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Ken and Robin Consume Media: Actors, Superheroes and the Most Famous Submarine
June 29th, 2021 | 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
Burn! (Film, Italy, Gillo Pontecorvo, 1969) To drive the Portuguese from a Caribbean island, a cynical strategist (Marlon Brando) turns a porter (Evaristo Márquez) into an inspirational rebel, who he must later destroy at the behest of his sugar company bosses. Polemical tone poem of colonialism and counterinsurgency draws more than a bit of its operatic scope from the era’s spaghetti westerns.—RDL
The Design and Construction of the Nautilus (Nonfiction, Demetri Capetanopolous, 2018) Reconstruction of Nemo’s submarine based on Verne’s data that attempts to answer: is it a good submarine design? (Yes) Could it have been built in 1865? (Except for the handwaved engines, surprisingly mostly yes) Really Recommended mostly for Nemo completists, but a striking example of one of my favorite exercises: real-world data (Capetanopolous is a former sub captain and engineer) retrofitted into hallmark genre fiction. –KH
The Neighbor Season 2 (Television, Spain, Miguel Esteban & Raúl Navarro, Netflix, 2021) Romantic discord ensues when stumblebum hero Javier (Quim Gutiérrez) discovers that ex-girlfriend Lola (Clara Lago) can also use his super pills. Looming alien menace nudges the charming comedy shambolism a few inches further into genre territory.—RDL
Nothing Like a Dame (Film, UK, Roger Michell, 2018) Judi Dench, Maggie Smith and Eileen Atkins drop by Joan Plowright’s house to tease each other, discuss aging and fame, trade acting shop talk, and roll out the anecdotes. Cozy hangout documentaries like this usually feature male actors, and I was little surprised to realize how little I’ve seen any of these legends interviewed at any length. Smith of course gets off the best line, zinging Plowright’s husband, Larry Olivier.—RDL
Staged Season 1 (Television, UK, Simon Evans, 2020) When the pandemic shuts down a production of Six Characters in Search of an Author, a gormless director (Simon Evans) persuades his leads, the petulant David Tennant (David Tennant) and tetchy Michael Sheen (Michael Sheen) to rehearse remotely. Considerable wit, a couple of superstar cameos, and of course the charm of the stars gleefully sending themselves up, overcomes one’s natural reluctance to sit through Zoom meetings or relive the early months of COVID.—RDL
Good
Project Superpowers Vols 1-3 (Comics, Dynamite, Jim Krueger & Alex Ross & divers hands, 2018-2019) The public-domain superheroes of the 1940s emerge from Pandora’s Urn into a modern dystopia and set about setting things to rights in the overarching frame story of Vol. 1. Vol. 2 focuses on the Black Terror, Vol. 3 on several different heroes and villains, the stories interacting with the frame crossover-style. (The X-Mas Carol and Owl stories in Vol. 3 are Recommended.) Ross’ covers are amazing, as are his art notes in the back, but he primarily acts as co-plotter and art director, so the actual art is kind of all over the place. The story mostly remains Big Reveals About Characters You Barely Remember, to necessarily limited effect, but the second half of Vol. 1 gets close to giddy Bronze Age event comics thrills, and Edgar Salazar’s art lives up to Ross’ potential there too. –KH
Episode 451: Bring a Bunch of Idiots
June 25th, 2021 | Robin
Keep an eye out for incoming candlesticks as the Gaming Hut finds ways to engage players in the prelude part of a scenario, for example the bit in a cozy mystery before any genteel murdering happens.
At the behest of beloved Patreon backer Dustyn Mincey, the History Hut examines the era of Greek history known as the Frankokratia.
In the Narrative Hut, estimable Patreon backer Derek Upham seeks enlightenment on third acts.
Finally in the Eliptony Hut, can you believe we went nine years before doing a segment on the Philadelphia Experiment?
Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!
Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.
Bears need hairstyles! Lumberjacks need beards! Be friends to both in Yukon Salon, a quick, humorous, family card game in a tin, from our snow-dappled pals at Atlas Games. Take Your Place at the Frontier of Style !
A murderous mystery lies beneath the gladiatorial arenas in the majestic, dragon-patrolled city of Axis. Only your first level 13th Age characters can confront it, in Crown of Axis, by Wade Rockett, now available at the Pelgrane Press shop.
The treasures of Askfageln can be found at DriveThruRPG. Get all issues of FENIX since 2013 available in special English editions. Score metric oodles of Ken Hite gaming goodness, along with equally stellar pieces by Graeme Davis and Pete Nash. Warning: in English, not in Swedish. In English, not Swedish. While you’re at it, grab DICE and Freeway Warrior!
Fear Is a Fractal …and your world is a lie. A horror freed from an antique book reverberates through reality. But don’t despair. There is hope. A King waits for us. And Impossible Landscapes, the first campaign for Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game waits for you. In PDF now, hardback in May. Hailed as “one of the best RPG campaigns ever made” and “a masterpiece of surreal horror!”
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Ken and Robin Consume Media: Peter Cannon & The Sparks Brothers
June 22nd, 2021 | 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
The Big Gundown (Film, Italy, Sergio Sollima, 1968) Implacable gunslinger (Lee van Cleef) tracks a an weaselly but ingenious criminal (Tomas Milian) accused of child murder. Quest-structured, Morricone-scored spaghetti western with emphatic staging, a wry eye for human perversity, and a classic frenemy dynamic between the leads.—RDL
The Clockmaker of St. Paul (Film, France, Bertrand Tavernier, 1976) Mournful watch store proprietor (Philippe Noiret) struggles to understand how his son could have murdered his girlfriend’s supervisor and gone on the lam. Restrained character piece with a political undertone, based on a Simenon novel. Aka The Watchmaker of St. Paul or The Clockmaker.—RDL
Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt (Comics, Dynamite, Kieron Gillen & Caspar Wijngaard, 2020) Peter Cannon, heir to the Ancient Scrolls of a lost civilization, reluctantly defends his Earth against a faked alien invasion. I could write an essay about this intelligent, honest response/homage to Watchmen, but suffice it to say that Gillen’s engagement with the form and the content of comics’ eternal, nigh-fatal masterpiece provides the best possible argument for broad reading in the classics as a basis for creative effort. Its biggest flaw is that unlike its model it doesn’t quite encompass a superhero story — but Gillen intends that lacuna, as well. Wijngaard’s art counterpoints both Gillen and Gibbons’ genius (two difficult tasks!) with remarkable fluidity and strength, and Mary Safro’s coloring quietly amazes. –KH
The Sparks Brothers (Film, US/UK, Edgar Wright, 2021) Rockumentary tracks the origin and evolution of the seminal, vastly influential glam-synth-comic-pop-art duo Sparks (Russell and Ron Mael) over five decades and 25 albums. Wright has as much fun as he can (which isn’t a whole lot) with the standard talking-heads-plus-footage format but fortunately the Maels’ dry seen-it-all vibe lets his puppyish auteurism bounce off and the music shine through. Nearly two and a half hours fly by with the only cavil being “oh I wish he’d dived deeper into [your favorite Sparks era] and also let Jane Wiedlin talk way more instead of Fred Armisen.” –KH
Okay
Dark City (Film, US, William Dieterle, 1950) Remote gambler (Charlton Heston) realizes that he and his confederates have been targeted for death by someone connected to a garrulous out-of-towner who killed himself after they fleeced him. Hardboiled noir falters until late in the game, when the protagonist finally gets far enough into his redemption arc for the viewer to stop rooting for his demise. Jack Webb appears in an uncharacteristic role as a contemptible heel.—RDL
Sword of Sherwood Forest (Film, UK, Terence Fisher, 1960) The Sheriff of Nottingham (Peter Cushing) pursues a fugitive into Sherwood, prompting Robin Hood (Richard Greene) to investigate a wider conspiracy. Hammer Films extends its policy of weaving new storylines around public domain characters into swashbuckler territory, resulting in an affable time-waster.—RDL
Episode 450: LIGHTNING ROUND!!!
June 18th, 2021 | Robin
Just when time had lost all meaning, the ineffable power of numbers tells us that we’ve hit Episode 450. Seasoned investigators know what that means: our beloved Patreon backers pose them, and we blast them with electric force. It’s time for celebratory Qs and exultant As! It’s time for… LIGHTNING ROUND!!!
Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!
Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.
Bears need hairstyles! Lumberjacks need beards! Be friends to both in Yukon Salon, a quick, humorous, family card game in a tin, from our snow-dappled pals at Atlas Games. Take Your Place at the Frontier of Style !
A murderous mystery lies beneath the gladiatorial arenas in the majestic, dragon-patrolled city of Axis. Only your first level 13th Age characters can confront it, in Crown of Axis, by Wade Rockett, now available at the Pelgrane Press shop.
The treasures of Askfageln can be found at DriveThruRPG. Get all issues of FENIX since 2013 available in special English editions. Score metric oodles of Ken Hite gaming goodness, along with equally stellar pieces by Graeme Davis and Pete Nash. Warning: in English, not in Swedish. In English, not Swedish. While you’re at it, grab DICE and Freeway Warrior!
Fear Is a Fractal …and your world is a lie. A horror freed from an antique book reverberates through reality. But don’t despair. There is hope. A King waits for us. And Impossible Landscapes, the first campaign for Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game waits for you. In PDF now, hardback in May. Hailed as “one of the best RPG campaigns ever made” and “a masterpiece of surreal horror!”
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Ken and Robin Consume Media: Literary Paranoia, Inspirational Wrestling, and a Flat Circle in Afghanistan
June 15th, 2021 | 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
The Afghan Campaign (Fiction, Steven Pressfield, 2006) Grunt’s-eye view of Alexander the Great’s three-year campaign in what would become (but is always called in the book) Afghanistan deliberately blends modern language rhythms and sensibilities with classical history to create a “time is a flat circle” effect around Western warfighting in Afghanistan. Pressfield’s story somehow never drags or even much suffers from the weight of his quasi-historical consciousness. –KH
Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché (Film, US, Pamela B. Green, 2018) Documentary profile of a director/producer who made films in France and then the US in cinema’s infancy, with a prodigious output ranging from comedies to message pictures to melodramas to westerns and biblical epics. Research becomes a detective quest rescuing its subject from a memory hole created by sexism and the volatility of silver nitrate film stock,—RDL
Fighting with My Family (Film, US, Stephen Merchant, 2019) Cheered on by her irrepressible family of regional wrestlers, a young Norwich woman (Florence Pugh) pursues her dreams of WWE stardom—even after her brother fails to make the cut. Merchant’s finely judged observational comedy keeps the warmth of this inspirational backstage docudrama from curdling into sentimentality. With Nick Frost, Lena Headey, and, as himself, executive producer Dwayne Johnson.—RDL
The Judge and the Assassin (Film, France, Bertrand Tavernier, 1976) In Belle Époque France, a hardline magistrate (Philippe Noiret) interrogates a vagrant serial killer who proclaims himself God’s anarchist, hoping to implicate him without allowing grounds for an insanity defense. Historical drama lightly fictionalizes the Joseph Vacher case, counterpointed by its Dreyfus-era political context.—RDL
The Mercenary (Film, Italy, Sergio Corbucci, 1970) A self-satisfied Polish gunslinger (Franco Nero) offers his expensive services as a tactical consultant to an easily swayed Mexican miner turned revolutionary (Tony Musante.) Dialectic-questioning team-up is more of a romp than Corbucci’s other Spaghetti Westerns. Jack Palance steals the film as a smirking, hateworthy villain named Curly. Aka A Professional Gun.—RDL
The Names (Fiction, Don DeLillo, 1982) American expat “risk analyst” James Axton has lost his wife to divorce and maybe his livelihood to the CIA and can’t really believe either in a tour de force of interior monologue that sometimes becomes brittle dialogue while a strange cult is killing people for linguistic reasons, maybe. DeLillo puts aphorism and analysis and epistemology together with some remarkably true-seeming but literary-sounding characters, resulting in a surface all halts and half-admissions. The cult, I should emphasize, takes up remarkably little word count, so don’t go in expecting Lavie Tidhar avant la lettre. –KH
Good
The Spiders (Film, Germany, Fritz Lang, 1919-1920) Adventurer Kay Hoog (Carl DeVogt) incurs the enmity of adventuress Lio Sha (Ressel Orla), the field commander of the secret society The Spiders, when he investigates a surviving Inca city in Part One of this silent pulp serial. In Part Two Hoog and the Spiders duel to find the Buddha’s Head Diamond. The sets and set pieces in Part One amaze, while Part Two must make do with an arbitrary plot and some rousing action traps. Little of what we think of as characteristic Lang appears in this, his first surviving work. –KH
Okay
5 Card Stud (Film, US, Henry Hathaway, 1968 ) Laidback gambler (Dean Martin) tries to figure out who’s bumping off the poker players who lynched a card cheat, with suspects including a psychopathic cattle heir (Roddy McDowall) and the town’s enigmatic new preacher (Robert Mitchum.) Oddball mix of western and murder mystery with the ambling pace of the late studio era.—RDL
Episode 449: Quietly Judging You
June 11th, 2021 | Robin
We venture from the Gaming Hut into a wider world of stashed items as beloved Patreon backer Carrie Schutrick requests the RPG angle on geocaching.
Estimable Patreon backers pool their resources in the Tradecraft Hut, where we gaze into the eyeless sockets of the CIA’s top secret asset—a mask of actor Rex Harrison.
Demon gods and their directional taboos trap us in the Mythology Hut.
Finally the Consulting Occultist profiles a genuine arch-villain of the occult, the Rasputin or Argentina, José López Rega.
Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!
Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.
Bears need hairstyles! Lumberjacks need beards! Be friends to both in Yukon Salon, a quick, humorous, family card game in a tin, from our snow-dappled pals at Atlas Games. Take Your Place at the Frontier of Style !
A murderous mystery lies beneath the gladiatorial arenas in the majestic, dragon-patrolled city of Axis. Only your first level 13th Age characters can confront it, in Crown of Axis, by Wade Rockett, now available at the Pelgrane Press shop.
The treasures of Askfageln can be found at DriveThruRPG. Get all issues of FENIX since 2013 available in special English editions. Score metric oodles of Ken Hite gaming goodness, along with equally stellar pieces by Graeme Davis and Pete Nash. Warning: in English, not in Swedish. In English, not Swedish. While you’re at it, grab DICE and Freeway Warrior!
Fear Is a Fractal …and your world is a lie. A horror freed from an antique book reverberates through reality. But don’t despair. There is hope. A King waits for us. And Impossible Landscapes, the first campaign for Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game waits for you. In PDF now, hardback in May. Hailed as “one of the best RPG campaigns ever made” and “a masterpiece of surreal horror!”
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Ken and Robin Consume Media: Booze, Gambling, and Crime
June 8th, 2021 | 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
Bloody Nose Empty Pockets (FIlm, US, Bill Ross IV & Turner Ross, 2020) Longtime habitues of a Vegas dive bar mark its last day in business with a marathon drinking session. Poignant fly-on-the-wall pseudodocumentary shows the mutual caretaking, as addictive as booze itself, that binds together a community of lushes. Joins the works of O’Neill, Goodis, Bukowski and Waits in the grand canon of American alcoholism.—RDL
The Gambler (Film, US, Karel Reisz, 1974) A massive debt to the mob prompts a gambling-addicted college professor (James Caan) to double down on self-destruction. You won’t find a clearer depiction of compulsive gambling as death wish than this unsparing American New Wave character study,—RDL
Pale Gray for Guilt (Fiction, John D. MacDonald, 1968) When his college buddy Tush Bannon gets in the way of a land deal, “salvage artist” Travis McGee deals himself in. There may yet be a Consume Media entry for “all the Travis McGee novels” but this one deserves to be singled out. Not only is the story a thoroughly satisfying double con squeeze play, but McGee’s self-image takes a few well-deserved knocks. This novel essentially spawned the whole “Florida crime fiction” subgenre despite being the ninth in the series. –KH
Philly D.A. (Television, US, PBS, Ted Passon & Yoni Brook & Nicola Salazar, 2021) Determined, data-quoting Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner and his idealistic team attempt to use the substantial but limited powers of his newly won office to enact progressive reforms in a city accustomed to incarceration and extended supervision. In-the-room documentary roots for its subject as it reveals the exacting grind of confronting entrenched institutional power. Mine it for rhetorical strategies your GMCs can use when shutting down player character proposals that threaten their power. —RDL
Unbelievable (Television, US, Netflix, Susannah Grant & Ayelet Waldman & Michael Chabon, 2019) In Washington state, detectives browbeat a vulnerable young woman (Kaitlyin Dever) into recanting her account of an intruder rape; years later in Colorado, two cops, one (Merritt Weaver) empathetic, the other (Toni Colette) abrasive, team up across jurisdictions to investigate attacks with the same M.O. Dual chronology crime docudrama mixes social realist observation with a compelling deep dive into real-world investigative technique.—RDL
Good
Escapes (Film, US, Michael Almereyda, 2016) Blade Runner screenwriter, ex-actor and former child flamenco dancer Hampton Fancher retells his life as a series of self-lacerating anecdotes. Minimalist documentary profile of the man who saw that Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? should be a movie conveys the feeling of hanging out in a bar for a night with a fascinating, rueful raconteur.—RDL
Okay
The Hitman’s Bodyguard (Film, US, Patrick Hughes, 2017) Disgraced but top-notch bodyguard Bryce (Ryan Reynolds) must protect free-spirited hit man Kincaid (Samuel L. Jackson) before he testifies at the war crimes trial of the dictator of Belarus (Gary Oldman). Triple threat talent squandered on desperately routinized action-comedy, with half a good chase scene and a joyous near-cartoon-violence flashback celebrating Salma Hayek, the only person who actually bothered to show up for the filming. –KH
Line Walker 2: Invisible Spy (Film, HK, Jazz Boon, 2019) Two cops, one (Louis Koo) tightly wound, the other (Nick Cheung) also tightly wound, fight an international shadowy conspiracy that abducts children to train as sleeper agents. Handsomely mounted, overcomplicated globe-hopping technothriller partially redeems itself when it stages a gunfight and car chase during the running of the bulls at Pamplona and remembers what Hong Kong action movies are like. A thematic sequel to 2016’s also mediocre Line Walker, meaning that both have Koo and Cheung in them —RDL
Episode 448: Mice and Diamonds
June 4th, 2021 | Robin
In the Gaming Hut we spitball scenarios that take place over a period of many years.
Fun With Science answers the call from beloved Patreon backer bt to examine Freudian psychologist Charles Seligman’s project to gather dreams from the many peoples occupied by the British Empire.
Good thing we just had a new bar installed in the Food Hut, because it’s time to tell the story of how 19th century America invented cocktail culture as we know it.
Finally estimable Patreon backer Neil Barnes wonders why Ken’s Time Machine had to be used to neutralize the OTRAG project to launch cheaper satellite rockets from then-Zaire in the 1970s.
Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!
Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.
Bears need hairstyles! Lumberjacks need beards! Be friends to both in Yukon Salon, a quick, humorous, family card game in a tin, from our snow-dappled pals at Atlas Games. Take Your Place at the Frontier of Style !
A murderous mystery lies beneath the gladiatorial arenas in the majestic, dragon-patrolled city of Axis. Only your first level 13th Age characters can confront it, in Crown of Axis, by Wade Rockett, now available at the Pelgrane Press shop.
The treasures of Askfageln can be found at DriveThruRPG. Get all issues of FENIX since 2013 available in special English editions. Score metric oodles of Ken Hite gaming goodness, along with equally stellar pieces by Graeme Davis and Pete Nash. Warning: in English, not in Swedish. In English, not Swedish. While you’re at it, grab DICE and Freeway Warrior!
Fear Is a Fractal …and your world is a lie. A horror freed from an antique book reverberates through reality. But don’t despair. There is hope. A King waits for us. And Impossible Landscapes, the first campaign for Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game waits for you. In PDF now, hardback in May. Hailed as “one of the best RPG campaigns ever made” and “a masterpiece of surreal horror!”
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Ken and Robin Consume Media: Capes, Cops, Copperfield
June 1st, 2021 | 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
The Boys Season 1 (Television, US, Prime, Eric Kripke, 2019) When a corporate superhero’s homicidal negligence kills his girlfriend, a nebbishy electronics retailer (Jack Quaid) is drawn into a cell of operatives, led by a ruthless wetworker (Karl Urban), that fights to shut them down—while at the same time falling for the super team’s light-powered new ingenue (Erin Moriarty.) Unlike other revisionist superhero takes, this adaptation of the Garth Ennis/Darick Robertson keeps a moral compass or two in its tool kit. Antony Starr plays its psychopathic Superman/Captain America figure with multi-layered brilliance.—RDL
The Personal History of David Copperfield (Film, UK, Armando Iannucci, 2019) Twists of fortune pull a studious young man (Dev Patel) up and down a social ladder populated by lovable eccentrics and contemptible villains. Sunny, mad dash through the Dickens novel, performed with brio by Patel and a supporting cast including Hugh Laurie, Peter Capaldi and Tilda Swinton.—RDL
The Multiversity (Comics, DC, Grant Morrison & divers hands, 2015) Under attack by extracosmic embodiments of fear, the heroes of various Earths of the DC Universe investigate and fight back, alone and in concert. A classic Grant Morrison high concept riff on the Silver Age DCU, in which each Earth was another Earth’s comic books. Occasionally reaches true peaks of genius homage, especially in the Charlton-Watchmen story, the Earth-Prime Ultra Comics comic, and the Shazam! tale, but never dull or easily anticipated. A little too in the weeds for casual fans, maybe. –KH
Peaky Blinders Season 3 (Television, BBC, Steven Knight, 2016) As Arthur (Paul Anderson) looks for redemption and a way out, a sinister priest/spy (Paddy Considine) squeezes Tommy (Cillian Murphy) into a double game involving White Russian emigres. False suspense and other series-extending tricks start to creep in around the edges of the show’s narrative compression and big finish suspense.—RDL
We Own This City: A True Story of Crime, Cops, and Corruption (Nonfiction, Justin Fenton, 2021) As the doomed effort to prosecute police officers for the death of Freddie Gray grinds through Baltimore courts, a much-lauded anti-gun squad boldly steals a staggering quantity of cash and drugs from the city’s dealers. Journalistic true crime saga exposes the lack of accountability at the heart of America’s policing meltdown, with a command of storytelling that more than withstands the inevitable comparisons to the genre-defining books of David Simon.—RDL
Good
The Burnt Orange Heresy (Film, US/Italy, Giuseppe Capotondi, 2020) Glib art critic (Claes Bang) brings his self-possessed new inamorata (Elizabeth Debicki) to the villa of a collector (Mick Jagger) who wants him to steal a painting from the legendarily reclusive artist (Donald Sutherland) living in his guest house. Crisp dialogue and characterizations elevate this art-world noir, though the script misses the point of the Charles Willeford novel it adapts, downgrading its anti-hero’s perverse intellectual motivation tof standard issue weaselry.—RDL
Let’s Not Meet (Film, US, Ryan Callaway, 2018) Pizza delivery girl Aya (Breanna Engle) gets drawn into bad doings in the woods, along with five campers she didn’t much like in high school. On its zero budget, this film accomplishes a lot: introduces a raft of characters you believe in and sort of care about, spins a creepy backstory with perhaps too much exposition, provides good slow-burn scares in places. The acting and lighting punch considerably above their weight; the editing and camera setups a little less so. Not quite Owlman great, but well above the microbudget horror average. –KH