TV

Death in Paradise
8x07 Episode 7
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Father Brown
7x03 The Whistle in the Dark
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

Pointless
The Good, the Bad and the Bloopers
Marking ten years of the quiz show. Ten years! Where does time go?!
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

TV

Death in Paradise
8x05 Beyond the Shining Sea Part One
8x06 Beyond the Shining Sea Part Two
[Watch parts one and two (again) on iPlayer.]

Articles

The surreally incompetent Not Another Not Another Movie is beneath contempt
by Nathan Rabin (from the A.V. Club)

This was recently added to Amazon Prime Video, so I looked up reviews. It sounds so unremittingly terrible that, perversely, I now want to watch it.

TV

Deadwood
2x08 Childish Things
+ the second audio commentary on episode seven, by actors Powers Boothe and Garret Dillahunt.

I'm going to be away from home for most of next week, so my Deadwood viewing will have to take a brief hiatus. At time of writing HBO still haven't scheduled the new movie, so there should be plenty more time for me to finish the series before that comes along.

Death in Paradise
8x04 A Different Story
[Watch it (again) on iPlayer.]

this week on 100 Films

3 new reviews were published to 100 Films in a Year this week, and they were...


Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (2018)

Normally I’d explain the plot round about now, but, frankly, I can’t be bothered. It entirely spins out of what transpired in the first movie; having not seen that since it was in cinemas over two years ago, I frequently struggled to keep up, scrounging around in my memory for the ins and outs of a story I didn’t realise I needed to thoroughly revise. That’s to say nothing of all the other stuff it dregs up from the depths of Harry Potter mythology.

Read more here.


Sanjuro (1962)

I found it more readily enjoyable than Yojimbo. It’s got a straightforward but clever plot, plenty of funny bits that don’t undermine the rest, and some decent bursts of action.

Read more here.


Zatoichi and the Fugitives (1968)

The fugitives provide quite the challenge for Ichi, almost defeating him at one point. Naturally, our hero comes out on top in the end: spurred by righteous anger, his final-act slaughter is even more brutally efficient than normal. Having been shot and nearly killed in his first attempt at a climactic showdown, Ichi ain’t messing around the second time. Well, they have it coming. They’re a vicious lot, happily slaughtering innocents on practically anyone’s say-so, at one point even coming this close to murdering a baby. Indeed, this is quite a tonally dark instalment of the series.

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

TV

Deadwood
2x07 E.B. Was Left Out

+ the audio commentary by actors Kim Dickens, William Sanderson, and Dayton Callie, a very laidback and chatty trio. I think Sanderson was trying to do a proper commentary, at least at times, but Callie keeps derailing it.

Films

Escape from New York (1981)
[#47 in 100 Films in a Year 2019]

Starship Troopers (1997)
[#46 in 100 Films in a Year 2019]
Blindspot 2019 #3

Collection Count

Collection Count tracks my DVD/Blu-ray collection via a number of statistics every week.

Six new purchases this week, including a DVD-to-BD upgrade, a BD-to-4K upgrade, and four fresh Blu-rays.

Number of titles in collection: 2,198 [up 5]
Of which DVDs: 1,134 [down 1]
Of which Blu-rays: 1,064 [up 6]
— of which Ultra HD Blu-rays: 23 [up 1]

Number of discs in collection: 5,698 [up 8]
Number of films: 2,516 [up 4]
Number of TV episodes: 8,427 [up 4]
Number of short films: 654 [no change]

See you next week, faithful reader.

TV

Deadwood
2x06 Something Very Expensive

The Twilight Zone
3x24 To Serve Man
The top episode according to IMDb users seemed to pack more of a punch to me, even if it's main success lies in waiting 25 minutes for a killer punchline.

DVD Extras

Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create - Sanjuro
As I watched all of Yojimbo's extras when I watched the film (apart from the audio commentary), here I am settling up with Sanjuro's. Yes, I've been meaning to watch this since I watched that film 9 months ago -- where does time go?!

TV

Deadwood
2x05 Complications (Formerly "Difficulties")
+ the audio commentary by exec producer, and director of this episode, Gregg Fienberg.

The Twilight Zone
1x22 The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street
With a new revival on the way, Screen Crush published a ranking of all 156 episodes of the original series. I've always meant to watch some, so now seemed like a good time. This was their #1 pick. It was good, though it felt like a familiar analogy I've seen before. Maybe everyone was copying this.

Films

You Were Never Really Here (2017)
[#45 in 100 Films in a Year 2019]

TV

Deadwood
2x04 Requiem for a Gleet

+ the audio commentary on episode three by creator David Milch, which includes a chunk where he explains the thinking behind a scene from the pilot!

TV

Deadwood
2x03 New Money

+ the commentary on episode one by Molly Parker and Anna Gunn. Several episodes this season have more than one commentary, so I'm going to be a bit out of sync with those at times.

Films

Upgrade (2018)
[#44 in 100 Films in a Year 2019]

TV

Deadwood
2x01 A Lie Agreed Upon Part I [2nd watch]
2x02 A Lie Agreed Upon Part II

I always find it fascinating when series that are one long narrative decide to label a pair of episodes a two-parter, because why? Why are these two episodes deemed halves of a whole when every episode is one sliver of the bigger whole? Often it feels like there’s no compelling reason why those two episodes are titled to imply they should be considered as one (though I can’t think of any specific examples right now). As for this two-parter, at the end of the first half it seemed to confirm my suspicion that was the case again, but as part two took shape it became clear it was indeed still dealing with the specific events of part one, rather than things that shape the overall season. So, fair enough.

Plus I listened to the audio commentary on Part I by Timothy Olyphant and Ian McShane. Early on, Olyphant notes he’s received letters complaining that their commentary on season one was not informative enough, and so the pair resolve to make this commentary... even less informative. I'd say they succeed, but it's funny along the way.

Films

Brigsby Bear (2017)
[#43 in 100 Films in a Year 2019]

Samaritan Zatoichi (1968)
[#42 in 100 Films in a Year 2019]

TV

Deadwood
1x12 Sold Under Sin [season finale; 2nd watch]

+ the audio commentary by stars Timothy Olyphant and Ian McShane, which is perhaps the least genuinely informative of the season, but once they warm up it is quite irreverently fun.

this week on 100 Films

You could say this is the "last fortnight on 100 Films in a Year" because I didn't post an update last week, but that's because there was nothing to report! In the last week, though, there have been 6 new reviews...


Deadpool 2: Super Duper $@%!#& Cut (2018)

It runs almost 15 minutes longer than the theatrical cut... The Blu-ray’s scene selection menu offers an indication of which chapters feature new material, and the answer is “most of them” — those 15 minutes are spread relatively thinly throughout almost the entire film. There are a handful of wholly new scenes (as many as ten, depending how you count it), most of them quite short (one is under nine seconds), a couple of extended fight sequences, and then lots of added lines here and there. Plus there’s a smattering of gags that have been changed for alternatives.

Read more here.


Free Solo (2018)

“Anyone can be happy and cosy. Nothing good happens in the world by being happy and cosy.” So says Alex Honnold, the subject of this documentary, when discussing the different approaches to life of his girlfriend, who he thinks wants to be “happy and cosy”, and himself, who seeks perfection in extreme endeavour. It’s as succinct a summation of his attitude to life as any in this Oscar-winning documentary.

Read more here.


Mandy (2018)

Mandy is today’s premiere on Sky Cinema, which feels like an ill fit to me. Maybe I’m being unfair, but I always feel like Sky Cinema (and by extension its viewer base) is much more focused around mainstream blockbuster kind of movies, especially for a Saturday premiere. Instead, it feels like Mandy should be making its TV debut on Film4 at about 11pm in the middle of the week. I can see some tuning in expecting a violent revenge action-thriller and giving up after a few minutes of its particular weirdness. For those on its wavelength, however, it’s an experience (and it’s definitely an experience) that’s thrilling in very a different way.

Read more here.


Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984)

Princess Mononoke's original Japanese trailers emphasise that it’s “13 years after Nausicaä”, which intrigued me, because director Hayao Miyazaki had made plenty of other films in between. But, having watched the earlier movie, the connection and similarities become clear: Nausicaä features an ecological message, a threat from nature that isn’t, industrial humans (with a female general) being the actual villains, innocent townsfolk that need saving, a princess who’s the only one who understands, and a boy from a different kingdom who helps her. They’re not identical, of course, but there’s a lot of overlap…

Read more here.


Princess Mononoke (1997)

Miyazaki has imagined a very lyrical and meaningful story, about nature vs industry, and their possible coexistence. The theme isn’t exactly subtle in the film, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t well portrayed. He’s populated the narrative with interesting characters, too. There’s little easy right or wrong here, with those on all sides coming across as nuanced individuals, with complicated relationships.

Read more here.


Triple Frontier (2019)

It doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but I think some of the commentary dismissing it as mere standard fare has done it some disservice. As a heist/action movie it’s more than competent, with some turns and developments that keep it surprising and fresh, and visuals that reward seeing it on the best-quality screen you can.

Read more here.


More next Sunday.

TV

Deadwood
1x11 Jewel's Boot is Made for Walking [2nd watch]