Here’s a chance to tell us about the best movies and TV shows you have watched in the last 12 months. Not a poll, just a chance to share your favourites: the more obscure and esoteric, the better!
You enjoyed a magnificent zombie-comedy-musical from Albania recently? We want to hear about it!
For example, this week I saw Another Day of Life (or Jeszcze dzień życia as you probably know it). A Spanish animated film based on Polish journalist, Ryszard Kapuscinski’s, book of the same name: the powerful story of the three months he spent reporting on the war in Angola in 1975. Excellent!
Movies have different releases date globally, so don’t be too pernickety about that. For me, Cuaron’s magnificent Roma was a 2019 film because that was when I got a chance to see it at the cinema. For you, it was perhaps 2018.
We got Netflix recently and it is responsible for some of my favourites of the year.
Films – Roma and Marriage Story (I saw both at the cinema in fact)
TV – the wonderful Derry Girls. And Mrs KFD binge watched The Crown which seemed to be rather good.
Old news for you but SVT are currently showing Killing Eve and I love it.
Please share with us what you enjoyed and perhaps even the things you were under-awed by.
Keep an eye open for this!
I’ll put in another vote for Killing Eve, and the fact that it divided opinion so much on here has to count in its favour. The break down was those who loved it, binged and wrote about it in the first Blogger Takeover after release, and those who hated it but stuck with it week by week in order to slag it off in a later edition. Those of us who loved it were on the right side, unless you disagree of course but we’ll just have to let you be wrong.
I completely missed the Killing Eve Controversy. Best thing too, as I am sure there were spoilers galore. I cam e to it with high expectations but it had me on board from the start.
All done with such panache and its tongue firmly in its cheek. So thoroughly entertaining.
I recently praised Florian Henckel Von Donnersmarck’s Never look away (Verk ohne autor) Une of the most popular films our film club has shown for a while.
Deeply moving, thought-provoking and at moments very amusing. A masterpiece. Go and see it!
Roy Andersson must be one of the most idiosyncratic directors in Sweden. His visual style is unmistakeable. His latest will not disappoint you. Not a story, rather a melancholy celluloid poem.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMLaFe5Qpk0
Killing Eve: watched the first one, not taken by it, didn’t watch any more.
I can see why people rated it so highly though (Mrs D loved it)
Killing Eve was nowhere near as funny as they thought it was.
It was preposterous and tedious in equal quantities.
Loved the first series of Killing Eve. Hooked immediately and glued to the screen as each one was broadcast, ditto watching the second series but I found it a little less enjoyable. Maybe that was due to the enforced break in between. If I’d been able to watch the entire thing in one binge I’d possibly have enjoyed the second part episodes more.
Less enjoyable for its lack of input from Phoebe W-B, I suspect.
There wasn’t much lack of input in Fleabag… hurrrr
I may even have liked the second series more. I thought the first one lost momentum when it moved to the prison.
Another fantastic year for telly. What We Do In The Shadows, Ghosts, When They See Us, Spotlight On The Troubles, Chernobyl, Fleabag 2, etc.
I’m surprised Years And Years hasn’t been mentioned more in the end of year lists that I’ve read so far. For me it was the best.
Years and Years was really well done.
Inserting that days news (Doris Day dying) at the start made it feel somehow “more real”.
Over the series, some of the scenarios could seem forced (on paper) but were played out with conviction and believeability.
Anne Reids closing speech (about t shirts being the cause of the worlds ills) was a fine thing
“Beware those men, the jokers and the tricksters and the clowns. They will laugh us into hell.” A powerful line and sentiment in the age of Johnson and Trump.
And set up as such a blatantly obvious message, along with the rest of that speech, that one could only roll one’s eyes at how patronising it was.
Well, that’s one point of view I suppose. Purely for the sake of differentiation purposes, let’s call it “the wrong one”. I really rate Russell T Davies as one of the best writers currently working in British television. I don’t find him too PC at all. (Whereas the most recent series of Doctor Who lost me for that very reason and I wished it had half the originality Davies brought to it.)
You won’t be at all surprised that The Guardian loved Y&Y. (https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/jun/18/years-and-years-finale-review-fast-furious-and-frequently-devastating). They’re doing their end-of-year top 50 thingy of telly at the mo and have got to number ten without mentioning it, so I’m guessing they’ll rank it highly.
PS. I like the way you say “one” to mean yourself. Like the Queen does. Posh ’tis.
I just thought Y & Y was liberal remainers comforting themselves. Very clever in terms of stroking the sensibilities of it audience. Group therapy is a good thing, but it doesn’t necessarily make for compelling television.
RTD: For the record, *that* episode of Cucumber was one of the most astonishing things I’ve ever seen, a feat of imaginative drama for which he should be carried around in sedan chair for the rest of his life.
80% of what Dennis Potter wrote was shite. But then there was The Singing Detective. RTD is only 50-odd and has the world at his feet. I’ll always be interested in what he writes.
Chernobyl was brilliant, Years and Years was basically a family soap opera with BIG ISSUES shoehorned in with a lack of grace and subtlety. *Plot Spoilers ahead* I did watch it all, but my favourite part was the nuclear bomb being used at the end of episode one and then never mentioned again as everyone just on with their lives. I wasn’t at all convinced by the climax, that publicising internment camps would turn the British public against the government, many of whom would be all in favour.
Somebody said the Y & Y was written with a checklist of liberal-leftie concerns next to the screen. If you must write about a family, please make sure that they’re a cross-section of society, like real families are…er…
Years and years was like a benneton advert. Sure it made the producers feel good, but it was full of clichés. And while we are at it, a bloke with a robot sex toy was made a laugh of, whilst if a woman has a sex toy, she’s empowered. What’s with the inconsistency of principles here, pray tell? Not that I have a robot sex toy, like…
She’s only empowered if she’s put the batteries in. Oho!
The last Line of Duty was a “must see” for me this year – despite never seeing any preceding series
(an oversight still not fully rectified)
My wife’s in two of the previous series. So I’d encourage a retrospective binge.
Impressive. Yes, they’re all worth watching but series 2 is the shiznit..
Yup, that’s one of her series.
Waitaminnit! You’re not Mr H***s, are you?
TV: more votes for Killing Eve, The Crown, Chernobyl, Fleabag…plus Giri/Haji (riotously violent London/Tokyo bloodfest with surprising depths), Good Omens, Dublin Murders, Sex Education, Back to Life (a particular favourite). Plus, courtesy of Britbox (forgot to cancel my subscription, inevitably)…Dinner Ladies. The wonderful Victoria Wood and her usual repertory company just smashing it, episode after episode. Haven’t laughed so much since….well, since I saw it first time round probably.
Film: The Favourite, Colette, Can You Ever Forgive Me?, Border (bonkers, but in a good way), Birds of Passage, Rocketman, The Irishman…mind’s gone blank.
I did like the new Alan Partridge.
Cringingly great at times
Yes, I really liked it too..
Handmaid’s Tale was extraordinary. Escape To The Chateau is lovely but makes me ridiculously jealous of Dick Strawbridge’s talents. Portillo’s trains and trousers are always fascinating. Lots of great dramas the pick of which for me was The Capture
Portillo’s trains and trousers…. rename that show now.
PS. Also, where does he get those jackets? Mars?
Dick Strawbridge and his wife seem endearingly bonkers and endearingly in love. I just can’t imagine the chaos of that huge tache, tho. My much more limited herbiage is a darn nuisance at times, shut up, Moose, but that too, and all that hair in your mouth when you are eating soup or stews.
Ohhhh, it’s the Tickle-Monster!
I find Mrs S intensely annoying. Having once met the fragrant ex-Mrs S, I am baffle.
It was an interesting series at the start, when they were first attempting to refurbish the chateau, but as it has gone on it has become simply an extended commercial for their various business ventures.
But no man should be allowed to wear a ‘tache unless they can grow one like Dick Strawbridge.
If we can include YouTube series, I’d like to nominate Charity Shop Sue, a spoof documentary about the passive-aggressive monster than runs the fictional Sec*hand Chances tat boutique of Bulwell, Nottingham.
If you don’t find yourself saying “‘Scuse me, laydeh!” to your colleagues, family, pets etc. after watching a few episodes, I’ll eat my panda hat with ears.
Well definitely not Killing Eve. Appalling dreck, don’t care if I watched it the wrong way. Crap TV is crap TV (and I quite liked the first series), completely empty.
On TV best thing I saw was probably The Marvelous Mrs Maisel, binge watched the first 2 seasons early in the year. First season was better, but that”s the usual story these days. Also enjoyed Line of Duty latest.
I made a conscious effort to go to see more films in the cinema, must have seen 30 or so, this after a decade of mainly seeing kid”s movies away from home. Best I saw all year is They Shall Never Grow Old, an extraordinary technical achievement, but extremely moving and a genuine educational eye opener. Another documentary that was great was Apollo 11, think best non doc I saw was in the last week, Ford v Ferrari (aka Le Mans ’66), but I also loved A Star is Born.
New Mrs Maisel landed yesterday. Not watched it yet, but looking forward with glee.
Yeah looking forward to it, will save for the cold dark days of January I think.
Oh Rocket Man too, best of 5 music related movies I watched. Loved Western Stars too, Bo Rap was the worst. And I watched first series of Fleabag, very good. I just found out why first series of Killing Eve was so much better than the 2nd one.
And Once Upon a Time in Hollywood! Actually went to see it twice!
And Stan and Ollie! And Joker! Can we do this again?
@kaisfatdad You’ll be interested to learn that there’ll be a new series of the mighty Derry Girls in January.
That is very good news, Moose.
Just remembered, from Italy, another film I liked a lot was Alice Rohrwacher’s Happy as Lazzaro .
The story of peasants being exploited by a hard-hearted landowner does not sound either original or exciting. But the photography, the countryside and the largely amateur cast, pulled into me into the film’s remarkable, magical realism world.
Re Derry Girls, I hope Lisa McGee remembers to supply a few more jokes this time (must admit though that the ‘cultural exchange’ episode between the schoolkids from each side of the Foyle was bloody funny).
Any takers for Giri / Haji? I thought it was terrific
I’m half way through it and enjoying it a lot.
Mikethep gave it a big thumbs up and others have mentioned it to me. Coming on Netflix soon.
Another film that made a powerful impression on me was Shoplifters.
It was so popular at Bio Reflexen that we put on an extra showing which also sold out.
400 enthusiastic viewers in the Stockholm suburbs. Kore-Eda, who DuCool and Kid Dynamite have praised here for yonks, really arrived with this very touching movie.
Kore-Eda? I prefer his older, more obscure films.
More obscure? That’s not like you!
I am looking forward to exploring Kore-Eda’s back catalogue.
For our Japanese speakers, here is the Cannes press conference for Shoplifters. The whole cast seems to have come. It is translated into English if you hang on in there.
Chernobyl – nothing else came remotely close this year. Jared Harris’ court room explanation of the disaster is some of the best TV I have ever seen.
Also, episode 3 (“The Long Night”) of Game Of Thrones.
Tried watching Fleabag, but I thought it was a pile of old wank, to be honest.
Good Omens on Amazon Prime was pretty good, although I found Tennant’s hammy mannerisms a bit irksome.
Fyre – The Greatest Party That Never Happened (Netflix) was a terrific documentary on the disastrous Fyre Festival. What happens when fraudulent grifters, clueless hipster ballbags and over-privileged millenial bellends meet? Fyre Festival!
One of my main takeaways from Fyre was that Instagram “influencers” need to be beaten with sticks until they stop.
No love for The Good Place?
I thought both Catastrophe and Broad City wrapped up on a high.
The Boys was a blast.
What We Do In The Shadows and (so far) Watchmen exceeded all expectations in carrying on from esteemed original works.
John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight is consistently strong. You could do with him back in the U.K.
But Chernobyl was the best thing I saw all year*
Mind, I missed a lot of the programmes mentioned above…
(*at least until I suddenly remember something else later)
Oh, What We Do In The Shadows! Loved that show! “Fucking Mike…”
‘We used to burn donkey dung to keep ourselves warm and then we burned the donkey once the dung ran out’. Brilliant show on par with Silicon Valley.
Lots of love for The Good Place. Lots.
Years and years was ok but (for a lefty) a bit obvious and blunt.
What we do in the Shadows was great (as was the film)
Chernobyl was just outstanding.
But if course the highlight drama of the year for me (tension, insurmountable odds, make or break, unexpected leading characters) was Liverpool 4 Barcelona 0. The sequel (Liverpool 2 Spurs 0) just wasn’t as gripping, despite having stars who had been brilliant in the prequels Spurs vs City And Spurs vs Ajax. They missed the leading man from the last preque, Lucas.
Also, They Call Me Dolomite (Netflix). Best thing Eddie Murphy has done in YEARS
Been enjoying the Prodigal Son and I watched Fleabag over a couple of long haul flights. The scene where she drops the valuable glass award, smashing it to smithereens, was fantastic. Her immediate reaction was brilliant TV comedy.
Persevered with Suits for a while but it is ridiculous now and we haven’t come back to it.
I love Wellington Paranormal (a spin-off from What We Do in the Shadows). Derry Girls was very funny too.
If we are looking at broader TV in general, Only Connect is appointment TV for us.
The US Storage Wars is also great.
Anyone know if Wellington Paranormal is available anywhere to purchase/stream legally? Don’t want to buy a DVD but can’t see it anywhere else.
It’s on TVNZ On Demand if you use a VPN.
I hadn’t heard of Wellington Paranormal but I can tell it is going to be right up my street. Germaine Clement and Taika Waititi created it? Then count me in!
Karen O’Leary is the name of the character and the actor. The story goes that during the filming of WWDITS, Jermaine asked her who she was – she was nervous and a little star-struck and replied “Karen O’Leary” – her real name. Jermaine was actually asking who she was playing in the film – so that became the name of the character.
I thought the first and last episodes of Fleabag series two were the best thing on TV ever – sounds a bit hyperbolic but I watched them again recently and, yes, they are superb. There’s just so much going on.
Find of the year is The Kominsky Method Season Two on Netflix. Michael Douglas and Alan Arkin are both brilliant, but it’s Chuck Lorre’s scripts that do it for me:
– “When we retire, guys like you and me are just two, maybe three Clive Cussler novels away from the grave”
– “I like his books
– “That’s okay. Just… read slow”
Stranger Things III was a brilliantly plotted thrill ride. Every episode had three of four plot lines perfectly threaded together, with likeable characters and proper scares, but never letting you forget it was supposed to be a bit goofy.
Biggest disappointment was Years and Years, which built up a very plausible and utterly terrifying timeline for the next 20 years, and then dissolved into sentimentality where everyone learned to heal and love again, or some sanctimonious bullcrap like that – I may have missed some subtlety while screaming at the screen in frustration at the writers’ capitulation in the last episode.
Liberated by our new subscription to Netflix, Mrs KFD has also discovered the Kominsky Method. I went to the cinema to see Matthias & Maxime, the latest movie by Quebec wunderkind Xavier Dolan, to come home and find her enjoying Douglas and Arkin. She also loves Grace and Frankie, Thanks @mikethep. That was an excellent recommendation.
In our rather ageist society, it is a delight to see extremely talented actors like Fonda and Tomlin getting top notch scripts and showing that their comic timing is as good as ever.
Yes Stranger Things gave us it’s best season I think. Playful yet disturbing at times. Perfectly balanced. I love all the references to other films. It’s the characters that make a series a success, that the events are faithful to the characters.
Killing Eve 2 was not needed. First series was great. Again it was the characters. Season 2 stretched credibility too far as often happens.
End of the f****ing world was superb. Funny and bleak.
Started Unbelievable. Gripping like a whodunnit but it’s real and naturalistic without cliche. Very well done.
A Place In The Country msintaind it’s high standard as the flagship for UK property-based TV.
Films? The Elton movie was a quality biopic, a rare thing. Then there was Shoplifters, maybe 2018. Anyway, a materpiece I would say.
Don’t know if it was best season of Stranger Things but I preferred it to the 2nd one. Unbelievable good too, but stretched out too much, 3 or 4 episodes would have been enough.
Russian Doll I also liked a lot. Bit of a marmite show I think. I found it funny, clever and really quite profound.
Others are Chernobyl, Line of Duty.
I haven’t seen any really good films this year. No 5 star ones. (Mind you, I haven’t seen the Tarantino or Scorsese films yet). One film I did enjoy was Harpoon. It’s not “great”, but it’s a laugh. A very black, very violent comedy.
Like Gary, not that many films, but I really enjoyed the latest from two reliable directors- Almodovar’s Pain and Glory, and Tarantino’s Once Upon A Time in Hollywood.
Good tv dramas included The Capture, Line of Duty, Below the Surface, and, so far, Giri/Haji. But the latest series of Spiral was the best of the lot. And then there was the utterly glorious Derry Girls.
My memory! I actually have logged each movie I have seen this year, but didn’t look at it when posting above. Yes, Pain and Glory was excellent.
Oh yeah, films. Saw only a few but three were excellent:
Into The Spider-Verse
Apollo 11
Teen Titans Go! To The Movies
Another vote for Spiderverse. (And one for Jumainji which has a sequel out next week but I just watched the 2017 fir the first time last night – way better than I expected)
Harpoon sounds promising.
Just remembered another excellent film: from Iceland, Benedikt Erlingsson’s Woman at War.
I enjoyed his rather black Of horses and men, so I was looking forward to this.
Another example of the “how” being far more interesting than the “what”.
Lone eco-warrior takes on corporate greed and nonchalance. Not a synopsis that would neccesserally have me dashing off to the cinema. It sounds very po-faced. But he tells the story in such a way that one is rooting for the heroine. One beautifully post modern touch is how the band that plays the sound track music keeps turning up on screen. On the moors, in her flat etc. Ingenious.
Ooh, ta for the reminder. I remember reading about this when it came out, must catch it now it’s on streaming.
Late favourite film of 2019, and I’m surprised to find myself saying this in a year when Avengers: Endgame came out, was Booksmart.
Agreed. Also my fave of the year. Just side-splittingly funny and amazingly sweet and doing new things with an old and tired genre. I thought it was incredible. The actor on the right, Kaitlin Dever, is also great in what turned out to be my best TV of the year, Unbelievable.
Boring to go about it I know, but Derry Girls has been the best comedy for years. The whole family including 3 teenagers loved it. We have seen both series several times and will stick on a favourite episode while trying to decide what else to watch. Beautifully quotable it’s become a favoured way for my family to communicate.
“This bloody bomb. I begged the Brits to let me take my chances, but the awkward bastards made me go the long way.”
“Health and safety gone mad, Deidre.”
The one I saw yesterday had them recalling the time JFK visited and got into a conversation with the devastatingly boring Colin.
“Jesus – that feller didn’t have much luck did he?”
I thought Derry Girls was ok, but seeing adults in their mid-twenties playing schoolkids was a little too “Please Sir!”. I thought both What We Do In The Shadows and Ghosts were much funnier. As for best comedy in years, I’d say both Detectorists and This Country have a far stronger claim to that title.
Humour is a rum old business. What makes one person laugh, leaves another stony faced. Personally, I feel I am getting harder to please too.
But one actor can make all the difference. I was surprised and delighted to notice that Matt Berry is in Shadows. I thought it was a Kiwi show. Matt was magnificent as Toast of London and in the IT Crowd.
Oddly enough, two of the funniest films I’ve seen in recent years have been French.
Le sens de la fete
Place Publique
Jean-Pierre Bacri stars in both and he is a curmudgeon of the first water.
YMMV – I’ve never enjoyed Matt Berry in anything till WWDITS. And he is perfect for it.
Original movie of WWDITS was kiwi, but then picked up in the US to turn into a TV show. They did a terrific job of it.
Nice touch was when the three kiwi guys from the original turned up in one episode.
Here’s the story about how Matt Berry ended up as a Transatlantic vamp.
https://www.vulture.com/2019/03/matt-berry-what-we-do-in-the-shadows-tv-series.html
Is that the one with a Catholic / Protestant bus trip for some reason? That’s the one I tried but was hampered by not being able to understand a word anyone said. I resorted to subtitles, but that played havoc with the comic timing. What I think I saw was an enjoyable but rather old fashioned sitcom. I confess I’m a bit baffled by the praise it gets.
Funnily enough, I did very much enjoy a zombie comedy musical this year, KFD! Sadly not Albanian, though. Anna And The Apocalypse is set in a small town in Scotland and follows a group of sixth formers through a zombie outbreak. It’s very low budget and scrappy and rough around the edges, but it’s full of enthusiasm and passion, plus there’s a nice Gregory’s Girl homage. It’s set at Christmas too, so perfect for this time of year.
https://youtu.be/o6v0euRlT8U
Aaaaaaaargh!! It’s Gregory’s Ghoul!
I take my head off to you, Kid. That just leapt to the top of my Must See list.
I’m stepping into Netflix-land at last, having not been able to afford it previously.
I’ve been gifted a spare login in my great-nephew’s girlfriend’s family account.
I just wonder where people find the time?
I watch maybe one or two hours of TV a day (not counting sport on weekends). Some must watch 5 or 6 hours a day I’m guessing?
Roma was definitely one of the highlights of my cinematic year. It had been so hyped up, that when we at Bio Reflexen got the chance to have a cinema screening, I half- expected to be disappointed.
Not a chance! The magnificent attention to detail. The stunning black and white photography. The acting.The leisurely pace combined with the powerful emotional punch of so many scenes. This was cinema at its finest.
So after that, it felt almost sacrilegious to go and see Avengers – Endgame. But my son was keen and it is rare these days that he wants to go to the movies with me. And I have enjoyed a lot of Marvel movies. And to my delight, Endgame was a big hit for me too. I know it is all utter nonsense, but it was done with such humour, intelligence and imagination, not to mention some rather decent acting, that I enjoyed it a lot.
The same goes for Spiderman – Far from Home. Sheer escapist nonsense. With some moments that had me crying with laughter. Those scriptwriters know how to build up a gag. The scene where Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau), trapped in the vaults of the Tower of London with a group of terrified teens, confesses that he has been playing hunt the sausage with Peter Parker’s Aunt May was priceless.
From the ridiculous to the sublime. Nadine Labaki’s Capernaum sounded pretty grim: life on the streets of Lebanon for a 12 year old who gets convicted for a violent crime.
I went to see it because it had been so highly praised, fearing I was in for a trip to hell. Which I got. But at the same time, without being sentimental, this was a film with a glimmer of hope,
I cannot do it justice, but it is a film you ought to see.
If you don’t see the Avengers, Dumbo, Shaun the Sheep- Farmegadon or Spiderman, you’ll have missed out on some top notch entertainment. And I am all in favour of the cinema as a place to be delighted, thrilled, entertained and amused.
But if you miss, for example, Capernaum, Roma, Paterson, Shoplifters or Don’t Look Away, you are missing out on a powerful emotional experience that will enrich your life.
We watched Chernobyl and were hooked.
We watched Maisel and turned off in a hurry. Dreadful tosh.
What I did discover this year is Australian drama, and two in particular. Jack Irish, starring ex Neighbors star Guy Pearce is really good. The books, by Peter Temple, are a masterpiece in concise story telling. He doesnt waste a single word. It starred Aaron Pedersen, who was in Mystery Road (released Australia 2018) which hit here in 2019.
It’s as good as True Detective. He is a phenomenal actor, but that entire series (not the one off movie but the series) is so soaked in atmosphere and heat. I watched it twice in quick repeat mode, and I don’t do that to a lot of TV.
Our other standby is John Oliver. Despite being on HBO, he’s fulfilling a much needed public service broadcasting need. There’s a lot of savage humor in it, but the issues are all important.
I’ve already written my review of Parasite, which you should all go and watch,
Another up for Jack Irish. Oz drama is really excellent at the moment.
Harrow, starring the not very Australian-sounding Ioan Gruffud, is in the same vein as Jack Irish but gets an extra star for being set in Brisbane.
Total Control is set in the toxic world of Canberra politics. An indigenous woman (the always excellent Deborah Mailman) suddenly finds herself thrust into national politics at the behest of a PM with a wafer-thin majority (Rachel Griffiths). Cynical and riveting.
Then of course there’s Tidelands, which in truth was completely bonkers but gained a star for featuring people shagging in our kitchen.
An Aussie detective named Harrow? As an ex-resident of the London Borough of the same name, I wonder where this will end. A new crime show about PC Uluru from Pinner?
I do have a great idea from Australian TV. A taut thriller series about a lunatic on the loose called …….Uxbridge.
@Sithere Mystery Road is absolutely outstanding. Not a weak link in the whole damn chain.
Chernobyl
Line of Duty
When They See Us
Fleabag 2
Mortimer & Whitehouse – Gone Fishing
Western Stars
Asbury Park: Riot, Redemption, Rock ‘n Roll
TV I really enjoyed was:
Unbelievable
The Act
The Boys
Veep
Game of Thrones
The Morning Show (currently)
It’s silly. It’s un-PC in places (quite a few actually). But it’s the funniest thing I’ve seen all year. The Guardian hates him. Should be enough of a recommendation…
https://youtu.be/FapFfOZ64cE
From The Contenders to Lunatics, Chris Lilley can do little wrong as far I’m concerned. The Guardian’s enduring disdain only sweetens the pot.
I’m sure this will be taken as heresy by devotees of Phoebe Waller-Bridge, but there was a better sitcom about a single woman struggling through messy relationships – Gameface. It was consistently funnier and Roisin Conarty created a more sympathetic character.
Best for laughs were What We Do In The Shadows and Mrs Maisel. Yes, I know the latter is fluff, but it’s razor sharp and highly entertaining fluff.
When it comes to darker drama I’ll drop in something running at the moment: The Sinner on BBC4. First series was very good but this one’s taken it up a notch, and Bill Pullman and Carrie Coon are both outstanding.
And one that actually appeared late last year but me and the Mrs only got around to watching during the summer was Alex, Swedish drama about a bent cop; full of unpredictable twists and didn’t shirk at the violence. Second series is just becoming available on 4oD.
I had never heard of Alex and presumed it had been shown on one of the Swedish channels that we don’t have. Wrong! It has never actually been broadcast on Swedish TV. Only available on the internet.
Hats off to them that they sold it abroad.
Gameface sounds promising.
Gameface was effin’ great: forgot it’s name until prompted the reminder. If Fleabag had irony (if?), Gameface had pathos.
Todd Philips’s Joker deserves a mention not least for Joaquin Phoenix’s performance. A very intense, paranoid, claustrophobic, uncomfortable, hallucinatory film that feels very much of our time.
I am making an IMDB list of the stuff being mentioned on this thread. Interesting, varied reading.
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls091252704/?pf_rd_m=A2FGELUUNOQJNL&pf_rd_p=4dc7ad1a-76a6-49eb-9acb-5d6959572df8&pf_rd_r=02NFA85AK48S4N16XR1A&pf_rd_s=right-4&pf_rd_t=48201&pf_rd_i=watchlist&ref_=ttls_vw_smp&sort=list_order,asc&st_dt=&mode=simple&page=1
I am nominating Shaun the Sheep: Farmegadon,
Toy Story 4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQgV-mh8eao
and the Incredibles 2 ( a sequel that we have to wait 14 years for.
Despite being sequels, all three were bursting with visual gags and a joy in creation.
Was unaware of Shaun the Sheep 2. Maybe not out here yet (Canada)
My favourite TV this year has been the excellent Fosse/ Verdon (unless I missed it, no one else on The Afterword watched it) and The Walking Dead. Again I seem to be the only viewer.
Ha, I’ve been watching Walkers too, but it is duty rather than pleasure. A couple of the episodes have been up to the standard of untold series ago, but too few to label any renaissance. More like The Watching Dead, @Carl , as I feel we are becoming…….
I discovered ‘Rake’ on Netflix earlier this year – the Australian original, not the US remake. I thoroughly enjoyed the entire series.
Other shows which I enjoyed in the last 12 months, which were on either Netflix or Prime Video (I always get them mixed up), in no particular order, are:
Catastrophe
Fleabag
I’m Sorry
White Gold
Sex Education
Thanks Carl and Billybob for those additions to our list. A couple of things there that I had never heard of.
You’re welcome. In addition, I just binged both seasons of ‘The End of the F***ing World’ and I thought it was very good. Way, way better than Netflix’s new ‘6 Underground’ movie. That’s 2 hours of my life I’ll never get back.
Woman at War, Booksmart, Honeyland, Gloria (I much prefer women to men), Shoplifters, Sometimes Always Never, Stan and Ollie, The Peanut Butter Falcon and Farmageddon all spring to mind, and our local cinema recently showed The Third Man.
And two musical documentaries: Marianne and Leonard and … instantly attaining a place in the Top 10 music films of all time … Amazing Grace, with Aretha Franklin.
Stupendous list Deram.
I am going to try and get Bio Reflexen to show those two docs. And there are many faves of mine on your list.
Mrs KFD is currently watching and really rates, Invisible Heroes, a Finnish Chilean TV series! They do not grow on trees!
The “Gloria” in the list was actually the U.S. remake “Gloria Bell.”
Wonderful film.
However, the one glaring loophole in the proceedings, which I struggled for two hours to come to terms with, was that any man in America, any man anywhere, would not find the central character … a single woman – aged about 60 – sassy – desperate to find a man – played by Julianne Moore … completely irresistible and want to bed her (which she wanted, badly) at the earliest possible opportunity.
I kept thinking, “You mean, men don’t find HER attractive? Err?”
But then I was watching a football match on TV the other day and the club chairman (about 40) was shown in the stand sitting with his wife.
And she was so typically … no offence to her … football chairman/player girlfriend/wife material. Too much make-up, hair extensions, artificial nails, you get the drift.
He almost certainly would have been like pretty much like all (!!!) the men in the film and not found Julianne Moore attractive!
Unlike say, Boris Johnson, I don’t, and will never, cheat on my wife, but, if she were to “go” before me, I’d have the choice of some of the most attractive women on the planet because the Kardashians are considered more attractive, physically and morally, than “Gloria Bell.”
I don’t get 2019!
“I don’t get 2019”
Perfect for an AW T shirt, not to mention, a thread just waiting to be started,
Just watched the trailer for Gloria and Ms Moore does look gorgeous. Some serious mis-casting there! Or the costume and make up department not making her look drab enough?
As you say it is a remake of this film by Chilean director, Sebastian Lelio.
Lelio directed the US version too. I know him for Una Mujer Fantastica, his drama about a trans woman whose boyfriend dies suddenly. Not seen it, but it was very well received.
Yes, I want to see the original.
It was repeatedly praised, and often preferred, in the reviews of the Julianna Moore version.
Here’s one I did earlier..
I just added Gloria and Gloria Bell to this list of remakes. I made a while back
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls062877640/
Haven’t seen (or I missed) anyone mention Parasite….South Korean cinema is fairly new to me, but this was staggeringly good, and strongly recommended.
And as a late entry I yesterday saw Jojo Rabbit…a ten year old boy living in WW2 Germany has an imaginary friend – Adolf Hitler. I won’t spoil it, but the second the music starts playing over the titles, you know this isn’t going to be an ordinary movie.
Our film club has just chosen Jojo Rabbit for the spring season and I am delighted. Directed by Taika (Flight of the Conchords, Boy, Neverpeople) Waititi.
Incidentally, I’ve just seen a UK Remake of the movie. It’s about a boy living in modern Britain who has an imaginary friend, a giant rabbit called Boris. It’s called ..BoJo Rabbit.
It all gets a bit nasty. The bunny shags the boy’s mum and then murders him and puts him in a pie. Sorry about all the spoilers but the plot is rather predictable. The moment you catch sight of Demon Bunny Boris, you know it will end in tears.
“Parasite” opens here on Friday (20 Dec.)
Really looking forward to seeing it.
Haven’t seen a Korean film since Park Chan-Wook’s “The Hand Maiden”, which was really good.
20 December?? Yes Parasite does sound like the perfect holiday treat for all the family. Not!
Bio Reflexen is showing it in mid January and I am expecting we will get a full house, I will be gutted if we don’t.
I think I mentioned Parasite in my review of the year.
Yes, great movie. Fantastically well lit, and the marriage of light and music was great. I thought it wasn’t entirely sure what kind of movie it was trying to be, but it was well worth the money.
It may have been mentioned but I can’t see it – very much enjoyed “Guilt”, a darkly comic Edinburgh-set sort of crime caper with some fine performances by familiar faces including a creepy Bill Patterson. There’s even a record shop involved – Rick Danko gets a name check – plus a great soundtrack including Annette Peacock, Stan Tracey and Darondo’s classic “Didn’t I” last heard of on Breaking Bad. It’s on iPlayer.
Otherwise, it’s 90 Day Fiance – the most awful exploitative long-winded US series with multiple spin-offs that remains compelling viewing in our house.
Two great suggestions there, Morrisson.
This looks very addictive….
In the US, it’s all about the Green Card. In Sweden, it’s all about the farmyard….
Bonde söker (The farmer wants a wife) is very popular. Hunky farmers, beautiful girls, stupendous countryside, sunny summer weather..I hate it. I asked Mrs KFD’s cousin, a hard-working dairy farmer, what he thought of this glamourised, phoney picture of country life and he was all in favour of it. Baffling!
Just got back our last Film Club screening of the year Den Skyldige (The Guilty), a Danish thriller which is a real-tour-de-force. It is not just what you tell but how you tell it. The entire action takes place in a 112 emergency call centre, The central character, Asger Holm , is a policemen who must do a desk job prior to a trial for professional misconduct. Jakob Cedergren puts in a remarkable performance.
It has been a ginormous hit in Denmark and quite rightly so.
Any bets on the number 1 spot?
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/dec/02/50-best-tv-shows-2019
I haven’t seen “Succession”. Is it any good?
Very. Off the top of my head it would be in my top 3 with Fleabag and Killing Eve.
@duco01 “Succession” was at number one! Announced the day after you did! How did you know? Inside info or the “gift/curse” of telepathic prediction? Do you already know everything that’ll be in tomorrow’s papers? Can you already tell me now, for example, what the weather will be like tomorrow or if Eastenders will be on? Does your gift/curse stretch to other areas beyond the newspapers? Do you already know whether Voice Of A Rebel will feature in the duco01 60 Favourite New Albums of 2019, for example?
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/dec/02/50-best-tv-shows-2019
Helena Bonham Carter mentioned recently on the Graham Norton show that she goes to a medium which can be a great asset when doing a period role. I hope she gets round to Boudicca one day.
And we have DuCool and his crystal ball. Whatever you do. do no underestimate his occult powers! Both Boris and Corby are rumoured to have made secret visits to Spånga.
Beware of the beautiful stranger! Unless of course,@gary in your case, you are the beautiful stranger!
I’d never heard of “Succession”. I just assumed DuCool was having a bit of a moment.
Erm … well, some of the people who post below the line on the Guardian seem to be very well informed about the top TV shows of the year. And they’d all seen that as “Succession” hadn’t figured in positions 2-50, it must be Number One.
You won’t get very far touring that as a headline act.
@Duco01. I was in Papercut on Kukmakargatan on Söder. They have Suxccesion and a whole pile of excellent DVDs. I binge bought.
On WHAT street?
Erm … yes … I think that might have been KRukmakargatan. An r makes such a difference…
Best tv? Chernobyl. Had to remind myself to breathe as soon as each episode ended. The Crown’s third season was also great. New cast somehow not an issue as they went from the mid-sixties to the late seventies. Also: Mindhunter is properly creepy.
Best movies? Well, without googling, Once Upon A Time In Hollywood stands out. Also, a documentary about Swedish comedy duo Hasse & Tage was a cinema highlight. Oh, and Spirits In The Forest, a documentary about Depeche Mode-fans, also featuring the band live in Berlin.
Well Neela and DuCool. You might like to visit Potter Street when you are buying specialist foreign movies. I prefer to take a walk on the wild side….
My pal Danne used to live opposite Papercut and taking a taxi late at night after a few pints could have problems pronouncing his adress…
Specialist foreign movies…. you rrrrrang?
Try Jerks…..German comedy…..no really.
I am certainly willing to give German comedy a try @waddy64.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VMeM2S8g0g
Toni Erdmann was hilarious. This could also be a hoot.
Another list of the best of the year, where a couple of Marmite films get a thumbs up.
https://film.list.co.uk/article/113463-best-films-of-2019/