jimparrett

This is where concept (dark) is taken to a ridiculous degree. You can barely see this movie. The director has saturated the blacks so all you can really make out in most of the indoor scenes are highlights. You spend most of your time peering into the picture to make out what is going on and then replaying to make sure you saw what you thought you might have seen. It's simply too much viewer effort just to prop up a director's conceit. The characters are not much, either. They're icy cold and not very interesting. There is so little genuine interaction between them that you lose interest very quickly. This series might interest horror/scifi folks but if you have a decent television, this is a waste of the money you invested in the latest technology. You simply cannot see it. What a waste.

Stylized and sometimes silly, this series is fun if you leave your common sense behind. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. The acting is sub-par, the scripts feel rushed, the characters cardboard thin but still I watched the entire series. It's all so out there, so in-your- face, you can't help but watch with a perverted fascination. At times the pedantic nature of the 'teacher' character gets a little tiresome and his beautiful 'student' paper thin (literally) but this is so foreign to most crime series that it has the charm of its own. Not for binge watching but every once in awhile, a decent time waster. Caution might be exercised for younger viewers as it is quite violent, with many almost too-realistic images of violent death. Not at all PC, this show is not for everyone but if you want a change of pace, give it a try.

It's hard not to like the unspoiled, friendly and proud people profiled in this documentary. The director remarkably touches bases with both common folk like the three elderly farming brothers who make up the heart of the film and Castro himself. There's a sense of resiliency and humor that is inspiring. You also get to witness an American's view of the roller coaster ride Cuba has taken from the heady days of revolution to the horror of the 90's to 2016, when life has improved immeasurably for the subjects, some of whom have gone from gaunt to almost portly. Whatever your opinion is of Castro and his autocratic tendencies, this documentary concentrates its light on the Cuban people, their relationships with each other, their country and with the cameraman. I was surprised at how open Cubans are in criticizing their leader and their predicament, especially in the horrible 90's. One gets the feeling from western media that Cubans have been silenced and jailed under Castro for their views but here, nobody seems to be intimidated at all in speaking of their anger and resentment over the way the country has been run. By the end, I felt close to each of this film's subjects to the point where I was disappointed that two Cubans who emigrated to the USA during the later stages of filming are not interviewed after their exodus to America.