peterquennell

In 2022-23 Netflix stock price dropped by 3/4 after rocketing up eight times in the previous five years. The drop happened after this muddled, historically incorrect movie and similar were put online.

It added to a growing perception among stock analysts and the sharper IMDB reviewers here that Netflix efforts were becoming Hallmark-Lite or Lifetime-lite just when real competition between streaming services was setting in.

Since then Netflix seems to be trying for better writing and better direction and its stock is creeping back up. So the 1-2-3 star reviews here (which I rarely add to, but often read) sometimes do producers a good turn!

By the way, Kelly McDonald, put in a ridiculous position here, is a fine actress with some great parts in her past. She was very moving in "The Decoy Bride".

Well-written episode, again with news-you-can-use on an industry or sport, like the wine-making.

As with other produce and wines, some of the NZ seafood is a big seller around NYC here and farmed King salmon (broiled: must be broiled to a crisp!) does well in top restaurants - dont try it or you could be hooked for life!

The salmon is not in all the fish selling stores and is not cheap, but the Korean SuperH's etc always have it in stock. It was in Costco but went away. We've checked out a bit about how it is farmed, in Cook Strait, in huge nets, and the colorful industry that vies for the rights.

NZ has a huge and varied coastline (1/3 as long as Australia's coast) with endless empty beaches, some of which we have cruised by car, and this look compels us to think of seeing more.

In this episode we see how mussels are farmed and lobster (okay crayfish) get caught and readied to fly out toward us. One seafood manager says two tons of mussels were due to fly out the next day. A great industry as dairy and sheep come down from their peaks.

Very impressively cast, with strong characters, and the perp caught us totally unawares. One woman with a scar (Kate McGill) which is explained near the end had an especially touching arc. Well played.

And kudos to the 4-5 who played obnoxious. I always admire that. Someone should create a special award for them.

1. There seems to have been some successful retooling and re-energizing by creators Alibi and PBS (see also Van Der Valk and Vienna Blood for successful mid-course corrects), perhaps in response to feedback perhaps not, but all really very nice. An intelligent and now even more likeable show.

2. Old-town Belgrade where this is filmed continues to look just great, on a par with old-town Dublin, Dubrovnik and Prague I'd say (with the UN I worked in each). The river Danube in the background in Episode 6 is one of the world's more spectacular, think The Thames plus-plus.

3. The late-Victorian era in London proved to have been even more well-picked, after the worst era which Charles Dickens helped to move beyond, and when technologies generally and the telephone and crime solving techniques in particular were bubbling up. And where smart women really were elbowing their way in - check out Silvia Pankhurst, on whom a movie or series is overdue; though younger, she would have been Eliza's "cup of tea".

4. With The Duke thankfully off the scene (Stuart Martin is a fine actor but the jealous-angry old-school arc is not a career-booster for sure; maybe he is thanking his lucky stars!), Kate Phillips's Miss Scarlet was far more relaxed and less full of angst, and her stuck-in-the-mud love-life was pushed to the rear. No less remorseless of course, a proto robocop always going the extra mile.

5. To this end, the light quizzical exchanges with agency owner Mr Nash (Felix Scott) and his progressive attitudes always helped. Perhaps the most emotional scene of the whole series came in Episode 6 when Eliza declared him her truest friend, the only friend who always thought she could make it, and stopped him shooting the perp (who was shot anyway, haha!).

6. Also to this end, the really inspired Episode 3 ("Origins" with the charismatic and sunny actress Laura Marcus as Young Eliza) really hit home how idealistic, self-starting and smart Eliza was when she first got the detecting bug, and to which persona she is now maybe headed back.

7. Eliza friends Ivy (Cathy Beeton) and Mr Potts (Simon Ladders) are sure-fire bets for a laugh, and often moved the story along.

8. DS Phelps (Tim Chipping) is a real monster in the old-school "non-com officer" way! Well done that he never ever lets up, never blinks. Young "sprog" Detective Fitzroy (Evan McCabe) is a well conceived polar opposite, never funnier than when he is putting his dad's "knickers in a twist".

9. And finally, the inspired new Clarence (Paul Bazely), a very, very smart clerk with a conscience (which Eliza in robocop mode usually sends up in a puff of smoke), who lights up the screen whenever he is on.

10. Finally, every inside & outside set goes the extra mile, really well done to sets & props managers. The rooms and furniture are almost invariably fine. There is so much interesting stuff on the floors & tables & walls, sometimes we wind back a minute or two with the sound off simply to take it all in. Who knows, they may be clues. :-)

Sylvia Constance Ashton-Warner (who died in 1984, 23 years after this movie was made) in large part actually lived this story herself: she taught in mostly-Maori schools where inspectors and rules were somewhat lax and thus she had latitude to innovate.

Both in NZ and North America and elsewhere she came to be regarded as brilliant. To quote from an American review of the book: "Sylvia Aston-Warner was a brilliant teacher and her innovative approach to teaching Maori children is as valid today as it was when it was first demonstrated in 1965. I used this system of teaching early reading. Not only in my Kindergarten and First Grade classrooms but also with my children and grandchildren. It is particularly useful for children who do not immediately respond to other methods of teaching reading such as totally phonetic or whole language approaches. It can easily be included as a quick and easy supplement to any reading program. This is a particularly valid approach to underprivileged and resource-deprived classrooms."

The movie's resemblance to the real NZ and its people and their looks and accents is almost non-existent, as other reviews have rightly decried. One big tell is the lurid colors: NZ is closer to the sun especially in summer than the northern hemisphere ever is, and the intense sunlight is somewhat white and bleaching, so lurid is a rarity.

A pity the film had to be made on a Hollywood backlot and the NZ look and main theme of the book was somewhat trampled on; Sylvia Constance Ashton-Warner deserved better. Nine stars to maybe encourage a teacher or two to make a beeline for her much superior books.

First movie that I saw either lead in, so it sticks. The Riviera never looked so good before or since, and I've appreciated the leads often in their other films. Plus the chicken tied the police up in knots and we got a fun funeral and a fun flower-market fight.

However, having paid my dues, I suggest there is a good reason to resuscitate Hitch and get this aspect straight. WHY were Bertani (Robie's friend) and Danielle (Robie's fancier) and Foussard (Danielle's pegleg dad) doing what they did?

It was putting quite unkind pressure on Robie's old crew, the kitchen team, and provoking Robie to come looking for them. By the end one was dead, and two were frogmarched off.

Was Robie simply living too high on the hog from the gang's ill-gotten gains while the others were still mere dishwashers and such? Hitch?

*** Okay, spoiler: the book differs slightly, there it all makes sense. The gang formed in the WWII resistance, then all helped set up the steals, then were all caught and out on parole, then Robie used some of them to nail the new cat. The three were just in it for themselves, not deliberately setting Robie up. Victimless crimes in a way, as the insurance always paid out.

Two actors to die for; what could possibly go wrong?!

Well, something did. The 1972 gross was around $43m in modern values, whereas the 2007 gross was less than $5m. It was reported that the 2007 director and leads had expected another hit, and were rather shocked at the poor box office and reviews.

So many reviews here explain how the original really did get it right and that thus, enough was enough. Several more distinctions to note:

1. Class warfare: Lord Olivier generally played amused nobs, and in 1972 he was again an amused nob. Michael Caine generally played obstreperous cockneys, and in 1972 he was again an obstreperous cockney. They were clearly enjoying the class warfare, and when at the end one popped off, it was accidental and left the other clearly distraught. This went out the window in 2007: the much-loved cockney actor not very convincingly played a nob, and the much-in-demand actor who often plays professionals and semi-nobs (Ripley, Holiday, Side Effects, Spy) not very convincingly played... a cockney actor, down on his luck?!

2. Age credibility: the mano-a-mano was over a girl, seemingly not too separated from the hairdresser/actor's age. In 1972 the cockney actor was 39, and the nob actor was a just-believable 65; a difference of 26 years. Sort of okay. Whereas in 2007 the cockney actor was just 35 while the nob actor was 75: a hard-to believe difference of 40 years; the nob was more than twice as old. This changed the nature of the warfare a lot; a tiresome generational thing. No wonder we never got to see the girl, that would have really rubbed it in.

3. Creepy ultra-modern house: Haven't these been a bit done to death? In some they are vital to the plot (Automata) but here? The 1972 house was pure fun, the 2007 house anything but. In fact several 2007 critic reviews complained that even for a stay of only 80 minutes, the claustrophobic windowless set really got on their nerves.

So wasn't it surprising that nobody saw failure in the wind - forsaw cinema-goers staying away in droves? Love you, Law & McCain; but Pinter and Branagh (as a director) not so much.

Deeply haunting, with a justified 8.9 rating as of this moment. Four gripping main arcs (see below) with fine casts, some state-of-the-art and humane team police-work, vivid locations, and a certain social value, though left murky is where the inadequate "system" should go from here.

There is also quite a loose-ends count, caused primarily by muchos time assigned to extraneous issues of Cassie, her father and son, and Sunny, all tangential to this investigation, which could have been moved to less-packed episodes. Some actors and their personas really were owed more detailed resolutions, more happy landings than we saw.

(1) Sara, a Moslem victim: Hauntingly played by a stoic Badria Timimi (her agent should please upload a good photo and full bio to the Pro area here) in the least resolved outcome, with an excellent Hassan Mahmoud as kind husband, plus three kids, an errant father, a Moslem community and a school-board committee. Given that her teenage history leaks out: How did she off the guy in the drifting sailing boat? Does her ticked off son come full circle? She had been exploited by some others than Walker: do they walk? What of the new steady-state of the middle eastern community? Does she get a better women's space in the mosque? And top unresolved plot points: Is she ever told that she is no longer under threat? And does she get the new headmistress job or doesn't she - continue her vital work?

(2) Colin, a lawyer (public defender?) and ex financial wizard by a fine Mark Bonnar, a non-gay who struck a nice one for gays: What happened to his blackmailers? How was the "suicide" hanging in a forest achieved? Did he and the boyfriend get to keep the attractive little adoptee or foster child? Was everyone at his former employers put right about a trumped up rape charge? Did he keep his law license? And top unresolved plot point: Is he ever told that he is no longer under threat? But big pluses: of the gang of three, he was the one that explained most vividly to Cassie what the three (and by extension tens of thousands of others) had had to live through. And he could probably stick to his vital work.

(3) Marion, a cancer nurse, by a compelling Rosie Cavaliero: What was the final state of her husband, her supervisor, and her enabler mother? Why a suitcase and no attempt at faking a suicide? How did she get him into it and transport it? Why a shallow river? And top unresolved plot point: Is she ever told that she is no longer under threat? But big pluses: her pet patient might perhaps live, and the scorching u-turn of her sister (wow) when the revelations finally hit home. And she could probably stick to her vital work.

(4) Walker's ex wife and enabler by a steely Lorraine Ashbourne. Did she get to keep her police job? Get away with her enabling? Get her son (Will Brown) back, after putting him through a 180? She seemed to get off too lightly, though her excuse that the 80s were a free-for-all on easy victims was a minor plus.

I've seen Nicola Walker play a similar type on Broadway; in smart lead-from-behind and empathy, she has carved out an impressive niche. Sanjeev Bhaskar makes a likeable and loyal #2. Caroline Main, Lewis Reeves, and Jordan Long (is he funny or what?!) are shrewed supporting investigators. Andy Wilson is a talented, fast-paced director. And Chris Lang is maybe the best script-writer on humanity & crime; he goes the extra mile on modern investigation methods, but might watch the pesky loose ends. :-)

Smart fast story. Funny chatter. Fine actors. Joan Blondell. And NYC. What's not to like?!

When I was transferred to NYC several decades ago I thought: a year or two should do it here, and then I'm gone. But it grows and grows on one, the crowds and Broadway and museums and on and on, and it's hard to be away for long. Over 1m visitors a week - and most want exactly a taste of this. I actually liked the lead guy here. To the non-New-Yorker he may seem over the top, but everybody gravitates toward that manner a bit, and he was a familiar type.

Pretty funny and relevant here is the whole movie-making-business arc. Begun in Brooklyn by Jews largely excluded from main business and clubs, and next to some huge studios across the Hudson from 175th Street at Fort Lee. (A large funfare, Palisades, was also there and ferries did a roaring trade.) Then the migration to Hollywood, 7-8 days away by train - and what do the producers do? Make movies on the backlots by the ton - taking place in New York! Where most of the producers were from - and Joan Blondell too.

The monopoly phone company was Bell Labs. The operator jobs there look like fun. The Bell Labs building still stand, in a straight line several blocks south of the High Line Park. The elevated tracks and trains continued south of where the High Line ends now (by the Whitney Museum) and the trains ran right through the building's edge. Many shots of this on the web.

Both segments watched on the Passport streaming service. A fascinating well-filmed freerunning sport, not too-well known in the US. A laid-back Marc Warren, funny and smart in the role. Two likeable, photogenic new members on the team, Django Chan-Reeves and Azan Ahmed, with impressive brains. Rita Bernard-shaw (British) and Simone Giel (Dutch) impressively good in their roles. Some spectacular Amsterdam scenery, especially from drones, the shore of the huge inland IJmeer (slightly below sea level) was used well. Amsterdam looked wealthy and well-run. Dutch systems were made to look good, not the case always in Series 1. And contrary to some "Its all about me-me-me!" 1, 2 and 3 star reviews on the main page, the Pro level of IMDB describes extensive Dutch professionals' help. What's not to like?!

As all involved knew, Series 1 (made under COVID restrictions) was a miss. Van Der Valk barely spoke, and seemed to hate his whole team. Amsterdam looked like a place to avoid.

In contrast Series 2 had exceptionally cool, witty dialogue, and menace in spades. And with the extensive use of drones, vibrant Amsterdam was really on show. The shore of the huge inland IJmeer (slightly below sea level) was used well, and is not something that most visitors see. And Marc Warren became human (who knew?!).

Series 3 is shaping up even better (it is already all on the excellent PBS Passport). The first story of S3 was about freerunning (an actual sport) that caught us by surprise. It twisted and turned, and the credible outcome worked out fine.

Dutch systems are made to look good. Detection methods were improved in S2 and are impressive in the first episodes of S3.

S3 is especially boosted by some excellent casting. Marc Warren remains likeable, managerial, and often great fun. Now we also have the beautiful, enigmatic Django Chan-Reeves, and the supersmart Azan Ahmed; between them with their skills and their emerging backstories they could make a watchable spinoff show.

Only Maimie McCoy now is let down by the writing. She incessantly smirks, sneers at all suspects and witnesses (as if that is good method!), and gets things wrong too often. Plus she is given an unfunny habit of needling Piet. Chris Murray, do give her a makeover please?

Finally, in S3 E1 and E2, the nail-biting running sport was filmed spectacularly. And Rita Bernard-shaw (British) and Simone Giel (Dutch), as they needed to be, were compelling; nicely done.

By the way, contrary to the ridiculous "It's all about me-me-me!" 1, 2 and 3 star reviews, the Pro area of IMDB describes heavy Dutch involvement in producing this. It strengthens the industry and opens the way to selling purely Dutch-made shows.

The original Morse series with John Thaw won 9 BAFTAs and was nominated for 12 more. This prequel series (which was longer) not so many - in fact, none at all.

In understanding why BAFTA voters passed on this, it helps to have in mind a really good prequel as a model, as well as an acquaintance with the real Oxford - which is almost exclusively a university town, not exactly riddled with factories or nightclubs or gangs.

One of the very best prequels, ever, was the three-part "Prime Suspect: Tennison" of 2017. This series starred Stefanie Martini, and the main series from 1991 to 2006 had starred Helen Mirren. Both were written by Lynda La Plante.

Many viewers gave up on "Tennison" after parts one or two. Many critics gave the series a low rating after parts one or two, presuming it was pussy-footing, or wandering, or not sufficiently bleak or tough, or not the makings of a brilliant cop.

They really jumped the gun. Something happened in the third episode that was absolutely jaw-dropping, and quite brilliantly Stefanie Martini morphed into Helen Mirren before our eyes.

A flawless segue, which set things up for years down the road.

In the Morse prequel, Shaun Evans seems perversely to not want to morph into John Thaw, flawlessly or not. And he did a lot of the directing as well as the starring, so presumably nobody else on the team felt comfortable remarking on his take.

John Thaw's Morse really WAS Oxford. A university don persona, habitually amiable, frequently quite funny, and professor-level smart. He was authentically into high culture, and had numerous academics friends.

In contrast, Shaun Evans remained the incessant outsider, humorless, self-absorbed, and gloomy, with few or no friends who fits in poorly with the real Oxford.

While the original series elevated Oxford, this prequel diminished it. Abigail Thaw and Roger Allam and Anton Lesser all went through the motions commendably. Eight stars only for them.

Likeable film. Colorful, funny, fast... and the sunny Janet Leigh! She always makes me laugh. Tony Curtis also tends to be fun.

Many critics' reviews and comments here have the accents wrong. They either knock or apologize for Tony Curtis's accent. Nobody seems quite sure what authority to quote.

"Do You Speak American?" is maybe the best source on this. That is a PBS series now all on YouTube, and a book, by the former PBS anchor Robert MacNeil. He had traveled back and forth between parts of the UK and parts of the US, to show how regional British dialects had crossed the Atlantic, and even now remain intact.

It is the "received pronunciation" or "Queen's English" in the UK used by almost all the actors here EXCEPT Tony Curtis that has evolved - a lot - in just the past 100-plus years. Nobody back then spoke English like the actors all wrongly do here.

See also "How Americans preserved British English" on the website of the BBC.

Not before time! Nicola Walker is pretty well known in NYC here, she was in a major Broadway hit with Mark Strong where her intensity went right through the roof and then some. While there were no Shakespeare-type asides with the audience in that play, they are quite common and welcome for their humor and thoughts-sharing on Broadway (eg in the Lehman Trilogy) and it's no surprise that Nicola Walker excels at them. Big plus there.

Other pluses in the first episode: (1) Silvie Furneaux as the sardonic daughter, reminiscent of Chloë Grace Moretz, Hailee Steinfeld, and Hermione Corfield; (2) James Silvie as the slightly disgruntled #2 in the team who classily concedes that Annika beat him to a key point; (3) Katie Leung and Ukweli Roach as the eager two others on the team, doing some funny gun-jumping; (4) Sardonic Boss Lady; (5) news-you-can-use about commercial fishing, whales, harpoons, and pigeons; (6) musical and easy-to-understand Scottish accents, and (7) trips hither and thither in boats and cars, in settings of real beauty.

So what's not to like here?! UK etc episode ratings on IMDB for S01 crept up from just north of 7.0 for E01 to just south of 9.0 for E06 suggesting this fresh series could become a regular. The self-absorbed grumps desperate to tell the rest of us why they switched off after 10 minutes are long gone.

The "nothing happens, quite boring really" line in "Grand Hotel" in 1932 was one of the funniest ever, in any movie, as a LOT had happened subversively. (It was a very funny line also in "Adventures In Babysitting" which this movie slightly resembles.) Watched carefully, a LOT happens here.

We see a proud but despondent skilled carpenter down on his luck in part through his own fault who ends up in a seriously better situation after 48 hours - he has got his valuable tools back, fixed a house and a car, maybe pushed back on his addiction, ended up on better terms with his ex-wife (and really nice husband though wrong as a mentor for the boy), and won serious lifelong respect from his son.

But it's the son's arc that is so unusual and difficult to convey in a film and so well done here. A real deflection point. He starts off repressed, by a micromanaging mom and priest, and one can imagine a future where he has a staid and unchallenging career and life, and humanity reaps zero advances from his time on Earth.

But then he gets exposed to the ingenuity and fearless drive of his dad, who time and again makes a big deal out of things done really well, and by the end he really has the mindset he needed to go his own way and achieve a lot - presumably in the direction of science, which gets a lot of respect here.

There will be other inflection points, which almost all readers here will have experienced too (think back!), but this was the really big deal - the movie might to its advantage have been called "The Inflection Point" in fact.

Nice to see the working class face of Vancouver, which is an exceptionally beautiful city in parts, and to see so many excellent actors, some playing less than likable roles. The moving scene with the actual purloiner of the tools and his desperate and sad little family was a real jolt, in showing how cruel the world can be if those deflection points don't work out.

Bob Nelson says something really important here. Humanity could use more of the same.

Framed correctly (as Lionsgate really didn't) this is perhaps the most significant of all of the many films involving UK royalty. It captures quite vividly the start of a once-in-a-millenium sea-change. The vital initiative of MINGLING. It was not Diana and then Harry & Meghan who began this. It was George VI (with his close buddy Churchill) during WWII, and then Princess Elizabeth from shortly before the time of this movie, and then the Duke of Edinburgh, who initiated the heavy lifting. For decades Elizabeth mingled, with up to 1000 groups and communities and enterprises a year - many far from the UK - praising their worth and enforcing their connectedness. Socially and economically this really mattered. Diana and Harry & Meghan meant well, but their own mingling was rather rudderless. No wonder "Elizabeth" in the movie's very last frames is so joyfully empowered and magnetic. She had just brought a severely depressed airman back from the brink. She knows now that she can mingle purposefully. An inspired and actually not-so-lightweight movie.

This cruel and irresponsible story left me feeling saddened for all three of the fine leads - to their credit, none later seemed proud of it. Probably not the writers either! The Hollywood morals police of that era were telling them this, that if a divorce was to represent a happy outcome, there'd need to be plenty of nastiness in the marriage to justify it.

Take a look at these five illogicalities and three back-stories. See if you agree.

Illogicality #1. That the several slight clues to the Kay Francis character being a monster would be adequate grounds for divorce by the (vague) ending of the movie. But the varying state divorce laws back then (no "fault-frees") were mostly very tough, and for a good reason. They were intentionally protective of the wife, who was unlikely to get a high paying job and likely to have to support any children alone with zero help from any welfare. This movie left it unlikely that any court would see the husband - the Cary Grant character - as the loser, even though there were no children (for reasons not explained, though the Kay Francis character did have a separate bedroom, hint-hint).

Illogicality #2. In real life, divorce does seem to have been acceptable and seen as possible and not to be frowned on by all three of the leads. All three were married multiple times (Carole Lombard twice, Kay Francis three times, Cary Grant five times, total 10 times) and all would have known that done fairly divorce in the US right then was not so impossible. In the movie there's mention of a divorce route via the Reno Nevada courts; one problem with a no-fault divorce in Reno (which saw hotels built for the purpose) is that there was a 6 week residency requirement. But divorces were also possible in Connecticut, where this story was set (just northwest of Yale) based most frequently on adultery or on separation. The Cary Grant character could easily have long paved the way to either of these grounds, long before he ever even knew the Carole Lombard character existed (the wannabee girlfriend did hint at a history of adultery).

Illogicality #3. That the Cary Grant character had any reason to be so shrill so much of the time (a first & last for him?!), unless of course the Kay Francis character was denying him sex and an heir (see #1 above). There had long been a quite simple way available for him to better his situation and lighten his mood: move into the cottage at the other end of the garden (instead of selling it, which in the movie led to him buying it back), thus paving the way to separation as grounds for divorce.

Illogicality #4. That the seeming scheming and cool-headed Kay Francis character (looking like a wife anyone would be proud of) would write such a weird and dangerous letter to her former boyfriend; or that the letter we saw on the screen would have driven him to suicide - the number of men out there alive or dead as jilted lovers and suicidal victims seems a tiny fraction of despondent women. Also that her character would say those incriminating words at the movie's end to anyone, let alone the Carole Lombard character, who would then have conveyed them instantly to the Cary Grant character (they were likely still not grounds for divorce though).

Illogicality #5. That the fairly laid-back Carole Lombard character would fall for such frantic courting by someone with obvious anger issues and zero interest in his day-job. Or that she would not ever have qualms over the Kay Francis character being cast off despite the multiple blunt warnings of her risking ostracization. Or that she would not fear ending up as Divorce Victim #2 not so many years down the road. Or that she could have no objection to some of the cruel things spoken right in front of her small daughter.

Backstory #1. Via things they had in common with the fine "Thin Man" actor, William Powell, Carole Lombard and Kay Francis were close friends. Carole Lombard had been married to Powell (they separated amicable; she then married Clark Gable) and Kay Francis had done six successful movies with Powell. Lombard is presumed to have done this against-type movie to give her a shot at an Oscar; this was the only time she ever tried that one.

Backstory #2. Kay Francis was the highest paid of all actresses in the first half of the 1930s - Carole Lombard, Deanna Durbin and several others later followed suit as the new wave of high earners. The "box office poison" story which made a victim of Kay Francis had an extremely nasty origin. The independent theater owners were being hit with a financial double whammy - studios owning their own theaters; and the Great Depression. So the independent owners got behind an ad intended to ruin the negotiating powers of most of the top-paid stars with the intent of making movies cheaper for them to rent. Thus Kay Francis lost her contract - and this led directly to Carole Lombard enticing her to be in this movie.

Backstory #3. There are shades of Cary Grant's own life in this movie. Several of his own marriages ended rather nastily with bitter accusations by the wives. He may have been damaged in childhood. At a very early age, in Bristol UK, a brother had died, and his mother blamed herself and micro-managed Cary Grant's own childhood from then on. His father, seemingly an alcoholic, subsequentialy put the mother away in an asylum, and married again, telling Cary that his mother was dead. Years later, Cary found that his mother was still alive, and he managed to get her released and give her some peaceful final years. Cary Grant was still on the way up at the time of this movie. Appearing with two of Hollywood's biggest-name actresses might have been hard to pass up. But I for one wish he had. Let sleeping dogs lie. Move on.

The writer should have talked with a real victim's family and friends about how any real murder reverberates on for them over the years. This was callous, irresponsible, and ugly. The killers deserved no hero-izing, and the cops and especially those dead deserved a lot more respect. And for even being in this, all the actors and especially Olivia Colman should be rated down a notch.

Amazing that after all of its ups & downs this show is now hitting a super-high in its writing and acting and especially its ensemble teamwork. What we found ourselves newly waiting all week for:

First, the three nailbiting longform arcs over the 8 episodes, all of which were very enlightening and insightful into the era: Geordie having a bout of belated PTSD with his Burma chum (and Robson Green looking absolutely drained in Episode 8), Leonard manning up and actually becoming super-confident, and Will's periodic locking of horns with the Bishop from Hell (if I can put that delicately).

Second, the new arrivals were really sharply drawn: Will's super-hilarious stepsister, the Black priest from Nigeria who sees himself as English as fish & chips, and the charismatic Borneo chum & lawyer. Mrs Thingie and Leonard's boyfriend remain excellent presences as does Cop #2 always playing the party-pooping heavy.

And third there were things to really laugh at: Sidney tootling around on his motorbike, Tamara (Emily Patrick) as the free-spirited stepsister waking up in bed with him, Leonard with his growing flock in prison, the wide-eyed forever-smiling Black curate bobbing around like a cork, and the over-eager Will forever treading on Geordie's toes in the witness interviews.

Finally, sets were really well selected and/or constructed. Nice to see one of the fine Cambridge colleges, which unlike Oxford's appear only too rarely in any such show. More of that?

1. Do you know who made this film even possible? Foreign actors, in an Italian film, marketed globally? It was the actress Silvana Mangano. She had pretty well single-handedly put Italian movies on the global map immediately before. Pre-WWII Italian movies were in part tools of fascism for a domestic audience. Immediately post-WWII Italian movies were mournful "neo-realist" laments also for domestic audiences. And then, along came Mangano. Starting late 40s she made four extremely intense movies, and all four caught fire globally (Bitter Rice, Wolf Of The Sila, Outlaw Girl, and the haunting Anna). They each made a ton of money, breaking Italian records, and saw theater goers waiting in long lines in New York and London. Directly, this had a 2-way effect: (1) Mangano opened the way to international fame for Marcello Mastroanni, Sophia Loren, Gina Lollobrigida, and numerous other Italian actors (those 3 were all in films with Mangano). (2) Mangano opened the way to British and American actors risking a presence in such Italian films as this and Stromboli, Bergman's earlier one. Mangano herself appeared with Dirk Bogarde, Joseph Cotton, Kirk Douglas, Clint Eastwood, Burt Lancaster, Yves Montand, Jack Palance, Tony Perkins, Anthony Quinn, Terence Stamp, Van Heflin, and Orson Welles. She also made the career of her husband, de Laurentiis; a common delusion is that it was the opposite.

2. Starkly displayed in this film, and in only a very few others, is a sad phenomenon, one you might call The Embassy Wife, that is still around. Nationals get sought-after foreign career postings (diplomats and development experts and military) but their spouses (usually women) often have a hell of a time, forbidden to work, trying to normalize and educate a family if they opt for one (large minorities do not), and fighting loneliness and boredom. Marriages on the rocks are incessant. Yes, in Journey to Italy, geographical and cultural and language displacement was not actually the plight of Ingrid Bergman, but her husband's career and an unexplained decision not to have children had created this identical effect. Separation sometimes works magic, and in this case there was separation: she went cultural and noticed a lot of happy pregnant women; and he went looking for better company but found none. His stony heart melted for her in the final seconds, and my own interpretation was "Okay, finally we have liftoff".

Do please hunt down Bitter Rice and Anna as this movie's vital forbears, and also, in the light of this movie, Gold Of Naples - Mangano's final several minutes are still marveled-at in film schools.

It's common to the point of universal in romcoms to have one party be one of the walking wounded which the other party at the last second sets right. It's rarer to have both wounded and both ending up setting the other right. SLP being one of the few.

In Man Up, she admits to her sad plight first. He does take a while, but there he is, suddenly and dramatically, sobbing about his own sad plight, on what the Brits call "the loo".

Their growing chumminess (prior to her being outed by the schoolmate from Hell and he being shaken by the soon-to-be-ex wife from Hell!) followed a compelling arc, and their conversation was fast and funny and increasingly buoyed up one another.

Where she figured out why they were in THAT bar was maybe the funniest line in the film. Each at times showed touches of real class. I'd bank on them making it.

In London around 1740 Handel had a stroke and for a while lost most of the use of his right hand. His Italian operas had been a huge money spinner in London, but they were becoming repetitive, and were actually ridiculed by rival operas!

So around then he had financial pressures and was feeling his way forward from his Baroque phase to his germanic oratorio phase, hoping there was a way he could cash in on that by staging oratorios other than in churches so he could sell tickets.

Had THAT failed it would be a case of "George Frideric who?" these days. But it didn't, because of what is surely the most amazing long shot in all of musical history, see below. And with the wind of the eventually wildly successful Messiah at his back, he was in his last 17 years pretty triumphalist (as quite correctly depicted here)!

So, to the long shot, the extraordinary critical path to the most performed music in world history, of which we can see quite a few of the key elements here.

Handel had to be born, in Germany of a father then over 60, had to have his mother secretly buy him a piano, had to have a local count hear his organ playing (at age 11) and sponsor him, had to learn baroque music and Italian in his 4 years in Italy, had to find cities & audiences back in Germany smallish, had to move to London for more business, had to be a favorite of the German-born kings then, had to see his main income from Italian operas fading, had to have an avid Christian come up with the idea of the Messiah and the unique libretto (phrases all lifted from the bible), had to have a possible stroke and survive it, had to get fired up enough to write the music on spec for all singers and players in 3 weeks (at age 56), had to doubt London was the best place to surface it, had to need money, had to be invited to Dublin, had to encounter a certain high-profile contralto, had to grasp a charitable angle, had to encounter a crazy-keen first audience there, had to be rebuffed initially in London, and had to be championed years later by the passionate co-founder of a hospital for babies of unmarried mothers (eventually 25,000 of them) in large part funded because he made the Messiah in a real sense theirs.

This has an 83% positive score on Rotten Tomatoes. Rightly so. Labeling its era merely "mid 1980s" sells the movie short. NYC really had descended into being the ultimate gritty tough noir city of the western world right then. This was a one-of-a-kind watershed time.

There were street-gangs still, muggings, graffiti on subway trains, a decadent and dangerous Times Square, hookers easy to spot in that area. There was a druggie nest right on 42nd Street (Bryant Park). Half the play-acting theaters were dark, some storefronts were abandoned or trashed, Soho was an urban desert avoided by almost all, and the city (under a well-meaning but ineffective Mayor Koch) was close to broke. Sagas not so different to this movie's played out for sure, and the occasional Susans and Robertas were quite real.

When exactly did NYC bounce back into a pussycat of a place, low-crime, attracting a million tourists a week? Not so long after this film. From Wikipedia this hammered home that NYC was back on the rise: "Disney Theatrical Productions signed a 49-year revenue-based lease for the (New Amsterdam Theater on 42nd Street) in May 1995". Soho and Harlem became places to walk, as did Central Park with a camera not hidden under a coat. The theaters, museums and restaurants in recent years bulged, and Bryant Park is a lunchtime mecca now. Maybe 15 years ago the NY Times printed a half-serious editorial lamenting the loss of NYC's gritty edge.

This movie shows us that there was a funny colorful side of NYC even when it was nearly down for good. Roberta finds herself someone with heart and she moves, against the prevailing flow, from the burbs to Manhattan. Millions of others soon chose to do so too. Perhaps this nice movie helped in a small way. Keys of the city to the director, Madonna, Aidan Quinn, and Rosanna Arquette?!

I came for the actors and the first of the all-star ensembles, but it was the noir-ish arc that hit home the most. A strikingly-lit black-and-white in a lavish art-deco setting, the action takes place almost entirely at night, and we have an accidental and very likable villain with his back increasingly against the wall. And he-who-must-die checks out leaving no less than three of the leads substantially better off for having brushed up against him, one of whom has a sizable entourage who also will gain, and the real nasty is locked up. Works for me!

I saw Mark Ruffalo with Danny Devito on Broadway a couple of years ago, two of the funniest performances I've ever seen with half the audience in hysterics half the time.

So the 10 stars is in part intended to urge Mark to please come back, maybe even make this an annual event. :-)

Okay. Main point. Unless I am missing something, the much raved about "Big" seems to have zero message other than, if you don't act your age you will see more success.

Really?! Try that in NYC where I work. "13 going on 30" seems to me to have zero in common with that.

The Jennifer Garner character makes just ONE key wrong choice at 13 and then she gets to see at 30 how truly awful THAT all turned out. It was commendably remorseless in not letting up almost to the end.

This is actually a display of the vital concept of "path dependency", one of the best ever put on film, much more akin to "A Winters Tale (Scrooge)" than to "Big".

As every kid of 13 would benefit by being taught, path dependencies are choices made by us or for us often very far back which for better or worse narrow down our range of choices going forward - rather like trains on rails with no turns or getting offs.

Many are good: alternating current thanks to Tesla; all driving on the right side of the road in the US; the good qualities evolution produced in us.

But way too many are bad (consider the role of HMOs in health care - what exactly do they add? But there they are). In the US there are strong pressures to lock kids into career choices in their early 20s - exactly why? Add here the bad qualities evolution produced in us.

We are in fact heavily constrained by dozens of path dependencies at any one time. With a freaked out population like the US's they are now plaguing most of the population most of the time (gee thanks, George Washington and blah blah blah!).

Unlike the empty "Big" this film is potentially of immense usefulness, capable of sparking serious upgradings of careers and lovelifes.

Every kid of 13 could benefit. Watch this film. And read "The Innovator's Dilemma" and "The Art Of The Long View" ASAP.

That is actually what happened in the 2020 year-end special. Everybody is dithering and wailing - until Captain Jack Harkness shows up - and springs her in the blink of an eye.

Really?!?!

If you are a doctor, you are pretty smart. Doctors are actually known for that. If you are Doctor Who, you are very very very smart indeed, highly innovative and extremely wise, given to pulling endless rabbits out of hats.

They can certainly get their own selves out of any prison fast - if the script is so dopey as to put them there first.

They are certainly not simply one among clueless equals in The Gang That Cannot Shoot Straight, which seems today's misconceived mode..

David Tenant and Matt Smith seriously exuded this essential brilliance. Poor Jodie Whittaker simply does not. She is badly miscast, and this throws a spanner in the companions nexus too.

In one of the most remarkable narrative arcs in the history of TV (really dont miss) the Matt Smith doctor for an entire 2 seasons (26 episodes) was resolving the extremely complex puzzlement of Amy Pond.

He rebooted THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE to make a certain matter come right.

And the equally brilliance-exuding Karen Gillan played Amy Pond. She played one amazing episode almost entirely by herself.

The British actress pool is absolutely rife with women who take on roles that make brilliance shine through.

Watch Judy Dench playing M. Watch Brenda Blethyn playing Vera. Watch Emily Blunt in Edge Of Tomorrow. Also Tilda Swinton in Michael Clayton. Emily Watson in Chernobyl. Helen Mirren in Prime Suspect. Olivia Colman in The Night Manager. Lena Headey and Natalie Dormer in Game Of Thrones.

Any of them along with a strong narrative arc could have imbued this 2-3 year stint with real fire. One star is for the sad and embarrassing past two years.