nuntukamen

This movie was a little slow in getting to used to, very funny, but spaced zany humor, but by the time it got to the last scene with The Bearded Man in his apartment, I was falling on the floor. A serial killer of 28 people and a large Great Dane, not a cute little dog, The Bearded Man scenes are worthy of any young or early Reiner-Allen-Brooks (Mel or Albert) effort I've seen. Never to be confused with an academy award level film, it nonetheless is definitely worth a watch, and Adrienne Shelley as the actress/writer/director hits a home run and not just a triple. One of my favorite exchanges in the film is her boyfriend coming across her in disguise, as she is across the street from where she has witness two murders. "What are you doing here?" he asks. "I'm investigating," she replies. "Shouldn't you leave that to the police?" he responds. "This is New York City, Adam; you know we don't have any real police." A very well written effort by a true comedic talent.

I Led Three Lives was shown in Akron, Ohio, on now defunct WAKR channel 49 as reruns in the late 70's-early 80's, and thank goodness for it. I remember gathering around the television at my father's insistence as a family, as if the news were coming on, during its original broadcasting. Don't believe a word of the nonsense posted here that this was more of a documentary and true story premise. Yes, this kind of paranoia reigned supreme, but Senator Joe McCarthy was and will always be a proved fraud, the HUAC Hearings were a national disgrace, and whatever the KGB spent on agents here, and no matter the intent, it was all absurdly harmless. pc-privconfounder has the only realistic review here, and just as an aside, one I personally remember watching was about the lead character, Herbert Philbrick, noticing what appeared to be single men buying large carts of groceries, reporting this to his FBI connection, and then discovering that commies were actually buying more groceries than they could eat! Why? Because they were deliberately driving the prices up, causing inflation. Common sense would tell anyone the KGB would need millions of shoppers every week buying hundreds of carts full of groceries each (that they threw away into a nearby dumpster in the show) to actually have any noticeable result like claimed, but that didn't stop many millions (some posting here) from truly believing inflation and higher milk and bread costs were a commie plot to disrupt normalcy in the United States. Yeah, right, sure, sure; that's the ticket. Yeah. Well, it was the '50's; what else can one say? Its not about liberal or conservative viewpoints; its about perception and intelligence. This was one of the funniest unintentionally-so shows ever created, and SHOULD be watched by every American just to see what truly was paralyzing intelligent growth in America for several decades. Unfortunately, the newest suspicion involving the show is that it also unintentionally promotes marijuana use. Watch it, and see if you don't light up for a more profound appreciation of its hilarious plot lines.

Just to justify this review, a few whining sour pusses inspired it. They didn't like the characters, they thought the accents horrible, and Walter Goggins needed to go, in their opinion, not to mention the pace for them was agonizingly slow. Really? I will use that framework to bolster my own thoughts. Slooow pace? Absurd. What they mean is that something isn't blowing up every ten seconds. The pace is a written drawl that is typical of where the setting, Harlan County, is, and serves to enhance the characters in unspoken ways. Wayne Goggins and Tim Olyphant are terrific, and while they lapse out of accent periodically, both actors have replicated the Kentucky slur down to a T. Especially Wayne Goggins has caught a defining core of that Harlan County accent perfectly, and his character, Boyd Crowder, is a living embodiment of legendary Kentucky badmen, right down to the moonshine and "ovah yondah thur" direction. Yes, some things are not in a 100% totally realistic vein. Why should they be? Its television, not a documentary. Tim Olyphant's character, Raylan Givens, could have walked out of any doorway from Whitley County to any high school in Harlan County and be accurately portrayed as the Marshal he becomes. Astounding character development and intricate character accuracy. He and Goggins both deserve Emmy Awards. The plots are tight and taut and the dialogue flavored with humor and common sense. Anyone disliking this series is verifiable blind, deaf, and, yes, the D-word. Television needs this style programming to demonstrate a maturity of creative expression unavailable just a few years ago. Worth watching twice, and even a third time...and that's true entertainment, folks. Highly,highly recommended.