Maybe Season 4 will be set in Goa !?!
God help us all.
But no, not luxe enough.
Maldives are more along the right lines.
Hated it when I first watched, then absolutely loved Enlightened. So very human 
1 Like
Fair enough - at least we’ll be spared weird articles written by professors of Indian cultural studies!
Coming in May on Netflix, “Nonnas”, based on Enoteca Marie, that Staten Island restaurant that hired, well, nonnas (and bubbes) to cook.
Today’s menu:
3 Likes
Here’s a BBC short documentary on Enoteca Maria.
1 Like
The spot has been all over social media of late – makes sense given Netflix
No Taste Like Home – Net Geo show where celebs (re)discover the food (and stories) of their ancestry.
I started with the Henry Golding / Malaysia episode – his mom is from a tribe on the island of Borneo (that is part of Malaysia).
Other episodes:
Awkwafina - Korea
Justin Theroux - Italy
Issa Rae - Senegal
James Marsden - Germany
Florence Pugh - England
2 Likes
The new season of Black Mirror is out — just in case real life wasn’t dystopian enough for ya 
We watched 3 episodes, the first (and best, if by best you mean devastating), Common People features Chris O’Dowd and Rashida Jones as a couple dealing with some… tech issues. Depressing AF.
The second episode, Bête Noir is a revenge play rooted in schoolyard bullying. Lots of over-the-top gaslighting, so — just like real life
The third episode had a reasonably compelling plot, touching on a similar theme as the fantastic San Junipero from S3, but didn’t quite work for us. The weakest of all three we watched. Looking forward to the rest. In a way.
1 Like
Season 3 of the Great American Baking show on Roku is available. It’s filmed in the tent in England with Paul and Prue as judges so a nice option if you love Great British Baking Show. I just finished watching the new season of junior bake-off and it was the perfect escape for this dystopian messed up week.
2 Likes
She kept good company at Bletchley Circle with Mrs. Peel’s daughter Rachel Stirling.
1 Like
We finished the brilliant The Pitt, then watched the next installment of Ludwig. One more epi left, I believe!
We were in the mood for a movie & started in on The Wild Robot, which is animated quite prettily, but the schmaltz of it all was just laid on a bit too heavy for us, and we turned it off after 25 minutes.
Still spoiled from the magic that was Flow, I guess.
1 Like
Universal Language (2024) - dir. Mathew Rankin
This is one of those films that you could talk about for HOURS. There’s so much to pull apart, so many layers. There’s the quirky performances and characters, like Fargo or the Raising Arizona cast were all transferred to Canada. But not just any Canada. It’s a Canada where the Quebec secession vote of ‘95 was successful. The French-speaking part of the country has formally split with the rest of Canada, which primarily speaks… Farsi? The British culture that slowly morphed into Canadian niceness has been replaced by pre-revolution modern Muslim culture that yields an odd and fascinating mix of familiar beats with a very odd accent. That reflexive Canadian niceness is still there, combined with the Muslim practice of hospitality and welcoming strangers.
So there’s that whole aspect, an odd alternative present which has a lot to say about Canadian culture, assimilation, and who is having to adapt to whom.
If THAT weren’t enough, we have the raw cinematographic excellence at work. Rankin frames his shot among the grey, brown, and beige rectangles that serve as the cities disconnect from its inhabitants. Harkening back to framing devices in Wong Kar Wei’s In the Mood for Love or even to Wes Anderson’s uncanny, quirky symmetry. So thoroughly is this mastered that about 2/3rds of the way through, a sequence breaks thing up with natural, organic form and movement that catches you by surprise in the best way.
But wait!! There’s still more! We have a usual setting and world, built cautiously and with clear intent to disorient the viewer somewhat, keep them thinking and on their toes. We have pitch perfect see photography, drawing the viewers in and (sometimes literally) keeping the characters in their respective lanes.
Oh but the characters!! There is Mathew (plays by director Rankin) as an average white guy living in Quebec in some govt job. His mother, who we clean he’s been estranged from for quite a while, has requested him, so he’s quitting his job and going back to Winnipeg Manitoba. A big flat province with bitterly cold winds and, in this reality, a nearly homogenous Persian-descended population.
Two other stories are circulating around as well, two girls have found a stack of money frozen beneath the ice on a sidewalk. They need to money buy their classmate new glasses or their teacher will expel them all. Meahwhile, a tour guide insists of giving tours to the city that has nothing interesting about it, as he attempts to re-enact the great parallel parking incident of 1975 or similar trivialities.
And on of all that structure and plot and woven narrative, it succeeds fantastically. The setting creates the world where this story fits in nicely, as if it was the reason it was all made up for. Low-key funny, a little pointedly satiric jabs to those who unambiguously Ideserve them, and ultimately a sweet little ending that seems earned and satisfying even if the universe that contains it is absurd on its face.
It’s a beautiful idea and tremendous execution.
5/5 - No notes.
Like The Bloody Lady from last week, this is one of the preview screenings for the Sacramento Midnight Film Festival, running from 4/23-4/27
Badges available here:
2 Likes
I want to see this!
3 Likes
I’m halfway through Pitt, and it struck me that nobody was wearing masks. I commented on The Well, my main online home, and someone pointed to a Reddit discussion on just that.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ThePittTVShow/comments/1ifrbd0/how_are_there_no_masks/?rdt=33973
1 Like
Indeed, but this is more a privatised healthcare story that is enhanced by the tech imagining. Otherwise: That dystopia is there in the US. (And coming for us elsewhere, I fear.)
I didn’t want to get into the plot too much. It’s also a satire on streaming services and their pricing.
Yeah, I got that. But the focus on the tech seems to me one of those ways that people aren’t paying attention to the health care issues of the US, which are the source of the devastation.
IDK I thought that point was made with no subtlety.
Nothing was subtle at all. What intrigues me is how much when people are talking about it, they’re emphasising the tech nightmare as the site of satire and it’s so obvious it’s not really doing much, particularly when it’s applied to a circumstance that also exists already (coverage, costs, tiered services in American’s privatised health system). That is, can it really satirise that which is already existing at the level of satire? And if speculative fiction: What speculation does it offer when giving people what they have?
I know you’re German but sometimes I wonder if Americans/ people based in the US understand how dystopian their circumstances already are. (As such, I’d almost say Black Mirror is a warning to the UK and our sad tendency to trail the US. I mean, goodness knows Charlie Brooker must be worried too.)
2 Likes
