Looking at the past year in TV

Politically speaking, don’t we all wish 2017 hadn’t happened?  Cinematically speaking, it wasn’t so bad, but still felt vaguely disappointing, though all the returns aren’t in yet, at least for a tardy viewer like me.  Frankly, I don’t get out of the house much, and wait for new movies to come to me by some medium of home video. 

One of the year’s disappointments was the end of my role as film programmer at the Clark.  So I don’t get to foist my favorites on a willing audience anymore, but I still want to call attention to films worth seeing, so I am going to persist with this blog as long as I keep watching oh-so-many films and tv series. 

I’m going to take an anecdotal approach to reviewing the past year, more raconteur than critic, dispensing pats and pans rather than analysis, a simple matter of thumbs up or down.  Not assuming the voice of authority, I’ll take a conversational tone and not strive for rigor or brilliance.

As I look down the list of films and tv I want to highlight, one thing strikes me as a thread running through the year.  In the media, 2017 was definitely a year of coming out for women, as much as it was in politics, from pussyhats to #metoo. 

I’ll start with tv shows, and with what might seem an exception to that generalization.  David Simon is a favorite of mine, and I am inclined to absolve him and George Pelacanos of the male gaze in The Deuce (MC-85, NFX, HBO), and to give extra credit to Maggie Gyllenhaal as producer as well as star.  As she is in the story, playing a Times Square hooker who moves into pornography production in the Seventies.  I thought this was a limited series, but apparently two more seasons are planned, each jumping seven years into the future.  In an unnecessary gimmick, James Franco plays two brothers, one a conscientious entrepreneur and the other a charming ne’er-do-well gambler (he also directs some episodes).  One of the pleasures of the series is getting re-acquainted with alums of The Wire and Tremé – though this show has not yet risen to quite that level.  But, believe me, this HBO series, despite its subject matter, depends a lot less on T&A than GoT.

I gather Big Little Lies (MC-75, NFX, HBO) will return for further seasons as well, and I’ll definitely take another look.  How could you miss with a combine of Nicole Kidman, Reece Witherspoon, Shailene Woodley, and Laura Dern?  Direction by film pro Jean-Marc Vallee adds gloss to a soapy adaptation of a pulpy novel.  Deluxe setting in Monterey showplace homes is made delicious by gossip and infighting among the mothers of a group of first graders.  This could have been “Odious Housewives of Upscale Enclaves,” but rather is rich in characterization, as well as humor and sentiment, and domestic terrors of one sort or another.

Hulu clearly intends to drag out Handmaid’s Tale (MC-92) as long as possible.  I gave it five or six episodes before abandoning it in exasperation and impatience, and will certainly not come back for more.  For me the year’s infinitely better Margaret Atwood adaptation was Netflix’s Alias Grace (MC-82, NFX).  Since I don’t know Atwood’s work at all, the first guarantor of quality here was the adaptation by Sarah Polley, whom I consider a great filmmaker.  Director Mary Harron also has a track record.  Emerging star Sarah Gadon exceeds expectation in the very complicated lead role, of an Irish immigrant servant girl convicted of murder in Victorian Canada, whom many want to see released.  So many in fact, that they hire an American alienist to interview her (Edward Holcroft, a dead ringer for Matthias Schoenaerts) and determine how guilty or innocent she really is.  True to the historical case, it is never made clear whether the protagonist actually participated in the murders or not, but the kaleidoscopic telling and retelling of the story opens up more mysteries than it forecloses.  Absorbing and impeccably done period piece.

Not at that level, but quite entertaining and maybe a bit more, was Feud: Bette & Joan (MC-81, NFX), carried by fascinating, resonant performances from Susan Sarandon as Bette Davis and Jessica Lange as Joan Crawford, centered on their wary, feral relationship while making Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?  Alfred Molina and Stanley Tucci offer manic but effective support, as director Robert Aldrich and mogul Jack Warner respectively.  There are any number of backstage and backstabbing pleasures in this Ryan Murphy series.

I enjoyed a number of woman-centered half-hour comedies in the past year, about which I have already commented in previous seasons.  Better Things (MC-96, FX) was widely acknowledged as one the best current shows.  Pamela Adlon’s semi-autobiographical series about a single mom raising three daughters just keeps getting better and better.  Reality meets shtick and both are enhanced.  Similarly with Tig Notaro’s One Mississippi (MC-82, AMZ), also better and deeper in its second season.  Catastrophe (MC-96, AMZ), from the writing/acting duo of Sharon Horgan and Rob Delaney, continued its too-true potty-mouthed hilarity into a third season.  Each series comes with my highest recommendation.

A new entrant in this category is GLOW (MC-81, NFX), which stands for the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling, and jumps off from an 80s collective of women creating their own characters, or having them created for them, in a cross-gender attempt to capitalize on the popularity of totally fake professional wrestling.  The collective is not exactly feminist, as masterminded by impresario Marc Maron, but comes to be woman-dominated, by Alison Brie who assumes a Russian villainess role while her ex-friend Betty Gilpin assumes a cartoon Miss America persona.  The other women are engagingly varied in ethnicity and type.  Netflix also has an entertaining documentary on the original GLOW girls.

Joined by a connection to two of GLOW’s creators, and one of its stars, there was a concluded series that I was happy to binge-watch all seven seasons of.  Nurse Jackie (MC-78 avg, NFX) ran on Showtime from 2009-15, and I have to say it’s the first series from that channel that I ever watched and enjoyed from start to finish.  They seem to have a tendency to peter out, even when they start strong (Homeland is only the most extreme example).  Edie Falco as the title character – an extremely competent ER nurse who happens also to be a drug addict – is the rock that holds this whole thing together, though the rest of the cast are effective as caricatures, who develop a shallow depth over time.  Merritt Wever stands out as Jackie’s protégé, who eventually becomes her conscience and nemesis.  I watched this while editing a book about nursing, and it really felt like useful research.

Another show that I caught up with through its final season was AMC’s Halt and Catch Fire (MC-92, NFX).  I wrote about the first two seasons last year, and was engaged by the reversals of the next two seasons, though I was not blown away by the series’ concluding episodes in a way that would move it into my top ten (or however many) of all time.  I enjoyed the journey with Joe and Gordon, Cameron and Donna, as their relationships shifted and characters evolved.  Also, the techno-historic journey from the PC (“the thing that gets us to the thing”) to the wonders of Internet search.  In this series too, the women moved from the periphery to the center of the story.  Between this show and Silicon Valley, I feel that I know something about something I know nothing about.

A real candidate to enter the pantheon, Better Call Saul (MC-87, NFX) continued to rise in its third season, almost to the level of its precursor, Breaking Bad.  Bob Odenkirk is terrific as Jimmy-becoming-Saul, as is Jonathan Banks converging as Mike, but the real heart of the show has become Rhea Seehorn as Kim, especially with the season-ending departure of another major character (I’ll say no more).  It’s a major point of concern among many of us, what happens to Kim between the end of BCS and the beginning of BB.  This is the show whose return I look forward to most.

Here I take note of several highly-regarded shows to which I cannot make a commitment.  I’m on-again off-again with Fargo (MC-89, FX) – dismissed the first season, loved the second, endured the third.  That could be the way with these anthology series.  With American Crime (MC-90, NFX), so hard to differentiate from American Crime Story (source of the great O.J. miniseries), I’ve never had that on-again moment.  Similarly, so many critics declared The Leftovers (MC-98, NFX, HBO) the best show of the year that I had to give it a look.  Admitting that it’s unfair to judge a third and final season without watching the first two, I have to say that I was not grabbed at all, except by the performance of Carrie Coon, who was also the best thing in this season of Fargo.

I’ve lost all patience (and amusement) with HBO’s comedy centerpiece Veep (MC-88, NFX, HBO), but find Silicon Valley (MC-85, NFX, HBO) getting better and better, the only guy-centered show that I really enjoy.  On the subject of HBO comedies, I have to highlight the return of High Maintenance (MC-85, HBO), even though I haven’t yet seen all the current episodes.  Same with Netflix’s Black Mirror (MC-77avg, NFX), though I’ve written about both before.

Before turning to the British shows I enjoyed most of all this past year, I have to cite two highly heterogeneous series that ranked among my favorites.

Everybody’s heard about the new Ken Burns documentary The Vietnam War (MC-90, NFX, PBS), but I wonder how many have actually endured it.  I’m here to testify that it is definitely worth 17+ hours of your time.  The rewards are great, however painful at times, in recapturing and understanding an era, especially if like me, that era marks your formative years.  Vietnam was the television war, so there is astounding footage throughout.  Interviews balance all perspectives, including Vietnamese.  The contemporaneous music track alone will carry you through those years.  A powerful, powerful experience.

Nobody’s heard about the new French series on Netflix, Call My Agent! (NFX), but I’m here to spread the word.  If you are a Francophile in cinema, as I am in nothing else (except maybe painting), then this is a series you should not miss, two seasons of six hour-long episodes.  The central characters are four diverse agents for a company that represents French movie stars, one or two of whom appear in each episode.  Some of them are longtime favorites of mine – Nathalie Baye, Fabrice Luchini, Isabelle Adjani, Juliette Binoche – and some are totally unknown to me, but each episode is great fun, with undertones of real-life drama, backstage and in the office.

Though I am an Anglophile in many areas, the Brits really stood out in TV this year.  The second season of The Crown (MC-87, NFX) was every bit as good as the first, and cements Claire Foy as one of my favorite actresses.  It’s a shame she won’t be back as Queen Elizabeth in future seasons, but I will look forward to them nonetheless, since the intelligence of writing and quality of production will likely persist, and there’s some interesting history to traverse.  Talk about women in positions of power!  I don’t have the effrontery to name the best tv of the year, but I can say that there was no show I watched with more relish than this.

With much less notice or acclaim, the tv film To Walk Invisible (MC-71, NFX, PBS) gave a very credible and creditable portrait of the Bronte sisters, and how they broke into print from a world of familial fantasy.  The story and acting seemed true to what I know of the Brontes, and the Yorkshire locations for sure, as it was written and directed by Sally Wainwright, well known for Last Tango in Halifax and Happy Valley.

I know there are a lot of cooking competitions out there, but I was never lured to watch one until I got hooked on the latest season of The Great British Baking Show (MC-88, NFX, PBS).  Highly entertaining, and more revealing of a diverse national character than you would expect.

Last but far from least, I was thrilled to learn that there were two more seasons (the 7^th and 8^th) of Doc Martin (BCG, NFX, ATV) available through the streaming service Acorn TV.  If you haven’t sampled the delights of this series, the first six seasons are also available on Netflix.  If you have, you will be delighted to return to the utterly enchanting Cornish seaside village of Portwenn, with its equally engaging tapestry of quirky village characters, stitched around the Aspergerish doctor from London, brilliant but with no people skills at all, played by Martin Clunes.  Against all odds, through each season, his love interest is played by Caroline Catz.  I don’t know that there is a more purely enjoyable show out there, given the humor and heart of the writing, the exquisite scenery and setting, the ease and charm of both the human and canine acting, and the seriousness of purpose that Doc Martin brings to his work.  There’s no show I recommend with more confidence that you will enjoy it, unless of course you’re a miserable human being.

Now that I’m rolling again with this reviewing business, I’ll be back soon with my round-up of the best films of 2017.

Unrest

This is more an alert than a review.  Unrest (MC-80, NFX) is a documentary that has been shortlisted for an Oscar, which was shown on the PBS series Independent Lens on January 8^th (in most areas), and is now available for streaming on Netflix.  My temptation is to call it must-viewing since it profiles a little-understood and unfortunately-named disease, from which my daughter suffers.  “Chronic Fatigue Syndrome” became the butt of jokes, and Myalgic Encephalomyeltis is not much more helpful (and a government committee’s stab at “S.E.I.D.” was a complete nonstarter). 

Jumping off from her own experience with the disease, director Jennifer Brea, who was stricken while a Ph.D. student at Harvard, began by filming her own struggles with the severely debilitating effects of the disease, and medicine’s flailing (and frequently derisory) attempts to come to grips with its nature and etiology.  Various doctors had little idea, based on minimal research funding or findings, as to its cause and cure.  Historically belittled as “hysteria” and “all in your head,” the condition has taken a while to be recognized as a post-viral disease that attacks the immune system in multiple ways, with perhaps a million sufferers in the U.S. and as many as 17 million worldwide.

Jen Brea, with strong support from her husband, tries all sorts of treatments, and reaches out by video chat to many other afflicted individuals and families around the world.  Her film has become a rallying point for an organization called ME Action.  It is a compassionate and reasoned plea for more public understanding of the disease and its victims, and for more medical research and training.

Your experience of the film will be different from mine, but I think that you’ll agree that it is moving and well-done, perhaps eye-opening as well.  For more on my daughter’s experience, see my compiled essay on “Rachel’s condition.”