Paul Levinson's Infinite Regress

reviewing Black Doves; Dark Matter; Dept. Q; Detective Hole; Dexter: Resurrection; For All Mankind; Foundation; Hijack; Memory of a Killer; MobLand; Outlander; Paradise; Presumed Innocent; Severance; Silo; Slow Horses; Smoke; Star City; Star Trek: Strange New Worlds; Tehran;The: Day of the Jackal, Diplomat, Last of Us, Night Agent; Your Friends & Neighbors +books, films, music, podcasts, politics

George Santayana had irrational faith in reason - I have irrational faith in TV.

Showing posts with label Maura Tierney. Show all posts

Tuesday, September 21, 2021

American Rust 1.1-2: Pennsylvania Noir

My wife and I just had a chance to see the first two episodes of American Rust on Showtime. We'll definitely be watching the ensuing six episodes.

It occurred to me that American Rust is part of what may be called Pennsylvania Noir, joining Mare of Eastham (which received three impressive Emmys the other night) and Your Honor (which should have received some Emmys). American Rust is the most down in the dirt, depicting a way of life under siege from poverty and the elements, with characters who know what's good even if they can't have it, and escape to New York City if they can.

The acting that portrays those characters is outstanding. Jeff Daniels is Chief of Police Del Harris. He's on some kind of PTSD-control drugs, in love with Grace Poe (played by Maura Tierney), who is married to a jackass husband Virgil (Mark Pellegrino), but Harris still manages to do his job with a moral code that transcends the law. But I think my favorite character is Billy Poe (played by Alex Neustaedter), somehow involved in a murder which I'm guessing he didn't commit, and reminding me a lot of Riggins (Taylor Kitsch) on Friday Night Lights, which is a very good thing.

More on the murder: the whodunnit is the heart of narrative, and so far it has some compelling players. Harris will bend the rules to the point of breaking them to protect Billy, and it's not clear at this point what Harris really believes. Billy's in love with the sister of the guy who may have committed the murder with Billy, or maybe did it just on his own, and I was glad to see the two of them totally together again, even for just a night, because I'm a hopeless romantic. It was sweet to see Lee (Julia Mayorga) fall asleep in Billy's arms as they were dancing at a wedding.

So there's a lot of story to see in American Rust, and I'll be back here with weekly reviews.

Sunday, January 31, 2021

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.

Monday, December 2, 2019

The Report: The Not-So-Good Old Days

My wife and I saw The Report last night on Amazon Prime. Even more so than its superb star-studded cast - Adam Driver, Annette Bening, Jon Hamm, Michael C. Hall, Maura Tierney, Ted Levine, you get the picture - the story of how our government, before Trump, lied and otherwise did its utmost to keep the public from knowing that we tortured prisoners via water-bordering after September 11, makes The Report an absolute necessity for anyone who cares about democracy and human decency to see.

I say the government, but Senator Diane Feinstein, brilliantly portrayed by Bening, sticks with Daniel Jones (powerfully played by Driver) and is ultimately instrumental in seeing his report published. Not so much just about everyone else, other than a few of Feinstein's colleagues on her Senate committee.

That George W. Bush would have wanted to keep this secret is not surprising - the torture took place on his watch. But Obama was in no hurry to make it publicly known, either. And since the government was regularly denying that it ever took place, including when Obama was in office, well, he doesn't come across the greatest in this narrative, either.

But the most disconcerting was CIA Director John Brennan (2013-2017, i.e,, under Obama) perfectly played by Ted Levine, whom I first noticed as a good guy in Monk. Here, in The Report, Levine plays pretty much the complete antithesis of a good guy. I've seen Brennan many times on MSNBC. He's understandably a favorite critic of Trump to have on the air, seeing as how Trump took away his security clearance after Brennan dared to criticize Trump. But the way he behaved in regard to Jones, coming this close to getting him thrown in prison for years for daring to uncover the truth, well, I'll never look at Brennan the same again.

The point here is the degradations of democracy and humane conduct on which we pride ourselves here in the United States were bipartisan, with many Democrats, at least in the Administration, more than willing to do whatever it took to cover up what the Bush Administration had done and denied doing. All in the name of national security.

To be clear, I'm a New Yorker, and was terribly traumatized by what happened on September 11. Although I wasn't in favor of torturing prisoners, I might have at least understood it though not supported it, if it had really worked. But as The Report makes clear, it did not. And the attempt to keep it from the public, to lie about its effectiveness, represents a low day for all Americans.

The only heroes here are Driver, Feinstein, and The New York Times for going public at a crucial time with what it knew of the story, which kept Jones from being ruined. And now, this crucial movie is heroic for being made (written and directed) by Scott Z. Burns and shown on Amazon right now. Kudos to all, and, once again, our First Amendment.

Sunday, November 3, 2019

The Affair Finale: Saving the Very Best for Last

Finales of significant and great series come in on all kinds of levels. The Sopranos, Six Feet Under, Star Trek: The Next Generation in their own very different ways came in the very best (see my PBS interview about this a few years ago). I'd say The Affair came in tonight in that very lofty company.

It was a heart-warming, healing, beautifully and sadly appropriate ending to a brilliant, disturbing, unique, and refreshing series. Noah and Helen in bed together, with all four of their children sitting on a bench outside of the motel room. Just perfect. Joanie finally growing into herself and going home to her husband and kids. Noah on the cliff overlooking the water and dancing at the end, both of the finale and of his own life. A Noah wiser than he'd ever been.

Those were the big things, pure gold, and there were more of them. But there also were little things. Bruce coming through for Whitney, even though his brain is faltering. The fact that Helen and her mother died the very same year (poor Helen couldn't get rid of her). The dance that the kids and Whitney's new husband and Sierra and even Helen's mother did - no, that was not a little thing. That was a big thing, and wonderful.

But I was sad that Noah at the end has lost Helen, in a way that can't be repaired. Sad and glad that he can at least talk to her at her grave, and read to her from their daughter Stacey's book. Life and love and talent can endure through generations. That's a great parting thought, and I'm glad Noah was still alive to convey it to us.

What an Emmy-worth performance by Dominic West, and by Maura Tierney as Helen, too. They both deserves the very highest accolades for their work in this series, as do the creators Hagai Levi and Sarah Treem. The Affair was before the finale one of my favorite series ever on television. The finale makes it even more so.

Sunday, October 27, 2019

The Affair 5.10: Helen and Noah

And The Affair checked in tonight with its very next to last episode - 5.10 - and, depending upon what's on the screen next week, the series may have saved its best for next to last.

Noah and Helen frequently had the best stories over the years, and tonight they had it all, with a Helen story, a Noah story, a Noah and Helen story, and another Noah story, all superbly acted by Maura Tierney and Dominic West. It was about how they escaped the fire, and finally ended up as friends, again, at the very least.

The drama was great, as the two walked down a steep side of a canyon, at Noah's behest, as the only way to get ahead of the flames. But if that wasn't enough, Helen getting bitten by a snake, and Noah saving her, again, this time by getting her to hospital on time, was just the thing.

All of this served as a fitting canvas for the two to tell each other, and therefore us, their stories. Why Noah married and then left Helen and their family. Why Helen married Noah, and how she survived Noah's leaving them. If there were another season, I wouldn't mind at all seeing the two get back together again as a married couple. It would be the ultimate healing of what happened. But I doubt that's going to happen next week.

Noah and Helen still wrongly think that Allison took her own life. The coming attractions show Joanie again in the future. This still leaves some room for at least Joanie getting some truthful resolution on her mother's death. If by chance Noah is still alive then, too - it was hard to tell in the coming attractions - then he'll be able to get some truthful resolution on what happened to Allison, too.

I'm sorry to see this unique series come to an end. But tonight's episode shows it's giving coming to an end a good shot at ending well.

Sunday, July 29, 2018

The Affair 4.7: Noah and Janelle

A superb Noah half hour on The Affair tonight - the second half hour in tonight's line-up. As I think I've already mentioned in the reviews this season, Noah has really been at his best this year. Compassionate, courageous, decisive, all the things you would want in a leading man.

And it was good to see Noah and Janelle finally consummate their flirtation. For a variety of reasons, Janelle is the best woman for Noah that he's been involved with in lo these four seasons. And that includes Helen - who, I've got to say, had another half-baked episode. It's not Maura Tierney's fault. The script is obliging her to do stupid things - including being nasty to Noah, who is trying to do the right thing for their kids.

Back to Noah: the resolution of his episode tonight was also outstanding, swerving from bringing Anton out to Princeton to getting the two into that car we saw at the beginning of the first few episodes. In that car were Noah, Anton, and Cole - and they're looking for Alison.

Not to get too meta, but news was just announced a few days ago that there will be a fifth and final season of The Affair. I was a little worried that, if this was the last season, Alison might not survive it. Which would be a shame - she's the best character (with Noah moving up now to a close second).

So here are my predictions for what's left of this season: Ben is the most likely reason for Alison's absence (though he seems a little too obvious to be such a major villain). Of course, we don't yet know that Alison's missing is involuntary. And back to Helen: I'd love to see Vic survive, but that's not likely. What I do think is that Sierra will have his baby. (Good name for a character - see The Plot to Save Socrates.)

And I'll be back next week with another review.

the Sierra Waters time-travel trilogy

Monday, June 25, 2018

The Affair 4.2: Meanwhile, Back on the Island

Episode 4.2 of The Affair last night, was a pretty good, even excellent, standalone episode, though it had little to do with the central themes which animated the three previous seasons. If an overall series is a book, and each season a chapter, Cole and Alison's half hours felt like chapters in a new book, a sequel, published some years later.

The two different takes on the same story still worked well, though actually there weren't too many scenes in which Cole and Alison were together, making 4.2 almost two half-hour standalone stories. But my favorite was Alison saying "fuck" in her rendition, with the expletive absent in Cole's.

Alison's story was the more compelling and unusual. In her half hour, which came second, we see her at work in a center that offers peer-to-peer counseling for parents who lost a child. She meets a guy who saves her from a father suffering from a kind of PTSD - literally saves her life, from the guy who is choking her - and this proves to be the beginning of a longterm romance (also literally longterm, since the guy is in a program, too, which won't let him have romantic erotic relationships for another five months and x number of days and hours). Hey, were it me, I'd have left the program to go out with Alison - but, then, I wouldn't have joined such a program in the first place. Not drinking is one thing. Not being allowed to have relationships is ... well, I'd say counterproductive at best.

It's gratifying to see Alison in such good shape - the best she's been in the entire series, I'd say, and much better than Cole, who seemed more pathetic than usual last night. I'm with his wife - what's he so unhappy about? I know, he was a harrowing backstory, too. But, hey, man, get over it - you have a good life now, including on the verge of being a millionaire. Does he love and unconsciously miss being with Alison that much? Maybe.

Very well acted as always by Ruth Wilson as Alison and Joshua Jackson as Cole, and I forgot to say the same for Dominic West as Noah and Maura Tierney as Helen last week, because that was true, too. The Affair was always a unique series, and I think I'm going to like the new turn it's taken this year.

the Sierra Waters time-travel trilogy

Sunday, January 14, 2018

Philip K. Dick's Electric Dreams 1.6 Safe & Sound: This Isn't a Drill

Safe & Sound - episode 1.6 in Philip K. Dick's standalone 10-episode anthology series on Amazon Prime which I'm reviewing one episode at a time (with minimal spoilers and no or scant comparison to the original Philip K. Dick stories) - returns to the familiar but always exquisite Dick territory of is it real or illusion, in this case the real being an ear gel through which Foster Lee hears the voice of a digital assistant, the illusion being the possibility that the voice is literally in her head, given some credence since her father was a psycho who heard voices.

This dilemma is presented in the environment of a not-so-distant future in which the big Eastern cities are worried about domestic terrorist attacks from the rural "bubbles" out West. On that count, Safe & Sound is as reminiscent of Damon's Knight's 1951 story "Natural State" as it is of Philip K. Dick's 1955 "Foster, You're Dead!" on which it is thinly based.

But there's nothing thin about Safe & Sound, written for television by Kalen Egan and Travis Sentell, who give us an hour rich in symbolism and relevance to our own time, including the words "this isn't a drill," heard just yesterday in Hawaii, in our reality, when someone who should have known better released an announcement of an incoming ballistic missile attack in error.

Paranoia is also a mainspring of Dick's fiction (and as his biographers and people who knew him attest, sadly also his life), and Annalise Basso does a fine job of portraying Foster in the throws of struggling with whether what she is hearing is real or worse - though, in this case, paranoia could be the better of the two choices, since what she hears from her digital helper are escalating warnings about terrorists about to attack, and what she needs to do to stop that.

Well directed by Game of Thrones' Alan Taylor, and it was good to see Maura Tierney as Foster's mother, with almost the exact same personality as Helen in The Affair. Hey, I'll take that until The Affair comes back on the air, and Safe & Sound is eminently worth seeing in its own right.

See also Philip K Dick's Electric Dreams 1.1 Real Life: Mutually Alternate Realities ... 1.2 Autofac: Human v Machine ... 1.3 Human Is: Compassion or Alien? ... 1.4 Crazy Diamond: DNA Batteries ... 1.5: The Hood Maker: Telepathy and Police ... 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

terrorists use squirrels in near-future NYC

Monday, November 24, 2014

The Affair 1.7: True Confessions

A very different episode of The Affair tonight - 1.7 - with barely a scene in either story of Noah and Alison together. But the episode was one of the best in the series so far, and broke all kinds of new ground.

In a nutshell, Noah and Alison each confess their affair, to Helen and Cole, for very different reasons. Noah is being blackmailed by Oscar about the affair, and Alison tells Cole the whole truth - after a partial truth - because Cole wants to know if the guy Alison was sleeping with stole Cole's drugs.

It was great night for both Maura Tierney and Joshua Jackson, who each put in their best performances in the series so far. Jackson as Cole was especially remarkable, after seeming like he cared about more the loss of his drugs than he did about Alison, but pivoting into the warmest and deepest we've seen him so far this season.

Noah, as he does often, comes out the worst in the two accounts, including his. At very least, he's insensitive to Cole about the loss of Cole's son, and his closing the curtains in his Brooklyn brownstone to Alison, standing outside, was a low moment. Alone and vulnerable, however, Alison is now more open to a re-uniting with Cole.

The series - or this season of the series - could well be heading to aftermath territory, in which the affair in over, and Alison and Noah repair their marriages, with the greatest threat coming from the detective, whose most interesting appearance is at the beginning of Noah's episode, reading Noah's book. But the marriages are not quite equal. Noah and Helen have four children, which gives them more reason to stay together. But Cole seems to have gotten over what Alison did far more than Helen with Noah. And I have a feeling we've not seen the last of Alison and Noah together by any means - if not this season, then likely next.

The series story has moved into the end of the summer, or the beginning of the Fall, and in our world it's taking off a week for Thanksgiving. I'll be back here in two weeks with another late night review.

podcast review of every 1st season episode

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

The Affair Premiere: Sneak Preview Review

Just saw The Affair's first episode, nearly a week before show time on Showtime, thanks to Showtime On Demand, for everyone who has that. The following review has spoilers.

The first episode is neatly split into two parts - two, mirror stories - a he-said, she-said, about the beginning of the affair, or how Noah and Alison first met. This is a good piece of writing, with agreement on all the events, but differences on who initiated conversations and suggestions, such as who suggested that Noah take an outdoor shower - Noah or Alison.

The background is also appealing. Noah is a grade-school teacher and an author of - so far - just one novel. As his rich father-in-law obnoxiously tells him, most people have one book in them, and that's it. Noah, of course, wants more. He's happily married, with four kids, but life isn't the best it could be for him. Not only has his first book not been all that successful - good enough to get a contract and advance for the second, but no best-seller - but with four kids he's lucky if he has a chance to make love to his wife. At least, that's how he sees things. He's an attractive man, in his story, who is somewhat unappreciated by his wife but wanted by other women.

Alison's story is more profound, certainly more tragic. She and her husband (or partner) lost their six-year old son. Her husband is beginning to get over the pain, but not yet Alison. He wants to sleep with her, but she's not comfortable making love with their son still so much on her mind. She's attracted - a bit, in her vision - to Noah, but not as much as Noah thinks she's attracted to him in his vision.

Both stories are presented to a police detective, at some future time - years in the future - as Noah and Alison are being separately interviewed. In this sense, The Affair resonated with True Detective. At this point, it's not clear what the interviews are about - apparently the death of one of their partners, likely Alison's, which may be a murder.

The acting is excellent. Dominic West is his customarily superb - and I'm impressed, as always, not only with his acting but his American accent, which I first took note of in my reviews of The Wire. Joshua Jackson is back in his first major series since Fringe, but the character he plays in The Affair - Alison's partner Cole - is so far a lot less likable than Peter on Fringe. Maura Tierney as Noah's wife is good in this part, as is Ruth Wilson as Alison in hers.

The filming is Long Island seashore evocative, and the mixture of the infidelity with some kind of likely murder makes The Affair an attractive contender off to a strong start.

See also The Affair 1.2: Time Travel! ... The Affair 1.3: The Agent and the Sleepers ... The Affair 1.4: Come Together ... The Affair 1.5: Alison's Episode ... The Affair 1.6: Drugs and Vision ... The Affair 1.7: True Confessions ... The Affair 1.8: "I Love You / I Love You, Too" ... The Affair 1.9: Who Else on the Train? ... The Affair Season One Finale: The Arrest and the Rest

a different kind of affair and murder

#SFWApro #SHO_TheAffair

podcast review of every 1st season episode

Monday, October 29, 2012

The Good Wife 4.5 meets The Sopranos

Three powerful women figured prominently in The Good Wife 4.5 last night:

1. Annabella Sciorra of The Sopranos and all kinds of fame puts in an appearance as one of Lemond Bishop's attorneys. She's as cute and effective as ever.

2. Of course Julianna Margulies - another anna - is also on hand. Come to think of it, she was also in The Sopranos. All that was missing was the Polish woman with one leg.

3. And Maura Tierney - who I'm pretty sure was not on The Sopranos - also shows up, with a continuing storyline that has nothing to do with Bishop.

Maddie (Maura Tierney) has had a strange storyline so far. There was an implication that she wanted to sleep with Alicia - which didn't happen but could still be true. All she seems to want is to be friends with Alicia, who is happy to have her as a friend as long as Maddie keeps the money flowing to Peter's campaign. But last night, as a snakey blogger - whew, The Good Wife doesn't like bloggers - posts an article about how the mainstream media backed off publishing the bogus sex story about Peter and a blonde campaign worker, Maddie shows a keen interest in the story and the campaign worker.

Why? Not yet clear, but after a meeting with the campaign worker, Maddie withdraws her support from Peter's campaign. From the inklings we get in the coming attractions, maybe Maddie is thinking of jumping in the race for governor herself?

Unknown at this point. All I can say is, "Don't stop-"

See also The Good Wife 4.1 Meets Occupy Wall Street ... The Good Wife 4.2: Reunited ... The Good Wife 4.3: "Template-Based Link Analysis Algorithm"

And see also The Good Wife 3.1: Recusal and Rosh Hashanah ... The Good Wife: 3.2: Periwigs and Skype ... The Good Wife 3.7: Peter v. Will ... Dexter's Sister on The Good Wife 3.10 ... The Good Wife 3.12: Two Suits ... The Good Wife 3.13 Meets Murder on the Orient Express ... The Good Wife 3.15: Will and Baseball

And see also The Good Wife Starts Second Season on CBS ... The Good Wife 2.2: Lou Dobbs, Joe Trippi, and Obama Girl ... The Good Wife 2.4: Surprise Candidate, Intimate Interpsonal Distance ... The Good Wife 2.9 Takes on Capital Punishment ... The Good Wife 2.16: Information Wars

The Silk Code Kindle

"challenging fun"
- Entertainment Weekly

e-mail received from a reader:
Dear Paul, I just dreamed of airships flying between raindrops. I just returned from 2042 CE, where I sold my hardcover copy of The Plot to Save Socrates for seventy million Neo-Euros, because it had your response to this e-mail from way back in 2007 scotch-taped onto the inside of the cover. A Paul Levinson collector paid top Neo-Euro, because of the authentic archaic e-mail printout from you. It turns out that not many of your e-mails from before your tenure as CEO of HBO/Cinemax and terms as United Nations Secretary General will survive that far into the future. So, please respond to this e-mail, to help found my great-grandchildren's fortune. My Will will stipulate that they must share with your great grandchildren. Thanks! Tom

I of course happily replied...

42 reviews of The Plot to Save Socrates!