I wouldn't say I disliked it, but it's a very odd show. It feels like nobody is meant to be likeable and their flaws are what make them interesting, watchable characters - but in a different way to normal sitcoms. It's not like you're wanting anyone to succeed in their goals because they're all so selfish, ignorant and thoughtless, and after a few seasons I abandoned it because it just wasn't fun to spend time with these characters for such a long period. Like, you watch something like Friends or Cheers and even when the characters are being awful or stupid you're still hoping (or at least meant to hope) they'll figure out the error of their ways, whereas Girlfriends it feels like they're just all horrible people - Toni is spoiled, Maya has the affair, Lynn is perpetually exhausting and Joan is just too much work to be around - and they're not designed to be sympathetic.
uk comedy is in a nadir
- Thread starter shakahislop
- Start date
woops
is not like other people
now i'm offended
Yeah, I know who Steve McQueen is and what the films are about. I wasn't put off because I thought they were some BBC comedy thing. What put me off was that they looked as though they had that same sense of fakeness that something like the Gary Oldman Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy had; that glossy, modern, digital attempt at a period piece where everything looks too clean and perfect to really pull you in. The Spielberg West Side Story looks the same. Just looks off.
forclosure
Well-known member
didn't look off to me at least in terms of the attention to detail of the eras he was depicting.
Yknow i put it more down to gentrification having an effect on period pieces rather than just it being shot digitally, because places like London and New York don't natutally look like what they did they have to do extra work in trying to make it look like the period.
Passing(which i thought looked good but felt really empty) had this problem
WashYourHands
Cat Malogen
Where the fuck is Jerry Sadowitz?
Yeah the bloke has a few issues but easily one of the funniest gigs attended. He did a card trick section with an overhead projector to focus in a camera on his hands. Classic example of not sucking up to broadcasters too
You have to find Sadowitz, irregular shows, always a chance it’ll go dark side rapid. Pay your £ and take your chances
Yeah the bloke has a few issues but easily one of the funniest gigs attended. He did a card trick section with an overhead projector to focus in a camera on his hands. Classic example of not sucking up to broadcasters too
You have to find Sadowitz, irregular shows, always a chance it’ll go dark side rapid. Pay your £ and take your chances
This is a good thread...
must confess I've never seen or heard of 'Martin' either but I might see if i can get a season on a streaming site. I like that actress, the first girl's from house party?
there was a routine in the mid-90s. neighbours on bbc 1, then home and away on 3, then switch to 4 for cosby show and different world.
i dunno what happened - i went to uni and then lots of things changed? but i'm sure i never saw 'martin' on tv here... one main thing being that channel 4 stopped being channel 4 at some point and didn't get all the good american tv shows. we suddently had 50 channels but they were mainly crap.
i too am a bit surprised version has never heard of desmonds, but then it's not something that's survived into the internet era??
and as to the original question... i think just at the moment, with a few notable exceptions, british showbiz in general is in a bit of a nadir? i can't think of a genuinely great british film from the last 5 years (i like steve mcqueen a lot but those telly movies small axe don't quite count in my book). everyone moves to america double quick?
comedy wise, the best thing for me, gold standard, will always be brass eye. and i did used to like newman and baddiel a lot. not so much skinner and baddiel, tho i did go to see skinner live and he was good.
i liked the thick of it as well, not as much tho. the only other show that has captured my attention in recent years is curb. seinfeld i've rewatched a few, but it's tailed off tbh, we cancelled netflix.
there is one stand up comic from recent years who i also like, this scottish guy kevin bridges, there was one show i caught where i thought he was really good, just well-observed stuff about small town life
must confess I've never seen or heard of 'Martin' either but I might see if i can get a season on a streaming site. I like that actress, the first girl's from house party?
there was a routine in the mid-90s. neighbours on bbc 1, then home and away on 3, then switch to 4 for cosby show and different world.
i dunno what happened - i went to uni and then lots of things changed? but i'm sure i never saw 'martin' on tv here... one main thing being that channel 4 stopped being channel 4 at some point and didn't get all the good american tv shows. we suddently had 50 channels but they were mainly crap.
i too am a bit surprised version has never heard of desmonds, but then it's not something that's survived into the internet era??
and as to the original question... i think just at the moment, with a few notable exceptions, british showbiz in general is in a bit of a nadir? i can't think of a genuinely great british film from the last 5 years (i like steve mcqueen a lot but those telly movies small axe don't quite count in my book). everyone moves to america double quick?
comedy wise, the best thing for me, gold standard, will always be brass eye. and i did used to like newman and baddiel a lot. not so much skinner and baddiel, tho i did go to see skinner live and he was good.
i liked the thick of it as well, not as much tho. the only other show that has captured my attention in recent years is curb. seinfeld i've rewatched a few, but it's tailed off tbh, we cancelled netflix.
there is one stand up comic from recent years who i also like, this scottish guy kevin bridges, there was one show i caught where i thought he was really good, just well-observed stuff about small town life
WashYourHands
Cat Malogen
Malcolm Tucker seems like aeons ago
It's the costumes and hair / wigs and whatnot too though. I was noticing it even before things got really digital, Life on Mars and Red Riding had the same issue.
Kevin Bridges is even funnier to Scottish people because the observations are so specific and detailed and accurate it's hard to not recognise them in your own life.
Britain seems to have no interest in new talent. Tangential but I've noticed that 15-20 years ago there were always new faces coming through in the world of presenting - folk from T4 making the leap to the big leagues if they were popular enough. Now there's nobody. Ant (minus Dec) getting done for drink-driving was the moment of Too Big To Fail, in that there's no replacement for him/them lined up. And Phillip Schofield coming out to deflect from the rumour of his [REDACTED] scandal because there is anyone trusted to fill his role in British media.
Britain seems to have no interest in new talent. Tangential but I've noticed that 15-20 years ago there were always new faces coming through in the world of presenting - folk from T4 making the leap to the big leagues if they were popular enough. Now there's nobody. Ant (minus Dec) getting done for drink-driving was the moment of Too Big To Fail, in that there's no replacement for him/them lined up. And Phillip Schofield coming out to deflect from the rumour of his [REDACTED] scandal because there is anyone trusted to fill his role in British media.
sufi
lala
i found that fascinating like how did they (McQueen) do the street scenes to remove all the 21st century street paraphenalia. is there a "making of"?It's the costumes and hair / wigs and whatnot too though. I was noticing it even before things got really digital, Life on Mars and Red Riding had the same issue.
It spoiled it for me too, i just couldnt get away from the feeling of it being a reconstruction.
WashYourHands
Cat Malogen
Interesting line of critique. I think my feeling about it being true to the period didn't feel like the main thing going on... Like I've seen it all before anyway I feel, that look they are going for, to make it feel realistic. What I liked about those films were the audacious art bits he always adds, the full length playing of silly games with the lip syncing, or in the other one about the cop, there's a long still shot of a car rear view mirror as the dad and son have a chat. All of those sorts of things are what makes that set of films for me. The look, style etc, it's not what I'm there for with them.
But now you've both said it, I'll bear it in mind.
Also, fwiw, I think my view on most British films is very much coloured by the period of time I spent working on a few features so I always see the same rooms (like, for eg, there's one particular courtroom that is used for literally every British film). In fact, that probsbly dies something to my enjoyment straight off the bat.
sufi
lala
I kind of loved it too, the colorisation, the neatness of the scenery and wardrobe, the careful staging of the dance and the choices of music is all brilliantly realised and aesthetically beautiful.
but it's hyperreality - mcqueen reality has more clarity and is more meaningful than pedestrian reality, especially back in the day (or way back in 12 years a slave which has a similar feeling), the reconstruction felt a lot less mucky than real life....
sufi
lala
BBC stuff quite often has a kinda similar "made by a committee" vibe, like it's all been thought through very carefully, involving more than a single creator's brain power and perspectives.
i think mcqueen's agenda is a lot more sophisticated than most of your bog standard beeb shows, but it still shows through
Part of the issue is that you maybe can't really do a proper city scene in a British film anymore, it's just too difficult/expensive. A lot of the main dialogue bits have to be done on sound stages and you can always tell.
That's one thing I like about the safdies, they've carried that verite feel through and get it done.
We had 'london to brighton' a few years ago and top boy more recently which were more convincing in creating the correct set, but also a bit unrelentingly grim (maybe not so much top boy, but that had other issues).
The weird thing is that the mcqueen or beeb look or whatever you wanna call it will end up becoming the standard of how people think these things looked...
That's one thing I like about the safdies, they've carried that verite feel through and get it done.
We had 'london to brighton' a few years ago and top boy more recently which were more convincing in creating the correct set, but also a bit unrelentingly grim (maybe not so much top boy, but that had other issues).
The weird thing is that the mcqueen or beeb look or whatever you wanna call it will end up becoming the standard of how people think these things looked...
shakahislop
Well-known member
i don't watch loads of films and i'm not at all up to speed on what's going on in british film over the past 20 years or whatever. there is though for sure a linage - a continuum if you will' - of which Notting Hill is a part. which has a lot of distinctive ingredients packaged together, one of which is their fairly subtle glorification of british values. the one I saw most recently in that vein was East is East (and West is West as well).
i've often thought that one distinctive thing about the US is the extent to which there is a cycle between real life being reflected in TV/film, and then in turn real life being influenced by TV/film. It seems pretty bad all things considered to have so many representations of your own country in a medium as direct and powerful as film. Especially if the Hollywood machine happens to be located in your country. The UK is really protected from that dynamic I think given that so much of what's on tele and especially films are set in this kind of weird foreign continent, America, where almost none of the UK audience has ever been
WashYourHands
Cat Malogen
Belfast by your man Henry V was full of cunts but it looked granular. The shots of alleyways behind houses really stood out except that wee smiley prod cunt was so ott all the way through I wanted to brick him in the puss every few seconds
Pulp history is usually bollocks, hence seeing posts about The Northman and wondering if I can smell the actual wolf piss in it, not having watched it yet and the ahem paucity of competition
Pulp history is usually bollocks, hence seeing posts about The Northman and wondering if I can smell the actual wolf piss in it, not having watched it yet and the ahem paucity of competition
sufi
lala
actually notting hill is a special example as hollywood parachutes in there regularly - there's a particular tension about the way it's portrayed on film as a sort of archetypal london, but disneyfied (Paddington films, those effing terrible hugh Grant films... for example), that particular britishness of richard curtis, which is "diverse" and modern, but, erm, without black people or un-posh folks,
notting hill as the edgy farthest corner of mary poppins london