Hiatus

I’m putting this blog on the back burner, quite possibly permanently. To those who visited and shared your thoughts and opinions, thank you.

DVD Release - The Godfather: The Coppola Restoration

I’ll confess: I’ve only seen the first of the Godfather trilogy. But boy, am I ever glad I did. I’ve never been a fan of mafia tales, but when done with excellence in mind, as with both The Sopranos and The Godfather, it comes down to this: great storytelling transcends topic. The Wire does this as well; I submit you don’t have to love cop shows to appreciate the greatness of The Wire, or westerns to delve into Deadwood.

When I finally forced myself to sit down and see The Godfather, I remember being completely unnerved by Marlon Brando’s performance as the formidable Don Corleone. No matter what scene he was in, I felt this undercurrent of terror I couldn’t shake, as though he might explode into a rage at any moment. This was both calculated and effective, I’m sure.

For fans of the series, or those for whom The Sopranos kicked off an obsession with all things Cosa Nostra, good news: the DVD release of The Godfather: The Coppola Restoration dropped, oh, TODAY. Check out the official web site for information and some fun extras, like a link to a Facebook app that tests your knowledge of all things Godfather and interviews with actors who discuss how the films affected their lives and their craft.

Bones Season Premiere: Masters of the (Painfully) Obvious

Since we’re eagerly awaiting the arrival of Season 2 of The Wire at our public library, where I may or may not be staking out the front entrance amid assorted fast food wrappers and coffee cups strewn about the mininvan, we caught up with the season premiere of Bones, one of our favorite crime shows.

The episode was set in England, where brilliant forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennon and FBI Agent Sealy Booth meet up with . . . a brilliant forensic anthropologist and detective from Scotland Yard, prompting Booth to actually say aloud–in case sleepy viewers might miss it–”Hey, Bones, they’re like the English version of us!” This prompted me to wonder aloud whether the series had switched to CBS when we weren’t looking.

We tried counting all the stale, tired, and obvious British-vs.-American jokes, but became too disheartened to continue: tiny cars, yuk-yuk, the guards at Buckingham Palace, har dee har, driving on the left is hard, whee!–Gosh, everyone! England sure is different from America! I’ll bet you never knew that.

Also, could the subplot between Angela and Hodgins be any more forced, contrived, and unbelievable? And annoying? I mean, I love the Angela character immensely, but are we seriously expected to believe she has any sort of complex human emotions toward a man whose name she couldn’t even recall at first? Or that the hottie husband has been pining for her for five years–after a drunken weekend during which they got married? Either I’m not very romantic, or that’s just a lame storyline. Anyone care to prove me wrong on that one? I dare ya.

Anyway, there were precious few bright spots, all of them taking place back in D.C., where the show is set, usually involving the youthful psychologist Dr. Sweets, whose first line about Hodgins being in deep trouble upon seeing his competition was hilarious. And props to the writers for making a gay joke that didn’t actually denigrate the gays re: Sweet’s story of his childhood pal. The other funny bits involved the meta commentary by the temp forensic scientist, who repeatedly pointed out that the lab workers tended to over-share their personal lives in the workplace, as if the writers of the show were poking fun of the nature of the show itself. It made for a couple of funny moments in what was otherwise a pretty lame offering from a usually entertaining show.

Both Fox and FX both are running a healthy amount of two-hour season premieres, and I have this to say about that trend: if you’re going to ask me to sit down for a movie-length season or series premiere, you’d better make it sensational. Otherwise, it’s fanfare with no substance. Either make great TV or don’t, but don’t try to dupe us into thinking that longer is better. Ahem. I’m just sayin’: I have a TiVo remote with a fast forward and delete button, and I know how to use ‘em.

Thoughts on the season premiere of Bones? I’d love to hear from you; share your thoughts in the comments section.

Fiction: The Chicago Way by Michael Harvey

The Chicago Way by Michael Harvey

My review

My rating: 4 of 5 stars
The Chicago Way is a brisk, entertaining read about a private detective and ex cop named Michael Kelly; I couldn’t put it down once I began reading. Set in Chicago, the book is a love letter to The Windy City, and those familiar with the neighborhoods, politics, and media there will find themselves smiling–often. (Loved the joke at Chicago TV newscaster Jackie Bange’s–pronounced “bang!”–expense–every guy I know has made the same or similar wisecracks about that name).

My favorite line that shows Kelly’s wry wit: “He stopped renewing his license in 2004, when he did of a massive heart attack. Made sense to me.” Reminded me of Robert B. Parker’s Spenser.

I didn’t feel like I had a good sense of who Michael Kelly was by the end of the book, but I think that’s okay; not telling all leaves more facets to reveal later and also something for the reader’s imagination. I also liked how the theme of the story–here, sexual assault–is woven throughout the fabric of the story and viewed from multiple angles, whether investigators on the scene, activists raising money for awareness and prevention, or the stories and memories of victims and the horrific toll this horrific crime exacts on its victims. His depiction of the loneliness of Kelly’s existence was also superbly done.

[NOTE: This next line is a wee bit spoiler-y in that it refers in general to how the story wrapped up] I’d say the main thing I didn’t like was that the characters all came together a little too neatly at the end, each serving a purpose integral to the mystery itself; it felt a bit more contrived than I’d expected from this story. That won’t stop me from reading Harvey’s subsequent novels, however; I finished his second Michael Kelly mystery in the same week I read The Chicago Way.


View all my reviews.

Book Trailers: Love ‘em or Hate ‘em?

Or do you fall somewhere in between?

A book trailer serves the same purpose for books that it does for movies: it provides a video preview that entices readers to get excited about upcoming releases. In a world of social media and multimedia, TiVo and Hulu, GoodReads and author blogs, it only makes sense to add an Internet-friendly dimension to book sales, right?

I say: possibly.

Like movie trailers, I think book trailers can be done poorly. I saw one for a book I’d read and really enjoyed–no, loved–but when I saw the trailer, I quickly realized that had I seen the trailer first, I might not have read the book. The production quality wasn’t the greatest, the actors didn’t jibe with my perceptions of the book’s characters, and the acting wasn’t strong. I’d only viewed a handful of book trailers before that one, but was starting to lean toward filing them under “generally bad idea.”

Until I saw one made by Chicago author Michael Harvey during his recent appearance at Woodstock’s awesome independent book store, Read Between the Lynes.

Harvey was promoting his second novel, The Fifth Floor, and after I’d expressed my reservations about book trailers (me and my big mouth!), he offered to show us the one he’d made for The Fifth Floor.

Watch the video, after the jump:

Read the rest of this entry »

Tangled Up In “The Wire”

Mos’ def’, I’m in.

I realize I’m five years behind, but as someone whose all-time favorite cop show is Homicide: Life on the Street, is it any surprise that I’m swooning over The Wire, which was developed by David Simon, the mind behind Homicide?

Now I understand why in the past, when the subject of The Wire would come up in casual conversation, fans of the show would all but grab me by the figurative lapels and implore me to watch this show. The subtlety, the complexity, the writing, the dark humor, the acting, the music, the cinematography . . . it’s all there. It reminds me a great deal of another great HBO show, Deadwood, right down to its often elegant use of profanity (yes, you read that right: I said “elegant”).

Here’s a great example, courtesy of You Tube, of what makes this show great–it’s funny, but also poignant, and it also handily serves as a metaphor for the show itself, where life on the tough streets of Baltimore is regularly referred to as The Game:

I’m still making my way through Season 1 with my husband, and should finish by the end of the weekend at the rate we’re going; we simply cannot get enough of this show. I truly love intelligent TV!

Whether you’re new to the show or a veteran and are itching to jump out of your seat and Netflix The Wire, you must read TV critic Alan Sepinwall’s episode guides. He set up guides for veterans of the show (i.e., people both more intelligent and less cheap than me who both caught on from the start and also coughed up the cabbage for HBO) and also for newbies like me. The newcomer reviews even restrict comments to avoid letting spoilers slip through. Fantastic stuff, and I daresay, required reading as you work your way through each episode.

Are you a fan of The Wire? Share your (non-spoilerish!) thoughts about the show in the comment section. If you haven’t watched it, allow me to grab you by the lapels and screech in your face like a doomsday prophet to get thee to the DVD rental outlet of your choice. (You can thank me now or later, your choice).

Embrace Your Grace

Now here’s a cool idea–TNT added an interactive blog called “Embrace Your Grace.” The idea behind this is to get in touch with your inner Grace Hanadarko, the fiesty and delightfully dysfunctional Oklahoma City police detective played with relish by Holly Hunter on Saving Grace. (Hunter is up for a leading actress Emmy this year for her portrayal of Hanadarko, by the way).

TNT gathered six female bloggers (a musician, stand-up comic, author, among others) to discuss issues raised on the show and reveal their own wild-child aspects, while also inviting readers to join in the conversation. Check it out and join the fun.

New episodes of Saving Grace return in March 2009. I’ll have more reviews of the season that just wrapped soon–after I first finish watching Season 1 of The Wire, aka “The cop show that other cop shows dream of being when they’re on hiatus.” (If you knew my ardor for “Homicide: Life on the Street,” this take on The Wire would come as no surprise).

Losing Sight Of “In Plain Sight”

Now that our summer travel carousel has finally ground to a halt, I have some time to catch up on my TV viewing–and my writing here. As the title of this post implies, we finally finished the first season of In Plain Sight by watching what was mostly a pretty brutal season finale. And I don’t mean in the traditional sense of the word; there was no brutal violence, but rather, it was brutal for fans of the show (namely: us) to watch.

Spoilers ahead.

Alan Sepinwall covered the season finale really well, I think, and his readers offer insightful commentary, too. Go on over and read what he has to say; I’ll wait.

As Sepinwall has noted more than once (go ahead and read that post, too; I’ll still be here when you return), this show needs to make up its mind what it wants to be: a look inside the Witness Protection Program and the U.S. Marshals charged with protecting witnesses, or a family drama involving some seriously irritating female characters and storylines. I like the idea of giving the lead character depth by showing where she came from and giving insight into why she is the way that she is–and how those facets influence her job performance. But the family-scene-hogging way in which they’re doing it isn’t working, at least not for me.

There is depth in the writing; I’m astonished (given the way TV shows usually go) and pleased that Mary’s dim bulb sister Brandi didn’t sleep with her boyfriend, and I even found myself almost liking her mother a time or two. They manage to skid just shy of cliches in the writing, but I still find myself wishing there was far less of Mary’s family members per episode. My husband and I even found ourselves wickedly hoping Mary’s sister and mom would end up in the Witness Protection Program, shipped off to a new city with new identities, forever banned from contacting family and friends.

There are flashes of greatness in the writing of this show, particularly involving humor. There’s some great banter between Mary and her partner, Marshall and her boss, Stan. My second-favorite TV sight gag of the summer involved the homicide detective Bobby D., who could’ve use a lot more of the screen time Jinx and Brandi crowded out. A criminal runs off into the night toward the end of en episode, and as Mary and Marshall are regrouping, Bobby rides up on a horse, dressed in his usual suit and tie, leading the fugitive by a lasso around the waist, deadpanning, “‘Sup, y’all?” Brilliant.

In Plain Sight won’t return until next summer, so the writers have a few months to get their shit together. The show had great ratings this summer and the second season is a go. I really want to like it, and I think Mary McCormack’s performance stands out; the awkwardness she feels in her own skin, the cynicism and secrecy required to do her job, and her obvious devotion to that job. I’m liking the female antiheroes developing in the land of cable TV cop shows.

And hey, as long as I’m wishing for a different focus for the show, can we please see more of Jason Wiles, aka “Bosco” from “Third Watch” next season? He made a more equal partner for Mary than Raph–probably because they actually have some chemistry and things in common. (Also: how nerdy is it of me to love that cheesilicious fan vid featuring Bosco and Linkin Park? Off-the-grid, Spock-eared nerdy? Yeah, I thought so).

Finally, if you were curious, my favorite sight gag from this summer’s TV? Michael Westen spotting his beloved refrigerator (aka “the keeper of his yogurt”) on the yacht in the latest ep of Burn Notice. Third favorite, the “Oh YEAH!” expression Fiona made face after shooting at Michael while driving and hitting the ground between his feet.

Book Review - Winter Study by Nevada Barr

Winter Study by Nevada Barr

My review

My rating: 4 of 5 stars (contains mild spoilers, nothing that gives away the mystery)

I received this book as a Mother’s Day gift and it’s taken me till now to finish it. I’d read a few pages here and there and it seemed to repeat itself quite a bit (wolves are noble creatures, winter at Isle Royale is more wintry than other places - lather, rinse, repeat) so I’d put the book down and move on to something else.

I’ve read every Anna Pigeon mystery and this one took me the longest to get into, but once I did (it only took 97 pages!) I couldn’t put it down. I’m glad I kept going or I’d have missed out.

Having read this series, featuring crime-fighting, ass-kicking, redhead forest ranger Anna Pigeon, it’s been interesting to see Pigeon’s character evolve and grow older - she observes that where young bucks fighting forest fires only grew stronger, those over 40 needed to rest and recover. It’s been an interesting evolution.

Of course, it’s not an Anna Pigeon mystery unless she gets her ass kicked from here till next Tuesday, and Barr delivers yet again. There were some really great spooky scenes here, too; I’m not sure I’ve read one in this series that was so adept at being ghost-story creepy like this one.

Funniest line:
Gavin began a proficient physical check, starting with her pulse and body temp.

“EMT?” Anna asked.

He shook his head. “Eldest of seven,” he said.

Saving Grace - Season 2 Premiere: Eww. Just: Eww.

As usual, I’m a few weeks behind in my viewing due to traveling a great deal for my day job as a family travel writer. But the point of this blog isn’t to report on breaking news or offer up-to-date reviews so much as to savor what’s out there pretty much anywhere in the timeline. There are plenty of blogs reporting current events in TV; see my sidebar for what I think are some of the best out there.

Anyway, after blowing through our TiVoed eps of Burn Notice and In Plain Sight and then enduring a pretty okay ep of Law & Order: Criminal Intent featuring Joan Jett (who should be selling her anti-aging regimen and thereby becoming a billionaire) we turned our eyes to the new season of Saving Grace, starring Holly Hunter as a troubled, alcoholic, amoral, and wickedly slutty detective who works for the Oklahoma City P.D. Oh yeah, and she also has a tobacco-chewing guardian angel, a good old boy named Earl, whose purpose seems to be to bring the embittered Grace closer to God.

When I saw the debut episode of Saving Grace, I didn’t think I’d end up watching the rest of the season. The pilot tried too hard and featured “hit the viewer over the head” cardboard cutout characters that let us know, in no uncertain terms, that this ain’t New York or L.A., y’all. Don’t get me wrong; as a resident of the so-called “Great Flyover,” I love that this show is set in Oklahoma, and I love even more that they didn’t reveal that Hunter’s character, Grace Hanadarko, is part Native American until we were well into the season - a more subtle approach than the “gee whiz, yee haw-ing” we were treated to in the pilot. Also, the show got much better as the season progressed. I’m a fan of both Holly Hunter and Laura San Giacomo, even if she is overly fond of her prop glasses for the show.

Anyway, the season premiere was a huge disappointment. Spoilers ahoy, maties.

It opens with an off-duty Grace involved in a shootout in an OKC retail district (that some citizen standing directly in the line of fire just happened to videotape for the evening news instead of peeing himself and running away), which I can forgive on most days; it’s TV, we know this doesn’t usually happen, yada yada but it creates good drama so we can forgive the writers, right? But the scene ends with Holly Hunter drawing her weapon and you get an extended glimpse of her mealy, freakishly muscled arms and then something horrible happens to a police dog. Wow, way to rally us to the cause of Saving Grace, writers.

Warning, major aside coming: Look, I’m all for women looking their best, however they choose to do so. I’m forty and I know first-hand how unkind the years can be and how quickly that unkindness can visit upon a woman. And I’m also fine with talent accompanying good looks, and Hunter fits the bill there, to be sure. But this whole charade of a fiftysomething woman playing a thirtysomething is just . . . wrong. It’s not plausible, I don’t care how skinny Hunter gets or how many ratty blonde hair extensions she adds on (though I will say, the character not having perfect hair is a bonus in my book; I know several female police officers and let’s just say none are a stranger to peroxide–therefore, realism revealing flaws is fine with me.) But this trend of weight lifting as a fountain of youth? Isn’t fooling anyone, ladies. Step away from the Bowflex, girls. When Linda Hamilton had those biceps in Terminator 2, she was addicted to exercise and horribly depressed. It’s not healthy to look that way. Please, Detective Hanadarko and Madonna, while we’re at it, eat a freakin’ sandwich. Preferably from a good Italian deli, where they don’t skimp on the prosciutto.

It just gets worse from there, unfortunately. I’ll admit, I’d been wondering whether or not Grace had murdered the priest who’d raped her as a child when she confronted him at the end of the last season; she was awfully tight-lipped about what she’d been up to. So when midway through the episode, you see her kick at a rolled up carpet and reveal the priest, bound and gagged in her living room during her absence, I have to say that was both a clever and entertaining bit of writing. Entertainment that immediately faded as Grace does an awkward dance routine reminiscent of the scene where Michael Madsen tortures a rookie police officer in Reservoir Dogs.

But when the priest is murdered during the course of the episode, the writers lost me because, unthinkably, Grace was allowed to work the case. I’m sorry, but I cannot think of a police department, I don’t care how good ol’ boy and loyal they may be, that would allow a sexual abuse victim to work the murder case of her childhood abuser. No way, no how, I ain’t buyin’ it.

One creative bright spot in the episode comes in a gritty scene where a friend of Grace’s sister, who died in the Oklahoma City bombing, tells her off for being too hung over to care for her nephew, requiring her sister to go into work on that fateful day. Grace listens to her comeuppance, having ironically just ordered a Budweiser longneck. The woman eviscerates Grace and even the viewers know she deserves it and that this will continue to fuel the character’s self loathing. Grace ends up leaving the table, her beer untouched. She’s been a very bad girl for a very long time, and even though we know and can empathize with why (childhood sexual abuse), we also know it’s time for our girl to grow up, and I think this conversation might herald the start of that, since in the next scene, she appears to forgive Earl as she hugs him and sobs into his chest, saying, “I’m sorry.”

I’m going to continue watching this show, hoping future episodes are better than this season premiere, just as they improved after the pilot.

Are you a fan of Saving Grace? What do you think of the series so far? Share your thoughts in the comments section.