[PassedOut]

y66, on 2020-June-18, 18:14, said:

We just finished watching Season 2 of "My Brilliant Friend" on HBO. Gorgeously filmed. Incredible acting by everyone. I am envious of their friendship.

Yes, one of our favorites too. Great show.

[thepossum]

Just finished seasons 1-3 of Homeland. Missed it when it came out. A good production.

EDIT Just completed series 5. ot sure whether to invest time in the next 3. WOuld be curious to know anybody's thoughts. It seemed to cover some very difficult issues remarkably well but I know it also was regarded as misrepresenting some parties/issues internationally. From my position it did well while acknowledging its limitations

[y66]

We're watching Babylon Berlin on Netflix. Set in Berlin during the Weimar Republic. Good writing. Good acting. Interesting characters and story lines. Awesome sets and photography. The protagonist, police inspector Gereon Rath, is mostly likeable although not as sharp as his counterparts in recent Nordic noir series or his protégé, Charlotte Ritter.

[sharon j]

Just finished the series "Stateless" and found the story quite moving.

[pilowsky]

[y66]

"Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice". Wow. Available for rent on iTunes and Amazon.

[melbob]

The Wire on AmazonPrime
Ozark on Netflix

[y66]

Borgen is now streaming on Netflix. We watched it a few years ago on DVD. It got rave reviews in my household of 2.

[PassedOut]

Constance and I enjoyed Charlie Kaufman's Netflix film I'm Thinking of Ending Things, based on Iain Reid's novel.

[y66]

We watched seasons 2 and 3 of "The Leftovers" on HBO after I read a positive review. My wife's observation, which I mostly agree with, is that it would have made a good movie or 3-part series but was too uneven to hold her interest for 2 seasons. We both liked the last episode a lot.

[y66]

We watched "Bellingcat", the documentary, on Netflix. Very well done. Story here.

[y66]

We're watching The Queen's Gambit on Netflix. Two thumbs up in my household of two.

[Winstonm]

We're watching The Handmaid's Tale....oops, my bad....that's the U.S. Senate holding Barrett's hearings.

[y66]

I enjoyed Aaron Sorkin's "The Chicago Seven" on Netflix. The performances by Sacha Baron Cohen as Abbie Hoffman, Mark Rylance as William Kunstler and Frank Langella as Hoffman's "illegitimate father" are fun to watch as are the exchanges between the Abbie Hoffman and Tom Hayden characters.

From Joseph Berger's NYT story (2019) about the University of Texas at Austin's acquisition of Hoffman's papers:

Quote

Robert H. Abzug, a professor of history and American studies at the University of Texas, said he was particularly intrigued by documents that outlined the changes in Mr. Hoffman during his years at Brandeis.

He came to the school as a relatively conventional student, wearing a jacket and tie, winning spots on the tennis and wrestling teams, even becoming the tennis team’s captain. But two unconventional professors, Dr. Abzug said, exerted significant influence: Herbert Marcuse, a Marxist who advocated social revolutions, and Abraham Maslow, a psychologist who argued that fostering human growth and self-actualization was more important than repairing neuroses.

Drawing on their ideas during rising ferment among the young, Mr. Hoffman felt liberated and was able to “unleash his personality” and lead “the theatrics ring of the New Left,” Dr. Abzug said. An example in the collection is a poster featured during the 1968 Democratic convention protests picturing Mr. Hoffman with an obscenity scrawled on his forehead and the caption: “The system is falling apart by itself. We’re just here to give it a little push.”

Mr. Hoffman’s style, Dr. Abzug said, entertained young people drawn to the movements of the 1960s and helped break down a stodgy culture as quickly as the ideas of more serious-minded radicals like Tom Hayden.

“It would have been a different era without the yeast of the Yippies and his making fun of a culture that was about to be challenged,” Dr. Abzug said.

It would have been a different movie too.

[hrothgar]

Blumhouse is releasing a cross up between

Freaky Friday and
Friday the 13th

in a couple weeks

I think this looks incredibly amusing (in a stupid stupid stupid sort of way)

[barmar]

y66, on 2020-October-25, 11:55, said:

We're watching The Queen's Gambit on Netflix. Two thumbs up in my household of two.

I binged it over the weekend. Anya Taylor-Joy deserves an Emmy nomination, she was fantastic in an incredibly intense role.

The story itself is a bit incredulous.

[Elianna]

barmar, on 2020-November-03, 17:41, said:

I binged it over the weekend. Anya Taylor-Joy deserves an Emmy nomination, she was fantastic in an incredibly intense role.

The story itself is a bit incredulous.

I agree that it is quite fantastical, but it's very engaging. What I found most surprising is how interesting they made the chess matches to audiences that aren't interested in chess. (Speaking for myself, I know how the pieces move. I could play a game following the rules. And that's it.) I don't know how the games were to anyone who knows anything about chess, but they supposedly had Kasparov as a technical consultant, so maybe the games are challenging, plus my guess is that they got the depictions of the Soviet System correct (even though all the players and events were fictional).

I wish that someone could do something similar with bridge. Maybe based on Sachar's book?

[Gerardo]

Elianna, on 2020-November-05, 12:36, said:

I agree that it is quite fantastical, but it's very engaging. What I found most surprising is how interesting they made the chess matches to audiences that aren't interested in chess. (Speaking for myself, I know how the pieces move. I could play a game following the rules. And that's it.) I don't know how the games were to anyone who knows anything about chess, but they supposedly had Kasparov as a technical consultant, so maybe the games are challenging, plus my guess is that they got the depictions of the Soviet System correct (even though all the players and events were fictional).

I wish that someone could do something similar with bridge. Maybe based on Sachar's book?

The story is a stretch, and she rose very fast (win all games state champ at first try?).
There is a significant list of children/teenagers with outstanding results, so not THAT much of a stretch.

But the youngest World Champion was 22 when he got the title.

Of course, beating the World Champion in a game, while quite an achievement, doesn't make you World Champion.
The games in the show are replays of actual games.
The adjournement (by the way, killed by the rise of the computers as players and analyzers) scenes were spot on.
Players getting their rest while teams of people analyze the position and present their finding to the player.
The Soviets had the upper hand here, in quality and quantity.
The book is based on an early 1980s novel by Walter Tevis, so missed the rise of the computers.

I was interested in the show as a chess amateur patzer, but it was quite good in general. The protagonist was superb.

Small peeve: The mexican commentator naming the chess piece "caballero", which is a literal translation of "knight"
but does NOT apply here, correct translation being "caballo" (horse).

[y66]

"The Hour" is very good. Streaming at acorn.tv

[y66]

We watched the first episode of season 4 of "The Crown" last night. Josh O’Connor as Charles is very good, sniveling and all.