Dir. Charles Sturridge. Starring Jeremy Irons, Anthony Andrews, John Gielgud Brideshead Revisited meanders a little while before getting started. Its first episode is an hour and forty minute jaunt which begins with Charles Ryder (Irons), officer in the British Army, alone and pensive. I’ve always felt loneliest when people have to tell me that I am, in… Read More Brideshead Revisited S1E1, “Et in Arcadia Ego”
It’s another edition of the B&B B&B, but based on the number of topics we give airtime to, it’s more like three. In our first segment, we discuss TV: The Book, the marvelous Sepinwall/Zoller Seitz joint which gives an authoritative and super readable rundown of great American television. Matt: I was pleasantly surprised by where… Read More Baumann and Burch, Episode 26: British Miniseries and the Worth of Clive Owen
Dir. Adam Kane. Starring Lee Pace, Anna Friel, Chi McBride Late in the first season of Pushing Daisies, Chuck (Friel) discovers the Big Secret that Ned (Pace) has been keeping from her since they were little kids: Ned killed Chuck’s dad. Ned didn’t mean to – didn’t know until it happened, in fact, that he was… Read More Pushing Daisies S2E3, “Bad Habits”
I’ve long been fond of Roger Ebert’s assertion that a children’s movie can do just fine without a villain. Here’s the opening paragraph of his review of My Neighbor Totoro: Here is a children’s film made for the world we should live in, rather than the one we occupy. A film with no villains. No fight… Read More The Great British Bake Off
Dir. Charles Sturridge. Starring Ted Danson, James Fox, Mary Steenburgen I have long been on the record that just because something shares the same title as its source material doesn’t mean, necessarily, that it must follow the source material’s lead. In practice, what that means is that film adapters should feel real freedom to edit… Read More Gulliver’s Travels (1996)
It’s 1983. Stephen King has just published Christine and Pet Sematary, although “The Body,” the novella that birthed Stand by Me, was just published last year, and no one could have forgotten Carrie just yet. Last year was also the year that E.T. came out, where friendly aliens get sloshed at home, dress in Yoda costumes, and have to hide… Read More Stranger Things, Season 1
In this episode, we strike out into a discussion of Mad Men, arguably the finest television drama of all time. We try not to linger too long on Dick Whitman; we spend ample time discussing the tragedy of Lane Pryce; we giggle over the possibility that Archer’s Cherlene might go on tour with Ramblin’ Don… Read More Baumann and Burch, Episode 21: The Allman Brothers feat. Ramblin’ Don
Created by David Simon. Starring Dominic West, Larry Gilliard, Jr., Sonja Sohn I remember how frustrated I was watching Glee, a show which in its first season gave meaningful screen time and plot directions to, by my count, at least sixteen different characters. Plot arcs which could have sizzled and developed over the course of… Read More The Wire, Season 1
Dir. David Livingston. Starring Avery Brooks, Louise Fletcher, Rosalind Chao (I’ve had this blog for three years now, and I have never written a post on Deep Space Nine. Not once! That amazes me.) There’s a wonderful scene in “Q-Less,” the sixth episode of DS9, where Q shows up with Vash for reasons not much… Read More Star Trek: Deep Space Nine S1E20, “In the Hands of the Prophets”
Dir. Roger Spottiswoode. Starring Matthew Modine, Saul Rubinek, Alan Alda The story of the HIV/AIDS crisis, especially in its nascent days in the late 1970s, is utterly terrifying. Until I read Randy Shilts’ magnificent tome on the first ten years of AIDS, And the Band Played On, it was hard for me to realize just… Read More And the Band Played On (1993)
Seeing Things Secondhand 