Dune: Prophecy 1.1: Compelling Prequel

I just watched the first episode of Dune: Prophecy on HBO Max.  Here's a non-spoiler review:

This prequel to the Dune series takes place 10,148 years (you can look up whether that's Earth years) before the birth of Paul Atreides, we're told near the beginning of this first episode.  Now the Dune series of novels is second only to the Foundation series of novels, I've thought ever since I started reading science fiction many years ago.  And the first episode of Dune: Prophecy has a lot in common with the first Dune novel.  Both have some scenes I'd rather not have read or seen.  And both start off way too slowly.   But Dune proceeded to be monumental in its story and impact, and Dune: Prophecy looks like it could be headed in that direction, too.

The essence of Dune: Prophecy is the establishment and growth into power of the Bene Gesserit, one of the most compelling components of the future Dune saga.  The characters in this powerful order that seeks to guide and control the universe by breeding the most appropriate humans for the job are well introduced in this first episode, but my favorite character is Desmond Hart, played by Travis Fimmel, whom I first noticed in his incandescent role of Ragnar Lothbrok in Vikings.  He has a way of speaking and acting that dominates every scene he's in, and leaves an indelible impression.

Someone on some social media site remarked that Dune: Prophecy was just Game of Thrones in outer space.  I did hear someone comment in Dune: Prophecy about "bending" someone's will, and, as I said, there was a scene or two I would rather not have seen, but the Dune story first came out in two serials published in Analog Magazine in 1964 and 1965, followed by the novel in 1965, so if Game of Thrones and Dune: Prophecy have any connection, it's that Thrones was influenced by the narrative qualities of Prophecy rather than vice versa.

And Dune: Prophecy has a freshness and some unexpected turns -- which I won't tell you about -- all its own.   I will tell you that Mark Strong as Emperor Javicco Corrino is memorable -- the Emperors have always been among my favorite Dune characters -- as are Emily Watson and Olivia Williams as the Harkonnen Sisters, who play such important roles.

So if you've been a devotee of the Dune saga, well, you can't go wrong with Prophecy. And if you haven't read or watched yourself into the Dune universe, well, you don't know what you're missing.

A Poem: "I Fell in Love with a Robot"

Silo 2.1: The Post- Apocalyptic Ladder

Well, Hugh Howey's Silo is back on Apple TV+ for its second season -- which will happen one episode at a time -- and it couldn't have come back at a more appropriate time.

[And there will be spoilers ahead ... ]

Juliette escaped/was thrown out of the silo at the end of the first season. She and we knew that the air wasn't really poisonous outside, but, hey, you can never be sure.  But she and we were right, and after we discover/confirm that it's not quite the world that has gone to hell, Juliette makes her way into and through another shelter or whatever it is, within easy walking distance from the silo with Sims and all those other characters we saw so much of last year.  One question that immediately arises: why are these two silos so close to one another?  What is it about this particular area?

But there ensue three parts to Juliette's journey now: 1. She uses a series of rusty ladders to get over the huge caverns in the shelter she enters (she's an engineer -- the title of this episode -- so she knows how to position a ladder across cavern and make her way across it with almost by not getting killed).  2. She hears a song faintly in the background, which gets louder as she walks on  -- it's "Moon River," you can't go wrong with that, though "You'll Never Walk Alone," especially Patti Labelle and the Blue Bells' version, with that impossibly high note she hits at the end, would have worked well, too.  3. And we learn that someone has been playing that song -- it's not some remnant of Spotify that's been programmed in the future -- and that someone ends this episode with a threat to kill Juliette if she opens the door.

I'll mention here (in case you haven't read my reviews of the first season, for which, see below) that I haven't read any of Hugh Howey's books, and once I started watching and enjoying the series, I didn't want to, because I wanted to enjoy all the twists and turns in the TV series.  So I don't know who any of the characters who are new to the second season are.  All we see of the man who plays the music and makes the threat are his eyes.  I thought the actor playing him might have been Steve Buscemi.  But it turns out the actor is another Steve -- Steve Zahn (a fine actor, I first noticed him in Treme).

Anyway, the return of Silo is off to a good start, with a nearby silo, and fine music and acting likely to take place there, and I'll be back here likely every week with a review of each episode.

See also Silo 1.1-1.2: A Unique Story, Inside and Out ... Silo 1.3: Like Chernobyl, Repaired ... 1.4: Truth, Not Quite ... 1.5: Revelations ... 1.6-1.7: The Book and the Water ... 1.8: What Really Happened ... 1.9: I knew It! But What Then? ... Silo 1.10: Three Truths

The Diplomat 2: West Wing Meets Bond, Part 2

I just finished watching the six episode second season of The Diplomat, which went up on Netflix on the last day of October.  Here's a review with no specific spoilers, and therefore no warning.

Let's begin at the end.  It's got the best surprise ending I've seen in at least the hundred seasons of any television show, on traditional network, cable, and streaming.  I don't know ... maybe make that five hundred.

Now, it's important to state the obvious, and keep in mind that this second was finished before the results of our election for President a few days.  So think of this second season as capturing the ambience and reality of the American President, VP, and staff maybe a year or six months ago, replete with a pretty old old American President, and a somewhat younger female VP.

I say American, even though the story takes place in Britain.  But American leaders appear in person and on video calls,  And of course the central characters are Kate Wyler, recently appointed US ambassador to the UK, and her husband Hal Wyler, former ambassador to Lebanon.  Unsurprisingly, both parts are played to perfection by Keri Russell and Rufus Sewell (who sounds, as always when he wants to, as American as I am).

Indeed, every bit of the acting was top-notch, especially Rory Kinnear as the British PM, and Allison Janney as the US VP.  But don't get me wrong.  I didn't love every last scene in this second season, such as when one character explaining something to another character says it's a case a correlation not causation, and the other smugly says no one really gets what that means.  In off-screen fact, that's actually a very easily comprehensible concept, with an obvious example: there may be sunspots when the stock market crashes (correlation) but that doesn't mean the sunspots caused the crash (causation).  (Here's a video from CNBC in which I explain the concept to an anti video-game crusader.)

Now banter like that, whether clumsy or astute, serves in this series to give it a cutesy, savvy flavor.  But the story is so bold and powerful, it doesn't need any help from the cutesy side.  Further, honestly, it couldn't have come along -- this second season -- at a better time for we Americans, and a lot of the world, as we try to make sense out of what just happened in our election.

See? No spoilers.  And do see this second season of The Diplomat.  After you've seen the first (and maybe read my review, see the link below).  You'll be in for a treat.

See also The Diplomat 1: West Wing Meets Bond

Disclaimer: Media vs. Reality

I just finished watching Disclaimer on Apple TV+, the seven-episode series adapted from Renée Knight's novel of the same name, which I haven't read.  The short series has so many twists and turns, that I'm really going to try to give you a review with no spoilers, and try hard to confine myself to the powerful and deep generalities that animate the narrative.

Well, I will say this about the first episode, which I suppose constitutes a spoiler of sorts.  I had almost no idea what was going on in that opening episode.  It wasn't until the end of the second episode that I began to get a glimmer of what was going on.  And by the third episode, I was coming to the conclusion that Disclaimer is one outstanding series, the likes of which I can't quite recall ever seeing on any television or laptop screen before.

It's erotic, reminiscent of the first R-rated movies I saw in theaters with my girlfriend now my wife many decades ago.  It's also an increasingly breathtaking mystery, with lives almost literally hanging in the balance.  But it's most of all a story about media, about the circumstances under which we may take them for reality, and the very deadly dangers of so doing. I'm not talking about fake news, though I suppose Disclaimer does have some connection to the rash of fake news that's been plaguing this world and our lives for years now.

But I was thinking more specifically of the photograph, which thanks to our mobile phones, has become as easy and ubiquitous as the blink of an eye.  As I often point out in my books and in my classes at Fordham University, the painting is an interpretation of reality, in contrast to the photograph, which is of reality.  But how much of it?  Certainly not all of reality, or even more than a split second of it.  If we want to capture a bigger time slice of reality, we need to move from photo to video.  But even a video has a beginning and an ending, and it doesn't capture what happened an instant before or after the video.

And then there's the written memoir.  Now words on a page or screen quite obviously are not reality, they are at most descriptions of reality.  But that knowledge doesn't stop us from taking memoirs seriously, as truthful accountings of what really happened.  But how can we tell the difference between a memoir that is utterly factual and a novel that is pure fiction?   Not as easily as you might think, especially if the work has not been published as yet, and in that process has been officially labelled as memoir or novel.  (I recommend Caroline Shannon Davenport's Terror at the Sound of a Whistle as an example of an excellent memoir that reads like a novel.)  And what of a book published as a novel but thought to be a truthful memoir by the publisher?

Well, I hope you see enough of where I'm going with this -- but not too much -- and if these issues and questions interest and even fascinate you as much as they do me, and you're in the mood for an R-rated series brought to life by outstanding acting and directing,with Cate Blanchett and Kevin Kline in unforgettable leading roles and Leila George as the erotic interest, and Indira Varma with a narrating voice, created by and directed to perfection by Alfonso Cuarón -- trust me, you can't go wrong with Disclaimer.

Some Thoughts on the Results of the US 2024 Election

 Some thoughts after the most consequential US election in my lifetime:

1. The pollsters got it wrong -- for the third time in as many US Presidential elections.  The vote tallies were not razor thin, or even just plain thin by any margin.  Donald Trump won the popular vote by more than 5 million votes, and the Electoral College by 292 to 224 at this moment.  He won the swing states of Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, with Arizona and Nevada still too close to call.  He lost New York State, but Kamala Harris did much more poorly than Joe Biden in New York four years ago.  The polls predicted none of this.  Maybe it's time to stop paying so much attention to them -- or any attention at all.

2. Maybe all the Democrats who hounded Joe Biden out of the race after his unsettling performance in his debate in June with Trump should have thought twice about coming after Biden.  I said at the time that debate performance has nothing to do with Presidential decision-making and governing.  But everyone from George Clooney to Adam Schiff* were so sure that just about anyone other than Biden would do better than the man who was born in Scranton -- one of the reasons that Biden did so well in Pennsylvania in the 2020 election -- that they went on and on in the media as if it were their sacred duty to make sure Biden stepped down.  Kamala Harris would have made a great President.  But she would have been far more likely to beat Trump or any opponent four years from now, after she had served another term as VP in a second Biden administration.  Of course, no one can know now if Biden would have bested Trump in yesterday's election, but I and everyone who expressed concern about Biden being driven out of the election can't help but think that he might well have done better, much better, in the election just concluded, given his success against the same opponent in 2020.

*No doubt influenced by the same polls that later said the Harris/Trump run for the White House was way too close to call.

3. The US House of Representatives is still up for grabs.  If the Democrats don't retake control of the House, we can expect unobstructed Republican rule, with the courts as the only check on their power. And we've already seen more than once where the Supreme Court stands on that.

I may have some further thoughts as the day goes by.

Paul Levinson interviews Andrew Hoskins about AI and the End of the Human Past

Welcome to Light On Light Through, Episode 398, in which I interview Andrew Hoskins about the new book he is writing, The Deadbot Society: AI and the End of the Human Past.

Relevant links:

• "AI and Memory" an article by Andrew Hoskins
• the AI-created video I mentioned in our conversation
• more about McLuhan in an Age of Social Media

Check out this episode!

Time Cut: Meets the Sine Qua Non of Paradox and Surmounting It

So, Time Cut went up yesterday on Netflix.  It's a time travel movie, so I had to see it.  The story of a younger sister who goes back in time in 2024 to prevent the murder of her older sister in 2003 by a serial killer at first seemed a little trite, even more so with the high school shenanigans in which the story is situated.  But--

The story respected the paradoxes of time travel (a sine qua non for me in a time travel narrative) -- one of the savvier characters correctly says you might stop your sister's murder and in so doing cause World War III -- and the story becomes emotionally profound when--

[And here I'll warn you about some spoilers ahead ... ]

The younger sister, Lucy, from 2024 in 2003 knows that her parents had her only because her older sister Summer was killed.  When Lucy asks her parents who in 2003 don't know they will have another child if they're planning on having another child, they tell her no, and that sounds like a fait accompli. Lucy instantly realizes that if she prevents Summer's murder, that she, Lucy, will cease to exist.

I would have liked to have heard someone in the movie -- Quinn, the teenaged science nerd, and more -- voice the new conclusion that Lucy's realization engenders: that Lucy's very existence shows that somehow it might be possible that Summer survived, and Lucy was born, anyway.  Instead, we get the emotional turmoil that Lucy goes through, wanting to save her sister, and continue living herself.

But that's ok, it all makes sense at the end, and we find out who the masked serial killer is, which I guessed, but only pretty close to its revelation in the movie.  And we even get some clever dialogue, like when Lucy tells her as yet unknowing parents after dinner, "Thanks for having me". All of which is to say, Time Cuts is eminently worth seeing.

 

Don't Move: Keep Watching

Here's a short, mostly non-spoiler review of Don't Move, the movie just up on Netflix this week.

This is an original, high-anxiety movie that will keep you guessing until the very last minute. Which is an impressive accomplishment, given that we've seen something like the overall plot on the screen at least dozens of times before: a woman kidnapped by a handsome, highly intelligent, articulate, fiendish stranger.

Ok, that gives something away, but it happens close to the beginning, and is touted in the trailer and tagline for the movie.

It happens out in the country, not the big city, with rivers, rugged terrain, and leafy green trees as background.  A cabin in the woods, a gas station, and everyday cars play major roles.  Our victim receives help from unexpected and expected sources, but you'll be unlikely to guess what happens in the end.

The movie in its own way has Hitchcockian flavor, and a Nordic noir ambience, too, though it all takes in America.

But I've said enough.  Don't move once you start watching Don't Move.  You'll be rewarded.

Paul Levinson interviews Gerrit Van Woudenberg about his new movie Quantum Suicide

Welcome to Light On Light Through, Episode 397, in which I interview Gerrit Van Houtenberg about his new multiple universe feature film, Quantum Suicide, debuting on Amazon Prime Video on October 18.

Relevant links:

• my review of Quantum Suicide
• The Chronology Protection Case movie on Amazon Prime Video
• The Chronology Protection Case novelette

Check out this episode!

Paul Levinson interviews Bob Hutchins: An Optimistic Discussion of AI

Welcome to Light On Light Through, Episode 396, in which I interview Bob Hutchins about AI.  My guess is you'll find this discussion much more optimistic about AI than what you'll usually hear.

Discussed or mentioned in this interview:

• "On Behalf of Humanity: The Technological Edge" my 1996 article
• The Media Ecology Association
• New Explorations: Studies in Culture and Communication
• my review of Confronting the Presidents

 

 

Check out this episode!

Patrick Rands interviews Paul Levinson about It's Real Life on WZBC Radio

Welcome to Light On Light Through, Episode 395, in which Patrick Rands interviews me about It's Real Life: An Alternate History of The Beatles on his WZBC Radio program Abstract Terrain.

• more about It's Real Life: An Alternate History of The Beatles here
• say hello at the Meet and Greet at Big Red Books, 120 Main Street, Nyack, NY, Sunday, October 6, 12noon-2pm 
• Anne Reburn's cover of Real Love
• my interview with Anne Reburn
• Yoko Ono's Cambridge 1969

 

Check out this episode!

Confronting the Presidents: A Review of Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard's New Book

I started reading Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard's new 400+ page book on Friday.  I finished it last night -- Monday night.  That should give you an idea of how important and captivating Confronting the Presidents is. 

It is subtitled "No Spin Assessments from Washington to Biden".  But that obscures what the book actually is: assessments of US Presidents from Washington to Obama, co-written by O'Reilly and Dugard, followed by assessments of Trump and Biden written by O'Reilly, and assessments of Trump and Biden written by Dugard.  I'll explain near the end of this review why I think that distinction is crucial.

First, let me begin by saying I was on the O'Reilly's Fox show, The Factor, several times over 20 years ago (here's the video of my first appearance in January 2004), and four times on O'Reilly's No Spin News podcast several years ago.  We have strongly different political opinions, but I very much enjoyed our conversations.  O'Reilly has written numerous best-selling books, and O'Reilly and Dugard have a best-selling series (the "Killing" series about assassinations, attempted assassinations, killings of terrorists, etc), which I haven't read, but based on the writing in Confronting the Presidents, I expect that I eventually will, or at least read some of the books.

That writing is crisp, informative, and even exciting.   In part because most of it is in the present tense -- "At the start of Jefferson's second term, he is sixty-one years old.  He is no longer the young idealist...."  And in part because it has so many facts, big and little, that I didn't know and, after reading them in Confronting the Presidents, I think I should have known.  Like Theodore Roosevelt planning to run for a third term as president in 1919, before he died, and LBJ having a decades-long affair with Alice Glass, which Lady Bird knew about, and only ended when Alice left him because she was so furious about the Vietnam War.

We learn what each president ate for breakfast (right, I find that interesting), what kind of exercise they preferred, and how they died.  There's lots of humor in the book, but cradled in an underlying gravity and mortality.   And this is not because of what happened to Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, and JFK, and almost happened to several others, but because as the authors make clear, the job of president, given the power to make one's dreams come true, is almost guaranteed not to be fulfilled, meaning your dreams will end up broken, their only chance being some future president may pick one up and carry it to victory in some more hospitable time.

Another salient point of history which I already knew as a media historian, and Confronting the Presidents makes abundantly clear, is that the intense polarization in our current world, (wrongly often blamed on social media, I would say), actually has been in the United States of America from the very beginning.  Editors of newspapers were prosecuted under the Alien and Sedition Act that John Adams signed into law, and O'Reilly and Dugard tell us that Alexander Hamilton wrote that Adams was "a mere old woman and unfit for president".

As a professor and lifelong student of communication and media studies, I was also glad to see that Confronting the Presidents notes that First Lady "Carrie" Harrison brought electricity to the White House but she and her husband Benjamin (1889-1893) were afraid of being electrocuted, radio began to have a big influence on politics in the 1920s, and of course TV took center stage in the 1960s.  (See my continually updated McLuhan in an Age of Social Media for how and when television gave way to the social media president.)

***

But this powerhouse book, brimming with fascinating, useful, and important information, concludes its confrontation of presidents with Barack Obama.   An "Afterword" briefly gives O'Reilly's and Dugard's assessments of Trump and Biden independently.  The reason for this change in format isn't given, but it must be because Trump's presidency may not be finished (he's currently running for a second term), and at the time the book was written, neither was Biden's (he had not yet withdrawn from the current election).

I'm making such a big deal about this because O'Reilly's assessments of Trump and Biden are the first in the book I strongly disagree with.  No mention is made of Trump's treatment of COVID, and the attack on the Capitol he instigated on January 6, 2021 is barely mentioned, as a political mistake, not the fundamental attack on our democracy that it was.  Even more incredibly, O'Reilly ranks Biden as the second worst president in American history (after James Buchanan).  

As I said at the beginning of this review, O'Reilly and I are on opposite sides of the political spectrum.  But I was nonetheless taken aback by what he said about Biden and didn't say about Trump because I found his joint assessments with Dugard about other progressive presidents like Obama and Clinton, and conservatives like Nixon, to be right on key.  

Obviously, Dugard was a moderating factor, and he had plenty to say in his own assessment of Trump about January 6, 2021 (because of this, he ranks Trump the worst president, one below Herbert Hoover).  Dugard also had some praise for Biden, and went so far as to say he hopes Biden wins in 2024 (the book was completed, again, before Biden withdrew from the race).

So what you'll get from Confronting the Presidents is a fair and balanced -- to use that Fox cliche -- assessment of every American President prior to Trump.  Then, for Trump and Biden, separate assessments from each author, which taken together accurately reflect the current polarization of this country.

I'm not sure what I would have suggested to the two authors prior to publication about how to conclude this book.  Maybe conclude with Obama with no Afterword.  Or maybe struggle to find some common ground as the authors did for every other president.  But I can say I recommend this book to anyone who'd like to have a handy, accessible guide to the people who have been at the top of our noble, imperfect experiment with democracy.

The Perfect Couple: The Perfect Series

So, the family and I spend a lot of time on Cape Cod, and have been loving it for decades.  The Perfect Couple takes place in nearby Nantucket, and the shots of the water and the sand and those wind-blown weathered wooden fences look so much like those on the Cape I felt like I was back there again, and it was still the summer.  Hey, for all I know, those scenes were shot on the Cape.  How could I not love this series?

And the lead actors, Nicole Kidman as Greer and Liev Schreiber as her husband Tag, top-notch any time, were especially outstanding in this scenic murder mystery adapted from Elin Hilderbrand's novel (which I haven't read), so well plotted, with so many nearly convincing suspects, that this novel could have been written by Agatha Christie.

The supporting actors, most of who I haven't seen on the screen before, were excellent as well.  Here are some of my favorite scenes and characters:

[And there may be spoilers ahead ...]

• Eve Hewson as Amelia Sacks, half of the imperfect couple, was perfectly convincing in her combination of almost sultry and deeply vulnerable.
• Schreiber as Tag, when he tells Merritt (pregnant with his baby) that having a baby is the most beautiful thing a man and woman can do, as prelude to his telling her he doesn't want her to have it, is a truly memorable scene of repulsive personal betrayal.  Schreiber as Tag is also noteworthy when he bursts in and deconstructs Greer's book launch.  (Greer being an author is something else I identified with -- here's a video of my most recent event. Note a bit of the tribulations at the end of the introduction.)
• I also got a kick out of Donna Lynne Champlin's gruff, Rosie O'Donnell kind of police detective, and her interaction with Michael Beach (whom I have seen a lot of over the years) as her de facto partner in the murder investigation was a fine piece of police repartee.
• Ishaan Khatter as Shooter Dival was the most tempting of the false leads (he wasn't the shooter and indeed the murder victim wasn't shot), and his relationship with Amelia gave rise to one of the best lines in the series, "the girl on the B train," which come to think of it would make a good title for any novel, short story, movie, or TV series (Irwin Shaw certainly would've liked it).
  
• Back to Dan Carter, my favorite relationship in the series -- maybe the closest to the perfect couple -- was Carter's daughter Chloe (not Zoey!) and her shared feelings with Will, the youngest Winbury. After she's told by her father to stay away from Will -- Dan's understandably worried that the Winbury family is connected to the murder -- she leaves Will a note on a napkin, "you're cute". Hey, a little sweetness goes a long way in a story like this. (Will is also key to figuring out who the killer is, but I'm not going to drop any more spoilers.)

Anyway, I defy anyone who hasn't read the book to identify the killer before the ending, and I highly recommend this Netflix short series, especially if you've just returned from Cape Cod to the big city and its B train.

Harris vs. Trump Presidential Debate: Eating Dogs and Viktor Orban

I don't recall ever seeing a Presidential debate like this, Kamala Harris vs. Donald Trump: a cool, passionate, articulate champion of democratic values and principles vs. well, a lunatic and fascist admirer.

One of Trump's lies which struck me most -- lies are too weak a word for it -- was Trump's claim that immigrants are eating dogs.  One of the moderators, David Muir, quietly pointed out that the City Manager of one of the allegedly afflicted places said that dogs were not being eaten in his town.  Among the plethora of Trump's lies, this one strikes me as one of the most indicative of Trump's mental maladjustment.  It's far less serious, of course, than Trump's continuing charge that governors in Democratic states allow killing of newborn babies -- denounced as a lie by both Harris and the other moderator, Linsey Davis.  That's an egregious lie about a crucial issue.  But the claim about immigrants and dogs is somehow vivid evidence that the former President is not in his right mind.

As for his politics,what I found most significant and disturbing was Trump's citing the pride he takes in Viktor Orban's praise of him.  A fascist, neo-Nazi, who has systematically put down and tried to pull down the press and democratic structures in his country, Hungary.  I couldn't help thinking that if Hitler was alive, and said anything good about Trump. the former President would have cited him as an admiring ally too.

Kamala Harris aptly pointed out that the most important thing in Trump's book and psyche is flattery from others.  Everything she said in the debate was astute and on target.  In fact, I can't think of a single off-key thing she said.  Sure, that's because I agree with everything she said, but I still think her performance was objectively excellent.  That includes her facial reactions to Trump's lies and absurdities, which we've known since the 1960 JFK/Nixon debates are at least as important as what the candidates actually say.

As for the moderators, better than CNN's in the Biden-Trump debate in June, but that's faint praise. They did quietly point out a few of Trump's lies, but maybe I'm old fashioned thinking that they should have called out every single one of them.  Loudly and clearly.

Big good news arrived shortly after the debate in Taylor Swift's ringing endorsement of Harris for President.  I'm pulling for a landslide.

Paul Levinson interviews Dan Abella about The New York Science Fiction Film Festival

Welcome to Light On Light Through, Episode 394, in which I interview Dan Abella about The New York Science Fiction Film Festival, to take place Saturday, September 14, 2024 at the Stuart Cinema and Cafe, 79 West Street in Brooklyn, NY.

• more details here
• my review of Gerrit Van Woudenberg's Quantum Suicide

Among the science fiction filmmakers we discuss: Gerrit Van Woudenberg, Jay Kensinger, Frank Spotnitz, M. Night Shyamalan, Francis Ford Coppola

Among the science fiction authors we discuss: Philip K. Dick, Sam Delany, Robert Harris, Walter Mosley

 

Check out this episode!

Poster for Quantum Suicide

 

                                 read the review here

Slow Horses 4.1: River

Well, Slow Horses is back on Apple TV+ with the debut episode of its 4th season, and

[Spoilers ahead ... ]

In the riveting opening and subsequent scenes it sure looks like River was shot to death by his (probably) somewhat deranged grandfather, but I didn't really believe that, because it's too crazy a way to die, even for Slow Horses, and in the end we learn Lamb didn't buy it either, and in fact River's in France, on some mission likely connected to the terrorists Taverner and the MI5 crew are dealing with (ineptly, because this is after all just the beginning of a new season).

But there were clues before the big French reveal, most notably that the body said to be River's had its face shot off, which made it difficult to identify as River's, on the basis of just eyesight.  This probably tipped off Lamb from the beginning.  He's in good form, by the way, not only farting, but scratching his ass (not at the same time).  At least it was outside this time, not in a car with the doors closed.

The team, other than Ho, are more or less devastated, especially Louisa, who in one unfortunate scene not only rebuffed River's possible advance, but suggested he visit grandpa.  Standish is not devastated at all, because, as we learn near the end, she knows River has not been shot, and Grandpa David is taking a nap in her bed.   Have we ever actually seen her and Lamb in bed together and awake?  I can't recall, but I think not, and I hope that will happen sooner or later in some future episode or season.

Kudos again, by the way, for Mick Jagger's excellent theme song at the beginning, but I didn't hear it again at the end, as we have in prior seasons, and that's s shame, because I'm always eager to hear that song, even in the middle of an episode.

But off to great start, and I'll be back with weekly reviews.

See also Slow Horses 3.1-3.2: Beatles Level ... 3.3: The Meaningful Difference Between "The" and "A" in the UK ... 3.4: "Clear the Board" ... 3.5: Winners and Losers, Part 1 ... 3.6: Winners and Losers, Part 2

And see also Slow Horses 2.1-2.2: Do Horses Eat Ramen? ... 2.3: Faster Than You Think ... 2.4-2.5: Lamb Firing On All Cylinders ... Slow Horses 2.6: Heralds of Humiliation

And see also Slow Horses 1.1-2: Fast-Moving Spy Thriller ... Slow Horses 1.3: The Fine Art of Bumbling ... Slow Horses 1.4: Fine New Song by Mick Jagger ... Slow Horses 1.5: Did You Hear the One About the ... Slow Horses 1.6: The Scorecard

  

Fair Play: Fairly Good

I watched Fair Play -- a 2023 movie on Netflix last night -- because, well I've been a fan of Rich Sommer since he played Harry Crane on Mad Men (and he looked then like a young Isaac Asimov), [see

========= 

Isaac Asimov (1965) and Harry Crane aka Rich Sommer (1960)

=============]

and Eddie Marsan has been one of my favorites since he played Ray Donovan's older brother on Ray Donovan, the Showtime series that ended too soon.

Also, I'm always willing to give an erotic thriller a chance.

And the two -- Marsan and Sommer -- play a mean, soulless chief (Campbell) and assistant (Paul) of a hedge fund from hell, though for all I know, that's what all or at least most hedge fund offices are like.

But that's not really what Fair Play is about.  It's about a couple, Emily and Luke, who love sex and get engaged, right before Emily gets promoted to the job Luke was yearning for.  The promotion devastates their relationship to the point where Luke is unable to perform in bed, despite Emily's inducements.  I actually had a slightly difficult time believing this because, well, Phoebe Dynevor as Emily is an excellent, convincing actress.  But tensions between the two escalate. Luke continues to not have the good sense to find another job (another somewhat unbelievable lack of development, since Luke, well played by Alden Ehrenreich, otherwise seems pretty smart), and in the end, verbal attacks and lack of sex escalate into ... well, I don't want to give too much of the ending away.

All in all, I think Fair Play is worth seeing.  But a little more subtlety would have helped the story.  It's ok for Emily's mother to be a caricature, but I would've liked to have seen a little more depth in the other characters, beginning with Campbell and Paul.

Criminal Record: Outstanding in Every Way

I just saw the eight-episode Criminal Record on Apple TV+.   My wife and I are avid devotees of British detectives in dramas, and Criminal Record is better than most.  In fact, it's outstanding in every way.

The story features a relatively junior detective, DS June Lenker played by Cush Jumbo, and a senior detective, DCI Daniel Hegarty played by Peter Capaldi, who come into conflict over Errol Mathis (played by Tom Moutchi), who Lenker increasingly believes was railroaded into taking the fall for the murder of his wife.

The acting is superb.  Capaldi distinguished himself as Dr. Who, Jumbo was on The Good Wife, and I don't recall seeing Mathis anywhere before Criminal Record, but it's Paul Rutman's writing and creation of of this series that give it such remarkable power.  In most stories like this, you'd expect DCI Hegarty to use every ounce of his prowess to protect himself and his colleagues' putting away Mathis for the presumed murder of his wife, but Hegarty has a conscience and a decency, Mathis may actually think he's guilty, and you don't know what's really what until the very last moment of the eighth episode.

And in the midst of all this, Criminal Record delivers some really funny moments.  Hegarty under the strain of these events often looks like he slept the night before in a crypt, and one of his former colleagues remarks when Hegarty is looking particularly haggard that he would do well if he showed up for a casting call for a corpse.

I don't want to share any more humor with you, or anything more about the plot, lest I rob you of the enjoyment you'll have watching this series.  There's talk of making a second season, and I certainly hope they do.  In the meantime, you absolutely can't go wrong watching the first.

Playlist by Anthony Marinelli of Songs from It's Real Life: An Alternate History of The Beatles

 

Presumed Innocent 1.8: The Killer

Well, in the thoroughly superb season 1 finale of Presumed Innocent on Apple TV+, we find out who killed Carolyn.

And that's not the person who killed Carolyn in the novel and the movie!

And I won't tell you who either is, in case you haven't read the novel, seen the movie, or the series, even after the Spoiler advisory below.

[Spoilers ahead ... ]

It wasn't Tommy Molto, even though he loved Carolyn too, and she rejected him.  He gave a great summation of the prosecution's case to the jury, but Rusty's in his own defence was even better, and carried the day.  All in all, one of the best courtroom scenes I've ever seen on screen,

It was also something to learn that Rusty staged the murder scene -- tied up Carolyn's body -- to protect whom he thought was the murderer.

Hats off to everyone who created this series for telling a story much like the book and the movie, but with some very different parts and angles, all sharp and intriguing.  There wasn't a single acting performance that wasn't powerful in all kinds of ways, and I can't wait to see where all of this goes in the second season.

See also Presumed Innocent 1.1-1.2: Presumed Excellent, And So Far Is ... 1.3: Sterling Performances ... 1.4: Under Fingernails ... 1.6: Tommy Molto ... 1.7: The Poker

Presumed Innocent 1.7: The Poker

[Spoilers ahead ... ]

First, let me say that I'm glad we find out in the first few minutes of episode 1.7 of Presumed Innocent on Apple TV+ that Horgan and is alive and well.  In fact, so well, that we see him back in court with a pacemaker in his heart as Rusty takes the stand.

Which, of course, is the last thing a defendant in a murder case is supposed to do, and Molto has a field day with Rusty, winning the rarely given praise of Nico.  But Molto's satisfaction is short-lived.  He returns home, finds his apartment has been ransacked, and a fire poker with the charming note attached, "G0 FUCK YOURSELF".

What does this tell us?  Well, Molto didn't write the note in all caps himself.  Someone put it there on the poker.  That poker, presumably, is the poker that was used to bludgeon and kill Carolyn.  I didn't see any blood on it, but that could have cleaned off.

I see two possibilities.  One, Molto is the killer, he cleaned and hid the poker in his home, and someone found it -- after ransaking the place -- and left it and the note.   Who could that person be?

Well, the other possibility is that the murderer in the book and the movie, angry about what Molto had put Rusty through in court, left the poker with the note in Molto's home.  I guess this is the more likely explanation, but then why was the home ransacked?

We'll find out the answer next week. And I'm glad there'll be another season of this superb drama.

See also Presumed Innocent 1.1-1.2: Presumed Excellent, And So Far Is ... 1.3: Sterling Performances ... 1.4: Under Fingernails ... 1.6: Tommy Molto

Criminal Minds: Evolution 17.7: Jill Gideon

Episode 17.7 of Criminal Minds: Evolution on Paramount Plus expanded the retrieval of earlier Criminal Minds players with the introduction of Jason Gideon's wife Jill.

[Spoilers ahead ... ]

Wow!  Jill's played by Felicity Huffman, and she not only was married to Jason -- killed nearly 10 years ago (off-camera) by an unsub -- but had some kind of important relationship to Rossi, who tells Emily he doesn't want Jill brought into the BAU's current investigation into the various Stars.  (As far as I can recall, she didn't actually appear in the first few seasons in which Jason was on the show.)

Of course, Emily ignores Rossi's plea -- she's back in charge of the BAU, so no one in the BAU can tell her what to do, including Rossi -- and we get some great scenes as Emily knocks on Jill's door, and is something less than warmly received.  Again, as in last week's episode, it was fun to hear Emily go over all the missing BAU members, when Jill asks her what's happening at the BAU.  Once again, I was most interested in what Emily had to say about Spencer, characterizing his absence as "on sabbatical".  That's certainly better than dead -- which we know isn't the case for Spencer -- or even left in a huff.

Moving on to other characters, I just want to also say that Tyler should be made a member of the BAU already. No need to keep him in the vestibule of being a consultant any more.

And as for the plot of this episode and its violence -- the specific kind of depraved violence featured in this episode -- I found it suitably revolting, as I usually do.  But that's not why I watch this fascinating series.

See also Criminal Minds: Evolution 17.1-17-.2 The Elusive Profile ... 17.3: "BAU Gate" ... 17.4: Progress ... 17.6: Gideon, Morgan, Hotch

And see also Criminal Minds: Evolution 16.1-16.4: Outstanding! ... 16.5: Assessment of What Could Have Happened at the End ... 16.6-16.8: Better Than Ever on Paramount Plus ... 16.9: Elias Voit and David Rossi ... 16.10: Gold Star

===

Some reviews of episodes from earlier seasons:

Criminal Minds 8.12: Spencer's Burden

Criminal Minds 7.1: "The Is Calm and It's Doctor" ... Criminal Minds 7.3: Meets House and The Unit

Criminal Minds in Sixth Season Premiere ... Criminal Minds 6.2: The Meaning of J. J. Leaving ... Criminal Minds 6.3: Proust, Twain, Travanti ... Tyra on Criminal Minds 6.13 ...Criminal Minds 6. 17: Prentiss Farewell Part I ... Criminal Minds 6.18: Farewell Emily ... Criminal Minds 6.19: Fight Club Redux Plus ... Criminal Minds 6.20: Emily's Ghost ... Criminal Minds 6.21: The Tweeting Killer ... Criminal Minds 6.22: Psycho and a Half ... Criminal Minds 6.23: The Good Lie ... Criminal Minds Season 6 Finale

Criminal Minds 5.22 and the Dark Side of New New Media

 

Presumed Innocent 1.6: Tommy Molto

Well, episode 1.6 of Presumed Innocent on Apple TV+ had a shocking ending which I won't tell you about until the end of this review, in which I want to talk about something else.

I think there's a good chance Tommy Molto murdered Carolyn in this excellent version of Presumed Innocent.   We saw previously that she said she didn't want to work with him on any more cases.  And in episode 1.6 we learn that she formally told Human Resources that she didn't want to work with Tommy because he was "ick"y.  

Now, again, I know who killed Carolyn in the novel and the movie.   It wasn't Tommy.  But I've already seen some differences between those and this TV series, and I can see why Carolyn would see some "ick" in Tommy.  Does that mean he killed her?  No, but it certainly makes him a good suspect.

[Spoilers ahead ... ]

Now for the shocker: Rusty's lead attorney, former DA Horgan, collapses in the courtroom.  I think Horgan is a great character, and Bill Camp's doing a fine job portraying him, so I certainly hope he survives.  If he doesn't, Mya's an excellent attorney, she can take over, but she doesn't have the gravitas that Horgan has as the former DA.  

I recall Horgan in the novel or the movie, so I have no idea how he'll fare in the TV series, but I sure hope -- for Rusty's sake and the audience's -- that we haven't see the last of him.

See also Presumed Innocent 1.1-1.2: Presumed Excellent, And So Far Is ... 1.3: Sterling Performances ... 1.4: Under Fingernails