> Disclaimer: Network pilots now in circulation are not necessarily in the form that will air in the Fall. Pilots are often reedited and rescored, and in some cases even recast or reshot. So these critiques shouldn’t be taken as full TV pilot reviews, but rather as a guide to the general style and content […]
And finally, after 2 seasons, 26 hours of television, seemingly a hundred red herrings, and enough rain to float the SS Poseidon, THE KILLING revealed who killed Rosie Larsen. The only thing that was ever worth spoiling on this show is going to be revealed here, so if you’re reading this without having watched, a […]
CHASING LIFE: Tuesday 9PM on ABCFamily – Change the Channel ABCFamily is launching all its summer shows over the next week or two, so it appears to be luck rather than careful planning that’s resulted in its new CHASING LIFE, about a lovely young woman diagnosed with cancer, just a few days after the […]
THE HUMBLING (Millenium) – no release date set – Watch It At Home THE HUMBLING wasn’t one of Philip Roth’s major novels, and Barry Levinson’s film, despite striking performances from Al Pacino and Greta Gerwig and some memorable moments of dark comedy, isn’t a major film either. The script by Buck Henry and Michal […]
SECOND CHANCE: Wednesdays 9PM on FOX (pilot also available via VOD/streaming) – If Nothing Else Is On… There’s not much spark to FOX’s SECOND CHANCE, a spin on Frankenstein (at one point it was even titled The Frankenstein Code), restyled as a contemporary sci-fi-tinged procedural. The show’s creator Rand Ravich was behind the intriguing […]
> FILLY BROWN, directed by Youssef Delara (who also wrote the script) and Michael D. Olmos, falls into a recognizable Sundance genre: sagas of poor young women (usually ethnic) struggling to escape their poverty and make a better life. Celebrated examples in festival history include Girlfight and Real Women Have Curves; Filly Brown, while it […]
A lot can happen between the creation of a TV pilot in the spring and the production of episodes for the regular season: a writing/producing team is hired, audience focus groups weigh in, networks and studios (which may have had their own turnover) give plenty of notes, helpful and otherwise, and critics begin to rear […]
> The magically moving portraits are pulled off the walls of Hogwarts in 2007’s HARRY POTTER AND THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX, and the colors have started draining from the Potter universe. Gone are the lush visuals of Prisoner of Azkaban and Goblet of Fire; the palette of Slawomir Idziak’s photography (his films include Kieslowski’s […]