IMDb - Fun, informative and kinda addictive!

The Internet Movie Database

IMDb. I can't believe there are people out there who don't know about it. Whether you are a movie lover looking for a review or information on a film or just a middle aged person wracking your brains for the name of some movie star ("You know...the actress with the big mouth...she was in that film from the 80s...the one about the high class prostitute...Julia Roberts!") this website is the go to spot for movies and TV.

My son loses hours on YouTube. I lose hours on IMDb. I blame my sister for this, as she introduced me to the site! Launched in 1990 and bought by the evil Amazon (who suck money out of my pockets monthly!) in 1998, it is supposedly accessed by 44 million registered users, and many more unregistered ones.

So let me demonstrate how I lose these hours! Take a recently viewed film, the adaptation of EM Forster's Where Angels Fear to Tread, which of course I had purchased a while ago from said evil Amazon corporation (probably one of those "suggestions" which always seem to be spot on. I am not hard to read).

I go to IMDb to find out when it was made (1991), how well it was rated (6.6- not so bad for an obscure period drama) and the names of all the actors.

Rupert Graves. Ooooh, I love him. What else has he been in? Click on his name. Hmmmm. Lots of stuff there for him to be my next Actor of the Week!

A Room With a View- Freddy Honeychurch
The Madness of King George- Robert Fulke Greville
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall- Huntingdon
Sweet Revenge (The Revenger's Comedies)- Oliver Knightly
The Forsyte Saga- Jolyon Forsyte Jr.
Death at a Funeral- Robert
Made in Dagenham- Peter Hopkins
Garrow's Law- Sir Arthur Hill
Sherlock- DI Lestrade

The White Queen as Lord Thomas Stanley...this is new...just filming?...what is this about? CLICK!

Tagline "Women caught up in the conflict for the throne of England". Well, that grabs my interest. A BBC television series? Who else does it star? Rebecca Ferguson as Queen Elizabeth? Never heard of her but she is very pretty. Swedish. Hmm. Her mother Rosemary is related to Sarah Ferguson? Mildly interesting.

Who else? Amanda Hale...she sounds familiar. Oh yes, Mary Musgrove from the latest Persuasion adaptation with Sally Hawkins and Rupert Penry-Jones.

Who else? Backclick, backclick...Janet McTeer! I love her too! She was so awesome as Mrs. Dashwood in Sense and Sensibility 2008, but I have seen her somewhere else recently.

Oh yes, she was Mrs. Satterthwaite in Parade's End, and Mrs. Daily in The Woman in Black and Hubert Page in Albert Nobbs. She has been busy lately! Oh, she also played Vita Sackville-West in Portrait of a Marriage. May have to check that one out. And she was in Into the Storm, playing the wife of Winston Churchill played by Brendan Gleeson.

So you see, a whole day can be spent in this manner. I hesitate to say wasted, as I always enjoy myself and usually find another topic for my blog. Look out for my next two Actors of the Week!

So that's my tribute to IMDb. I had better turn the computer off now before I fall down the rabbit hole again and disappear for hours.

Cheers!

Remains of the Day, Where Angels Fear to Tread, and other stuff

Remains of the Day is one of those films I thought I had seen, but I think I had only seen snippets of it on television. It's much better when you see the beginning and the end of it!

Based on the 1989 novel by Kazuo Ishiguro who is a Japanese born but English raised author, this Merchant Ivory film ends up being a fascinating look at English sensibility through the eyes of an outsider. Nuanced and yet intense it is a very riveting film, but I can't say it is one of my faves.

Fabulous performances from Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson along with some pretty gorgeous period locations certainly make this one stand out. Great supporting performances from Hugh Grant, Christopher Reeve, Tim Piggott-Smith and James Fox are absolutely worth mentioning.

The only question remains, why did it take me so long to see this film?

Where Angels Fear to Tread was one I had never heard of. I am afraid my science background didn't give me a good grounding in E.M. Forster. I certainly knew about A Room with a View, Howard's End and A Passage to India, but this, his first novel, was not on my radar.

Again, with a cast that includes Helen Mirren, Helena Bonham-Carter, Judy Davis and Rupert Graves it is certainly worth watching. And again, the setting of Italy a century ago (and the gorgeous Italian actor Giovanni Guidelli) makes it a pleasure to watch.

And yet again, this one is down in my book as well worth seeing, but not one of my faves. I think my faves all have happy endings, so perhaps this reflects more on me, than on these films.

Sweet Revenge is a silly little farce, adapted from an Alan Ayckbourn play called The Revengers' Comedies. If you like dark comedies and tongue in cheek farce then this is for you. If you don't like the idea of the two main characters plotting revenge on each others' nemeses, not stopping far short of murder (played for laughs the whole way) then give this one a pass.

Personally, this one gave me more than a few belly laughs. I was in the mood for something silly and this hit the spot. By the way, keep IMDb handy for this film as every single one of the actors save one was well known to me from other British gems. Helena Bonham Carter, Kristin Scott Thomas and Sam Neill are only the beginning of the star studded cast.

Speaking of silly comedies, Family Tree is one of the oddest and most hilarious things I have seen on TV in a while. A Christopher Guest mockumentary, it follows in the footsteps of This is Spinal Tap and Best in Show but this time he takes on genealogy, an unlikely target for comedy. Apparently the idea came from Guest himself tracing his ancestors and thinking there may be some fodder for laughs. And it works.

It is a bit twisted and bear in mind that it airs on HBO, so not appropriate for children or sensitive types. But again, if you are in the mood for some quirky British comedy starring adorable Irish actor Chris O'Dowd this is your show. I am looking forward to a new episode tonight. The sister's ventriloquist dummy monkey really cracks me up. Try to see the first show if you can, as it really explains the crazy story line. You might be lost otherwise.

Cheers and happy viewing!

Garrow's Law- Sexy Lawyer from the late 18th-century!

Garrow's Law

Garrow's Law is a period legal drama that truly rocks. Even if you aren't a fan of modern legal shows, this is one you really need to see. A dramatization of real-life Georgian lawyer William Garrow, this follows trials at the Old Bailey in London when our legal system was in its infancy. Garrow was very modern in his approach to law, and apparently introduced the phrase "innocent until proven guilty" as legal counsel for the accused.

Andrew Buchan as William Garrow

Andrew Buchan as the titular Garrow is absolutely riveting,and he wears that waistcoat really well I must say. Does he not also look smashing in a cravat? (rhetorical question- all men look better in a cravat)

You may recognize Andrew Buchan as Jem Hearne in Cranford, or as St. John Rivers in the 2006 Jane Eyre. But this series really lets him show what a great actor he really is. And there is a bit of humour thrown in to the script to keep it lively.

Lyndsey Marshal as Lady Sarah Hill

Lyndsey Marshal plays Garrow's love interest Lady Sarah Hill. She is basically a legal groupie, who enjoys hanging out at the Old Bailey watching the drama in the courtroom and ends up getting interested in the handsome barrister as well as the cases in which he is involved.

In real life, Sarah Dore was the mistress of Arthur Hill (Viscount Fairford) not his wife as is portrayed in this series. She did have a son with Hill, before moving on to become involved in an "irregular relationship" with William Garrow. She gave birth to two of Garrow's children before finally marrying him in 1793.

Lyndsey was seen most recently as Mabel the lady's maid in Julian Fellowes' Titanic and also as Cleopatra in the miniseries Rome and Ethel Montacue in The Young Visiters.

Alun Armstrong as attorney Thomas Southouse

Alun Armstrong (who you likely recognize as Flintwinch in Little Dorrit or as Inspector Bucket from Bleak House) is the perfect choice for Southouse, a Cheapside attorney to whom Garrow was articled as a young man. Armstrong's Southouse is a great foil for the headstrong, aggressive Garrow, often trying to rein him in when he gets too confrontational. Alun Armstrong apparently found the more subtle Southouse a pleasant change from the broader cartoonish Dickensian characters he has recently played.

There are only three series (seasons) of 4 episodes each at this point in time and BBC has no plans for a fouth series at this time. But the 12 episodes are each wonderful and well worth seeing more than once.

Any other fans of Garrow's Law out there?

Sherlock with Benedict Cumberbatch

Sherlock

I am in the middle of watching series 1 of Sherlock, a 21st century take on Sherlock Holmes by the BBC and it is AWESOME! Sorry about the caps. But it really is. I wanted to recommend this to you now, because if you missed the replay of series 1 on PBS in January, you may want to catch up before PBS airs series 2 starting Sunday May 6th 2012. It stars Benedict Cumberbatch (Atonement, War Horse, Amazing Grace) and Martin Freeman (Love Actually, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Hobbit).

Holmes and Watson

I was skeptical at first, but I had this series recommended to me from a few people I trust so I thought I'd give it a whirl. The Squire (my husband) protested at first that it was set in the present and not in Victorian times like the latest theatrical releases with Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law. In fact he sat through the first episode with his arms crossed. Harrumph! He couldn't wait however for episode 2 the next night, and we plan to watch episode 3 tonight! You can still catch series 1 online at PBS.org. 

221B Baker St. London

The stories translate especially well to the present day as in the original books, Dr. Watson was just back from medical service in Afghanistan which seems eerie. Does nothing ever really change? So the opening scenes of the first episode A Study in Pink show Watson having a nightmare about the war. And then he meets Sherlock!




Favourite quotes from Sherlock:

• Anderson, don't talk out loud. You lower the IQ of the entire street  
• Sherlock Holmes: Shut up.
  DI Lestrade: I didn't say anything.
  Sherlock Holmes: You were thinking. It's annoying. 
• I'm not a psychopath, Anderson, I'm a high-functioning sociopath, do your research. 
• Look at you lot, you're all so vacant. Is it nice not being me? It must be so relaxing. 
• Oh what now? I'm in shock! Look, I've got a blanket. 
• We've got a serial killer on our hands. Love those, there's always something to look forward to. 
• What it must be like in your funny little brains, it must be so boring!

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Anyone already a fan?

A Room with a View- 1985

Helena Bonham-Carter as Lucy Honeychurch in A Room with a View

Do you know what the problem with movies on TV is? Other than the stupid commercial breaks of course. The problem is that you think you have seen a movie and you haven't really seen it at all!

Helena Bonham-Carter and Julian Sands in A Room with a View

I thought I had seen A Room with a View. How much of it I had actually seen I really don't know. I saw the parts with the pensione. I saw the part with the fight in the square and Lucy fainting. I saw the hilarious part where the two young men are joined in their naked bathing by the naked vicar. I had definitely seen that part, even though it was on TV (must have been on City TV, the notoriously liberal Toronto station). But I hadn't really SEEN it.

A Room with a View

Well, that was remedied this week. I have now truly seen A Room with a View and I think it is wonderful. So wonderful that I now absolutely have to read the novel. For me, I think that is the ultimate compliment for an adaptation of a classic novel. In this case 26 years have not aged this production at all. No one has eighties hair and it is not done on video, but shot on location in gorgeous film. The only thing that jars is how young the actors look. Judi Dench and Maggie Smith are in their prime in this film. They are middle aged and they are gorgeous! Helena Bonham-Carter is nearing that stage now in real life, but in this film she is the fresh faced young Lucy Honeychurch who I couldn't bear to see engage herself to the poncy Cecil Vyse played by that chameleon Daniel Day-Lewis!

A Room with a View

Well I will leave it at that, other than to say that if you haven't truly SEEN this film either, or if it has been a while since you have seen it, I highly recommend it as an alternative to the trash on TV these days. As an aside, I watched the premier of Pan Am this week on television and I have to say, I adored it. Sunday nights are now looking brighter while I wait for Downton Abbey to return for season 2!

P.S. I watched this film in it's entirety here on YouTube this week. I have seen other productions on YouTube but they are broken into 10 minute segments. This was the whole thing! Uncut! Which is how it should be watched.

P.P.S. I saw the ITV television adaptation of the novel when it aired in 2007. Andrew Davies did a very nice job as usual and I really enjoyed it. However I LOVED the older film version. Anyone else seen both? What did you think?