Unhealed Wound – Page 5 – Passion for Art, Movies, and Culture

Day of the Jackal–Hunt or Be Hunted

Written by Diana Paul on December 22, 2024. Posted in Television reviews. No Comments on Day of the Jackal–Hunt or Be Hunted

In this Peacock mini-series released November 2024, British assassin-for-hire and super-sniper is known only as the “Jackal” by police and those paying him millions. Of course, he has multiple aliases and disguises. An update of Frederick Forsyth’s 1971 novel and the 1973 movie, Day of the Jackal is a modern high-stakes thriller of international politics, espionage, and the dark web. It is not a sequel to the movie. A cold-blooded, shapeshifting chameleon, the Jackal (Academy Award winner Eddie Redmayne for “The Theory of Everything” and nominated for “The Danish Girl”)...

The Americans–Cold War at Home

Written by Diana Paul on December 16, 2024. Posted in Television reviews. No Comments on The Americans–Cold War at Home

In this multiple award-winning six-season Hulu series (2013-2018), The Americans has invaded the hearts of countless viewers. The Americans takes place during the Reagan era of 1980-1987, the Cold War with Gorbachev and what was known then as the Soviet Union. Philip (Matthew Rhys) and Catherine (Keri Russell) Jennings are high-level Soviet KGB spies who live in Falls Church, Virginia close to where the action is in Washington, DC. Matched as husband and wife by their KGB handlers, all allegiance in the first few seasons is to their homeland. Their two American-born...

Paranoid–Someone’s After Me

Written by Diana Paul on December 9, 2024. Posted in Television reviews. No Comments on Paranoid–Someone’s After Me

Paranoid, a British police procedural crime series (2016) set in the small town of Woodmere, opens with a brutal murder of a general practitioner pushing her young son on a swing in a public park. The woman is murdered in public by an unknown man in a black hoodie. Who could be the murderer? And what can the witnesses sitting in the park provide as clues to a possible suspect? Mysterious notes sent by a “Ghost Detective” contribute valuable evidence for identifying and tracking down the murderer. Three detectives–Nina Suresh (Indira Varma...

Penguin–A Waddle of Weirdness

Written by Diana Paul on December 1, 2024. Posted in Television reviews, Unhealed Wound. No Comments on Penguin–A Waddle of Weirdness

Based upon the DC Comic Batman and one of his nemeses, Penguin, this HBOmax mini-series is a spinoff of the 2022 Batman movie. Premiering on September 19 as a weekly installment, each episode tightly leads the viewer to the next surprising and noirish plot point. Oz Cobb (Colin Farrell), rather derisively called Penguin because of a limp and a disfigured face, no longer wants to be the nebbish that the mob boss, Carmine Falcone (Mark Strong of “Law and Order” fame), orders around contemptuously as his driver and go-fer in Gotham City. Not...

Disclaimer–Truth or Fiction?

Written by Diana Paul on November 25, 2024. Posted in Television reviews. No Comments on Disclaimer–Truth or Fiction?

Five-time Oscar winner Alfonso Cuaron (of “Roma”, “Y Tu Mama Tambien”, “Pan’s Labyrinth“, “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkhaban”, and more) directs Disclaimer based upon Renée Knight’s novel of the same name. The middle-aged protagonist, Catherine Ravenscroft (Academy Award-winner Cate Blanchett), receives a career-defining award for her courageous coverage and truth-telling. Flush with the recognition for her efforts as a journalist, a book, The Perfect Stranger, arrives at her office. Purportedly written by Stephen Brigstocke (Kevin Kline) as his novel, The Perfect...

Slow Horses–Win the Race

Written by Diana Paul on November 19, 2024. Posted in Television reviews. No Comments on Slow Horses–Win the Race

Slow Horses, a multiple award-winning British spy thriller based on the Slough House series of novels by Mick Herron, will have at least a six-season run due to its phenomenal popularity. [The first four seasons are available for streaming now.] MI5 recruits and some agents who have failed training or assignments are banished to Slough House, the tawdry hellhole (“slough”=swamp) for those destined to fail. But they don’t. The slow horses are ridiculed by the intelligence department at the top of the organization, particularly by the First...