deeana-78424 Reviews

Mission of Honor (II) (2018)

Eighty Years for the movie Industry to tell this story

[19 October 2019]

After eighty years of silence from Hollywood around the most inspiring epic story of WWII, suddenly in 2018 two movies were released about the Polish 303 Squadron based at RAF Northolt for the Battle of Britain. This little known story that surely deserves to be told, is based on the real story of the Polish Government moving itself and their military to Britain after Poland was invaded by the Germans in the west and the Russians in the east. But Does MISSION OF HONOR do this story justice? With tarty WAFs, bullying snobbish RAF pilots, and dispicable RAF officers, the inspirational core of the story seems to get lost in a series of unfortunate events, which should be that these highly skilled pilots decimated the Luftwaffe, outshone the British pilots, flew day and night in all weather daringly downing double the number of the planes that the British downed, and turned the tide of the war by preventing Hitler from invading Britain, and therefore making it possible for the Americans to have bases there. Perhaps this story has not been told in war movies because the West is ashamed of the ending. While the allies won the war, Poland became a satellite of the Soviet Union, and the Polish Military were not allowed to be a part of the Victory Parade because it would have offended Stalin. This movie is unsurprisingly anti-British in its bias, but does not allude to how the Polish pilots were appreciated by the common people of Britain as their exploits were heralded on the radio and Pathe News.

Foyle's War (2002–2015)

An evocative series

[9/10 · 6 March 2018]

There are many television series that are set in WWII Britain, such as Home Fires for example, and many detective series set in Britain in earlier times, but a series with a detective functioning in Hastings during WWII offers an unusual perspective on television crime drama. Mainly what is unusual for Michael Kitchen as Inspector Foyle is that much of his work is impeded by government red tape, civil service bureaucrats, and a whole host of unpleasant military officers, who oppose him at every turn, and make his life more difficult for him than the Germans. As a counterpoint to Foyle, the war provides him with a driver who is a perpetually cheerful young woman in military uniform who accompanies him almost everywhere, and who develops a relationship to his son. By the end of the series, which lasts for more years than the real war, it is clear that the real bond is between Foyle and his driver, and they have a father-daughter type of connection. The entire series is very evocative and is a platform for many social injustice issues that came up during the war, such as the hatred towards German immigrants that often erupted into violence, the provocation of British Nazi sympathizers, and the presence of American soldiers dating English women. Many of the episodes have domestic violence as an issue that is heightened during the war and a motive for murder. Overall, I watched all of the seasons together and found it a very satisfying series with Kitchen's Foyle as a very sympathetic, clever, moral, paternal person, and I missed him when it ended.

Mozart in the Jungle (2014–2018)

Hah!

[4/10 · 6 March 2018]

I binge-watched the entire four seasons over a period of three days, and at the end of season four I wanted to express myself to someone, anyone, about how unsatisfying the ending of season four was! I was sucked in at the beginning of season one with the characters: the naive ingenue oboe player, her cool offbeat best friend, the charismatic and unpredictable Mexican Maestro, and it was clear from the beginning that the inexperienced young musician and the brilliant Maestro belonged together, and that through the seasons they became closer and closer until they became an item. Then, in the last season everything goes to pieces. The talented oboe player decides to become a conductor, which is a more ridiculous ambition than being a member of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, and when she fails due to her own psychological problems she ends her relationship with the charismatic conductor and he goes completely insane. A spiteful ballet choreographer convinces him that he is participating in a conceptual art performance with no audience, no music, and no other dancers, so the Maestro dances around Central Park all by himself in the throes of total madness. Meanwhile somehow his former girlfriend gets to contuct the New York Philharmonic in a new piece by a famous composer which ends with a long standing ovation. It is as if the entire series was written by a deranged feminist whereby what is happy about the ending is that the underdog character grows throughout the seasons as her hair gets shorter, and her genius partner sinks deeper into madness as he becomes more dependent on her presence in his life. The series had me at hello, and then led me deeper down the rabbit hole to a horrible ridiculous ending almost as if the writer had had her heart broken by a Mexican maestro and this was her revenge!

Shut Eye (2016–2017)

Binge-worthy and sometimes cringe-worthy

[8/10 · 25 December 2017]

I binge watched seasons 1 and 2, and I am hoping that there will be a season 3 because I am hooked. You have to remember that it is a dark comedy, so it is not trying to portray reality, but satirize elements of reality such as psychics, new age motivational speakers, gypsy families, crime families, and blend them all together into a violent dishonest dangerous interactive soup, that swirls around some innocent naive teenagers who are caught up in the horror of Romany tradition. While it is satire, you just do not know if at the heart of it all, whether the visions that Charlie has after a blow to the head are real, valid evidence of actual psychic phenomenon, while on the other hand the storyline seems to invalidate real psychics like John Edward. Towards the end of season 2, Jeffrey Donovan looks, sounds and performs so much like John Edward, that I began to feel that the series was aimed at John Edward. However, in this comedic version of reality, Charlie has a team relaying messages to him based on research that they have done from the internet social media, which did not even exist when John Edward was a popular TV celebrity. Anyway, if there is a Season 3, there are some plot lines left hanging, and it could all end as the season ended, or take everything to another level. However, the main theme seems to be that everything is a con and nothing is real.