Television reviews – Page 14

“The Undoing”–Deeds Undone

Written by Diana Paul on December 14, 2020. Posted in Television reviews. 4 Comments on “The Undoing”–Deeds Undone

This HBO original mini-series, The Undoing, is a police procedural based upon the novel You Should Have Known by Jean Hanff Korelitz. We observe the daily life of a highly successful New York therapist, Grace Fraser (Nicole Kidman), a specialist in marriage counseling, as well her husband, Jonathan (Hugh Grant), a successful pediatric oncologist. Their teenage son Henry attends an elite private school which receives generous donations from Grace’s father (Donald Sutherland). At a school fundraiser Grace...

“Retribution”–Karma is a Beast

Written by Diana Paul on December 7, 2020. Posted in movie reviews, Television reviews, Unhealed Wound. No Comments on “Retribution”–Karma is a Beast

Retribution ( a 2016 BBC production originally titled “One of Us”) opens with a horrific double murder, which will tear apart the lives of two families, the Douglases and the Elliots. They are friends who live side-by-side in the isolated Scotland Highlands hamlet of Braeston. The atmospherically remote Scottish scenery is reminiscent of Nordic noir landscapes. Events soon take an even more brutal turn when a badly injured man arrives at the Douglas family’s doorstep after his car careens off the road – a man who they...

“The Comey Rule”–Inner Conflict

Written by Diana Paul on November 23, 2020. Posted in movie reviews, Television reviews. No Comments on “The Comey Rule”–Inner Conflict

In this two-part Hulu and Showtime series, FBI Director James Comey (Jeff Daniels) begins a collision course against Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump (Brendan Gleeson). Based on Comey’s book, “A Higher Loyalty”, the first part of The Comey Rule follows the investigation into Hillary’s email and its impact on the 2016 election. Part Two follows the aftermath of the election on Comey’s career and on his family, together with his investigation into Russia, code-named “Crossfire Hurricane”. This is not...

“Hinterland” —The Remote Interior of the Mind

Written by Diana Paul on November 1, 2020. Posted in movie reviews, Television reviews, Unhealed Wound. 1 Comment on “Hinterland” —The Remote Interior of the Mind

An original Welsh-noir murder series on Netflix (in three seasons, 13 total episodes), Hinterland is for those who love this genre. The main character, DCI Tom Mathias, is a deeply troubled unsympathetic detective who, together with his more mature and brilliant partner Mared Rhys, travels around a small hamlet in Wales solving at least one murder per episode. The dark, forboding, and gloomy landscape rivals that of the best Nordic noir raising the same question: how can there be so many murders in such a small...

“Flesh and Blood”–Deadly Sins

Written by Diana Paul on October 18, 2020. Posted in movie reviews, Television reviews. No Comments on “Flesh and Blood”–Deadly Sins

Don’t be fooled. This dysfunctional family gives the appearance of happiness and love, but Flesh and Blood disguises a murder. This mystery-thriller set in the sunshine and warm beaches of West Sussex is a multigenerational psychodrama. The gentle surf and sunny skies can lull the residents into a false sense of comfort and security. Flesh and Blood immediately goes to the darkly secretive interior family drama that throws shade on the murdered. Wisely keeping the identity of the victim hidden,–although the obscured...

“Ratched”–Ratcheting Up the Tension

Written by Diana Paul on October 12, 2020. Posted in movie reviews, Television reviews. 1 Comment on “Ratched”–Ratcheting Up the Tension

This Netflix quasi-horror thriller creates a backstory for Nurse Ratched, the heartless villain in the 1975 Academy-Award winning classic “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest”. “What made Ratched so vile and so unimaginably cruel and unempathetic?” The answer, of course, has roots in Nurse Ratched’s tragic early years, unhealed wounds that continue to fester. Ratched is a female-villain origin story. Ratched opens in 1947 as Mildred Ratched arrives in Big Sur to seek employment...