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Watch, Watched, Watching: Hunting Minds


Ramsay B.

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Am halfway through Spy and I keep regretting we didn't get to see S.B.Cohen as F.Mercury.

I had only saw him in his comedy roles like Ali G and Borat, but had a pretty good feeling he could deliver with straight roles, being a Cambridge alumnus, he seem destined for more than a slapstick comedian to me.

Also rewatched a sci-fi with Mark Strong and Luke Wilson called Approaching the Unknown.

Both the Sacha series and the Strong movie very enjoyable viewing, two great actors imo.

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Got caught up with the new season of Peaky Blinders today. My God, these accents are hard to understand! Luckily the acting and the action more than make up for it. Love the cinematography and directing as well so far, there have been a few shots were the framing was just perfect! Can't wait for the next episode to come out tonight :D

Also finished the last season of Poldark. I got to say, it went out with a whimper instead of a bang. I hope someone else picks it up and they make more, because the series deserves a better ending. 

Btw, just a question but how is the new season of the terror shaping up? :) 

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10 hours ago, Nictarion said:

Watched Mary Queen of Scots on HBO tonight. It was ok. Not great, but worth watching for Saoirse Ronan. She is always amazing in everything she’s in. Good makeup work to transform Margot Robbie into Elizabeth, too. 

I lost interest after the first 30 minutes, it seemed pretty bad, and WTF does Mary have a Scottish accent for?  LMAO.  Good god.  I did think the two leads did a nice job, but what mess.  

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8 hours ago, Veltigar said:

Got caught up with the new season of Peaky Blinders today. My God, these accents are hard to understand! Luckily the acting and the action more than make up for it. Love the cinematography and directing as well so far, there have been a few shots were the framing was just perfect! Can't wait for the next episode to come out tonight :D

Also finished the last season of Poldark. I got to say, it went out with a whimper instead of a bang. I hope someone else picks it up and they make more, because the series deserves a better ending. 

Btw, just a question but how is the new season of the terror shaping up? :) 

I havent been motivated to watch the latest Peaky Blinders. I found the plotting/story of the last season a big turn off

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Almost done with Carnival Row.  This show is wild.  It's like someone threw Game of Thrones, The Witcher, Peaky Blinders, and Sherlock Holmes in a blender.  I still have basically no idea what the fuck is going on in this show, but there's human/fairy fucking and I am all in.  

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14 hours ago, HelenaExMachina said:

I havent been motivated to watch the latest Peaky Blinders. I found the plotting/story of the last season a big turn off

So far I find it better than last season. I wasn't opposed to Adrien Brody's take on his character, but this season already has fun presenting Mosley as the epic douche history makes him out to be. And the actors keep on delivering. I would give it another shot if I were you. 

8 hours ago, briantw said:

Almost done with Carnival Row.  This show is wild.  It's like someone threw Game of Thrones, The Witcher, Peaky Blinders, and Sherlock Holmes in a blender.  I still have basically no idea what the fuck is going on in this show, but there's human/fairy fucking and I am all in.  

Eumh, that's a good thing? :huh:

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I finished Carnival Row yesterday. It was fine. I didn't really find anything compelling about the story and the world felt fairly derivative (i.e., there is nothing new to a story about immigrants or half bloods being thought of as lesser people). Think there is something there if they want to explore outside of the story that has been done many times before but who knows if they'll ever get to it.

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17 hours ago, HelenaExMachina said:

I havent been motivated to watch the latest Peaky Blinders. I found the plotting/story of the last season a big turn off

Same here.  I dropped it after one or two eps of the last season.  It felt like a soap opera flailing to create increased drama each season. 

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I really liked Carnival Row.  Unlike anyone else evidently, I found the story lines of refugees, immigrants, racism, ghettoization, colonialism, theft of resources, including -- hurray! art and sacred objects -- and the collision of all these back in the post colonialist East India Company era of Victorian UK (and other powers) -- compelling.  It's so seldom on screen to see art play a role in fantasies -- or even in period adventure fiction.  Valuables such a jewels, for instance in period screen productions, sure.  Or 'magical / sacred objects in fantasy productions.  But art and intellectual achievements of the colonialized, conquered peoples, hardly ever.

I particularly liked that the story line made it perfectly clear the reasons these peoples, now considered undesirable residents, are in this 'mother country' in the first place, is because a block of other nations created so much devastation in the undesirables' homelands through their own conflicts over control of those lands' resources.  We seldom see that in period fictions out of the real world Victorian era, as in Wilkie Collins, et al. The 'foreigners' are simply there, threats with their unscrutable faces, aspirations and practices, not to mention their criminality.  There's little provided that tells us that wherever a nation practices the inevitable evils that are foundational to successful colonial power grabs, people are so displaced and so threatened that they will arrive in the colonial power's own, original home.  I've witnessed this personally myself here, to the point that I now expect to see cab drivers, restaurants and other service small business spring up, run and staffed by people from wherever the US is waging war and / or interfering.  It's a background to those many stories in the Sherlock Holmes canon as to Portuguese, Asians and so on, which is never mentioned, beyond Watson's injuries in the UK's debacle of Afghanistan.

Also the sexual elements never work in these previous productions either -- risible and exploitive and degrading to the actors and audiences alike. But in CR the connection between Imogene and Agreus was not only significant for story and character development, but it felt plausibly hot as the two figures came together over the episodes.  It was the same with Philo and his landlady-lover, and even Sophie and Jonah -- there were plausible character and plot points for their scenes of fornication, i.e. they provided the viewer with important information.  Not so much with Philo and Vignette (what a stupid name!).

I particularly admired how much my interest in Imogene and her brother actually developed over the episodes, when they began as such stock, dislikeable characters.

However, I am content to accept how much in a minority I am. :cheers:

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18 minutes ago, Iskaral Pust said:

Same here.  I dropped it after one or two eps of the last season.  It felt like a soap opera flailing to create increased drama each season. 

I don’t think the show ever really reached that high in terms of writing quality anyway. I liked the first season well enough but it only ever hinted at being great rather than actually managing it. It was written as quite a broad popular show and it feels like it. Not quite soapy but not far off.

 

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54 minutes ago, Mark Antony said:

Peaky is the cheap mans Boardwalk Empire. 

Can't agree with that. Nucky never was in the trenches, for one thing.  The UK never had Prohibition for another. The popular music of the time in the US was far superior. :D

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10 minutes ago, Nictarion said:

The writing would have to be really bad for me to drop Peaky Blinders. Cillian Murphy, alone, is enough to keep me watching. 

True, I will probably watch this season it's just not a priority right now. Also Helen McCrory, such a fine actress. I certainly can't complain about the acting on the show, or production for that matter. Purely plot related disappointment for me.

I really enjoy the anachronistic use of music, think it's used to great effect.

The Shelby bros having been in the trenches has resulted in some of the most poignant moments of the series imo.

Previous season spoilers

when I do get around to this season I will no doubt miss Tom Hardy's mumbling.

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