel head lecturing the main character at length about existentialism. Somehow I just can't picture Pablo Escobar blathering to an individual he's not happy with that the person has "crossed over" from "one world to another." A lot of the dialogue left the viewer wondering, "Huh? Say what?"
I gave it 4 stars because it has some of the most unique and brutal killing scenes in a film.
Megan Is Missing (2011)
One of The Worst Movies I've Ever Seen---In My Entire Life
This is supposed to be based on actual events surrounding the disappearance of two teen girls. The director, Michael Goi claimed to have researched the case and used actual "computer files" to reconstruct the scenes.
Everything about this movie is terrible, the writing, the acting, the directing, even the lighting.
The actors stare directly into the camera all the time, and talk to it. When they have scenes together, there were supposedly Skyping, and the screen was split, again showing them talking to the camera. Aside from the oddness of having the actors talking to the camera instead of each other, teens don't Skype, they text. But that's just one of the many things fundamentally wrong with this film.
This movie is a good example for film students of what not to do.