Critical Commentary - "Hollywood"

The latest blockbusting, binge-worthy series from Netflix is "Hollywood" which began streaming last week.  The creative force behind this series is Emmy Award winning  producer/director/writer Ryan Murphy, who gave us "Feud", the terrifically stylish and trashy limited series about Bette Davis and Joan Crawford a few years back.  That was enough to peak my curiosity about "Hollywood."  Yes it was stylish, yes, it was trashy, and yes it was quite entertaining, and I watched all seven episodes over a period of three days.

It tells the stories of young people - four actors, a director, and a screenwriter - trying to make it in Hollywood in the period immediately after World War II.  It also gives what can be called, and this is a huge understatement, an alternate history of how Hollywood has dealt with such issues as race and gay lifestyles over the years.  No doubt the frankness with which some of these issues are dealt will turn many people off of this series.  Some will also choose to make a political issue over it, so to those people I say, just don't watch it.  C'est le vie.

The main characters - the kids trying to make it - were pretty much unknown to me.  They are David Corenswet, Darren Criss, Laura Harrier, Jake Picking, Samara Weaving, and Jeremy Pope.  

Harrier, Corenswet, Criss, Pope, Weaving

The young stars of "Hollywood"

All were attractive, engaging, and quite good in their roles.  In other key supporting roles, however, were a bunch of older actors such as Patti LuPone, Holland Taylor, Dylan McDermott, Rob Reiner, Mira Sorvino, and Queen Latifah.  At least two of them, LuPone and Taylor, deserve Emmy consideration for their work in this one, I believe.

Also playing a huge role in this one was Jim Parsons, best known as Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory.  Parsons obviously wanted to break from his Sheldon character by 180 degrees, and he succeeded in doing so.  Playing a gay and sleazy Hollywood  agent and fixer, Parsons was the guy that everyone hated, including  us in the viewing audience.  He played the part so broadly and flamboyantly that it verged on caricature, and it was hard to take him seriously, until, that is, the last half of the seventh and final episode.  His scene at that point with Rock Hudson, whom he had demeaned and exploited throughout the series, was very good and had a lot of depth.  Enough to make you say, this guy is a pretty good actor.

The series includes portrayals of real Hollywood people, Rock Hudson being the most critical one to this story, but others include Anna May Wong, Hattie McDaniel, Tallulah Bankhead, Vivian Leigh, George Cukor, and Noel Coward.

"Hollywood" is a trashy soap opera about, well, Hollywood, but it was stylish and beautiful to look at and had its fun, scenery chewing moments.   It gets Two and One-half Stars from The Grandstander.

Movie Review - "The Highwaymen"

In the ever-changing paradigm of how movies are delivered to the movie going public these days, at least in  the world that includes Netflix, "The Highwaymen" was released to selected theaters last March (I don't believe it ever reached a movie theater in Pittsburgh), then withdrawn two weeks later and made available only to subscribers of Netflix.  I can recall hearing some positive reviews of the movie at the time, so last night, this new Netflix subscriber decided to watch it.

The movie is billed, as you can see in the picture above, as "the untold true story" of "the legends who took down Bonnie & Clyde."  The two legends in question are a couple of aging put-out-to-pasture Texas Rangers named Frank Hamer and Maney Gualt, played by Kevin Costner and Woody Harrelson, who are called upon by Texas Governor Miriam "Ma" Henderson, the governor who disbanded the Rangers and replaced it with more modern police and investigators who used more up-to-date methods in tracking down criminals and preserving the peace.  Well, these modern guys were having no luck back in 1934 halting the murderous reign off terror being brought about by the infamous Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, so Henderson (Kathy Bates)  reluctantly agrees to authorize Hamer and Gualt as "highwaymen" to capture and, hopefully, kill Bonnie and Clyde, and makes it clear that she is not all that concerned with pesky little details like due process of law.  So old-timers Costner and Harrelson are off and running using methods that will make Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry Callahan look like some bleeding-heart sissy pinko.  The New York Times review of the movie called is "Grumpy Old Men meet Bonnie & Clyde."

This is a movie that sounded like it could be a lot of fun, but I found it slow moving and at times almost ponderous.  It was kind of fun watching Costner and Harrelson playing the old guys who, if they are now unable trying to chase down a teen-aged kid on foot anymore, they can still kick the asses of bad guys when the need arises.  

Bonnie and Clyde (Emily Brobst and Edward Bossert) are more like MacGuffins in this one rather than full blown characters and are seen full face on in only the climactic scene of the movie.  Unlike 1967's classic "Bonnie and Clyde" with Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway, this movie is told strictly from the lawmen's point of view.  In both movies, the criminals are seen as Robin Hood-type heroes by the downtrodden folks of Depression Era America ("Did Robin Hood ever murder someone in cold blood for four dollars and a tank of gas?"), and - spoiler alert! - Bonnie and Clyde come to a similar end in this one as they did back in 1967.

As another review I read stated, the story of "The Highwaymen" may tell a story closer to the truth than did "Bonnie and Clyde", but that doesn't mean that it's a better movie.  The Grandstander agrees and gives this one only Two Stars.

A couple of historical footnotes: 

• Not sure if this is true or not, but it is said that at one point, Hollywood kicked around the idea of telling the story of Hamer and Gualt with Paul Newman and Robert Redford playing the parts.
• The "Bonnie and Clyde" 1967 version is not available on Netflix.  If you want to know the story of the demise of the Barrow Gang, Netflix will only give you their version.
• Not long after the events portrayed in this movie, the Texas Rangers were reconstituted and still exist today.
• In the interest of historical accuracy, here is a picture of the real Bonnie and Clyde.  Beatty and Dunaway, they ain't!

What We Are Watching On TV

In the past week, we have committed to throwing ourselves into several streaming television series.  

The first was Amazon's "Modern Love". Eight episodes that we have already finished.  Really delightful take on varied forms of love and romance in a contemporary setting. We found it thoroughly delightful.

Next came Season 2 of "Jack Ryan", also on Amazon. We've been waiting for this one ever since we devoured Season 1 a year ago in about three days. The first episode promises more of the same slam bang action.

Yesterday I re-upped for Netflix (get the first month for free!) as Season 3 of "The Crown" debuted last night.  As followers know, Claire Foy has been replaced by Oscar winner Olivia Coleman as Queen Elizabeth II to show a "more mature monarch" (or the Queen as an "old bat", as she herself stated in Episode 1) as the time frame has shifted to 1964. Other cast members have also been replaced, most notably Helena Bonham Carter as Princess Margaret. The actors playing Phillip and others have also been replaced, but, honestly, who cares about them? Episode 1 was excellent and the new season promises to be a good one.

So far, we have watched only one episode each of "Jack Ryan" and "The Crown." We are going to try to savor these rather than devour them in only three or four sittings Wish us good luck with that.  

We also gave Amazon's "Fleabag" a try, although we are two seasons behind on this Emmy Award winning series. Have only seen one episode thus far, but it was enough to make us want to revisit it and give it a shot.

And, of course, we are very anxious to catch the new season of "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel" when it returns to Amazon next month.

Lots of good TV viewing in the weeks ahead.

Martin Scorsese, Marvel Movies, and Changing Paradigms

Martin Scorsese, undoubtedly one of the great movie directors of this or any other generation, is much in the news these days for a couple of reasons.  One, is the release of his new film, "The Irishman", a three and one half hour epic centering around the death of Jimmy Hoffa.  The movie stars Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, and Joe Pesci and is one of the most highly anticipated films of the year.

The second reason revolves around a comment made by Scorsese in a recent interview.  When asked about the popularity and preponderance of movies based on Marvel comic books, he responded by saying that they weren't for him.  I've tried them, he said, but "they are not really cinema."  This created a firestorm of response from both the creators of and fans of the comic book flicks, and the controversy was exacerbated when fellow filmmakers Francis Ford Coppola  and Steven Spielberg jumped in and agreed with Scorsese.  "Not really cinema" they agreed while looking down their noses. 

Normally, I would tend to brush off these comments and say something like "Let Scorsese yell at the clouds.  He's earned a right to his opinion" and go on my way.  However, I feel the need to opine on this, and it revolves around the production and distribution plan for "The Irishman."

The movie was produced by Netflix, and if you haven't been paying attention, this streaming service has gotten heavily into the production of top shelf feature films over the past few years as programming for its subscription service, which is fine.  Netflix also thinks that these films should qualify for Academy Awards. (Something that Spielberg, I believe, has lobbied heavily against.)  In order to qualify, films must be shown in actual  movie theaters, or "cinemas", if you will, in either New York or Los Angeles, during the calendar year.  So, Netflix, presumably with Scorsese's blessing, began a very limited release of "The Irishman" last week and it will expand a bit this week (not even sure if it will be on a theater screen in Pittsburgh)  and then it will be pulled from movie theaters, I believe, in the third week of November. After that, the only way you will be able to see "The Irishman" will be via streaming on Netflix.

So, while Scorsese may sneer at popular films like the Marvel comic book franchise, he is okay knowing that most people will only see his latest masterpiece on their home TVs, laptops, iPads, or four inch telephone screens?  Where is the cinematic value in that?  Maybe this is the way of the future for full length motion pictures, and if so, give the 76 year old Scorsese credit for recognizing and embracing this new paradigm, but don't do so and then look down on other popular movies and labeling them as so much mindless trash.  The truth of the matter is that while Marvel movies may never win Oscars or make Ten Best lists, the hundreds of millions of dollars that they rake in at the box office allow the doors of actual, honest-to-God movie theaters to remain open and in business, and that is no small thing, and auteurs like Scorsese, Coppola, and Spielberg should be glad of that.

Full disclosure:  I am not a Marvel Movies person myself.  Just not my cup of tea, but good for them and the movie going public that does enjoy them. Also, I can't wait to see "The Irishman", even if it will mean becoming a Netflix subscriber once again.  One good thing abut these services, you can cancel them and come back to them at your convenience.  I was going to re-up anyway once Season Three of "The Crown" becomes available.