Binge Watching Hearts

 Over three months of binge watching from TV and the library brought me up to date on the Hallmark series "When Calls the Heart". The schmaltzy but wholesome soap is the all time top watched series on Hallmark, but it is not as good as the even longer (11 seasons) running "Call the Midwife" on PBS. Some of the oddball movies on this list were shown on the Comcast Watchathon.

Call the Midwife (Season Eleven) – 2022 (3.0). This series always manages to evoke a deep and legitimate emotion that is at the heart of the vocation of the midwives, helping people who are in need of help in times of physical, emotional and spiritual pain. Good writing captures that feeling both with ongoing characters, new additions to the cast and people just passing through. Good casting, acting, directing and production values completes the task of making it all work so well.

Anything Goes – 2021 (2.9). Some classic Cole Porter songs highlight this musical filmed from a live stage performance in London. But once again it is a delight to see the ensemble tap dancing, particularly to the title song. Sutton Foster reprieves the role of Reno for which she won the Tony in 2011. As expected the story is not much, though the 1930s cultural aspects have historic interest, especially with the a historical casting of some black players in key roles.

The Crown (Season Four) – 2021 (2.9). Great production values and good acting continue as Diana and Margaret Thatcher enter the story to add personal and political complications for the Queen. Though a viewer may feel “been there done that” about watching a retelling of the story of The Royals,it is entertaining enough with its inside the castle view. Obviously covering a multi year span of history (1979-1990) in ten episodes leaves a lot untold, but the real emphasis is on how The Crown is affected. Season Four won the Emmy for best drama series and also won many acting awards. The Diana actress was very good. Gillian Anderson as Thatcher wa a performance hard to take, as was the real Thatcher. Critics point out some historical inaccuracies, but nothing earth shaking.

Sanditon (SeasonTwo) – 2021 (2.9). Though new characters are introduced in the second season, they blend with the story arc and their interfacing with existing characters lends greater depth and feeling for the characters. Using the old Gene Siskel test, we care more what happens to them. Two cliffhangers tease the promised third season.

Boy – 2010 (2.8). Taika Waititi, half Maori and half Jewish, made this movie about the small east coast New Zealand community of his roots and an 11 year old boy growing up there in 1984. The movie has heart and humorous authenticity which though cast in an interestingly different culture, still has universal connections.

Judas and the Black Messiah – 2021 (2.8). When the family of slain Black Panther Fred Hampton is involved in making a movie telling the story of his rise and his killing, you know the FBI and the police are going to come out as villains, which is exactly what happens in this film. A sincere young black visionary meets with early organizing success in uniting the community to stand up and take care of their own, and the FBI and police quickly label him a terrorist, turn a black criminal into an infiltrator and plot his assassination. The Judas kept a very low profile thereafter, but did give an onscreen interview for the Eyes on The Prize series and then went home and committed suicide.

Lean on Pete – 2017 (2.8). This independent movie set in Oregon follows a teenage boy, ably played by Charlie Plummer,with a no-show mother and a no-good father. The boy stumbles into a job at the local racetrack while jogging one morning. The trainer he works for is not tops, evidenced by Steve Buscemi playing the part. The kid knows nothing about horses, but is a hard worker and quick learner. He ends up falling in love – with the horse after which the movie is named. When Pete is a likely candidate for the Mexican horse meat mill, the boy steals the horse and trailer and sets out to find his estranged aunt in Wyoming. The movie has heart and does not sentimentalize horse racing or Oregon.

Silent Sacrifice: Stories of Japanese-American Incarceration  – 2018 (2.8). Well done documentary about the incarceration of persons of Japanese Ancestry (three quarters of whom were American citizens) during WWII. Archival footage and interviews with prisoners and their descendants bring the story to life. Produced by American Public Television and by filmmakers concentrating mainly on persons from the Fresno California region.

West Side Story – 2021 (2.8). Spielberg must have anticipated the question when he gave the answer in an on screen graphic with the end credits of this movie saying how many jobs and worker hours the making of the movie enabled. The stage musical was a fantastic hit, the movie of 50 years ago was legitimately highly acclaimed. This remake shows what we already knew, the songs, music and dancing are iconic classics and any remake could not help but be enjoyable. But one thing the new version did remind us is that the love at first sight romance story line was actually quite shallow.

When Calls the Heart (Season Five) – 2018 (2.8). Comings and goings continue this season as the town grows. The same sorts of issues arise and are deftly handled primarily by the capable womenfolk, primarily the schoolmarm and the mayor. The preacher man who was the love interest of the mayor takes his leave from the series (apparently because the writers thought his role was tapped out and too restrictive on the mayor), though he pops back in to perform the long awaited marriage of the schoolmarm and Mountie. The Mountie survives a dangerous gang fighting assignment up north and the long expected wedding occurs, but then profound tragedy occurs in the last episode of the season. Hallmark schmaltz sometimes taps into legitimate hopeful sentiment, which is easier to ring true on the 1910s frontier.

When Calls the Heart (Season Six) – 2019 (2.8). The widowed schoolmarm passes through her initial time of grieving, aided by the arrival of baby Jack. Two new potential schoolmarm suitors arrive. Telephones come to town. Ethic extras continue to appear in the background of scenes, though in the opening Christmas show a black girl is among a group of orphans but has no lines other than sihnging Carols in a chorus. Mid season the mayor Lori Loughlin character is dumped over her off screen role in the Varsity Blues scandal, without anything dispatching her beyond a voice over by the schoolmarm writing in her journal that the mayor had to go back east a couple weeks ago to take care of her ailing mother. Unrealistically the town still does not encounter one foreign accented immigrant and no national news is mentioned, while the World War which started a couple years ago might as well be non-existent.

When Calls the Heart (Season Seven) – 2020 (2.8). The series continues to do what it does in an acceptable way, though it also continues to avoid a lot of historical reality, likely because the author on whose book the series is based as well as the die hard fans of the series are not interested in the historical realities of indigenous peoples, foreign immigrants, black and Asian settlers and a massive world war. The first motion picture comes to town though, as does the chicken pox. An early episode included a charismatic young black traveling salesman who had a fairly significant part and mentioned his parents living on the farm nearby where he grew up, raising hopes the man would become a regular character and that his parents might at least sometimes bring some produce to town to sell, so that we could meet them. Alas, it was not to be. There is a black school child now though we do not know her name and have never heard her speak or heard her spoken to. The romantic competition between the two suitors of the school marm appears to be an even match at this point.

When Calls the Heart (Season Eight) – 2021 (2.8). The series continues on apace with same occasional warm high points and also same shortfalls with one notable exception. The town now has welcomed the first black family to become a significant part of the cast. The father even becomes the new preacher, the mother quickly bonds with the other women and ends up cooking in the cafe, the young son is active but pleasant and the teen daughter is blind and musically gifted on the piano. Town romances are still always bubbling and bumbling, but in the last episode the school marm chooses between her two suitors.

When Calls the Heart (Season Nine) – 2022 (2.8). So after catching all the way up on nine seasons of this series in three months of binge watching,he question becomes whether to continue to the plane ride or bail out. As the most popular series in the history of the Hallmark channel, it is likely to continue on for many more years. The school marm seems to be the only indispensable character, and that actress has ascended to be an executive producer. Everyone and everything else is plug and play Hallmark formulaic, but it works well for what it is, just like a Hllmark card whose sentiments are predictably hokey but also appropriate to generic occassions.

In the Heights – 2021 (2.7). The stage musical debut of Lin-Manuel Miranda is brought to the screen with great exuberance, telling the story of the Washington Heights Caribbean neighborhood of NYC. Vigorous music, singing and dancing fill almost 2 ½ hours, but none seems particularly resonant with older non-Caribbean audience members.

Ridley Road – 2021 (2.6). This four part miniseries “inspired by true events” deals with English Nazis in 1962 London and the Jewish group designed to expose and defend against them. Naive Jewish girl goes inside the Nazis where her boyfriend is already a mole. BBC look of quality but no depth to the script.

This Is Us (Season Six)  - 2022 (2.6). If there was a master plan for the arc of this series, the decision for the sixth year to be the last probably undermined it. The first few years of flash backs and flash forwards worked surprisingly well, because they seemed to be appropriately balanced with the present. But the downside is that they created lots of expectations of longer backward and forward visits, and that expectation ultimately could not be met. This last year was a disappointing jumble of “remember this”, “here is something we wanted to explore but never got around to” and “alright, here is mashup of some of what we would have covered with more seasons before finding ending with the grand finale death”. After the first couple episodes of season six, sadly most fans probably were anxious counting the days before the relief the whole thing would be over.

A Quarter way thru 2022

All Creatures Great and Small(Season Two) – 2021 (3.0). This typically all around high quality series continues with the story arc moving forward for the central characters and the season ends with what looks to be the brink of WWII.

Apart – 2021 (3.0). Filmed over three and a half years and shown on PBS Independent Lens, this documentary by Jennifer Redfearn follows three women inmates in an Ohio prison aas they work to prepare themselves for life after prison. The three woman were each addicted to drugs, one as a result of pain medication for injuries from an accident, and the other two by virtue of having grown up in families of addicts and pushers. The movie intimately follows the women and includes some footage of their supportive family members on the outside. All the women are mother of young children and long to be reunited with them. The film is so well done that it is a relief not to have any interviews with academics and other “experts” pontificating. In this production, the women are fully capable of speaking for themselves.

Around the World in 80 Days – 2021 (2.9). Surprising pleasant is this adaptation balancing humor and drama and walking a good line between realism and comic book. The production values are high and blend actual sets with cgi appropriately. The casting of the co-leads Miss Fix and Passepartout works well even with Passepartout now being black.

Touch the Light – 2016 (2.9). Known also by its Spanish title Tocando La Luz, this Jennifer Redfearn documentary follows three blind women in Cuba as they contend with their blindness while striving to live the fullest life attainable. This movie style was also used effectively by Redfearn in her later film “Apart” which followed three female prison inmates on their return to society. This movie was streamed via Kanopy through the public library.

The Wind Rises – 2014 (2.9). The gorgeous animation art of Studio Ghibli and direction by Hayako Miyazaki may have been brought to the screen for the last time in this story of the man who designed Japanese fighter planes for WWII. The hero is followed intimately as hi creative drive blossoms and he reunites with the woman who is the love of his life. The War itself is barely a minor character even as we occasionally see some of its aftermath such as a burning Tokyo. The love story, though relegated to second status, is surprisingly touching.

American Reckoning – 2021 (2.8). Shown on PBS Frontline, this documentary tells the story of an overlooked time in Natchez Mississippi when civil rights workers were physically menaced by the local white supremacists, but a local group of armed black men, calling themselves the Deacons for Defense and Justice, provided protection for black activists. An NAACP led boycott of local businesses eventually became successful, but the murder of a local back man was never solved. The movie has interviews with the surviving siblings of the murder victim and also uses lots of archival footage from the Natchez of that time.

Marian Anderson: The Whole World inHer Hands – 2021 (2.8). American Masters broadcast this comprehensive biographical documentary on PBS. Archival footage and interviews are the basis and the emphasis is on Anderson while still touching appropriately on the racial context of her life and times.

Roma – 2018 (2.8). Alfonso Cuaron wrote and directed this homage to his growing up middle class in Mexico City with a beloved indigenous servant nanny. Watching the DVD special features reveals it was a cathartic experience for him in some ways. He also put his heart and soul into getting the exact right look and feel of the 1970s times. The resulting directorial Oscar may have been well deserved for all the hard work. The special features also include a documentary about the efforts Cuaron expended to take the movie on a full Mexican tour including to plcs where indigenous people do not have cinemas. But ultimately the film lacks much character driven drama, except for the character of the nanny, that would help the audience care about the people depicted and learn about their lives and times.

Sanditon (Season One) - 2019 (2.8). Confession: Though watched in 2020, this first series season got overlooked in rating and writing, so what is written here is based on a revisit of episode summaries at IMDB and conjecture that it was good enough to watch all episodes but not exciting enough to remember to rate. The IMDB visit vaguely refreshed memory but maybe a rehash at beginning of season two will help more and seeing the characters again in season two will help even more. Promise to self: rate and write up season two promptly.

Sun Come Up – 2011 (2.8). This early short documentary by Jennifer Redfearn follows some residents of the Cateret Islands of Papua New Guinea as they embark on a journey and tour of Bouganville Island in search of a community that will welcome them and give then land to replace their home island which is succumbing to sea level rise. This early movie shows the effective style of Redfearn in directly and intimately following the subject people of her film. This movie was streamed via Kanopy through the public library.

When Calls the Heart (Season One) – 2014 (2.8). Hokey is expected from Hallmark via Michael Landon Jr and so is delivered in this series about an upper crust young schoolmarm sent to a fictional coal mining company town in the Canadian Pacific Northwest of 1910, shortly after a mine tragedy has killed over forty miners. The time and place are different but the labor and management dynamics familiar enough to modern times that the basics are present to hold attention. The schoolmarm and the young Mountie dejected by his rural assignment are obviously going to hook up, though it takes to the last episode of the season for the first kiss (well this is a Hallmark). Characters and problems rush through the episodes anthology fashion, but the schoolmarm, Mountie and noble miner widow [played by Lori Loughlin who would a few years later do a two month prison stint as part of Operation Varsity Blues and be dropped from the series] remain central. The series is still going, so coming in eight years late and getting DVDs from the library will allow catch up as long as interest does not wane.

When Calls the Heart (Season Two) – 2015 (2.8). The mine closes and a dynamic good guy comes to town and replaces the mine with a sawmill. Modernity starts to come to town with some automobiles and electricity. Most characters from season one remain and are developed further while many new characters join the cast. We now sometimes go to the big city where the schoolmarm stays at her palatial family home where the Mountie feels out of place. Character development includes some shading of people to see there is more depth. We'll see what happens in season three which is ready to put in the DVD player.

When Calls the Heart (Season Three) – 2016 (2.8). Fairly hokey and a fair bit religious, the appeal of this series is that good usually wins out even as some tragedies occur, and people grow as individuals and as part of a community. New characters and story lines get sprinkled in even as the central characters continue their story arc. Checking on some of the actors at IMDB gives a hint of what is to come in that the list of cast members also includes the number of episodes in which they appear. Curiosity about how they get written out is one of a few reasons to continue catching up on the seasons via DVD.

When Calls the Heart (Season Four) – 2017 (2.8). Apparently lack of ethnic diversity on the screen prompted some attention, because the first episode of this season had a middle age black character who actually spoke a few lines, but after that diversity meant only an occasional dark skin person in the background of a gathering and more diverse people walking the streets. There was one scene in which one of the walking women of color seemed to be moving extra slowly as if to maximize her cameo. There is also a male extra who could either be Asian or First People or a mix. As for character and content, arcs continue and new characters show up including new students, though none of color. The Loughlin character becomes mayor and plays a theme of giving people the benefit of the doubt and eligible for second chances [ironic, since in a couple years Hallmark will decide not to follow suit with Loughlin]. Some students and their parent have secrets and problems, but the capable schoolmarm usually resolves them. She even solves a problem which put her job in jeopardy. But she also is distraught as her love interest takes a dangerous temporary assignment elsewhere.

Big Hero 6 -2014 (2.7). An enticing preview led to a DVD viewing of this Disney animated super hero tale. The first half had heart as the real people nerds showed their creativity, but then it became an action superhero genre as the fight against the villain consumed the last half of the film. For someone not enamored of the genre it was at least a near miss.

 

Another Suck Year

 For a lead in to the list of best watched in 2021, I can repeat what I wrote about 2020:

Supposedly staying home during a pandemic would afford an opportunity to watch lots of movies some of which might even be good. But the resulting mix was, not unexpectedly, disappointing. Most were actually shown on TV. Here are the few that scored the highest (listing those watched this year, rather than made this year).

 All 2021 viewings have been incorporated into the complete alpha and ratings order lists linked in the right sidebar.

Last of 21

 

Another pandemic year ended with the following list and uncertainty about what 2022 will bring. Maybe start Netflix again?  And use library system streaming more; Doc Martin Season 9 was streamed through the library Hoopla.

Call the Midwife (Season Ten) – 2021 (3.0). Ten years of a series with the quality holding up is quite an accomplishment and credit is first due to Heidi Thomas the series creator and writer throughout. Progressing chronologically through the years is a good idea, allowing the issues to be faced as they actually occurred and enabling viewers to become even more familiar with remaining characters while some old ones go and new ones come. Here is to at least ten more years.

Dead to Me (Season One) – 2019 (3.0). Engaging writing, good acting and overall effective production values elevate this Netflix original dark comedy above the average. Husband killed by a hit and rub driver while jogging late at night has elements of coping with grief, anger at the police and general discouragement. Enter the second lead in the person of a somewhat kooky other woman and the chemistry leads to believable bonding. Both have problems in their personal and professional lives and they are able to discuss their inner feelings – to a point. There is a different spin to this series and it is deftly handled. Second season ordered from the library. Third and final season delayed due to Covid and MS diagnosis for Christina Applegate, who along with Linda Cardellini received award nominations for their performances.

Dead to Me (Season Two) – 2021 (3.0). Surprising but believable plot twists continue in the second year as the series continues to hold attention and the characters generate empathy, even as they are sometimes realistically annoying. Once production is able to resume, the third season is expected to be as satisfying.

American Experience: The Codebreaker – 2021 (2.9). After decades of secrecy were lifted, the true story of Elizabeth Smith Friedman became known, and a fascinating story it is. This American woman backed into the field of cryptoanalysis and mastered it, protecting the country against WWI subs, Prohibition era gangsters and Nazis in WWII, and then helped in the founding of the CIA.

Annie Live! - 2021 (2.9). The Depression era classic orphan and billionaire story made into a musical gets an exuberant live TV production in this NBC special. All the dancers, adult and children are exciting, including many tumbling moves, and the singing is solid, Casting many black performers, while a bit unusual feeling at first, soon became irrelevant. This is not a racial story; it is a people story. Taraji P. Henson is delightfully over the top as Miss Hannigan and Celina Smith quickly wins hearts as Annie. Filming was pleasingly more cinematic than theatrical. Well done.

Doc Martin (Season 9) – 2019 (2.9). The crotchety but brilliant and grudgingly lovable Doc is in trouble with the licensing authorities and is being monitored as he continues to handle the tricky cases that always come his way. The locals are so familiar and their relationships always developing even as new, and sometimes old, characters come through, that viewers cannot help but feel at home watching this show. And even as his career is in jeopardy, the Doc may be expanding his family.

Call the Midwife Christmas Special 2019 – 2019 (2.8). Filling a void and exploring a place for possible expansion to the New Hebrides takes a group from Nonnatus House to the islands at Christmastime. They encounter mixed reception from the locals and get involved quickly with some highly pregnant women. We do not learn much of anything new about the main characters, except possibly learning a little more about the circumstances of the birth of the older woman Phyllis.

Call the Midwife Christmas Special2021 – 2021 (2.8). This Christmas Special is spent in the London neighborhood where the midwives are based. During the holidays they have to cover some extra patients from nearby which results in several cases with complications. Meanwhile the Caribbean nurse Lucille and her betrothed Cyril get married on Boxing Day, with some complications that get worked out. Once again, we do not learn much of anything new about the main characters, except to learn that adopted daughter May had been born to a drug addict and needed extra care in her early months.

Home from School: the Children of Carlisle – 2021 (2.7). Many Indian children died and are buried at the Carlisle Indian boarding school in Pennsylvania. This documentary follows Arapahoe tribal members from Wyoming as they work successfully to obtain permission to have three young tribal members relocated from the Carlisle Cemetery to cemeteries on their Wyoming reservation. They were the first tribe to obtain permission, and now other tribes have followed the same path. The movie covers some history of Carlisle and some effort by Carlisle researchers to help the tribe on its mission to verify and remove their members bodies, but mostly it covers the tribal members involved as they explain the Indian meaning of this process to them.