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chitowndale
Reviews
Becker (1998)
One of my two favorite series
Becker is the opposite of every other comedy series on TV. 129 episodes and I would be hard pressed to find more than a couple that were not funny. Even though the series committed suicide by dropping the Reggie character and the adding Chris character, even those later episodes have some chuckles to be found though the Chris character became dominant and pushed Becker back to a minor character causing the cancellation of the program. The only other series that comes close to Becker in hilarity is Fawlty Towers, which unfortunately only made 12 episodes. Basil Fawlty is just like Becker in his miserable outlook on life except that Basil is fawning toward those he considers his "betters" while Becker is acerbic toward everyone equally. The Basil character is interesting to watch as he alternates between acerbic and fawning which makes for a bit more comedic latitude and is a more realistic character (the taking those to the extreme) since most people do have two sides to themselves while Becker is nasty to just about everyone including most children. Some of the odd characters are very funny like Detective Borkow that investigates Becker's being shot outside of a gay bar and so he believes Becker is gay. The dialogs in the three episodes he appears in will make you laugh until your sides hurt. Same for the Prostitute that lives in Becker's building. When she is questioned in court when Becker is being sued by Vinny her answer to the lawyer when asked if "she was ashamed to admit she was a prostitute" and she answers "no more than you are ashamed to admit you are a lawyer" Who else, other than lawyers, feels the same way about lawyers?
Infinity (1996)
As Elements have half-lives, this is half a movie
This movie is a major disappointment to me. I looked forward to it after listening to many of Richard Feynman's Physics lectures. While doing a great job of showing the love between these two people, it totally misses out on showing Richard as a person unto himself. He is so unique that this is a massive oversight, to say the least. Despite his tragedy, I am sure he was just as irreverent and humorous during the Manhattan project as he was for the rest of his life. Yet only a couple of snippets show this irreverence and humor and even those are done badly. One is the repetitive exiting of the Los Alamos site to demonstrate the lousy security they had despite rigorous examination of everyone entering the site. The other was when he first met with the students in the data processing lab. That one too was far below what I'm sure the real Richard Feynman would have done, judging by how he treated his students in almost all of the lectures I have listened to.
So Broderick took a whole person and cut him in half, only showing the intimate portion of his life and relationship with his wife that he loved so dearly. He almost completely left out the public persona of the man and this hurts the movie so badly that it never really recovers from it. It makes it a poor movie when it could have been a great movie, right up there with A Beautiful Mind. That is why I rated it a 3 instead of an 8 or 9 like it could have been.
For Richer or Poorer (1997)
Funny movie
This movie strikes me as the reverse of Tim Allen's Home Improvement. There, Tim's the over the top ham and his sidekick Al is the tempering force trying to contain him. Here, the Amish do the job and they are the greater force that really tone him down while still giving him plenty of opportunities to be funny. The theme of materialism getting into the way of relationships is needed in 2006 even more than in 1997 when this movie was released. It would be well for everyone to re-watch it now to realize that materialism has gotten totally out of control in today's world. Another thing that makes this movie enjoyable is that it isn't frantic like most comedies are. Too many try to emulate the Marx Brothers. In the frantic lives we do lead today to sustain our materialism, it is nice to have something slower paced yet still not bore you to death.
Fawlty Towers (1975)
Never a dull moment!
Fawlty Towers is brilliant comedy. Though few episodes were made, each of them is a classic. I have the whole series and love watching it. The interplay between each character, particularly Basil and his wife Sybil are like no others in comedy, with only "Married, With Children's" Al and Peggy coming closest to mind. The writing done by John and his then wife Connie Booth (an American from Indianapolis... their daughter Cynthia plays John's daughter Portia in "A Fish Called Wanda"), who plays Polly the chambermaid, makes this series well worth the time to watch it.