Upstairs, Downstairs

Here is what I have watched on DVD since I posted my last list. The ratings I give are on my own number system explained previously in this blog. Those watched via Netflix instant view, include “Streamed” after the numeric rating.

In the weeks since my last list posting, I have spent most of my DVD viewing time finishing the Upstairs, Downstairs five season series, and the fourth season of Brothers & Sisters. About ten years ago I bailed out on the last TV series I was watching regularly, NYPD Blue, and I have not been even a casual viewer of any series since then. This was around the time I retired, and maybe the idea of watching a series on a regular basis seemed too much like a job. PBS documentaries, some sports, too much news and commentary, and my “one weakness” – Survivor – constituted my TV viewing time.

Watching a season on DVD can be a fairly efficient way to digest an older series, but watching several years in a row can eat up a lot of time. I’m glad I went back to an English series from the 1970s, to learn about England in the first 30 years of the 20^th Century, but a good editor could cull out maybe a third of the episodes as being a bit of a tangent or lark, unnecessary to the story arc and not particularly informative. An attempt for a sequel to this venerable series is being filmed now, as a couple of specials with hopes that it will lead to a new run.

A series that appeals to a particular audience, which in turn appeals to commercial sponsors, could arguably go on forever – look at the old soaps that are just now ending their runs - but the creative people involved eventually burn out or retire before they go down in flames. It is sad to see good shows fail to find an audience fast enough to keep sponsors happy, ending in premature cancellation. But it is pathetic to see shows stay on too long, not seeming to recognize they have become an embarrassment.

How a series or movie portrays a time period is always interesting to examine. Contemporary time is the easiest to portray – just show things the way they are. Showing the past requires research, and portraying the future adds intelligent speculation to the mix. If we view these portrayals when they are first released, we can judge whether they seem to honestly portray the now, whether we think they are accurately showing the past [confer the discussions about Mad Men], and speculate about the believability of the predictions of the future.

As DVD viewers of old movies and series, we have additional opportunities for evaluation. Old “contemporary” movies are like time capsules. Old movies about even older times can be evaluated for any historical “revisionism” that may tell us more about the time of the movie maker than about to time setting of the movie. Old science fiction movies provide a chance to see what they got right about the way we live today.

My evaluation of Upstairs, Downstairs from this perspective is that it was not revisionist but was highly accurate in portraying those early 20^th Century years, and that it is also a very good time capsule showing where Britain was in the 1970s in trying to understand and remember the changes it went through back then. Brothers & Sisters may someday be viewed as a time capsule of an upper middle class early 21^st Century California family whose members are all unable to live without continual cell phone communication, but I wonder whether it will have any lasting entertainment value. Maybe someone in the 2070s will make a five season series looking back at the changes the Walker family experienced through the 2020s. Hopefully the current B & S series, season 4 of which went downhill in my opinion, leaving me in doubt whether I will bother to watch season 5, won’t stick around long enough to become pathetic.

I’m really looking forward to getting back to watching a diversity of movies, rather than just lots of episodes of a couple series,

Upstairs, Downstairs – (Third through Fifth Season) 1974. (3.7) The story arc of the masters and servants continues to the start of WWI, as characters come and go, some permanently, and some new ones appear. A couple episodes off the main story arc feel a bit like clinkers, but the bulk are right on, as the characters develop and adapt to the War, deaths, injuries and the changing times and relationships. By the fifth season, with the 1929 crash of the American stock market, we understand that those who have moved on are not coming back and those who have stayed are settling in, so it is time to end the series.

Brothers & Sisters (Season 4) – 2009. [Supplemental comments and reduced rating] (2.9) The series made a mistake in my opinion, by very early uncomplicating the Callista complication that enabled her and Sally Field to show their acting chops. The rest of the characters and story lines are only marginal and I found myself being easily distracted by the really sloppy editing of dialogue scenes that are composed of an excessive number of cuts back and forth between the characters for no apparent reason. Someone must think that quick cutting close ups goes with the actively overly communicative style of the characters. But the technique is grossly overused and poorly executed, with many of the cuts not even matching. And it is even used in gently tender scenes, as in one short, quick kiss that was shown from three different angles in the couple of seconds it took for the lips to travel the one foot distance. As my viewing companion Susan said, “You must be bored if you are noticing those things”.

The Messenger – 2009. (2.8) Streamed. “Taking Chance” showed the dignified and respectful way our Armed Services and citizens treat the body of a service member killed in war. A different side of the story is told in this movie, how the military swiftly sends messengers to make personal contact with the next of kin of the dead warrior and give a perfunctory notice and expression of condolence. After a few disturbing scenes of death message delivery, the movie concentrates more on the messed up lives of the two messengers and their relationship. Woody Harrelson got a supporting Oscar nod for his role. Well meaning and well done, this story is probably understood better by those who have had pertinent military service. The movie did not have much drama or story depth, and the character exploration never quite developed. Though the Netflix stream was HD, the sound was poor. 

How to Make an American Quilt – 1995. (2.8) Winona Ryder is very good at playing sensitive, vulnerable young women, and here she is deciding on what direction to take her life, mentored by a quilting bee of older women who tell snippets of their past that has brought them to where they are today. The problem is the snippets are too much like a patchwork quilt that doesn’t really come together that impressively.

Falling for a Dancer – 1998.  (2.4) I suspect the writer whose novel, about an upper middle class 1930s city girl who comes up pregnant and is forced into marrying an older country widower,was made into this four part Northern Irish miniseries, had little experience adapting novels for the screen, because her screenplay was marginal at best and had so many gaps in the story she was telling that it was too hard to form any attachment to the characters. The Netflix algorithm was way off on this one, predicting a 3.3 for me.

The Buccaneers – 1995. (2.4) Streamed. Based on the Edith Wharton novel about daughters of noveau riche Americans being sent to late Victorian England to marry impoverished nobles, this four part BBC series was not up to the usual writing and acting standards for such pieces. By the time the script started zeroing in on particular characters, and chance for empathy had been lost in the confusing array of cast members and lack of story focus.