My daughter was pretty sick this Labor Day weekend and unfortunately plans to enjoy the weather and the motorcycle were cancelled. So I did some catching up on shows. I thought why not get some recommendations from folks here on shows that might not be on my radar but are really good. If you have any shows maybe folks haven't heard of feel free to mention them.
There are shows I won't mention just because I'm pretty sure you've already heard about them enough like Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad.
Movies/Shows I enjoyed and would recommend:
Ozark(Netflix) - relatively new show on Netflix. I've seen some reviews throw Breaking Bad similarities at it, but I think it's pretty different from Breaking Bad. The premise of the show is one decision from one person can have a pretty profound effect on a lot of people. The main character is a good guy who makes one bad choice... and the show takes us down that rabbit hole of all the people that choice ultimately affects.
Memento(Netflix) - This movie has been around for some time. It was the first major motion picture director Christopher Nolan(Batman Begins, Dark Knight, Inception, Interstellar, etc) ever made. It's one of the most unique movies I've ever seen. The story is basically about a man who went through a home invasion and his wife was killed. He's trying to track down who killed his wife. The unique part is the trauma of the home invasion gave him short term memory loss. He can't remember something that happened 10 minutes ago. So to counter it he takes polaroids of people, writes their names down, leaves himself notes, and literally tatoos information and clues on himself so when he wakes up he knows where he left off. And the movie is told from the end to the beginning. You would thinking that wouldn't leave much for plot twists and turns, but you'd be wrong. It's a hell of a mind bending ride. Highly recommend if you like movies that have you thinking a lot after you've watched it.
Oldboy - This movie surprised me. It's a South Korean movie with subtitles so if that's not your thing then you've been warned. Not to be confused with the American movie with the same name starring Josh Brolin.
The premise of the movie is a guy ends up getting imprisoned for 15 years by some mysterious captor and then he's released for unknown reasons. When he's released he finds out his wife has been murdered and his daughter was sent away to another country. So he's on a mission to find out who imprisoned him and why and kill them. But he quickly finding out someone is going through a lot of trouble to ultimately torture him. And it's a pretty interesting ride to watch. After I watched this I found out Spike Lee tried to do a remake of this movie for American audiences, but I never saw it. I've read the remake was pretty horrible. I can't really imagine this type of movie working that well without some serious re-write. I think what makes this work is the fact that it IS a foreign film and that it takes place in South Korea so it allows the audience to accept some of things this movie presents easier.
The Expanse(Amazon Prime): Sci-Fi show that I really ended up enjoying. Takes place quite a ways off in the the future. Where not only has man colonized Mars, but we've been there so long there's numerous generations of Martians and they've effectively become their own people who shared different views and ideologies from Earth. So much so there's been a growing tension between the two. And caught in the middle are what the call "the belters" which are the folks who live in the asteroid belts and do the dirty work(ie mining) for both Earth and Mars. They've been used and exploited by both Earth and Mars and are trying to vie for their own independence. And you as the viewer are thrown into all of this right when this powder keg of tension is about go off and there's a mystery as to who is really trying to light the match and why.
What I like about this show is the little touches they add to it. For example, the Belters spend most if not all of their life in zero gravity so their bodies are a by-product of that environment. And in one scene someone from Earth is torturing a Belter purely by suspending them from their arm pits and just letting Earth's gravity fuck with them.
Firefly: This show was actually made in 2002, and it got cancelled after the first season ultimately do to a really crappy time slot. But it had such a devoted fanbase that it didn't disappear. The DVD sales keep steadily climbing as more and more people found out about this show and really enjoyed it. Basically take the old days of the American pioneers going west and put that in a Sci-fi universe revolving around a main character, Captain Mal Reynolds, who is part John Wayne and part Han Solo and you have Firefly. Excellent show. It's continued popularity after it was cancelled eventually got the shows creator Joss Whedon(who wrote and directed Avengers and Avengers Age of Ultron movies) the green light to do a full featured movie to basically wrap up the series. That movie is called Serenity and was made in 2005. I recommend watching Firefly and if you enjoyed it then watch Serenity. It really wraps it all up really well.
Dunkirk(in theatres): I'm a big fan of Christopher Nolan and what is really slick about this movie is how tells the story of Dunkirk which in and of itself is quite a remarkable moment in history. He does it from 3 different perspectives. And each perspective is on their own timeline.
1> Perspective of a solider on the beaches and trying to get home that's on a timeline of one week.
2> Pespective of a citizen in England whose using their private boat to chross the channel and help rescue these stranded soldiers. This timeline is across one day.
3> Perspective of a British pilot whose trying to keep the skies clear whose timeline is one hour.
And the mastery is how Nolan goes between the three narratives and still ties them all together brilliantly. Really well done piece of film making IMO.
What are some of your recommendation?
There are shows I won't mention just because I'm pretty sure you've already heard about them enough like Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad.
Movies/Shows I enjoyed and would recommend:
Ozark(Netflix) - relatively new show on Netflix. I've seen some reviews throw Breaking Bad similarities at it, but I think it's pretty different from Breaking Bad. The premise of the show is one decision from one person can have a pretty profound effect on a lot of people. The main character is a good guy who makes one bad choice... and the show takes us down that rabbit hole of all the people that choice ultimately affects.
Memento(Netflix) - This movie has been around for some time. It was the first major motion picture director Christopher Nolan(Batman Begins, Dark Knight, Inception, Interstellar, etc) ever made. It's one of the most unique movies I've ever seen. The story is basically about a man who went through a home invasion and his wife was killed. He's trying to track down who killed his wife. The unique part is the trauma of the home invasion gave him short term memory loss. He can't remember something that happened 10 minutes ago. So to counter it he takes polaroids of people, writes their names down, leaves himself notes, and literally tatoos information and clues on himself so when he wakes up he knows where he left off. And the movie is told from the end to the beginning. You would thinking that wouldn't leave much for plot twists and turns, but you'd be wrong. It's a hell of a mind bending ride. Highly recommend if you like movies that have you thinking a lot after you've watched it.
Oldboy - This movie surprised me. It's a South Korean movie with subtitles so if that's not your thing then you've been warned. Not to be confused with the American movie with the same name starring Josh Brolin.
The premise of the movie is a guy ends up getting imprisoned for 15 years by some mysterious captor and then he's released for unknown reasons. When he's released he finds out his wife has been murdered and his daughter was sent away to another country. So he's on a mission to find out who imprisoned him and why and kill them. But he quickly finding out someone is going through a lot of trouble to ultimately torture him. And it's a pretty interesting ride to watch. After I watched this I found out Spike Lee tried to do a remake of this movie for American audiences, but I never saw it. I've read the remake was pretty horrible. I can't really imagine this type of movie working that well without some serious re-write. I think what makes this work is the fact that it IS a foreign film and that it takes place in South Korea so it allows the audience to accept some of things this movie presents easier.
The Expanse(Amazon Prime): Sci-Fi show that I really ended up enjoying. Takes place quite a ways off in the the future. Where not only has man colonized Mars, but we've been there so long there's numerous generations of Martians and they've effectively become their own people who shared different views and ideologies from Earth. So much so there's been a growing tension between the two. And caught in the middle are what the call "the belters" which are the folks who live in the asteroid belts and do the dirty work(ie mining) for both Earth and Mars. They've been used and exploited by both Earth and Mars and are trying to vie for their own independence. And you as the viewer are thrown into all of this right when this powder keg of tension is about go off and there's a mystery as to who is really trying to light the match and why.
What I like about this show is the little touches they add to it. For example, the Belters spend most if not all of their life in zero gravity so their bodies are a by-product of that environment. And in one scene someone from Earth is torturing a Belter purely by suspending them from their arm pits and just letting Earth's gravity fuck with them.
Firefly: This show was actually made in 2002, and it got cancelled after the first season ultimately do to a really crappy time slot. But it had such a devoted fanbase that it didn't disappear. The DVD sales keep steadily climbing as more and more people found out about this show and really enjoyed it. Basically take the old days of the American pioneers going west and put that in a Sci-fi universe revolving around a main character, Captain Mal Reynolds, who is part John Wayne and part Han Solo and you have Firefly. Excellent show. It's continued popularity after it was cancelled eventually got the shows creator Joss Whedon(who wrote and directed Avengers and Avengers Age of Ultron movies) the green light to do a full featured movie to basically wrap up the series. That movie is called Serenity and was made in 2005. I recommend watching Firefly and if you enjoyed it then watch Serenity. It really wraps it all up really well.
Dunkirk(in theatres): I'm a big fan of Christopher Nolan and what is really slick about this movie is how tells the story of Dunkirk which in and of itself is quite a remarkable moment in history. He does it from 3 different perspectives. And each perspective is on their own timeline.
1> Perspective of a solider on the beaches and trying to get home that's on a timeline of one week.
2> Pespective of a citizen in England whose using their private boat to chross the channel and help rescue these stranded soldiers. This timeline is across one day.
3> Perspective of a British pilot whose trying to keep the skies clear whose timeline is one hour.
And the mastery is how Nolan goes between the three narratives and still ties them all together brilliantly. Really well done piece of film making IMO.
What are some of your recommendation?
