Tag: Action

Viceroy’s House (2017) starring Hugh Bonneville, Gillian Anderson, Michael Gambon, Simon Callow, Om Puri, Manish Dayal, & Huma Qureshi

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SPOILERS: Don’t read this post if you haven’t seen, or don’t want to know, details from this movie (now showing in wide release in the US).

[1] If you saw something similar in a high school world history class it would be interesting and effective. As a theatrical movie it misses the mark.

[2] ...as history, it is inevitably selective. Most glaring is the benign portrait of a compassionate departing colonial power.

[3] It’s interesting to see, but it’s by no means a cinematic masterclass.

[4] What could have been an epic, ends up being too pedestrian. It is this failure in character development which pulls the film down harder than all the other negative factors combined.

[5] A special mention needs to go to Gillian Anderson. Her performance as Lady Mountbatten is wonderful. The received pronunciation was perfect. Her character adds heart, she adds a moral core, to both Lord Mountbatten, and in my eyes, to the film in general.

-Excerpts from reviews on IMDB

I saw this movie (ONLY available in SD- ugh) last night on FIOS On Demand. I had been anticipating it for almost 3 mos, so was VERY excited. (American actor Manish Dayal was posting bits about it on his social media.) I was a big fan of Bend it Like Beckham, British director Gurinder Chadha’s breakout indie hit. I thought her Thanksgiving-themed film (What’s Cooking?) was pretty good. The posters didn’t appeal to me- TOO slick and stereotypical of a historical drama. I liked the trailers that I saw; the high production value was evident (which viewers expect from this caliber of film).

Sadly, Viceroy’s House was NOT what I expected. After it ended, I wondered: “There MUST have been MORE to this film!” It seems edited down (to a mere 1 hr 46 mins); however, it seems longer b/c of it’s plodding nature (at least in the first half). Maybe it needs to be seen on the big screen (for its sheer scope and spectacle)? Or maybe it would’ve been better as a miniseries or movie on HBO (where directors and writers have more creative control)? MANY critics/viewers felt that Hugh Bonneville was miscast as Lord Louis Mountbatten. Hmmm… maybe it’s TOO close to his role as head of Downton Abbey? Gillian Anderson (who plays Lady Edwina) is given some of the best lines in the movie; she does well w/ in her role. (You should check Anderson out in British work, incl. The Fall on Netflix.)

The veteran actors who play Nehru (Tanveer Ghani), Jinnah (Denzil Smith), and Gandhi (Neeraj Kabi) do what they can w/ what they are given. Basically, they sit around and debate w/ the Brits on if and how to divide India and the new Muslim majority nation- Pakistan. Some of you know that Gandhi didn’t want India divided; he imagined a land where ALL religions live together in peace (as before the Brits arrived and used their “divide and conquer” strategy to rule). Some Pakistanis were NOT pleased w/ the portrayal of Jinnah, who comes off as duplicitous.

Michael Gambon plays Gen. Ismay, a cold/intimidating man who doesn’t care what happens to the Indian people. He wants to get the boundaries created ASAP and get back to England. Simon Callow ‘s overwhelmed character, Radcliffe, says that it’s impossible to make these decisions in such a short time frame. Ismay finally shows him a plan from 1945 which already lays out exactly how India and Pakistan should be divided (NOT sure how accurate this is in reality)!

The recently deceased international Indian actor, Om Puri, has a small, yet effective/touching role. (He played Dayal’s father in The Hundred-Foot Journey). In this film, Puri plays Ali Rahim Noor, the blind/elderly father of Aalia (Pakistani actress Huma Qureshi), the Muslim woman who has captured the heart of Dayal’s character, Jeet Kumar. Ali Rahim was a political prisoner in the jail where Jeet worked for 2 yrs as a guard. Now, Jeet is a manservant (alongside his Sikh friend, Duleep Singh) for Mountbatten. As Dayal has said, Jeet represents the Hindu perspective in the film. He is an earnest/optimistic young man who feels that his destiny is to marry Aalia.

One of the servants (among 500+ in the viceroy’s household) who stirs up trouble is Mohsin (Samrat Chakraborti, an American actor/musician whose career I’ve been following since 2005). He also has a crucial role in Midnight’s Children (check Netflix to see if it’s still available). Another pleasant surprise is the original music by A.R. Rahman, an internationally recognized composer. I thought he did a esp. fine job in the last section of the film, when we see large crowds of refugees streaming into the palatial estate.

Related Videos

Two (differing) reviews of the film

BBC interview w/ Chadha (12:16)

BUILD Series interview w/ Chadha & Ghani (34:29)

Game of Thrones: Season 7 – Thoughts & Questions

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SPOILERS: Don’t read this post if you haven’t seen, or don’t want to know, details from Season 7 of Game of Thrones.

My initial thought was that Arya and Sansa were plotting this eventuality all along, which is why they went along with Littlefinger’s scheme just long enough to put him in a position where they could kill him. But if that’s the case, why were there so many scenes featuring just the two sisters, scenes that Littlefinger couldn’t plausibly know about? And if going along with Littlefinger wasn’t an act, then the storytelling is even stranger, because Sansa and Arya spent a lot of time fighting about things that seemed largely out of character, as opposed to all of the things they really did have to fight about. –Todd VanDerWorff (Vox)

Of course, while it was Arya who actually did the executing, and it was Bran who provided some key intel, the bulk of the credit for Littlefinger’s death can go to Sansa. She was the one smart enough to see through Littlefinger’s machinations, and also the only one with enough sparkle to make him crawl on the ground while weeping and begging for mercy. -Joanna Robinson (Vanity Fair)

MANY viewers polled (on Amazon) considered Sansa the MVP of the finale. She had such a crazy journey over the the oast 7 yrs, BUT survived to become Lady of Winterfell, and FINALLY defeat Littlefinger (YAY)! We get a rundown of the “chaos” that Lord Petyr Baelish caused over the years; w/o him, there would be no story. It was he who had Catelyn Stark’s younger sister, Lysa (crazy in love w/ him) poison her husband, Jon Arryn (Hand to King Robert Baratheon). Robert needed a man who knew, as well as someone he could trust, so he trekked North w/ most of his family.

King Robert convinced his oldest/closest friend, Ned Stark, to move to King’s Landing and take over the role of Hand. (Robert had loved Ned’s long-dead sister, Lyanna, BUT that’s another part of the tale.) To sweeten the job offer, Robert betrothed his son/heir, Joffrey, to Ned’s eldest daughter, Sansa (who had dreamed of living in the big city and being married to a handsome prince). In time, Ned discovered that Joffrey (and all Robert’s supposed children w/ his wife, Cersei Lannister) were fathered by her twin brother, Jaime. The common people of realm thought that their king was killed by a boar during a hunt; he was actually poisoned by his cupbearer, Lancel, a young cousin/lover to Cersei. The plot to kill Robert was Cersei’s plan (and Littlefinger was allied w/ her); they had never loved (or even liked) each other. After Ned (kind/honorable/artless) revealed what he knew re: Prince Joffrey’s illegitimacy to (clever/power-hungry/ruthless) Cersei, it ALL went downhill for the Stark clan! 

This obsessive analysis of every line of dialogue and scene scene was possible because the series established and followed a distinct set of rules that kept the chaos in check. 

The patterned logic made it possible to hypothesize outcomes, for any viewer to wax poetically on Twitter about the theoretical fate of their favorite characters. It made a close reading worth it… 

…Season 7 shed these rules in order to sprint towards the story’s conclusion. And in doing so it became a very different series, one that has left the old Game of Thrones in the dust. -Kelly Lawler (USA Today)

“We” (English majors) analyze nearly everything (things we read, listen to, and see in media). That’s why GoT is such a treat; I haven’t been a “superfan” of any other show before (though I have followed MANY TV series in the past). There is SO much going on w/ the action, costumes, sets/locations, music, and (most importantly, IMO) characters and dialogue! This series has some of the MOST complicated characters and quotable lines we’ve encountered in recent years on TV. No wonder we get disappointed when the show doesn’t live up to its potential!  

Let’s not mince words: The Loot Train Battle was a masterpiece. Director Matt Shakman’s first Thrones episode [“The Spoils of War”] featured one of the single greatest battle sequences in the show’s entire history… The pacing and choreography involved in the imaginative battle, not to mention the sheer sight of dragon fire scorching the soil of the Seven Kingdoms, launch this episode into elite status. -Josh Wigler (The Hollywood Reporter)

There were some great moments in S7; the best action scenes happened in E4 (check out the behind-the-scenes segment from HBO, if you haven’t done so yet). This was the first time that Jaime (commander of the Lannister forces) saw a dragon- whoa! He lived (thanks Bronn) to tell Cersei, BUT she didn’t realize the gravity of their situation (until the finale).  As Jaime was riding away from the city, Winter (snow) came to King’s Landing for the first time in the series. 

QUESTIONS: (I hope these get addressed in Season 8!)

  • Why was Tyrion creeping around outside Dany’s cabin on the boat? 
    • I think he feels that these two rulers hooking up  (or “personal alliance” as Peter Segal called it) before the end of the war is a bad idea. 
    • Some YouTube reviewers think that Tyrion MAY have betrayed Dany, so is feeling guilty about it (a la Jorah w/ the poisoned wine murder plot). 
    • I don’t think this is the case, BUT wanted to share this theory also: Most likely, Tyrion goofed up and secretly fell in love with his queen. Game of Thrones has pretty much set this scenario up as an inevitability. Tyrion pretty much told her as much, right before they shipped out from Meereen: “He wasn’t the first to love you,” he said, referring to Daario, “and he won’t be the last.” -Vinnie Mancuso (Collider)
    • Will the fact that Jon—not Daenerys—is technically the rightful heir to the Targaryen throne put a damper on their burgeoning romance? -Joanna Robinson (Vanity Fair)
  • Is Tormund alive? If so, then will he ever be able to win over Brienne (hmmm). 
  • Is Beric alive? (He’s on his 7th life, having been killed and revived 6 times, as The Hound explains in E6.) I just LOVE this actor’s voice, and he has that cool flaming sword. Maybe Melisandre can revive him? 
  • Is Cersei actually pregnant? This has turned out to be one of the MOST discussed issue by fans online! Some even think that the baby could be Euron’s (after all, he is still loyal to Cersei).
  • What’s next for Jaime? Finally, he has escaped Cersei’s power (YAY)! I’m sure he will ally himself w/ Dany, BUT it may take him some time. Will he reconnect w/ Brienne? They has great chemistry together.
  • Will Theon be able to rescue Yaara from Euron?
  • What’s next for Euron? Related issue: Can The Golden Company (sellswords) stand up to Dany’s army?
  • Who will end up on the Iron Throne?
    • One could assume someone has to end the series on The Iron Throne, but there’s an equal possibility there won’t even be an Iron Throne. Or any people left alive, for that matter. -Vinnie Mancuso (Collider)

Game of Thrones: Season 7, Episode 7 (“The Dragon and The Wolf”) – Top 10 Lines

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SPOILERS: Don’t read this post if you haven’t seen, or don’t want to know, details from the Season 7 finale of Game of Thrones.

10) You don’t need to choose. You’re a Greyjoy and you’re a Stark. -Jon says to Theon.

9) This is the only thing I’ve ever seen that terrifies me. -Euron admits before sailing away to the Iron Islands (or perhaps not?)

8) You stand accused of murder, you stand accused of treason. How do you answer these charges… Lord Baelish? -Sansa asks. / My sister asked you a question. -Arya adds (seeing Littlefinger’s shocked face and silence).

7) Thank you for all your many lessons, Lord Baelish. I will never forget them. -Sansa says to Littlefinger (before Arya cuts his throat w/ the Cat’s Paw dagger).

6) I never could have survived what you survived. -Arya says. / You could have. You’re the strongest person I know. -Sansa replies w/ a (rare) compliment.

5) Have you ever considered learning how to lie, just a bit? -Tyrion asks Jon. / When enough people make false promises, words stop meaning anything. There’s no answers, only better and better lies. -Jon (channeling Ned Stark?) explains.

4) Your capital will be safe until the Northern threat is dealt with. You have my word. -Dany says to (a rather skeptical) Cersei

3) I cannot serve two queens, and I’ve already pledged myself to Queen Daenerys of House Targaryen. -Jon reveals to Cersei (and others assembled in the dragon pit).

2) The crown accepts your truce. Until the dead are defeated, they are the true enemy. -Cersei decides (finally).

1) Robert’s Rebellion was built on a lie. Rhaegar didn’t kidnap my aunt, or rape her. He loved her, and she loved him. -Bran (AKA The Three-Eyed Rave) reveals. / He’s never been a bastard. He’s the heir to the Iron Throne. He needs to know. We need to tell him. -Sam adds (re: Jon’s legitimacy).

 

 

 

Game of Thrones: Season 7, Episode 5 (“Eastwatch”) – Top 10 Lines

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SPOILERS: Don’t read this review if you haven’t seen or don’t want to know details from the latest episode of Game of Thrones.

10) Dragons are where our partnership ends. -Bronn explains to Jaime after rescuing him from drowning in a river.

Yasss, Jaime is OK (as MOST of the fans and GoT YouTubers guessed)! I wasn’t worried TOO long- maybe for a few mins after last week’s ep. Jaime is still an important character in this story, or game (as some like to say). Some viewers want Bronn to ally himself (yet again) w/ Tyron; I think that could happen (given this line re: dragons). I was a big fan of the Tyrion-Bronn friendship! 

9) Sometimes strength is terrible. -Dany explains to Jon upon returning to Dragonstone. 

Drogon let Jon touch him- WOW! This is a VERY crucial scene, as we get another hint into Jon’s true heritage, and see more of Dany’s interest in him. Dany knows that Jon doesn’t approve of how she went about defeating the Lannisters in battle, so she says this line (rather casually, I thought). Dany is comfortable in her role as queen; Jon is uncertain as King of the North (being more of a warrior than politician). Jon may NOT be Ned’s bastard son, BUT he was raised by him to be an honest, just, and peaceful kind of man.

8) Everyone in Westeros trusts and believes you. If you tell people the threat is real, they’ll believe it. -Sam tries to convince the council of Archmaesters. 

Poor Sam! His father (Randyll) and younger brother (Dickon) were burned to death by Drogon after the battle in The Reach, so he is now the head of his (old/respected/wealthy) house. Archmaester Ebrose doesn’t reveal this news to Sam though, feeling bad for him. Sam brings a bunch of books and scrolls into a room where the archmaesters happen to be having a meeting. They are debating the merits of a particular scroll which relates what Bran Stark/The Three-Eyed Raven has  seen beyond The Wall. Sam overhears and interrupts; he knows Bran and says the news is true. 

7) I haven’t given you permission to leave. -Dany says. / With all due respect, Your Grace, I don’t need your permission. I am a king. -Jon replies.

There is more Dany-Jon (burgeoning) romance stuff here; some viewers said that she was looking at him TOO much this ep. Come on showrunners, you don’t have to be SO obvious! Anyways, Tyrion’s idea of capturing a Wight to present at Cersei’s court is a clever idea. 

6) Daenerys is not her father. She is even willing to suspend the hostilities if Cersei agrees to certain terms. –Tyrion explains to Jaime when they are reunited in the dungeons beneath The Red Keep.

This was an emotional scene where BOTH actors did well. Though Tyrion has allied w/ Dany (“a foreign invader”), he can still reach out to his older brother, Jaime. As Ben Mankiewicz commented in the latest What the Flick? review: “Tyrion is friends w/ all the good guys: Bronn, Davos, Jorah, and Varys.”

5) Do you remember what father used to say about people? -Cersei asks. / The lion does not concern himself with the opinions of the sheep. -Jaime replies before embracing and kissing her. / Never betray me again. -Cersei commands, softly.

Hmmm… what do YOU think? MANY viewers are writing that Cersei is NOT pregnant; she is lying to get Jaime’s to follow her plans (no matter how bad). We know that Jaime is hopelessly in love w/ his twin (as Lady Olenna pointed out in E3, before dying like a boss). Cersei goes as far as to say that she’s NOT afraid of what people’s reactions; she will say that the baby is Jaime’s. 

4) Our fathers trusted each other. Why shouldn’t we? -Gendry asks Davos and Jon after he introduces himself to The King of the North.

Joe Dempsie was listed as part of the cast for S7, so observant viewers knew he was (finally) back! His hair is  quite short now and he looks taller and more mature. Gendry was hiding in plain sight, working as a blacksmith in “the street of steel” in King’s Landing. He is quick to leave (LOL), deadly w/ that big hammer (yikes), and eager to fight for Jon. Their fathers were best friends who fought together during the time of Mad King Aerys (Robert’s Rebellion). Gendry will be VERY useful in forging weapons out of dragonglass, some YouTubers commented. Some people were excited for he and Arya to be reunited; we will have to wait for that.  

3) Nobody mind me. All I’ve ever done is live to a ripe old age. -Davos comments to Gendry and Jon.

Davos has some of the BEST lines in this ep; that stuff w/ the “fermented crab” (or should we call it Westerosi Viagra?) was quite funny! Liam Cunningham has been doing a fine job in his role. I esp. enjoy seeing the father-son dynamic between Davos and Gendry.

2) What does “annulment” mean? -Gilly asks tentatively, reading from a book by High Septon Maynard. / It’s when a man sets aside his lawful wife. -Sam replies, not paying much attention. / Maynard says here that he issued an annulment for a Prince Rhaegar and remarried him to someone else, at the same time, in a secret ceremony in Dorne. -Gilly reads on.

Whoa, who would’ve imagined that Gilly would get to reveal such crucial info!? As pointed out on GoT Academy, the book she was reading was by a religious/priest-like figure (High Septon), NOT written my a maester. Septons can perform marriages and funerals (as we have seen in previous seasons); it turns out that annulment are ALSO permitted in Westeros. Rhaegar left his wife (Elia Martell), then legally married Lyanna Stark before Jon was born. Jon is BOTH a Targaryen and a Stark, and (most importantly) NOT a bastard! He is the rightful heir to the Iron Throne before Dany (his aunt) since he is male.

1) He’s [Beric] right, we’re all on the same side. -Jon says. / How can we be? -Gendry asks. / We’re all breathing. -Jon concludes. 

At Eastwatch (the castle closest to The Wall) we see Tormund again; he is STILL thinking of Brienne (LOL). Jon, Davos, Jorah, and Gendry go down to the dungeon where Wildling men locked up some strangers about a month ago. It turns out that these are the Brotherhood w/o Banners: Beric Dondarrion (brought back to life- like Jon), Thoros of Myr (who knows Jorah), and The Hound (who Jon saw once at Winterfell). Westeros (like DC) is SUCH a small world sometimes!

Game of Thrones: Season 7, Episode 4 (“The Spoils of War”) – Top 10 Lines

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SPOILERS: Don’t read this review if you haven’t seen or don’t want to know details from the latest episode of Game of Thrones.

10) Rickon! –Jaime greets a Lannister ally. / Dickon. -Dickon Tarly corrects him (just before Bronn bursts into laughter).

This will definitely be a fan favorite moment of the ep (LOL)! After the initial joke from Bronn, he, Jaime, and Dickon (younger brother to Sam) have an interesting discussion re: warfare. We see how a “fancy lad” (as Bronn calls Dickon) doesn’t know what to expect from battle, while Bronn had already seen death as a boy. 

9) I’ve noticed you staring at her good heart. -Davos says / There’s no time for that. -Jon replies

Yes, this could sound like fan fiction, BUT the show did it! Also, on 2nd viewing, I noticed that Davos corrected Jon’s grammar w/ “fewer” soldiers NOT “less”; he learned that from Stannis (LOL). 

8) Do I have to call you Lady Stark now? -Arya asks / Yes. -Sansa replies.

This is a light-hearted greeting before the two Stark sisters discuss more serious matters in the Winterfell crypt. Sansa should probably get better guards though (LOL). Jon, who was esp. close to Arya growing up, will be VERY happy to see her (YAY)! Notice how Arya wears her hair just like Jon? (Some viewers pointed it out last week.) Ned’s statue doesn’t look quite like him (awww). 

7) What you did for her is the only reason I’m not killing you! -Jon says to Theon after he asks after Sansa.

As one critic pointed out, it was a nice moment when Jon looked hurt upon first seeing Theon come ashore at Dragonstone. After all, this was the young man who’d grown up w/ him at Winterfell, yet betrayed the Starks. Then, Jon walked towards him and grabbed him by the throat, showing his anger. 

6) Chaos is a ladder. -Bran repeats Littlefinger’s own words back to him 

The look on Littlefinger’s face- priceless! That was at the beginning of  a speech Littlefinger gave Varys, alone in the throne room of the Red Keep. It’s also GoT’s most famous catchphrases. Littlefinger was clearly hoping to form some connection between himself and Bran, but he got bupkis. I highly doubt he’s “starting to understand” Bran (AKA The Three-Eyed Raven) at all. Bran gives Arya the Valyrian steel dagger; this is the ONLY material which can kill a White Walker (aside from dragonglass).

5) I remember what it felt like to be Brandon Stark. But I remember so much else now. -Bran explains / You died in that cave. -Meera replies  

Meera is VERY sad (close to tears) when she comes to say goodbye to Bran. After his emotionless “thank you,” you can tell she’s also angry. Meera says her brother (Jojen), Summer (Bran’s Direwolf), and Hodor ALL died on their journey, BUT Bran can’t give her the kind of response she wants. There is SO much going on inside Bran’s head now, he doesn’t have room in it for social niceties, feelings, etc. Meera concludes that Bran (or at least, his humanity) died in the cave w/ the Three-Eyed Raven. Wow, what a simple (yet great) line! 

4) But our stories aren’t over yet. -Arya says / No, they’re not. -Sansa agrees

These Stark girls have grown up, become more of who they were (Arya is a fighter; Sansa is a lady), and survived difficult journeys. I LOVED this little positive moment, b/c we don’t get many of those on GoT.

3) Who taught you to do that? -Brienne asks / No One. -Arya replies

Fans (esp. women) were VERY excited to see these two strong females sparring- finally! We see Syrio Forel’s influence on Arya’s fighting (awww). Brienne gives her a good fight- they are well-matched. Sansa and Littlefinger are surprised… and maybe also a BIT worried. Arya is a killer, for sure, and she still has a FEW enemies on her hit list.

2) The Children of the Forest and the First Men fought together, despite their differences and suspicions, against the White Walkers. -Jon explains to Dany 

Hmmm… weren’t those cave paintings a BIT too on the nose? Some viewers thought it was spelled out TOO clearly. 

1) Isn’t their survival more important than your pride? -Dany asks Jon

Will Jon “bend the knee” b/c it could save The North? Why are these two SO stubborn! I don’t yet see (romantic) sparks between Jon and Dany, BUT I do see sympathy and mutual respect. Are they truly BOTH of Targaryen blood, being nephew and aunt? We shall have to wait and see!