A double movie review

We've been re-watching Pushing Daises on Amazon Prime lately, which means I can't get enough of my longtime pretend British girlfriend Anna Friel.  So I decided to watch this film the other night:

It tells the story of a heroic, though roguish, French army officer during the Napoleonic war with England.  He gets captured and is sent to a POW prison in Scotland where me meets and falls in love with a local gal, played by Friel.  All sorts of complications conspire to keep them apart but in the end love triumphs.  It's very well done and it never takes itself too seriously, which is a problem usually with adaptions of Robert Louis Stevenson's novels.

All the actors do a fine job, especially Richard E. Grant as the prison warden who is smitten by love for Friel first, then for Miranda Richardson, who is smokin' hot in this production.  Friel and Jean Marc Barr shine as well.

I highly recommend this film, it's a light frothy, feel good story that's told very well.

Of all the explorers from the early 20th century Shackleton is my favorite.  He was heroic without being stupid.  He brought all his men home alive from his mission to be the first to the south pole, which is a huge feat considering all the men who died trying to do the same thing.  This film takes footage shot by the crew cinematographer and it shows us what life us like for the crew of the Endurance.  It's some amazing footage.  It's almost like being there alongside them as they make their quest.

This is a silent film, so be warned.  And because it's a silent film, they have a music score that runs under the film.  I found the score to be super annoying but the footage made it worth while to watch.

I doubt any of you will seek this film out which is a shame, the only way I knew about it was because a film buff friend of mine loaned me his DVD copy.  It's worth your time to see this film.

TV series review

Somehow I missed this series when it first aired, I think it was because I wanted to not watch any other hour long series on ABC other than Lost at the time. Crazy, I know, but that's what makes the wonder of me.

Anyhoo, I saw Anna Friel talking about the show one night on The Graham Norton Show and I fell in lurve with her. Then one day my local library had the first and second seasons of this show in and I checked them out.

And wow, I fucking loved this show. The premise is a guy, played by Lee Pace, can touch a dead thing and bring it back to life and if it stays alive for more than a minute something near it dies. If he touches a thing he's brought back to life again, he kills it forever. And if the thing he brings back to life is touched by him within a minute then it dies again and there's no harm, no foul. As he grows up he slowly figures out how to make all this work to his advantage and he collects a menagerie of quirky friends and business partners. He touches his childhood sweetheart, who he had though lost forever after he had killed his mother and her father (it all makes perfect sense when you watch it) after she dies and they fall in love but they can never have skin to skin contact.

The leads are brilliant and the supporting cast, which includes the outrageously cute Kristen Chenoweth (who won a well deserved Emmy for her part in this show), Chi McBride, Swoosie Kurtz, and Ellen Greene, are fantastic. There's more high powered guest stars than you can shake a stick at and the writing for the show is genius. The dialogue is whip smart and whiplash fast. The look of the show is eye poppingly beautiful, the show is drenched in rich deep colors and the costumes are kick ass cool

The first season of the show got cut short due to the writers strike which is why the first season is only six or so episodes. The show is a self contained series, the writers knew they were getting canceled after the second season so they ended the series in the final episode, which was smart.

I highly recommend this clever, stylish, funny, and cute as a button show. It's even well worth owning because it's one of those shows you'll love to watch again and again.

Brunette of the week

Anna Friel