Your Honor 1.10: Finale Irony

I just saw the finale of Your Honor: read no further if you don't know the ending of this marvelously well-acted series.

I'll start by saying I didn't like the ending -- not because it wasn't 100% well-motivated, and flowed from everything in the story, but, because, well, it was so unhappy,

Michael did everything he could to save his son.  Most of it worked.  He was willing to sacrifice himself to save Adam.  But there were too many deadly pieces in play.  It was impossible for Michael to account for all of them.  He certainly could not have foreseen that Eugene, with no moves left after Michael did not let him testify, would put a bullet in Adam when Eugene shot at and missed Carlo, who had killed Eugene's brother Kofi and was getting away with it.

I guess the moral of this story is you can't control events with so many deceptions at play.   Part of Adams's fate, though, was also sealed by his falling in love with Fia.  That's why Adam was at the celebration.  Jimmy already knew that Adam not Michael had hit-and-run killed Rocco.  So even if Eugene was not at the hotel, Adam would likely have been killed.

Ironically, or just to add to the irony, Eugene would not have gotten into the hotel had not Jimmy's men not been distracted with keeping Michael out.   And that's really a thumbnail of everything in this story; just about every lie Michael told ultimately worsened the situation for himself and Adam.

Back to the acting: this was a rare series in which every character was memorable.  The lawyers, the Baxter family, each could have a spinoff series of their own.  But most of all Bryan Cranston as Michael Desiasto aka Your Honor, who gave a tour de force (too weak a phrase) performance in this Shakespearean tragedy in New Orleans.

See also Your Honor 1.1: Taut Set-Up ... Your Honor 1.2: "Today Is Yesterday" ... Your Honor 1.3: The Weak Link ... Your Honor 1.4: The Dinner ... Your Honor 1.5: The Vice Tightens ... Your Honor 1.6: Exquisite Chess Game ...Your Honor 1.7: Cranston and Stuhlbarg Approaching Pacino and De Niro ... Your Honor 1.8: Nothing More Important ... Your Honor 1.9: Screeching Up to the Last Stop Before Next Week's Finale

Your Honor 1.8: Nothing More Important

Your Honor 1.8 was a relatively quiet, highly cerebral episode, in which we see the judge struggle to preside over a fair trial for the brutal murder of Kobe by Carlo.   His problem, as he states to a juror he's getting thrown off the jury, because she's a sure bet to convict Carlo, is nothing is more important than protecting his son Adam -- not conscience, not devotion to justice, not even plain decency.   Although Jimmy Baxter thinks Judge Michael Desiato killed Rocco, Michael knows that it won't be long until Baxter realizes that Adam was behind the wheel.   (Frankly, the best thing Michael can do to protect himself and Adam is to have Jimmy Baxter and his wife killed.  Surely Michael knows that Jimmy will kill him even if Michael keeps Carlo out of prison.)

Meanwhile, Adam is falling so hard for Fia Baxter that he no longer wants to go to NYU, where he's just been admitted.  This creates more potential problems for the judge.  He wants his son out of of New Orleans, as far away from the Baxter family as possible.  Fortunately, Adam's godfather Charlie is beginning to realize what's going on with Adam -- that there's a girlfriend involved -- which with any luck should help Adam and therefore Michael out of this part of the mess.

A word about the acting.  I already said how superb Bryan Cranston and Michael Stuhlbarg are.  The truth is that every single performance of every single actor is brilliant in this series.  Episode 1.8 features Maura Tierney in the courtroom as prosecutor.   What a performance!  I haven't seen her since The Affair, and she is as reliably memorable in her role as ever.

Episode 1.8 was also the first episode that acknowledged COVID-19, unless I missed it in an earlier hour.  But tonight saw some masks in the courtroom, and words about COVID from the bench.  Interestingly, though, we also saw people crowded in restaurants with no masks.  This corresponds to what we've seen in NBC's Chicago shows, and Law and Order in New York City.  The inconsistency almost suggests that the COVID-aware scenes were put in after the main action was recorded at an earlier time.

But back to the plot of Your Honor: just two episodes left, in which anything can happen, and which I'm very much awaiting.

See also Your Honor 1.1: Taut Set-Up ... Your Honor 1.2: "Today Is Yesterday" ... Your Honor 1.3: The Weak Link ... Your Honor 1.4: The Dinner ... Your Honor 1.5: The Vice Tightens ... Your Honor 1.6: Exquisite Chess Game ...Your Honor 1.7: Cranston and Stuhlbarg Approaching Pacino and De Niro

Your Honor 1.7: Cranston and Stuhlbarg Approaching Pacino and De Niro

Let me start off my review of Your Honor 1.7 by saying the scenes between Cranston and Stuhlbarg -- the Judge and the mobster -- were so good, they could have been between Pacino and De Niro.  Two outstanding actors acting their hearts and souls out in this one-of-a-kind drama, playing two fathers, one who wants at all costs to protect his son, the other wanting both revenge for the son who died and protection for the one who has just been arrested for murder.

The Judge again shows himself adept and quick-witted when the situation calls for it.  Why didn't you turn yourself in, Baxter asks the Judge.  I was going to, I was at the police station, the Judge replies, and then I saw you.  The best lies are the ones closest to the truth in these one-on-one situations, and the Judge was indeed in that police station, ready to bring in his son Adam.

I don't get Baxter's strategy in another scene, though,  Why not give Big Mo her $150,000 back?  Why say she has to eat it, and risk a war, right when he's trying to get his son Carlo out of justice's way, and get back to making the Judge pay?  He doesn't want to appear weak, I know, but he's not as smart as any of the lead mobsters in the Godfather or Goodfellas.

Adam, however, is as sharp as his father.   He doesn't believe the Judge's story.  He wisely has not told him that he and Fia are falling in love, and you know that's going to have a decisive role in how this brilliant series ends.  The Judge is a master strategist.  He managed to get Sarah off the Carlo case by feeding her single malts in the bar.  But he can't control everything, and it's still an open question of who will be left alive, who will be left out of prison, when this series concludes.

I'm very glad there are three more episodes.

See also Your Honor 1.1: Taut Set-Up ... Your Honor 1.2: "Today Is Yesterday" ... Your Honor 1.3: The Weak Link ... Your Honor 1.4: The Dinner ... Your Honor 1.5: The Vice Tightens ... Your Honor 1.6: Exquisite Chess Game

Your Honor 1.1: Taut Set-up

Your Honor debuted on Showtime on Sunday, with about as tight a set up as you're likely to find in a limited (ten-episode) cable TV series.

Here's what that is: Bryan Cranston plays a tough judge in New Orleans, a widower, with an asthmatic teenage son who goes off to lay a wreath at the site of his mother's death a year earlier.  He's upset, takes his eyes off the road to get his inhaler, and hits another teenage boy riding on the new motorcycle his parents bought him for his birthday.   Adam Desiato (the judge's son) tries unsuccessfully to revive the motorcyclist.  He leaves without calling the police, tells his father (Judge Michael Desiato) what happened, and the judge decides the best thing to do is to bring his son into the police.   Until the judge discovers that the slain boy is the son of one of the most vicious mobsters in the ward (or whatever exactly they call boroughs in the New Orleans).  Not only that, but this boy's father is played by Michael  Stuhlbarg.

So, we not only have a confrontation of good vs. evil -- or maybe, morally ambiguous vs. evil -- but the two sides are portrayed by two powerful actors.  Hunter Doohan as Adam is impressive too, as is just about everyone who opens their mouth in this taut, provocative start of a story.  The best kinds of conflicts, from a narrative standpoint, are those in which the two sides are evenly matched in terms of passion and justification for their position.   The judge wants to save his son.  The mobster wants to avenge his son.  Both are determined their goal will be achieved.  Nothing will stand in the way of either.

In one sense, Jimmy Baxter the mobster has the upper hand.  He's already a killer, and accustomed in the ways of doing this.   In contrast, His Honor, Judge Desiato, is used to following and interpreting the law.  But he'll do anything to save his son, and that no doubt is exactly what he'll have to do.

An excellent set-up, as I said, and I'll be back here next week a report on how it goes.

 

El Camino: Flashbacks and Onward

El Camino, aptly described by IMDb as "a sequel of sorts, to Breaking Bad," is nothing but a success, unqualified.

The "of sorts" does amply to El Camino's status as a sequel, and one of the key reasons, perhaps the key reason, why it is so satisfying.  Walter (Bryan Cranston), Mike (Jonathan Banks), and Todd (Jesse Plemons), none of whom survived the original series, each appear in El Camino in flashback scenes that we haven't seen before in Breaking Bad.  Todd's was much better than Mike's, and Walter's was sheer magic, but all three in-and-of themselves make El Camino eminently worth watching.

Robert Forster, whose character Ed survived the original series, made a crucial and winning appearance in El Camino.   He was one of my favorite actors since the groundbreaking Medium Cool, and everything subsequent from Jackie Brown to even Heroes, and had the rare ability to be perfect in every disparate part he played.  In a tragic irony which somehow also is in line with Breaking Bad, Forster passed away on the day El Camino debuted on Netflix.  RIP, truly.

As for the story of El Camino, I don't want to give any of it away, so I won't talk about the plot.  But Aaron Paul does a fine job as Jesse Pinkman, who is appropriately a bit older and wiser and all-around more capable than he was in Breaking Bad.   The movie crackles with sarcasm and satire and all kinds of humor interspersed with bullets flying and other life-and-death situations, and is a good additional (very short) season to one of the most original and remarkable series ever on television.

Is there room for another sequel?   See the movie and decide.

See also my review of Breaking Bad: The Official Book



And see also Breaking Bad Final Episodes #1: Walt vs. Hank ... Breaking Bad Final Episodes #2: Skylar and Jesse ... Breaking Bad Final Episodes #3: The Ultimate Lie ... Breaking Bad Final Episodes #4: Old Yeller ... Breaking Bad Final Episode #5: Coordinates ... Breaking Bad Final Episode #6: The Knife and the Phone ...  Breaking Bad Penultimate: $10,000 for 2 Hours ... Breaking Bad Finale: "I Did It for Me"

Also: Talking about Walter White and Breaking Bad

And see also Breaking Bad Season 5 Premiere: Riveting Entropy ... Breaking Bad 5.3: Deal with the Devil ... Breaking Bad 5.7: Exit Mike ... Breaking Bad Final Half-Season Finale

And see also My Prediction about Breaking Bad ... Breaking Bad Season 4 Debuts ... Breaking Bad 4.2: Gun and Question ... Breaking Bad 4.11: Tightening Vice ... Breaking Bad 4.12: King vs. King ... Breaking Bad Season 4 Finale: Deceptive Flowers



  

Philip K. Dick's Electric Dreams 1.3 Human Is: Compassionate or Alien?

Humans in outer space has been adapted to the screen less frequently than other themes of Philip K. Dick.   But his work in that area is equally brilliant and sometimes better than his better-known themes - I've thought that ever since I read his "Beyond Lies the Wub" first published in 1952 - and in the case of Bladerunner ("Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep"), the two motifs (outer space and robots) are in effect combined.

Human Is, the third standalone episode in Philip K. Dick's Electric Dreams 10-episode anthology now streaming on Amazon Prime, and which I'm reviewing one episode at at a time (see my review of the first episode for how I'll be reviewing these episodes), is just about outer space, and is science fiction at its very zenith.  Though, if we're dealing with Philip K. Dick, nothing he writes is ever just about that, whatever that is, because it's always imbued with the question that haunts and animates just about everything he wrote:  is it real or dream, human or android, this dimension or another one?

In Human Is, the question is whether Silas (powerfully played, of course, by Bryan Cranston) is human or Rexorian, a dangerous species from another planet that likes to inhabit its human hosts.  Silas left on the mission cold and distant to his wife Vera (played with sensitivity by Essie Davis, last seen - by me - in The White Princess and Game of Thrones) and returns full of tenderness, consideration, and lovemaking that Vera tells him she never experienced like that from him before.  Silas nearly died on this mission.   So is his new, much better behavior the result of that experience changing him, making him more human, or because he is no longer just Silas but a meld of Rexorian and human?

I'm not going to tell you ending.  What I will say is that this is one beautiful piece of work, down to the cinematography by David Katznelson, the directing by Francesca Gregorini, and the writing for television by Jessica Mecklenburg.  And the acting not only sails with Cranston and Davis, but strong supporting performances by Ruth Bradley (last seen in Humans - an android series about as Dickian as it gets) and Game of Thrones' Liam Cunningham.

Having now seen three episodes of Electric Dreams, I'd say it's right up there with The Twilight Zone, and better (from what I've seen) than Black Mirror.

See also Philip K Dick's Electric Dreams 1.1 Real Life: Mutually Alternate Realities ...  1.2 Autofac: Human v Machine ... 1.4 Crazy Diamond: DNA Batteries ... 1.5 The Hood Maker: Telepathy and Police ... 1.6 Safe & Sound: This Isn't A Drill ... 1.7 The Father Thing: Dick from Space ... 1.8 Impossible Planet: Eye of the Beholder ... 1.9 The Commuter: Submitted for Your Approval ... 1.10: Kill All Others: Too Close for Comfort

Curb Your Enthusiasm 9.4: "Hold You in his Armchair"

So, as I've mentioned here several times, I have something of a principle - well, not quite a principle, maybe more of just a practice - of not reviewing comedies.  They rarely have continuing storylines, and the act of reviewing always seemed somewhat antithetical to the very notion of comedy.  Yet I started against my better judgement to review this ninth season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, and I've been drawn so inextricably into comedy that I've even reviewed three short plays this weekend, two of which are comedies (see my review of Anthony Marinelli's  Max & Domino, for example).  So clearly, there's nothing to be gained by resisting a review of another episode of Curb.

In this case - a review of tonight's 9.4 - I drew the title from Rob Sheffield's masterful book, Dreaming the Beatles, and its maybe facetious discussion of whether the line in John Lennon's "Come Together" is "feel you in his arms, yeah, you can feel his disease" or "feel you in his armchair, you can feel his disease".  Never mind that the second makes no sense.  Sheffield says there's been a decades-long debate about which it is.

And what does this have to do with tonight's Curb?  Well, the least funny part of the episode, but still pretty funny, was Larry's quest to get his shrink (played by Bryan Cranston!) to get Larry a more comfortable armchair for their therapy sessions.  Hence the connection between armchair and therapy in Curb 9.4 and the armchair and disease lines in "Come Together".

Larry's disputing whether the patient is bound by doctor/patient confidentiality was funnier, and more profound.  And as almost always, I think Larry is right.

But the funniest, burst-out-laughing part came during Funkhouser's eulogy for his nephew, which Larry first disrupts in his pursuit of his reserved seat, then any seat, then someone who Larry is sure is about to enact the fatwa on him, but of course turns out just to be a late guest in Middle Eastern garb.  Anything Funkhouser does is funny, but this memorial scene was pure gold.

(The length of flies routine - the kind that zip and unzip - was also hilarious.  Some maybe that's a tie with the interrupted Funkhouser eulogy.)

Ok, enough of this comedy.  Time to turn to the grim and brutal Ray Donovan, which I'll do in my next review.

See also: Curb Your Enthusiasm 9.1: Hilarious! ... Curb Your Enthusiasm 9.2: Wife Swapping ... Curb Your Enthusiasm 9.3: Benefits





It started in the hot summer of 1960, when Marilyn Monroe walked off the set of The Misfits and began to hear a haunting song in her head, "Goodbye Norma Jean" ...

Sneaky Pete: True Win

Graham Yost, one of the main creative forces shaping Amazon's Sneaky Pete, was and is also executive producer of two other superb series, The Americans and Justify. But Sneaky Pete has the most in common, and is almost a kind of mirror image, of another pathbreaking series created by another GY - Greg Yaitanes - Banshee.

Both tell the story of an ex-con who adopts someone else's identity, needs to fool a lot of people, and must match wits with a vicious, highly intelligent, racketeering villain who holds forth from New York City.  Both must deal with expected and unexpected near revelations of their true identity, and cleverly fend them off.   Sneaky Pete is a little lighter than the unremittingly brutal Banshee, but Sneaky Pete has plenty of dark and violent moments, too.

Unlike "Lucas Hood" in Banshee, however,  Marius Josipovic is not only conning the world about being "Pete," but running cons in everything he does.   These cons start and end the season, and give Sneaky Pete something crucially in common with other great con narratives on the big screen, ranging from the The Sting (mentioned in Sneaky Pete) to Ocean's 11.

And speaking of Ocean's 11 (and Ocean's Eleven), Sneaky Pete has an impressive array of star power, with Giovanni Ribisi in the lead role, Bryan Cranston as the arch villain, and Peter Gerety, Margo Martindale, and even Ben Vereen and Malcolm-Jamal Warner in supporting parts.  All do memorable jobs.  Not as well-known Marin Ireland, Shane McRae, and Libe Barer also put in good performances.

As was the case with Banshee, credibility is strained by the extent to which the imposter can get away with it for so long.  And Sneaky Pete has the problem of needing to fool the real Pete's grandparents and cousins - wouldn't they realize something was different in his eyes, which would be pretty much the same for someone in his thirties, not seen since he was a boy at least 11+ years old?  "Lucas Hood" in Banshee didn't have to confront anyone in the real Hood family, except his son, who realized the deception immediately.

But it's easy enough to suspend your disbelief in Sneaky Pete.  The action is quick, the surprises jolting, and the series clocks in as another true win for streaming television.

Trumbo and Trump

We finally got around to watching Trumbo last night, the superb 2015 movie starring Bryan Cranston as the brilliant, blacklisted screenwriter Dalton Trumbo who in the 1950s was imprisoned and forced to write under pseudonyms because of the demagogic Republicans of that time, in particular Joe McCarthy and the House Un-American Activities Committee, better known as HUAC.

It was impossible not to be struck by disturbing parallels between those Republicans and the kind of campaign Trump is now running.   Scapegoating, division of Americans, lashing out at the media and the intelligentsia were part and parcel of that era and loom menacingly in this one.  Only the names have changed, from Communist to Muslim and Mexican, from Hollywood to cable television.

Indeed, Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House and a contender for Vice President on a Trump ticket, called for a revival of HUAC just a few days ago as a way of defeating ISIS.

In the 1950s, the original HUAC wreaked havoc on law-abiding Americans like Trumbo, who was only exercising his First Amendment rights.   As the movie dramatically shows, the unexpected death of liberal Supreme Court Justice Wiley Rutledge in 1949 - appointed by FDR - deprived the court of the liberal majority needed to strike down the anti-Communist witch-hunt.

The Supreme Court again hangs in the balance, with the cowardly Republicans of today refusing to even consider Obama's nomination of a replacement for Scalia.   The reign of terror in the 1950s eventually ended, as actor Kirk Douglas and director Otto Preminger stepped to give Trumbo credit for the great screenwriting he did for the movies Spartacus and Exodus, in one of the best days in American history and the best parts of the movie.   HUAC changed its name to something more benign in 1969, and was put out of business completely by Congress in 1975.  But we've yet to have a happy ending with Trump and his ilk in 2016, and Americans who value freedom should redouble their efforts to make sure he never gets near the White House.

All the Way on HBO and its Relevance to Hillary

I saw All the Way on HBO last night.  I thought this movie about the Texas politician and Vice President who became President on the day of what I still see as the worst public event in my lifetime - the assassination of JFK in November, 1963 - was outstanding for at least part of the way, in its portrayal of LBJ's mastery of domestic policy.  But it was frustrating for what it barely addressed - how Lyndon Baines Johnson messed up so badly in foreign policy, in Vietnam.

I came of age in the 1960s.  Not only was I devastated by the murder of JFK and his zest and idealism, but I appreciated and cheered the way Johnson came back with extraordinary Civil Rights legislation and all kinds of pathbreaking law for life in America, such as Medicare.  For a very short time, it looked as if the future could survive what happened to JFK. And then the Vietnam War, not started by LBJ but prosecuted and expanded by him, shattered all of that forever, or certainly at least until this very day.

All the Way does a great in job in showing how Johnson brought into being those domestic miracles, how he played the necessary Senators and recalcitrant parts of the country like a chess master moving pieces on a board.  Bryan Crantson gives an astonishingly  good performance, capturing every bit of Johnson's swagger, political cunning, vulgarity, wisdom, and insecurity.  Anthony Mackie and Bradley Whitford are spot-on and memorable in their portrayals of MLK, Jr. and the hapless Hubert Humphrey.   The deliveries and demeanors of the Senators and other players in this movie don't miss a beat.

Did LBJ really believe in civil rights and other domestic revolutions he championed and succeeded in putting into Federal law?  At the time, I was pretty sure he did, and All the Way - assuming that LBJ's words and expressions in the movie are based on truth - reinforces and satisfies that sense.

But what went wrong with LBJ in Vietnam?  All the Way provides little more than a shadow of that calamitous development, and thus not much help in understanding how and why it happened that the U.S. got drawn into this unconstitutional, disastrous war.   When it has happening, my best explanation was that Johnson was just over his head when it came to foreign policy, unable to navigate and parse what his generals and advisors were telling him, and above all not wanting to appear weak or indecisive. He just lacked the requisite experience.

Which brings this movie back to 2016 and its relevance to a decision facing all Americans today.   Though Hillary Clinton is not without her failings, including in foreign policy, she has far and away the most foreign policy experience of the three candidates still standing - easily more than Bernie Sanders, and Donald Trump's experience in foreign policy is zero.  Hillary Clinton, as a former Secretary of State, has more experience in seeing to America's best interests in the world than anyone other than a former President or Secretary of State.

LBJ's error in Vietnam, just hinted at like a hurricane on the horizine in All the Way, changed the United States for the worse in a way that has endured to this very day.  Given the challenges that our country now faces in the world, we need someone in the White House with enough experience to avoid making an equivalent mistake in the next few years, which could have far worse consequences than what happened in the 1960s.   Thank you HBO for bringing home this point so effectively, though it was likely not your intention.   In the short and long run, All the Way may be more important for what it didn't actually show on the screen.