Reviews

iZombie, a show that is brilliant in concept, brilliant in casting, and brilliant in execution, did the seemingly impossible with Cape Town - it went from brilliant to sheer, unbridled genius.

In this installment, we get up close and personal with a number of the members of its marvelous cast as it takes us on an hilarious and heart wrenching journey that leaves the viewer emotionally drained after its stunning conclusion.

Already the best show on TV, Cape Town launches iZombie into contention for the title: Best Show Ever. If you disagree, perhaps you haven't been following the story progression from the beginning, so you're missing the subtleties, the references, the deadpan humor, The complexities, and the shows greatest achievement - making fiction seem real - making a preposterous occurrence into an ultra-rare disease that causes its victims such shame and fear that they become both prisoners of the disease itself and pawns of any unscrupulous characters intent on exploiting them.

Only Liv has been somewhat in control of her environment, but in this episode, it all unravels. This despite our being presented with some of the biggest laughs to date.

And iZombie is so perfect that you not only appreciate the villains, you find yourself hoping that nothing too serious happens to them. Blaine and Vaughn have to be among the most delightful bad guys in history (that's right, I said "delightful"), but then along comes Mr. Boss who's so spectacular that we marvel at his ominous presence which belies his seemingly harmless physical appearance. And his portrayal of Santa Claus is the new standard for bad Santas.

There's so much more to be said about Cape Town because even the lesser characters have riveting stories, but I recommend you just do what I did and watch it a dozen times... and counting.

Clive: How can you not get this? It doesn't matter what you saw. You work for the police department. You can't storm into a place without a warrant.

Liv: That's why I wore a mask.

Oh, and did you catch the Star Trek reference?

This week Ms. McIver sings like an angel, though her first attempt is also hilarious, and that's not even the best part. Ties are re-woven, Ravi strongly asserts himself, it looks like Clive might have a budding love interest, and then there's the dog whose new name is a loud howl.

iZombie is a series like no other. To say it's brilliantly written is to do it a disservice. There are big laughs (as usual) in Even Cowgirls Get the Black and Blues, and they're juxtaposed with scenes that tear your heart out even as the evil Blaine explores new depths. If the first scene with Peyton and the last with Major don't bring a tear to your eye, "well... butter my butt and call it a biscuit."

I can't remember a show that showcased the enormous talents of one woman the way iZombie does, and one might assume that the rest of the cast would be mostly background, but iZombie has no equal. Each actor is compelling in his or her own right, and each more than holds their own opposite Rose McIver. What a pleasure it is to watch their development, even the bad guys, and realize that there are virtually no limits to where this show can go since Liv is a different person every week.

Me, I feel that each episode to date has been better than the last, but then maybe I'm just thoroughly mesmerized by Ms. McIver's stunning presence right down to her flawless American accent. Well... almost flawless. Our miles-beyond-lovely New Zealander (beats kilometers, right?) provided an ever so subtle hint to her land of origin in this episode, but if you have to "ask" when, you missed it. Better have another look... or ten.

Upfront, I'll say that I regard Johnny Lee Miller to be the definitive Sherlock Holmes for the twenty-first century. I don't dislike Ben Whatshisname, but he's like 19th century Sherlock in modern garb.

As I was watching The Empty Hearse I was thinking, "We waited for this?" Afterward, my feelings had changed some - I felt it was too bad the hearse was empty.

So over-the-top and preposterous was this installment that it was an insult not only to the Holmes character, but to Conan Doyle himself, and any viewer who thinks otherwise likely governed more by emotional fondness than Holmes-style deduction.

What made this episode all but unwatchable for me happened right at the outset in two outrageous scenes: the faked suicide redux and the restaurant reunion.

Holmes later says the jump was meticulously planned so nothing could go wrong. In fact, a number of things could have gone "terribly wrong" starting with a novice stuntman, Holmes, missing the airbag. And Watson might have chosen to run in the other direction, rendering the bicyclist who was supposed to "detain" him useless. And what certainty was there that the cyclist himself would have perfect timing? Even if he did, how could he be sure to leave Watson momentarily (Goldilocks-style just right) unconscious?

Then there was the restaurant. Even before Holmes pulled his unimaginably juvenile stunt, I was already yelling for the woman to punch Watson in the face and run out. Why are men, especially intelligent ones, so often portrayed as indecisive when it comes to proposing marriage, and then when they do, they become mealymouthed? Why would a respectable woman say "Yes" if Watson did get the words out?

Holmes actually played several stunts on Watson in the hour and a tedious half, thus becoming nothing more than an aging schoolboy. Ironically, Johnny Lee Miller may have been convincing at everything Cumberbatch failed so miserably in doing, simply because Miller's Holmes is manic and he has an edgy relationship with his beautiful Watson. He's often doing things to test not only her alertness and awareness, but her progress in putting the pieces of an event together.

And perhaps more ironically, Lucy Liu's Watson could easily be expected to have seen the staged suicide for what it was, if not immediately, then soon thereafter as things began not to add up. Then there'd be a scene where she's counting down the days until Holmes (Miller)decides to let her in on the game.

I'm a big fan of "Get the Bitch" movies - where the woman finally does something so amazingly stupid that you start rooting for the maniac, so films in this "genre" have to be extra stupid before I complain.

That said, this one has to get serious consideration as one of the worst movies ever. I know it has enormous competition, but the reasons favoring this one are many. Here are a few that come to mind, enough in themselves for this picture to merit the honor, I feel:

1) She lives in an enormous newer house that has no security system.

2) When she hears strange (and loud) noises, she doesn't get out of the house or call 911, she goes exploring... on more than one occasion.

3) When she discovers a guy dead in the attic whom we know has been there for some time (and apparently didn't smell), she calls a detective working on the case. When he doesn't answer, she... resumes her exploration.

4) When she discovers who's been watching her, she attempts to commit manslaughter. He lives so that she can kill him better, and more justifiably, later.

If that's not bad enough, the ending has two people supposedly in love, but totally lacking in chemistry, merely mouthing lines... and each other.

Update: there are presently two reviews, both negative, and our total rating stars = 4. Seven others have voted, and the overall rating is currently 6.9. That means those other voters have given this stinker an average 8.3 rating for something that, to be charitable, sucks the "life" out of "Lifetime."

This movie is a delightful addition to my favorite Lifetime category which I lovingly call "Get The Bitch." It's when the lead actress finally does something so stupid that you're compelled to start rooting for the villain. This time it's when our lonely lovely is distraught enough to confront her bad-beau at his church - an idea so terrible that she then deserves everything that happens afterward - as well as before.

To be clear, this movie was quite enjoyable overall as a good many of the movies in the "genre" are. A woman with a young boy becomes a damsel in slight distress and is befriended by a a man who, quite naturally, becomes her boyfriend. Of course, nothing is what it seems to her, even though we know exactly what's happening.

If the title itself doesn't offer enough of a clue, "The Preacher's Mistress" is soon over her head with enough problems to last a lifetime - possibly quite literally.

But while her naiveté and stupidity are actually very believable, the ending isn't, and as a viewer, that's distressing because the final scene of endangerment could have easily been done, say, as an attempt to stage suicide, with our poor mistress being saved in a nick of time by the private investigator her mother had hired to follow the no-good boyfriend.

Instead, we got a preposterous denouement in which the investigator had to be idiotic enough, not to mention close enough, to allow it all to happen before our drugged heroine saves both herself and P.I. guy. Then, throw in an instant romance and roll credits.

With Chuck, everything old is new again - and better! Written for an smart audience, it should also play very well to those who crave mindless action (though I wouldn't know, ha-ha).

The casting couldn't be better...

Zachary Levi is so good (and generous) as the lead that you'd hardly know he was one, but he can be both hilarious and sincere, geeky yet brave, and always believable. Chuck Bartowski is truly a geek's geek and the kind of guy you'd love to have as a friend.

Yvonne Strahovski may be the most alluring woman alive today, and in one of the funniest scenes in the series, Chuck acknowledges her as such when Sarah approaches his service desk for the first time. He's talking on the phone and going through a manual, but when he looks up and sees the stunning Sarah, the phone and manual fall like dead weight as the phone customer becomes something less than insignificant. But Strahovski can act too. And she makes action scenes look, as David Schwimmer said in Friends, like "dance karate... it's a deadly but beautiful sport." So is "Weiner Girl." Adam Baldwin is a guy who takes the killer elite to a new -comedic- level. He's literally seething in his every waking moment, and who wouldn't be if you're used to offing people for fun and profit, and you suddenly find yourself working as a stock boy and protecting a nerd? But Baldwin as John Casey also gives credit where it's due and he acquires a certain respect for Chuck that only a licensed to kill NSA agent could have.

Joshua Gomez plays Morgan, and you've seen his sort dozens of times, but never like this. He's a dork's dork. that is to say, he may be the only TV dope in history who's not irritating. Barney Fife could be hilarious, but he could also be infuriating. Morgan is totally human. His idiocy is touchingly funny, and you find yourself not only pulling for him but wishing you could be there for him when Chuck is off "on assignment." Sarah Lancaster is Chuck's (and every guy's) dream big sister - pretty, nurturing, expressive and warm. She's a wonderful diversion from the main plot, and she's what keeps Chuck focused on the real when he's not engaged in the surreal life of an intelligence agent. Even her name, Ellie, makes you want to have her hold you and tell you a bedtime story... even if you're at work! Finally, there's Ryan McPartlin as Devon... or Captain Awesome as he's better known. He's Ellie's love interest, and your first impression is that he's your standard jock. Not so. I mean would Ellie love such a guy? Devon is a jock all right - with a heart and a mind. He teaches Chuck how to dance, for God's sake! Dare I say he's a jock's jock? OK, I apologize for that, but the point is, none of the characters are stereotypes. They're all human, even if Casey hasn't realized his humanity yet. But he will, because he's already shown some.

I'd like to elaborate on some of the other cast members because they're perfect in their roles as well, but I'm more tired of writing than you are of reading. Suffice it to say that I think Chuck is one of the best shows ever produced, and even if you don't, I dare you not to get involved with each character and each episode. If you don't, I'll buy you a hot dog!?!

I've only seen one other Jennifer Lopez movie; it was Selena, and it was back when it was in theaters. The reason: I'm not a fan. But I nevertheless decided to watch Enough - twice in the past 24 hours on TNT.

I watched it the first time because of a bit of trivia I read here that Lopez used Krav Maga fighting techniques in the movie, and I am a big fan of this form of martial arts.

Then I watched the movie again half a day later because it was so realistic and suspenseful.

I was motivated to write this review however, not because the movie is so riveting (which it is), but because over 25% of the reviewers here panned the film, and in reading the negative reviews, I felt they had several things in common - they missed the point, they were nit-picking, they were looking for some how-to manual for abused women, and/or they had no understanding of Krav Maga.

Let's take the last one first I saw it repeated several times Slim could not have learned her fighting techniques in a month - she could. In fact, the History Channel has a show in which two guys learn various fighting techniques, and in the end, employ what they learned against real experts. And one of the episodes happened to be about Krav Maga which they learned in about a week and then had to defend against a half dozen soldiers in the Israeli army - all at once.

The guy chosen to do the fighting held his own very well.

Then there were many complaints about what Slim should have done at each point and how time and circumstances wouldn't allow her to do some things she actually did do. To those people, I'd ask you to watch again and pay closer attention because it mostly all fits. Just one example: She did go to the police, she just didn't like the officer's advice.

Granted there is a huge problem regarding an alarm, but if that spoiled your fun, you did it to yourself. On the other hand, I'm often furious when movies have people breaking into houses that SHOULD HAVE alarms. Here's a movie where the house has one and the intruder isn't stopped

Another big gripe is about the acting. The problem here is that people who find themselves in such situations in real life are not typically your Olivier-Hepburn types. They are usually poor to middle class people who have a hard enough time getting through, and their limited abilities and resources are further taxed by the incredible abuse to which they find themselves subjected.

So the cast does a decent job of playing average people and I realize full well that at least some may not be acting at all. But that hardly matters since this is a movie about people muddling through.

Finally, there was a lot of grumbling about Lopez taking the law into her own hands, but I think these people fail to see that this isn't a film about wife abuse, it's a film about a psychopath who wants what he wants because he wants it, and he's willing to go to any length to force people to conform to his reality, and that, in itself, answers a lot of questions posed by the negative reviewers.

So Slim can't follow the normal, civilized path. If she did, sooner or later she'd likely wind up dead. She simply has to force his capitulation. Are all the "T"s crossed and "I"s dotted? No. Might a real-life version of what she did turn out differently? I'd say the chances are 50-50.

However, the movie does present one credible version of a woman who does her best to prevail. She relies on men because she has to, and the real question is: would real life men be as helpful to a woman in her position as those who asst her in the movie?

So watch this movie for what it is, a gritty and tense bit of fiction that, once things start to happen, will grab your attention and keep you entertained. Although I was just thinking... perhaps this movie's better for people like me who aren't too familiar with Jennifer Lopez?

And I would agree with those who think that the child is terrible, but that's some adult's fault, isn't it?