On Monday, Swiss television showed the season 3 finales of both House, M.D. and Lost. We haven’t seen the latter yet, but it probably says it all that the best moment of House, at least for me, was the Chase/Cameron kiss. That scene was sweet, but the actual medical case was too vague and the character interaction not very interesting. The House vs. God angle had also been done previously. All in all it felt like the series could do with a couple of months off. Seeing as season 4, cut short by striking writers, is just about over in the States, we might get it fairly soon…
… but first, we’ve got the grand return of Grey’s Anatomy (at a point where I sometimes feel that if I have to watch McDreamy be a self-righteous, self-infatuated git for another minute, I’ll find the actor and put his face through a meat grinder), doubled up with Private Practice, the Grey spin-off that got started in an atrociously written and at best adequately acted two-parter on its mother series.
How’s a man to cope - especially when this man knows that there are only six more episodes of Deadwood? Like, ever? Come to think of it, I’d like to see a cross-over where some select characters from Grey’s Anatomy and perhaps Desperate Housewives stop by the picturesque little town of Deadwood. Derek Shepherd could open a practice with Dan Doherty as opthalmologist. (If you have no idea what I’m talking about, click here, unless you’re still hoping to watch season 3 of Deadwood.)
Six Feet Under is also almost over - two more episodes. What next? We’ve got a fair choice of series: Rome, The Wire, Carnivàle, season 6 of The Sopranos. Then there’s more escapist or pulpy fare: Heroes, Veronica Mars, Joan of Arcadia, Dexter. I’ve heard very good things about the latter series, especially season 2 - which came as a bit of a surprise, as the second Dexter novel was quite a bit weaker than the first. I guess that sometimes film and TV can improve on books…
And to end this very meandering blog entry, here’s a YouTube clip - the very effective opening credits for Dexter, a show whose ‘hero’ is a serial killer… who is intent on only killing ‘bad guys’:
Phew. He’s dead. And even though I knew it was going to happen - heck, I’d seen it before - it’s still amazing how much it got to me.
Rest in peace, Nathaniel Fisher Jr. You were often frightened, stupid, self-righteous, passive-aggressive (and lately just plain aggressive) and self-centred… but I’ll miss you.
We also watched another episode of Lost yesterday, namely “The Man Behind the Curtain”. It seems that the series makers have realised that you can’t just keep heaping mysteries onto the viewer without also revealing a thing or two, and the series definitely benefits from it. Also, I definitely like John Locke, Zealot more than the dithering Locke in the latter half of season 2. Hey, sometimes you just need to knock out a one-eyed Russian to make your point!
Also, note to all fathers reading this: Never, ever forget your son’s birthday every year - because otherwise he might just end up gassing you to death on some mysterious Hawaiian island. And some con-man from down South may just end up popping the skull off your dessicated remains to make the audience laugh.
“Airborne”, yesterday’s episode of House, M.D., was fun. I like it when they shake up the format, even though the episode was a tad high-concept (”House on a Plane!” Well, you get it…) Seeing the doc try to deal with the situation without his lackeys was enjoyably snarky:
House: Can you say “Crikey Mate”? 12 year-old Boy: Crikey Mate. House: Perfect. Now no matter what I say, you’ll agree with me, okay. 12 year-old Boy: Okay. House: Nicely done. You, disagree with everything I say. Foreign Man: Sorry, not understand. House: Close enough. (to random woman) You get morally outraged by everything I say. Sour Faced Girl: (about House writing on the movie screen) That’s permanent marker, you know. House: Wow, you guys are good.
The editing between the two storylines kept the episode dynamic throughout - and I’ve started to feel sympathy for Chase since last episode (especially the glow on his face when he looked at Cameron’s photo). So far he’d been the blandest of the supporting characters, but there’s something genuinely sweet - if still not terribly deep - to his growing feelings for Cameron. She, on the other hand, is becoming somewhat grating: the combination of self-righteous and self-indulging may be credible, but I find myself thinking, “How about you keep your mouth shut and your pants zipped for ten minutes, girl…” (Yes, every now and then I guess I am a bit of a sexist. Sorry. Feel free to throw things at me.)
In other not-so-news: we started watching season 3 of Deadwood, and boy, is the air thick with ominousness… ominosity- ominiminy? Well, you know what I mean. Quite obviously, Hearst is not a good egg, nor is he the kind of moustachioed bad egg who keeps heads in boxes and whom we secretly like. I can’t really put my finger on it, but there’s something in the balmy frontier air, and it’s not Calamity Jane’s heady aroma. We’ll see where this’ll take us, but somehow I doubt it will be anywhere nice. Or perhaps the episode’s title was ironic: “Tell your God to Ready for Blood” might really be the prelude to a season of goodwill, cheer and fluffy bunnies in Deadwood (no state yet).
Sorry, Magenta. This is another one of those pesky Deadwood entries that may just risk giving something away to you. Don’t worry, though - we’ve now finished season 2, so you can get started on that one whenever you wish.
For everyone else: Deadwood season finales are strange beasts. They’re a fascinating combination of carnage and sentimentality. Quite probably there are more deaths in this episode called “Boy the Earth Talks to” than in any other episode of the series so far. People hang themselves or get stabbed in the middle of the thoroughfare. Throats get cut. Juxtaposed with this, there’s Alma Garrett’s wedding to Ellsworth (whose first name, by the way, is Whitney - who’d have thunk?) looking eminently uncomfortable wearing lavender gloves.
What else? George Hearst has finally made it to Deadwood, after having been spoken about in hushed, ominous tones for an entire season (so far he looks non-threatening enough, but my gut tells me that will change); the cards dealer reborn as preacher gets his own back at Cy Tolliver (and I’m slowly getting away from seeing Zach Grenier only as Ed Norton’s poor boss in Fight Club); and Garrett Dillahunt makes us wonder who he’ll turn up as in season 3.
Meanwhile, in other series news: Greg House gets all sentimental after a 21-week old fetus grabs his thumb (things that make you undecided whether you should go “Awww…” or “Ewww…”); Lost continues its employment programme for Deadwood actors (it’s Joanie Stubbs’ turn again - now we just need Alma Garrett and perhaps Jewel); and Sawyer’s looking eminently silly with his ponytail, but there’s something sweet about seeing him conned by Hurley. Bless.
Yesterday’s TV evening was marked by a high number of funerals. The deaths I sort of expected - after all, we did watch Deadwood - but I could have done without the ominous onslaught of funerals. House, M.D. managed to do without a death, as it pulled off its last-minute Eureka! moment, House saving the hard-done by Marc Blucas at the last moment. (As if his breakup with Buffy hadn’t already done enough damage…) Then we zapped into some series with Craig T. Nelson (I don’t know what he’s doing on telly anyway - shouldn’t Poltergeist have taught him to stay away from the flickertube?) and an epic African-American funeral, complete with gospel choir. This was followed by the quite heart-rending Deadwood episode “Let the whores come” (and only Al Swearengen can pull off asking the whore who’s giving him his daily blowjob whether she’s dyed her hair and almost seem considerate).
But the whole thing was topped by the double-funeral, followed by double-death (très E.A. Poe) of Nikki and Paulo, Lost’s most hated characters since… well, depending on who you ask, since Kate or Ana Lucia or Jack or Charlie or Boone or Shannon or practically anyone. Except Hurley. No one seems to hate Hurley. (Okay, not true. There are people who hate him - but there’s only one TV Hurley that everyone can agree to hate.)
Okay, I know that there’s at least one reader out there who hasn’t seen Deadwood season 2 yet and is planning to do so. This is where I tell you, very politely, to come back tomorrow, lest ye read a spoiler.
Still there? I’m warning you, there be spoilers!
Well, that’s about all I can do. If you’re still reading, well, I won’t take any responsibility. So there.
Yesterday evening, after two middling episodes of House, M.D., we watched the pen-penultimate episode of the sophomore season of Deadwood, aptly entitled “Advances, None Miraculous”. In it, we were reminded (after several episodes that seemed to suggest differently) that Al Swearengen can still be the scariest mother****er in the Valley of Death, if he wants to be. And all without drawing a weapon.
We were also shown that when he needs to be, Sol Star is just as much of a badass. After seeing Al frighten Mrs Isringhausen - not exactly a shrinking violet herself - into signing a piece of paper, accepting $10′000 and getting the hell out of Dodge in a brilliant piece of Al-manship, we get Sol telling him in his face that he won’t stand for bad Jew jokes. Now that takes a pair… or stupidity, but I’ve always thought of Sol as the intelligent one in the Star-Bullock friendship. (Except occasionally, when he’s led by his privates rather than by his brain.)
However, the emotional centrepiece of the episode was the protracted death of William Bullock. It was quite heartrending to see Sheriff Bullock face a crisis that he can’t beat down with his fists. William’s dying was a moving counterpoint to the political wheelings and dealings about the coming annexation of Deadwood, affecting everyone in their own way.
Talking about affecting: I’ve gone on at great length about The Assassination of J.J. by the Coward R.F. before. Yesterday I made the mistake of checking out the Nick Cave/Warren Ellis soundtrack of the movie on Amazon.com. The dark, subtle elegiac tunes (or rather the 20-second clips that Amazon plays for free) got to me to the extent that I felt the pull of the movie all day afterwards. Tunes like “Rather Lovely Thing” or “Song for Jesse” wormed their way into my heart, making me feel sad for semi-fictional characters long dead for hours.
P.S.: When I read who’d composed the music together with Nick Cave, I had this momentary vision of the writer of Transmetropolitan scribbling darkly sentimental tunes on some sheets in between writing another tasteless, hilarious, biting chapter of his near-future satire. For all I know, it is the same Warren Ellis. Then again… No. Probably not.
Yesterday’s TV series evening was fun. First “Finding Judas” on House, M.D., then Lost’s “Flashes Before Your Eyes”.
Actually, I tell a lie. The “Judas” episode wasn’t fun, though it was eminently watchable. For the first time, House really seemed to lose it completely, becoming a strung-out bastard who used his incisive mind not to help his patient but to hurt those who are on his side. If Tritter wasn’t so clearly a bastard himself, he would have proven that he has a point in much of what he says. House’s words to Cuddy, for instance, were cruel and his general behaviour shitty. His suffering from withdrawal explains it, but it doesn’t excuse it.
Obviously the episode was manipulative (even more so than most of House), but effectively so. I knew they wouldn’t amputate the little girl’s arm and leg, but part of me sat there thinking “Ohshitohshitohshit…” nevertheless. I’m curious to see where they’ll take the Tritter plot and Wilson’s friendship with House, as that storyline seems to be coming to a head. And I wonder whether it’ll ever be lupus…
“Flashes Before Your Eyes” was an intriguing episode of Lost, and a heavy focus on Desmond is always welcome. For all its meandering and self-indulgence, the series has been fairly good at introducing new and interesting characters: Ben, Mr Eko, Desmond. The episode also had some interesting twists, such as the Precog Scot trying to save Charlie (and not Claire, as it appears at first), and the clever use of the flashback convention.
I could have done without the fake Englishness of some of it, though. The series’ England feels as if its makers only know the country from bad movies and TV. Especially Fionnula Flanagan’s character felt fake, when she should have been eerie. Still, though, it looks like Charlie - possibly the character who annoys me most - is heading for a rendezvous with the Grim Reaper. Can’t say I’m going to be too sad. Then again, they made me kinda like Shannon and Boone just before killing them off. The Lost writers are obviously bastards.
Yesterday my love came back from her holidays, and we watched a double bill of House, M.D. The first of the episodes, “Son of Coma Guy”, was one of the best, sharpest written episodes in a long time (and that on a series that has no shortage of sharp writing). Like many of the best House episodes, it broke the usual pattern: I like the series, but 95% of the episodes have exactly the same plot, the only difference being names, faces and illnesses. You can imagine a licenced version of the Clue board game: “Mr Smith, in the MRI room, with the lupus.”
The other thing it shared with my favourite episodes: “Son of Coma Guy” had a strong foil for Greg House in coma guy Gabriel Wozniak (John Laroquette). Two, even, if you count Wilson who’s definitely benefitting from the Tritter storyline. It’s quite heartrending to see Wilson’s friendship with House being brought close to breaking point, but it’s showing us a side of Wilson that we haven’t seen yet: he may be strong enough, and hurt enough, to draw the line at some point.
The episode benefitted from an effective performance by Laroquette (if only I could remember where I’ve seen him before…) who gelled very well with Hugh Laurie. And I loved House’s subtle screwing with Coma Guy’s head, suggesting that the future he’d woken up to was weird and wonderful in so many ways. And, of course, it’s got ip-ods!
Let me be clear. Taxi Driver and Raging Bull are great cinema, and they deserve all the accolades they get. But they’re the kind of movies I appreciate rather than enjoy. Watching Raging Bull yesterday, for the second or third time, I was struck less by the virtuoso cinematography and editing, by Martin Scorsese’s effective use of music (yet again), or by the performances, than by the sheer masochism in the movie. LaMotta’s masochism, where especially the later fights are extended bouts of self-punishment for his dimly understood sins. De Niro’s masochism, putting on 60 pounds for the role. But there’s also an element of masochism in sitting through this masterpiece. Paul Schrader (probably more so than Scorsese) writes the most effective guilt trips, but it’s difficult not to flinch and despair a little more at mankind (it’s really the men who come off looking worst in the guilt stakes) when LaMotta punches the walls of his prison cell or when he does his “I coulda been a contender” speech, or when Travis Bickle puts a finger dripping with blood to his temple and mimes blowing his head off.
On a less masochist note: last night’s episode of House, M.D. (”Que Sera, Sera”) featured a remarkably controlled performance by both Pruitt Taylor Vince and his fat suit, transforming him into a 600-lb patient. While the episode was far from perfect, kudos ought to go to the House team for an astute handling of what could have been eminently tasteless TV.
There used to be a time, in the late ’80s and early ’90s when I thought that Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry could only be booked as an ensemble. These days, both of them seem to have done well enough on their own. Laurie appears to have become more of a star, mainly thanks to his wonderful Gregory House, M.D. (Admittedly, the series wouldn’t work without him.) Fry, on the other hand, is less visible but does more different things, a small part in a movie here, writing novels there, and voicing interplanetary repositories of knowledge in between, all of which seem to fit him quite neatly.
We watched Wilde yesterday, a film for which I had fairly high expectations. Unfortunately, for me the high point of the film was seeing a teensy, pixie-ish Orlando “Not an elf yet” Bloom playing a rent boy, wearing a bowler hat twice his size. No, that’s not quite true. (Well, the bit about the bowler hat is.) Wilde isn’t a bad film: the acting’s quite good, as is to be expected with such a distinguished cast, and it’s handsomely made. But it’s basically a run-of-the-mill, all too earnest (the pun is accidental) period drama, the only difference being that the tasteful sex scenes are between men. There’s a German word that can’t really be translated - betulich - that fits the film, in my opinion. It roughly means “staid”, “respectable”, “well-meaning”. Is this what a Wilde biopic, or indeed any film, should be?
The problem mainly lies with the script. The characters are clear-cut from the beginning and remain static throughout. Oscar is sweet, witty, but too much of a doe-eyed romantic when it comes to beautiful young men. Bosie is a shallow, callous narcissist. Oscar’s wife Constance is hard done by, but loyal. The closest the film comes to character development is when one of the protagonists grows a moustache.
And while I didn’t watch the film for hot, sweaty man-on-man action, is it too much to ask that the homoerotic scenes are actually erotic? The sex scenes are entirely too coy. (There is one ironic camera pan from a Wilde coupling to the window drapes swaying in the wind, although that was perhaps the only glint of visual wit in the film.) As a result of the movie’s consistent respectability, there’s no sense of outrage at the late Victorian homophobia and hypocrisy, just a passive acceptance of Oscar’s inevitable fate, reinforced by the film’s score working hard to make it clear that we’re watching something tragic.
Finally, the film succeeded most in making me think that Oscar Wilde, for all his sparkling wit, may have been a sad bore. A nice guy, surely, and very sweet, but in the end faintly pathetic and faintly boring. Like one of his aphorisms on yet another souvenir mug sold cheaply.
