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Good Behavior starring Michelle Dockery and Juan Diego Botto: Solid Crash Course on Addictive Grey Characters

Posted on November 27, 2016 Written by Pinar Tarhan

Good Behavior, Michelle Dockery, juan diego botto — Good Behavior starring Michelle Dockery and Juan Diego Botto. Image via gstatic.

Good Behavior– Plot Summary (Minor Spoilers for Episode 1)

Letty (Michelle Dockery) is a beautiful mess. She’s an ex-con, a drug addict and a thief. She’s not allowed to see her son, her mother hates her, and she has to hold disgusting jobs if she wants to stay straight.

Javier (Juan Diego Botto) is a handsome, efficient hitman who just happens to be one of Letty’s theft victims. When she overhears what he is, she decides to try and save his target. She meets him, has a great date with him and has a wild night of sex. If you didn’t know his job, you could easily develop a crush.

Letty is not a hero. She doesn’t even make a great escapee. When her mother doesn’t allow her to see his son, she goes off the rails. Javier could easily kill her, but he has other plans…

Spoilers and Praises Ahead

We have a hitman who might have a soft spot for a woman he had sex with, who doesn’t do drugs and saves the woman’s life – and then recruits her for a trickier job. He doesn’t seem to be a total psychopath, and you can definitely forgive him (when you hear the reason) for job 2.

Letty is both drawn to and repulsed by him. Her escape attempts are useless, and she does need him to stay alive.

But not all murders are perfect, and we have one of the weirdest, most curious and engaging road trips ahead, including dead bodies, sexual chemistry off the charts and a Tesla running out of battery…

It’s an interesting show.

The acting is top-notch, and I don’t think we had grayer protagonists. What is interesting to note about Javier is that he seems totally against the idea of harming a child. He never once threatens to hurt Letty’s son. He doesn’t even threaten to kill Letty. He just says he will find her.

Then we have Letty’s parole officer who has his own addiction and demons to battle, a stupid eager beaver barking around and the past of Javier to discover.

I’m totally addicted. I watched the first three episodes in a row.

Good Behavior is a new show airing on TNT. It was created by Chad Hodge and Blake Crouch.

Prime starring Uma Thurman, Bryan Greenberg & Meryl Streep: A Good Romantic Comedy That Becomes Better With (Your) Age

Posted on October 16, 2016 Written by Pinar Tarhan

Prime 2005 movie poster — Prime (aff. link) poster via flixter.

Beautiful, recently divorced, emotionally raw 37-year-old Rafi (Uma Thurman) works in fashion and heals herself through therapy sessions with her psychiatrist Lisa Metzger (Meryl Streep).

Lisa is a devout Jew in her personal life who’s not thrilled that her 23-year-old son David (Bryan Greenberg) wants to be an artist, holds menial jobs and lives with his maternal grandparents. David also seems a bit more lax about his religion and doesn’t have a serious girlfriend.

Not knowing their connection, Rafi and David start dating. Rafi says she is dating a 27-year-old to Lisa, and David also tells his mother that he is also dating a 27-year-old. Happy for Rafi, Lisa encourages her relationship. However, as a mother, she is really upset David is dating a non-Jewish woman “4 years older” than him.

As Rafi shares their most intimate moments, they start falling for each other. But with more details and Rafi admitting his real age, Lisa puts it all together. So what the hell is she going to do now?

*
Prime is a thoughtful, sincere and hilarious romantic comedy. You have the classic disapproving mother-in-law conflict tripled by making the potential in-law from a different religion and the therapist. Add 14 years of age difference, and we’ve all got some thinking to do. Especially sometimes since David acts his age (and not in a good way), and Rafi is craving for a baby.

I sincerely recommend it. And Meryl Streep is just hilarious.

*
Spoilers Ahead: More About Prime (and Why It Gets Better As You Age)

When I first saw Prime (2005), I was about David’s age. And like David, I was a lot more optimistic. And unlike Rafi, I didn’t really want kids, so I was disappointed by the ending. And being a romantic impaired my judgment. I thought the film was okay, but it needed a happy ending.

But seeing it again it at 31, closer to Rafi’s age than David’s, I think the movie is great as it is. Honestly, I’m a bit freaked out at the idea of dating a 23-year-old even though I’m younger than Ravi, don’t mind a fling and still don’t want any kids!

As much as age is just a number in theory, and we are likely to break or bend our own rules when it comes to strong romantic connections, it is easier to see the ending as “right” and not as a disappointment.

Then there is the fact that this is Lisa’s story, as much as it is Rafi and David’s. While they both learn things about themselves, relationships and what they need to do in life, Lisa learns to give David a bit more freedom. She learns that the extreme gap between how she treats her patients and how she treats her family needs to be smaller, and that David needs a different route than her to be happy. And that’s okay.

So a lot of romance, comedy and character growth will warm up your heart. Give Prime a shot. Written and directed by Ben Younger.

Also on Uma Thurman

The Life Before Her Eyes starring Uma Thurman and Evan Rachel Wood

Beautiful Girls starring Timothy Hutton, Matt Dillon, Uma Thurman, Natalie Portman and Mira Sorvino

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No One Lives Movie Review: No One Lives starring Luke Evans, Adelaide Clemens and Derek Magyar

Posted on July 12, 2016 Written by Pinar Tarhan

No One Lives movie poster starring Luke Evans — Image via assets.tmdb.org.

A young woman, Emma, (Adelaide Clemens) screams. Again. We see her running in the forest, but she is caught by a trap, and is hung upside down by her feet. She’s not getting away, but she isn’t going down without a fight, either.

A bunch of redneck criminals are looting a family’s house, but when the family arrives early, one of them shoots them all in reflex, angering all the other members and forcing them to forgo their potential earnings.

Driver (Luke Evans) is moving away with his younger girlfrined to a new start. There seem to be issues between them, though they look like a couple that have deep feelings for each other. From their innuendos, we suspect an affair on the driver’s side. He apologizes for messing things up.

They stop by a motel and watch the news: the girl in the forest is still missing after about 6 months, but she has managed to carve EMMA ALIVE on the tree.

They later go to a diner/bar suggested by the motel owner, and the girlfriend is still upset about the other woman. The diner is empty, but soon the redneck gang arrives. The members aren’t looking for trouble, aside from the guy, Flynn (Derek Magyar) who killed the family. He’s certain our couple is loaded, and he disturbs them. The gang leader (Lee Tergesen) prevents him from bothering anyone further, but Flynn won’t let go.

The couple’s car is crashed into, and they’re wounded. They wake up in an empty storage place, guarded by the massive gang member Ethan, who seems like he could eat a couple of successful boxers alive.

The members are angry, but Flynn has returned with the couple’s car and trailer. He is sure Ethan can get the couples’ “financial” information easily, making up for the loss.

But what torture-ready Ethan doesn’t count on is the girlfriend completely losing it, and the Driver “losing” it even further. What starts out as a couple in distress, turns into a worse psychopath – a psycopath who’s weapons and combat-trained, hunting down the gang members one by one…

And as the gang members turn into victims, they will face other twists and turns.

As we slowly lose any sympathy we might have had for the driver, we still root for him to kick the gang members’ ass. They overestimated themselves and severely underestimated him. And it’s one thing terrifiying/killing a helpless family, and it’s another when they are going against a Dexter meets Hannibal meets Bourne – only without the morals or cannibalism.

It’s not the most sophisticated dialogue, and switches between finely foreshadowing and extremly on the nose. That said, I actually like on-the-nose dialogue when it works, and you can’t help like Driver talk what’s on his head without hesitation or calculation. Why not be blunt and open when you’re the one with a plan to kill everyone brutally, innocent or otherwise? And when he doesn’t kill you, it might even be a worse sign….

For a very bloody and mindless action/thriller, it’s pretty good entertainment. Some things could be improved, but it’s always fun to have a psycho hunting other psychos, and when he is strangely for empowering his chosen female victims while screwing them the hell up and developing his version of Stockholm Syndrome.

I’d love a sequel or a prequel, to be honest. Written by David Cohen. Directed by Ryûhei Kitamura.

Enjoy!

Favorite Lines:

Leader : Are you a serial killer?
Driver : Serial killers work in solidarity, I am more of a numbers guy.

Driver’s Girlfriend: A man who lacks emotion is sorry.
Driver : I don’t lack emotion. I just process it differently*. (*Which is the understatement of the year, really.)

*
Enjoy this bloody thriller. No pun intended. 🙂

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The Vicious Kind starring Adam Scott: Humanly Amoral, Emotional and Funny

Posted on June 21, 2016 Written by Pinar Tarhan

The Vicious Kind movie poster via amazon.com.

Oh, how Adam Scott (High Crimes, Leap Year , A.C.O.D, Friends with Kids, The Overnight) has grown on me. I’ve never not liked the guy, but this was definitely one of the more challenging roles he has taken on.

On the surface, the premise of the movie might sound like a typical romantic comedy. However, it’s not very typical, and it’s NOT a romantic comedy.

Caleb (Adam Scott) is a lonely construction worker who is not dealing well with his break-up at all. He can’t sleep, he has sex with hookers and then sends pictures of the act to his ex, and he is not taken the news of his younger brother Luke’s romance well. He believes, and openly states, that all women are whores, and this new girl, Emma (Britanny Snow), is no different. The fact that she was seeing another guy when she met Luke only confirms Caleb’s thoughts.

Luke introduces them as they pick up Emma, and drive her and Luke to their father’s house – a father called Donald (played by J.K. Simmons) Caleb isn’t on speaking terms with.

The problem is Emma kind of looks like Caleb’s ex. She is also sexy, nice and friendly, making Caleb assault her and want her all at once. Oh, yes, Caleb isn’t very a stable or healthy individual. However, he is a fascinating character to watch.

One minute he’s frightening the hell out of her, and one minute he’s crying and apologizing. One minute he’s trying to prove she’s out to break Luke’s heart and telling her not to, and one minute he’s being all intense and attracting her.

Of course, Emma is only less of a mess compared to Caleb. Her boyfriend, Caleb’s brother Luke, is a virgin. Caleb is a good-looking nutjob, their father Donald borders on creepy and weird, and she has her own drunk mother and parental issues to deal with. As a psych major who hasn’t been able to sort herself out, is it any wonder she’s slowly drawn to the volatile Caleb? And can anyone survive this triangle?

The performances are fantastic, and I had a pretty good time watching Caleb contradicting himself at every turn. Adam Scott does a brilliant job in making the audience going from wanting to punch him to hug him and back to punching in a matter of minutes.

Luke seems like the more innocent and normal of the bunch, but that might exactly be what’s backfiring in his relationship. It’s not that Emma wants a bad guy per se, but she’d certainly be prepared for one who deals with his issues out on the open.

It’d be appropriate to call Caleb both the antagonist and protagonist of the story: He’s the main character. We get to know him the most. He is also the one screwing up things left and right, and doing almost always the wrong thing to sort things out or feel better.

I’d definitely recommend this funny drama. Written and directed by Lee Toland Krieger.

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