This week's telly

The darker months are definitely good time for telly.  This week I have mostly been watching films with a bit of ordinary telly too 

First the films

The Menu - well I thought this was a delicious black comedy.  Rafe Fiennes as an indulged and adored chef with an exclusive restaurant and a unique dining experience.  Very very entertaining and yet another film aiming at pretentiousness and the entitled super rich.  Slightly more subtle than Triangle of Sadness but treading a similar path.

Bullet Train:  A silly and fun action caper, an entertaining way to while away an evening when too tired for anything more demanding than trying to remember who is trying to kill who at any particular moment

The Miseducation of Cameron Post:  LGBTQ teenagers locked away by their parents for reprogramming.  There's no physical violence but the mental and emotional impact is still laid out pretty clearly.  It's not misery porn though, with engaging characters to take us through to what I took as an uplifting ending

Luther - The Fallen Sun: Is this a film or a double length special?  Even more far fetched story than usual.  There were extended chase and action sections which I got a bit bored by but seemed ok.  Idris Elba is still pretty easy on the eye though so it was an entertaining enough couple of hours but I missed Ruth Wilson. 

And I did watch a bit of ordinary telly too …although does Netflix count as ordinary telly? 

Orange is the New Black:  Maybe a bit (10 years?) behind the times I have finally started watching this after being recommended it yet again.   I was put off by the SEVEN series, with 13 or so episodes, each an hour long.  So, it might take a while and I am watching it in 20 minute chunks when I take a lunch or coffee break.  I am only halfway through the first series and the characters aren't all that well drawn in yet, but I think it has promise so I will keep going.  There are soap opera tendencies  (or ‘continuing drama’ as we are supposed to call them these days)  but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing, and loads of great actors who have gone on to do other impressive things. 

Heartbreak High: One of the things offered to me as part of Netflix’s confusion that I might be a teenager.  I enjoyed this series which starts with the discovery of a map of sexual connections in a high school which gets all named students enrolled in a course of Sexual Literacy Tutorials SL(u)Ts for short.  So far, so Breakfast Club. It’s a great comedy drama with some serious stuff handled with a lightness of touch.

George Michael - Outed: The documentary made me disgusted all over again with the gutter press and their various stoking of moral panics.  The same language is used for whoever they are gunning for, even today.  Just take a quick look at the anti-trans rhetoric or the ongoing treatment of the LGBTQ+ community and try telling me not to worry.  An awful look back to not so distant times. 

The Last of Us:  It's brilliant but I am not going to write about it till it is finished - last episode next week