ARCHIVED FORUM -- March 2012 to February 2022READ ONLY FORUM
This is the second Archived Forum which was active between 1st March 2012 and 23rd February 2022
BeoNut since '75
Lately I've been working my way through the AMC show "Hell On Wheels" on Netflix. It's a western set during the construction of the transcontinental railroad on the Union Pacific side, the east to west side of the railroad. Hell On Wheels is the name of the railroad town housing the workers, the city sign says "Population: one less than yesterday." The main protagonist is a Southerner who manages to get out to the railroad town hunting down the Union soldiers who raped his wife and killed her and his son, and he winds up becoming chief engineer. Well written and acted, great production values, a lot of fascinating characters, including an insane preacher and a deranged Norwegian called the "Swede" who had been imprisoned in Andersonville as a POW during the war, and he didn't come out mentally right. He is seriously deranged and dangerous.The preacher is played by the same actor who played the insane and dangerous villain/drug lord Cain in "Robocop II" and he plays insane very well in both. I remember in Robocop he was having one guy who betrayed him basically dissected while alive and conscious, his girlfriend shrieks "I thought you were just gonna scare him!" to which he replies, very deadpan "Doesn't he look scared?"
The whole vibe of the show, down to the music in the intro, is very similar to the HBO drama "Deadwood" which took place in a mining camp/town in South Dakota during the gold rush, when it was just a territory and not a state. Both are dramas set in the frontier but at different places, and both are excellent shows.
Really enjoying "Hell On Wheels."
Jeff
I'm afraid I'm recovering from the BeoVirus.
Just watched "Terminator Genisys" on BlueRay, stunning picture. About 80% of the movie is set in the dark at night and such, so good black levels are a must. It was pretty much panned in reviews, but I enjoyed it. It's never going to be a "great" film such as "Blade Runner" or such, but it was well done for what it was IMO. Resets the timeline in interesting ways, and it has Dr. Who as Skynet. I found it interesting that they had scenes that were identical to the original movie, but then they diverged as the timeline had been altered. The first terminator Sarah Conner encountered was when she was a little girl, not when she was in college.
And of course watching Emilia Clarke is never a waste of time. Interestingly, the women who played Sarah Conner keep getting shorter. I think they went from about 5'8" with Linda Hamilton, to 5'2" with Emilia Clarke (who looks much better IMO as a brunette than that weird blonde hair in Game Of Thrones).
I just finished rewatching all 4 seasons of "The Lexx," one of if not the most unique and creative shows I've ever seen. I had the first season on DVD, and a couple of years ago had started watching the 2nd-4th on Netflix streaming when in the middle of Season 2 the rights apparently expired and they went away. Not available in any streaming format I can find now, so I went ahead and bought the DVDs.
Totally demented show. The Lexx is a giant, miles long space ship, a living/mechanical hybrid that looks like a wingless dragonfly. It was designed to destroy whole planets in the service of an evil religious order which runs the League of 20,000 Planets with an iron fist. Since the ship is organic, it has certain peculiarities, such as the toilets have giant tongues to clean you off. The ship gets stolen by a motley crew of a 4th class security guard, a woman who was made into a love slave by the Divine Order, an undead assassin, and a disconnected robot head who's in love with the love slave.
First season is 4 90 minute movies, the rest of the seasons are standard 1 hour episodes. 2nd season is moving from one place to another, third is very allegorical, they are in orbit around two planets that orbit each other so closely they share atmosphere, Fire and Water. On Fire, people are tortured in brutal heat,on Water they live in floating cities devoted to whatever pleasures the people like, doesn't take much to see the allegory. In the 4th and final season they are on Earth, which they describe as a Type 13 planet which usually is destroyed by being compressed to the size of a pea by experiments to find the mass of the Higgs boson.
A joint Canadian/European production, the US market kept wanting more violence, the European one more sex, they managed to split the difference pretty well. Amazing artwork and set design, demented plots, and great fun. I think most of the episodes can be found on YouTube. Well worth it if you like creative shows.
Just started watching "The Last Kingdom," a BBC show set in the late 9th century about the Danes vs. the Saxons, based around a man who was taken prisoner by the Danes who returns to try and recover his title and lands in Wessex. Quite good, reminds me a lot of the History Channel show "Vikings" except viewed from the other side. "Vikings" is set in the late 8th century, at the start of Viking raiding into England, whereas they are already pretty well established everywhere except Wessex in "The Last Kingdom." Both shows are well worth the time to watch, both are very good historical dramas.
Not familiar with those except for Outlander, we caught the first season and enjoyed it when I had cable. May have to do a "free month" just to catch up on the channel. I know I need to do that to catch up on Penny Dreadful.I seem to recall hearing good things about Person Of Interest before.
Will investigate the others that you like. If you do watch the Lexx let me know how you like it! I just was reading and one of the co-creators, Lex Giggeroth, died in 2011 at 49! Awfully young. He played parts in the 1st, 3rd, and 4th seasons. In the first episode he plays the thug/criminal who they mind wipe to be the new host to the essence of His Divine Shadow.
Alzheimer's, ugh. Too close to what we're dealing with, with a family member, who is well into it. Depressing.
Sounds like gloomy watching.
Jeff:Alzheimer's, ugh. Too close to what we're dealing with, with a family member, who is well into it. Depressing. Sounds like gloomy watching. Jeff
elephant: Jeff: Alzheimer's, ugh. Too close to what we're dealing with, with a family member, who is well into it. Depressing. Sounds like gloomy watching. Jeff Same at this end - early to middle stage - however the Wallander episode helped me empathise what it must feel like
Jeff: Alzheimer's, ugh. Too close to what we're dealing with, with a family member, who is well into it. Depressing. Sounds like gloomy watching. Jeff
Same at this end - early to middle stage - however the Wallander episode helped me empathise what it must feel like
Very, very sorry to hear that my friend. PM or email me if you ever want to talk about it, we are a bit farther along than early or mid stage here, maybe I can advise, I know I can empathize!
Just received a copy of a BR I ordered from Amazon, "The Company Of Wolves" which is a very surreal and metaphorical telling of the Little Red Riding hood story, involving several sub vignettes about werewolves. Angela Lansbury plays the grandmother. Very surreal, the fact it's filmed on a sound stage just makes it seem more otherworldly and surreal. There are only two real wolves in the film, most are dogs that have been dyed to look like wolves. Funny story I read, there's one scene where a wolf is supposed to fall in a hole going after a duck they stake there as bait. Apparently the real wolf started approaching the hole and the duck quacked, and the wolf ran off scared and wouldn't come near the set again, they had to use a different wolf! Great movie though it was never a big hit.
Jeff:I just finished rewatching all 4 seasons of "The Lexx," one of if not the most unique and creative shows I've ever seen. I had the first season on DVD, and a couple of years ago had started watching the 2nd-4th on Netflix streaming when in the middle of Season 2 the rights apparently expired and they went away. Not available in any streaming format I can find now, so I went ahead and bought the DVDs. Totally demented show. The Lexx is a giant, miles long space ship, a living/mechanical hybrid that looks like a wingless dragonfly. It was designed to destroy whole planets in the service of an evil religious order which runs the League of 20,000 Planets with an iron fist. Since the ship is organic, it has certain peculiarities, such as the toilets have giant tongues to clean you off. The ship gets stolen by a motley crew of a 4th class security guard, a woman who was made into a love slave by the Divine Order, an undead assassin, and a disconnected robot head who's in love with the love slave. First season is 4 90 minute movies, the rest of the seasons are standard 1 hour episodes. 2nd season is moving from one place to another, third is very allegorical, they are in orbit around two planets that orbit each other so closely they share atmosphere, Fire and Water. On Fire, people are tortured in brutal heat,on Water they live in floating cities devoted to whatever pleasures the people like, doesn't take much to see the allegory. In the 4th and final season they are on Earth, which they describe as a Type 13 planet which usually is destroyed by being compressed to the size of a pea by experiments to find the mass of the Higgs boson. A joint Canadian/European production, the US market kept wanting more violence, the European one more sex, they managed to split the difference pretty well. Amazing artwork and set design, demented plots, and great fun. I think most of the episodes can be found on YouTube. Well worth it if you like creative shows. Jeff Beovirus victim, it's gotten to be too much to list!
I had to resort to buying the DVDs, but then I wanted it in my permanent collection as well.
At least here in the States all of them appear to be available on YouTube. I watched the first episode, "I Worship His Shadow," 90 min long, on YouTube on my big TV and it looked as good as the DVD. Remember it's a 4:3 shot show in SD. Give YouTube a try and see if you can get it for free there.
Jeff:I had to resort to buying the DVDs, but then I wanted it in my permanent collection as well. At least here in the States all of them appear to be available on YouTube. I watched the first episode, "I Worship His Shadow," 90 min long, on YouTube on my big TV and it looked as good as the DVD. Remember it's a 4:3 shot show in SD. Give YouTube a try and see if you can get it for free there. Jeff Beovirus victim, it's gotten to be too much to list!
Glad you enjoyed it, it is indeed a mish mash of different themes and such, but quite creative. The episodes get more strange and out there as the seasons roll on. The 2nd season is more demented, and each episode is odd in a different way, though there is one unifying theme to it all. I think the third season is by far the most artistic, the sets, and imagery are just amazing. It has a lot of CGI for the backgrounds, as well as being filmed in ruins in Berlin and in the Namibian desert.
The first season episode "Eating Pattern" starring Rutger Hauer is really the most bizarre one of the first season. I did love the line in the first one "You are Giggarota, also known as The Wicked?" "You got problem with that? AAhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" as he throws her off the bridge.
May His Shadow fall upon you.
We've just rented on iTunes - Jim - The James Foley Story.
Soulful and humane when you least expect it.
Beautiful, moving and yet the tears of sadness through his suffering will flood from your eyes. Sincere and full of integrity.
A really amazing, true life documentary of what is going on right now in this world.
Paul W: We've just rented on iTunes - Jim - The James Foley Story. Soulful and humane when you least expect it. Beautiful, moving and yet the tears of sadness through his suffering will flood from your eyes. Sincere and full of integrity. A really amazing, true life documentary of what is going on right now in this world.
Couldnt find it - it was produced by HBO ? You use a VPN :) ?
Hi Elephant, we rented it for the UK iTunes store. Here in the UK, it's also on Amazon & Google PLAY to rent or buy. It was new to the UK last week both as a download AND as a showing at Art houses in the larger cities.
I do notice that VIMEO download is only available in the USA & Canada. I want to buy the film BUT I prefer to buy from Vimeo rather than iTunes as they repeat the artists better - they take a 10% cut rather than a greedy 30%. Plus I like Vimeo's style & integrity.
We saw it again on Thursday. It is truly the most beautiful, heartfelt, soulful documentary. The guy is a true hero to me.
A must see for all.
Here's the trailer...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7UTdyP2fmk
I know what you mean Elephant. You get used to the world being connected as one but then certain films aren't show online in certain countries and it's so annoying.
BTW, The quality of the film was outstanding in terms of picture quality :)
... for instance Paul, i can't seem to find Big Business anywhere here on DVD.
Last night I watched The Dark Knight, i played it on the Samsung UHD 4K BR (mouthful) player - and i think the movie hadn't looked better on the Avant. It was visually stunning.
Michael that's awesome. The player must have done a really great job of upscaling it. Thats a great reason why I like the UHD Blu-Ray players as I do have some DVDs that are not in the UK available as downloads and they are special DVDs :)
Have you tried VIMEO 4K streaming for it Michael? This video on France is stunning...
https://vimeo.com/182056930
Thanks Paul, i looked at the Vimeo even on my MacBook Pro its good
i'll try it on the web browser on the avant later today
Fabulous Michael. I'm a HUGE fan of VIMEO. Definitely my favourite streaming & downloading site :)
Beosound Stage, Beovision 8-40, Beolit 20, Beosound Explore.
Chris, that's real sad! :(
Paul W:Have you tried VIMEO 4K streaming for it Michael? This video on France is stunning...https://vimeo.com/182056930
we tend to forget there is more to design than designing.
Finally got around to the 4th season of "Vikings." Very good, Ragnar looks more bat spit crazy than ever.
Started rewatching an old HBO series, "Carnivale." Set in a creepy Depression/Dust Bowl era traveling carnival, a supernatural battle between the good and evil, very good and very creepy.
Watched "Look Who's Back" where Adolph Hitler wakes up in 2014 Berlin at the site of his former bunker. A both extremely funny and somewhat disturbing look at how easily he slides back into the world and learns how to use TV and the Internet. Some very funny stuff though, although at times you feel a tad guilty at laughing at some of the jokes
After that I watched a German documentary, "Hitler's Children" about people whose parents or grandparents were leading Nazi war criminals. One woman's great uncle was Himmler, and damned if her nose wasn't the same. One man, whose grandfather ran Auschwitz went there for the first time with an Israeli who studies the Holocaust. Very emotional scene where a man who had been interred there comes and shakes his hand and hugs him for having the courage to come to the camp, and tells him that it's not his fault, he wasn't even born then. True, but having that kind of relative would be a tough thing to come to grips with.
Then, since I seemed to be on a Hitler meme, dug out the DVD I have of a very strange, surreal, and thought provoking film called "The Empty Mirror." In it, Hitler is in an underground prison under guard, with Goebbels, Goering, and Eva Braun, while Freud tries to psychoanalyze him. An intellectually fascinating film, truly a psychological drama, its not long before you work out that this is purgatory, Freud represents his chance at realizing the magnitude of his sins and gaining some repentance, the others are there to keep him steeped in his rationalizations and prevent this, and by the end there's no doubt he's transitioned to Hell.
Weird set of videos, I'll admit, but it's been interesting viewing.
The third and final season of "Penny Dreadful" just showed up on Netflix and I binge watched it. 9 episodes over three nights, it was so good I couldn't stop watching it back to back, but it was an emotionally draining experience to watch it over such a short time span. It ties up a lot of loose ends, but the amount of drama, tragedy, and pathos was almost overwhelming. There was no happy ending to any of the episodes, it was non-stop dark and oppressive drama, albeit outstandingly written, directed, and acted. A fitting end to a wonderful, very Victorian Gothic horror series. I can highly recommend the series if Gothic horror is your thing, or if it's not and you appreciate excellent acting and writing.
Been working on the episodes of a cooking/chef series on Netflix "Chef's Table." Very interesting, hour long in depth looks at a variety of acclaimed chefs. One interesting one was a chef in Sweden, beautiful restaurant, rustic Swedish minimalist farmhouse vibe, with simple stoneware dishes of various earth tones. His thing was, how do you do a local cuisine centric restaurant when you can't get fresh vegetables for 6 months out of the year...so he focused on old traditional Swedish food stored in root cellars and preserved traditional ways. Very stylish plating and creative cooking.
Another was a US chef who is very cutting edge, radical molecular gastronomy and incredibly creative and innovative. He developed tongue cancer and they gave him a 30% chance of survival, if the removed his tongue, most of his neck and half his jawbone. He luckily got into a research program for a new treatment which worked, chemo and radiation, but after the radiation he lost all sense of taste! He still managed to create, his ideas and his assistant chef's implementation, but he eventually got his taste back, but I think losing it led to him appreciating things in a new manner. I guess it would be like Beethoven being deaf and composing the 9th symphony, but to me it seems taste is harder to visualize than the mathematics of music.
Excellent series though. These chefs are great artists that work in food instead of marble or oil paint.
Jeff:The third and final season of "Penny Dreadful" just showed up on Netflix and I binge watched it
elephant: Jeff: The third and final season of "Penny Dreadful" just showed up on Netflix and I binge watched it I stumbled across Eva Green as an actress the other day and noted she was in PD S1 and S2; and I thought of you and your love of the show. How do you rate her ?
Jeff: The third and final season of "Penny Dreadful" just showed up on Netflix and I binge watched it
The third and final season of "Penny Dreadful" just showed up on Netflix and I binge watched it
I stumbled across Eva Green as an actress the other day and noted she was in PD S1 and S2; and I thought of you and your love of the show.
How do you rate her ?
Outstanding, I believe that as talented as she's been in other things I've seen, her performance in PD is by far her best. Her character is a particularly tortured soul who has suffered greatly in the show, time in an asylum, demonic possession, etc. striking beauty too, with great range in her acting. She's in all three seasons. Lots of stunningly good performances in PD, great writing for an actor to sink their teeth into. Rory Kinnear plays Frankenstein's creature with great emotion, eloquence, and pathos for example.