Ken and Robin Consume Media: An Iceman, a Cartoonist and Shipboard Hijinks

March 19th, 2019 | Robin

Ken and Robin Consume Media is brought to you by the discriminating and good-looking backers of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Patreon. Each week we provide capsule reviews of the books, movies, TV seasons and more we cram into our hyper-analytical sensoriums. Join the Patreon to help pick the items we’ll talk about in greater depth on a little podcast segment we like to call Tell Me More.

Recommended

Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far On Foot (Film, US, Gus van Sant, 2017) After a motorized wheelchair wipeout attracts curious skateboard kids to his sketchbook, cartoonist John Callahan (Joaquin Phoenix) recalls his accident and journey through 12-step. Achronological biopic filled with the director’s love for the scruffy and scrappy inhabitants of his Portland milieu.—RDL

Iceman (Film, Germany/Italy/Austria, Felix Randau, 2017) This biopic of Ötzi (d. 3300 BCE) casts him as Kelab (Jürgen Vogel), shaman for a small proto-Rhaetian settlement, who sets out to avenge his family’s murder and the theft of the holy Tineka. Jakub Bejnarowicz’ gorgeous wide-angle shots of the Alps firmly establish the Neolithic Western vibe. Randau’s decision to leave the proto-Rhaetian dialogue unsubtitled builds immersion but (along with everyone being a mass of fur and hair) means characters remain distant. –KH

Romance on the High Seas (Film, US, Michael Curtiz, 1948) Vivacious singer (Doris Day) on a Caribbean cruise falls for the detective (Jack Carson) hired to follow the woman she has been hired to impersonate. Top talents, including the Epstein brothers and I. A. L. Diamond at at the typewriter, elevate a musical comedy trifle in zowie Technicolor.—RDL

Good

Better Call Saul Season 4 (Television, US, AMC, Vince Gilligan, 2018) A frustrated Jimmy (Bob Odenkirk) struggles for self-respect without his law license as Mike (Jonathan Banks) supervises a secret construction project for Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito.) With every season, the divide between the fresh and emotionally acute main plotline, and the unnecessary prequelizing of the routine crime drama off to the side, grows more glaring.—RDL

Cat Sense (Nonfiction, John Bradshaw, 2013) Anthrozoologist Bradshaw tilts at the windmill of figuring out cats, from the direction of genetics and kitten development. Nothing super new here if you’ve read other cat-science books, and if not this makes a fine overview, but don’t be misled by the subtitle: only one chapter in eleven deals at all with human-feline relationships. –KH

The Drummer (Film, HK, Kenneth Bi, 2007) A heedless young man (Jaycee Chan), sent to Taiwan to by his triad boss dad (Tony Leung Ka Fai) to escape a rival gangster’s vengeance, seeks belonging with a group of Zen drummers. Leung’s star charisma supplies the memorable moments in this fusion of crime flick and moral homily.—RDL

Okay

The Lodgers (Film, Ireland, Brian O’Malley, 2017) An ancestral curse, complete with bad nursery rhyme, traps twin siblings Rachel (Charlotte Vega) and Edward (Bill Milner) in their moldering mansion in 1920 Ireland. This watery Gothic barely lives up to its premise, and never to its promise, despite one or two flashes of weirdness and intermittent effort from the stars. A potentially interesting subtext about the English presence in Ireland remains slack.–KH