{"id":1457,"date":"2017-12-12T14:46:07","date_gmt":"2017-12-12T14:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/?p=1457"},"modified":"2017-12-12T14:46:07","modified_gmt":"2017-12-12T14:46:07","slug":"ken-and-robin-consume-media-fincher-kings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/ken-and-robin-consume-media-fincher-kings\/","title":{"rendered":"Ken and Robin Consume Media: Fincher Kings"},"content":{"rendered":"

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<\/a>. 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\u2019ll talk about in greater depth on our new podcast segment, Tell Me More.<\/i> <\/p>\n

Recommended<\/h2>\n

Icarus (Film, US, Bryan Fogel, 2017) Cyclist\/filmmaker Fogel embarks on a Morgan Spurlock-esque documentary in which he subjects himself to a doping routine, only to find his Russian medical advisor in the center of an international scandal that might have placed him on the FSB hit list. Fogel hits the documentarian\u2019s jackpot of a story that explodes into something bigger during the shoot, and makes the most of it.\u2014RDL<\/p>\n

Mindhunter Season 1 (Television, US,  Netflix, Joe Penhall, 2017) If you liked David Fincher\u2019s masterpiece Zodiac you will groove on this series (produced by Fincher, who directed four episodes) about the creation of the FBI\u2019s serial killer profiling system in the 1970s. Although only Holt McCallany (as the gruff veteran agent, Bill Tench) and Cameron Britten (as serial killer Ed Kemper) rise above the prosaic characterization, the real star is (as so often with Fincher) the procedure. –KH<\/p>\n

The Punisher Season 1 (Television, US, Netflix, Steve Lightfoot, 2017) Frank Castle (Jon Bernthal) discovers that he isn\u2019t finished wiping out the people who killed his family, and forms a reluctant alliance with a computer hacker (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) to flush out the remaining conspirators. Ultra-violence and empathy go hand in glove, with Bernthal continuing to score as a humanized Punisher, and an unusually coherent structure for a Marvel\/Netflix show, in which all the subplots pay off into the main narrative.\u2014RDL<\/p>\n

Wild Seed (Film, US, Brian G. Hutton, 1965) 17-year old (Celia Kaye) runs away from her New York home to find her biological father in L.A., learning the ropes of hitch-hiking and rail-riding from a handsome young drifter (a fresh-faced and tenor-toned Michael Parks.) Existential road romance shot about twelve seconds before the advent of the counterculture features sympathetic characterization, a lush jazz score and gorgeous black and white location photography by Conrad Hall. The only element holding this back from unheralded masterpiece status is Kaye\u2019s valiant struggle to meet the demands of the material.\u2014RDL<\/p>\n

Good<\/h2>\n

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button<\/a> (Film, US, David Fincher, 2008) As her mother (Cate Blanchett)  lies dying, her daughter reads the life story of her ex-lover, a man who aged in reverse. Oddball entry in Fincher\u2019s filmography, rich in incident but light on drama, in which he keeps the trademark queasy greens and oranges but otherwise wears Steven Spielberg\u2019s style like a jacket he\u2019s trying on.\u2014RDL<\/p>\n

Pitfall <\/a>(Film, US, Andre de Toth, 1948) Restless claims adjuster (Dick Powell) risks his career and family when he has a fling with a crook\u2019s good-hearted girlfriend (Lizabeth Scott), entering the crosshairs of her sleazy ex-cop stalker (Raymond Burr.) Snappy dialogue and direction, as well as top performances from the lead distinguish this entry in the spiral-from-domesticity noir sub-genre. The script\u2019s desire to steer clear of melodrama injects a fresh note of emotional realism, at the cost of an anticlimactic conclusion.\u2014RDL<\/p>\n

Pop Star: Never Stop Never Stopping<\/a> (Film, US, Jorma Taccone & Akiva Schaffer, 2016) Fame-addled pop star (Andy Samberg) sees his tour documentary go sour when his sophomore album lays an egg. Update of Spinal Tap to today\u2019s stadium pop and slick promotional documentaries, densely packed with jokes and cameos.\u2014RDL<\/p>\n

Okay <\/h2>\n

Justice League (Film, US, Zack Snyder, 2017) Batman (Ben Affleck) must assemble Earth\u2019s mightiest heroes to fight \u2026 a CGI third-tier Kirby villain. While better than the previous theatrical DCEU efforts, and even reasonably true to the comic book origin of the team, the end result remains a big missed opportunity. For a movie ten years in the making, far too much was rushed, especially including the vapid CGI — the Snyderverse works best when, like Nolan always did, he grounds it in the real. Joss Whedon\u2019s much-bruited fixups only add dissonance and weaken Snyder\u2019s mythic vision without building human connection. Even Danny Elfman\u2019s score seemed bland and committee-driven. –KH<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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\u2019ll talk about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[52],"class_list":["post-1457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-audiofree","tag-ken-and-robin-consume-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1457\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenandrobintalkaboutstuff.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}