Reviews

Bryan Cranston pulls this along, because it is so contrived and convoluted as to be ridiculous, never mind implausible, and the ending is just silly, though I imagine the makers thought it brilliant. One example - the sub-plot of Adam having an affair with his teacher is completely unecessary and adds absolutely nothing to the plot, it's only purpose being she tells one character that Adam was the real hit and run driver, which could have been done any number of ways. The lengths Cranston goes to to protect his son are a stretch too far too - suddenly this upstanding clean cut citizen gets involved in things like murder and drugging a witness? Another example of how ridiculous it is, in the final episode, when Cranston believes the Baxter character is going to kill his son in his hotel, why doesn't he call his policewoman friend, especially after he's unable to get into the hotel? And why don't the police find it suspicious that Cranston's car was oly reported stolen after it was involved in a hit and run? As stated, Cranston is charismatic throughout, but I just wish someone had pointed out to the producers how absurd their narrative really is.

Clunking ending! An awful, jarring, clunking ending almost ruined what was otherwise a sweet if overly long film for me - a good half an hour could have been cut with no sacrifice to the narrative. The narrative creeps up on you until you're totally immersed in the lives of Halley and Moonee and their struggles to survive. But because of the excess and repetition at the beginning of the film - yes, we see the kids get up to endlessm ischief but that was hammered into our heads for what seemed like half an hour - it takes a while to get involved. Halley is both sypathetic and unsympathetic at the same time, no man feat to pull off - tne acting by all involved, especially the kids.

Started out great, at least the first few episodes, but ended up ridiculously convoluted and implausible, with more twists and turns than a bendy country road. A shame, as the acting was first rate and the Faith character engaging and believable, but it went on far too long and ended up a mess, with a very silly ending that left the door open for a series two, which I can only hope will be shorter and more believable.

Where to begin? People don't really commit these brazen daytime robberies these days, do they? Sub-machine guns blazing everywhere, a death toll of around 20 people in a relatively small American city...it just doesn't really happen anymore, at least not since the days of Bonnie & Clyde. In fact, the entire film from Baby's character to the personalities of the various gang members and the forced dialogue (sorry, people don't really talk like these characters) had little connection with reality, which is a shame because there were a couple of good ideas in there, like Baby's tragic back story and his need for music. And the cliches abounded, from the bog standard car chases to Baby's on-foot escapes. If it was intended to be some sort of Tarantino-esque exercise in style it failed miserably, coming across as pretentious twaddle. I like a good heist thriller, but would have liked to have something I could actually believe.

Lots of spoilers here. This is basically very silly, and all over the place, with gaping inconsistencies, and blame has to go to Rowan Joffe, who created and wrote the series. In one scene, for instance, Tim Roth is savagely kicked half to death by an entire biker gang, but the next day he hardly shows any signs of having suffered such a beating. Later on Roth's wife and two other female characters kill an armed man who has broken into Roth's house looking to murder one of them. They turn the tables and kill him in an obvious case of self-defence, but instead of informing the police, they bury the body and then burn down the house - as I said, it's an obvious case of self-defence, so why not just call the police, who are aware that the family is in danger? In another instance, police chief Roth - who spends almost all his time getting drunk at the local bar - has an alcoholic blackout in which he ends up with a local crack whore and loses his weapon - in any other town in the world he would be immediately suspended. Also, Roth has several confrontations with the young man who is out to kill him, one or two literally face to face, yet does not recognise him as the boy he lived with 10 years earlier while on undercover assignment. True, 10 years have passed, but the two were close and you'd think Roth would get a sense of who this boy is. Here there could have been a meaty, relevant story about the moral implications and the damage the undercover cop has done in forming real relationships and attachments with the people he's investigating, as has happened here in the UK, but this is only introduced in the penultimate episode and the moral implications aren't really addressed. Roth seems to get away with a lot of killing and maiming as well, mostly in the guise of this alter ego personality he has that is released when he gets drunk, which his wife, played by Genevieve O'Reilly, seems to enjoy setting free; her character incidentally, inanely veers between dutiful wife looking to protect her family, to bloodthirsty harpy urging her husband to kill the person who shot their son. She also gets turned on in one scene when he arrives home one night covered in blood, which is silly. In aiming for a Twin Peaks atmosphere it instead is revealed as a triumph of style over substance and logic (not unlike Twin Peaks, really, in that respect). It's entertaining, but nonsensical, inconsistent and illogical. The best thing about it, besides the stunning, breathtaking scenery, is the acting, especially Roth's compelling performance, which is wasted in this claptrap. Top marks too to Abigail Lawrie as the daughter, Oliver Coopersmith as the wronged boy, and especially Michelle Thrush, as a damaged Native American women; Christina Hendricks is basically wasted in a minor role. Incidentally, the cast listing on IMDb is erroneous as O'Reilly and Lawrie are in pretty much every episode, not just one as listed. Will I watch Series ii? Yes, in the hope that it will be better.

The talents of Maxine Peake are wasted in this pretty much by the numbers so-called thriller. For one thing we're supposed to sympathise with this career woman who accidentally kills her cleaner in a fit of rage when she wallops the cleaner with a bottle of champagne the cleaner is carrying that Peake thinks is her own, only to later find out she was wrong. But why would the cleaner carry a heavy bottle of champagne up to Peake's flat rather than leave it in her car? And would she really leave her baby in the car, rather than bring it upstairs with her? The ending too was lazy, as if they didn't quite now how to get Peake out of her dilemma so they just tossed her and the security guard she was blackmailing out the window. Nor was there any point to the revelation that Peake had been having an affair with the man who got the promotion she was hoping for, it added nothing to the plot save to chew up a bit of time. Then there was the back story involving Peake and her sister and Peake's estrangement from their family, which didn't add anything either and whose only purpose seemed to be to fill out an empty plot. A weak film.

Just watched the final episode after which i realised i had no idea of what had been going on, i.e., who exactly was fighting who and for what reason, what everyone was after and why. a total waste of time. yeah, the scenery was nice, but it's just as nice out my window. utterly nonsensical. TV may be undergoing a renaissance with programmes like the sopranos, the wire, breaking bad, etc - all of which were excellent - but you'd never know it from tosh like this, or the current unbelievably awful top of the lake: china girl, which in fact is bad enough to be good. jane campion is supposed to be a quality director, but you'd never know it from that mess.

There are close to 100 reviews of this film so I'll get to the point. On the plus side, it has an authentic feel to it as the crew cut through the American Midwest - I've traveled to these same places (albeit a long time ago) and recognised the look and feel of the landscapes. The film is basically carried by the Star character, Sasha Lane, and she's superb in the role - headstrong and annoying at times, but eminently likable, and in the end she finds a real family to belong to, which neither she nor any of the other misfit kids she's traveling with have presumably ever had. As a portrayal of a bunch of lost kids careening through America, it's excellent, both downbeat and uplifting at the same time. On the downside, the premise is a bit unbelievable. Can these kids really earn enough through selling magazine subscriptions to provide them with room and board plus additional expenses like all the drugs and booze they consume, plus fuel, clothing, dog food, personal items like cosmetics and toothpaste, etc? It seems unlikely, but that's essentially a minor point - either you accept that they can, or not. The real problem with the film is its length - at 157 minutes, it's just way too long, there are too many longueurs, too many shots of them singing rap and hip- hop songs in their van, while some scenes, like Star's encounter with the three identically dressed Texan men, go on for far too long and probably aren't even necessary; a good 40 or 50 minutes could have and should have been shaved from the film - didn't anyone have the nerve to tell Arnold this? It would have been interesting too to learn more about some of the other kids, as we're told virtually nothing about any of them. In all, however, its a fine, enjoyable film that despite its longueurs provides a sharp glimpse into the lives of lost and rootless young American kids.