What Comes Around (Again) - Friday Video Distractions with Mike Norton

 

      Before getting to newer items, I'll start this week with a sub-theme and the simple yet grand reminder that we're the first era to have such a huge pool of film and tv entertainment at such ease of access. Even the oldest of us missed the majority of it along the way. The necessities - or maybe let's just say obligations - of life take up so much of our time and energy, and ideally we've spent large chunks of it directly and indirectly on family and friends, and beyond all that our tastes and interests change. Yesterday's "who cares?" often become tomorrow's "that's pretty cool."
     Dipping into, and generally soaking in this vast, shifting ocean of amassed recordings can find us being serendipitously pointed in the same direction by different sources.
     Recently, on a whim (and isn't that how most entertainment should be?) I finally got around to watching the 2004 Bobby Darin biopic Beyond The Sea - in my case it was via HBO, which also means it's on HBO Max. What the initial hook for this was I can't exactly disentangle, though somewhere over the years I developed an affection for the cool, romantic, sentimental sway of that title song, and had added Bobby Darin's performance of it to my main, massive playlist along the way. About the only detail that had stuck in my mind, likely from an NPR interview with Spacey back around the time the film debuted, was that Spacey made the decision to use his own singing voice rather than have something dubbed. This was a film that Spacey co-wrote, directed, and starred in, so he was all-in on the promotion of it.
     I know there are those who will cite the presence of the film's star, Kevin Spacey, as a major impediment to being able to watch, much less enjoy the film, as his actions over the years and the resulting accusations have made him persona non grata. That's, as ever, a matter of individual choice, and so you must do you. For me, in this case, it doesn't present a barrier, though it would be untruthful to say that it didn't color my view of his performance, adding an unpleasant sense of what the veneer of the role is attempting to conceal. Still, I enjoyed the film, though I've yet to dive into the minutiae to winnow the fact from the fancy. For now, that part's not important to me. I know enough to know that key elements are correct, ranging from his life-shortening illness, his actual parentage, and key elements of his career path. That Darin's own son, Dodd, was a partner in this project, and one of those who saw several similarities between his father and Spacey, also helps.
     The film itself is somewhat fanciful, framed with a production of a Bobby Darin biopic in which the star plays himself (allowing him to take a barely veiled shot at those who objected because they felt the mid-40s Spacey was too old to play someone for all of the adult scenes who died when he was 37), and interacts with the preternaturally knowledgeable kid who plays his boyhood self, and where it slowly becomes apparent that this is being done by people who know the complete tale, including his death. Very broadly, the film reminds me conceptually of the Bob Fosse biopic All That Jazz, though I wouldn't want to lean on that comparison as that 1979 film is simply superior. I'm not among those who seemed to be obsessively fixated on Spacey's age, not being able to move on from the perception that he was too old to play the late singer.
     Here's the trailer:

     Part of the biopic hit on Darin's Academy Award nomination for his supporting part in a film I'd never heard of, 1963's comedy drama (from well before the era where it would have been tagged a "dramedy") Captain Newman, M.D. 
     Directed by David Miller, and starring Gregory Peck, Tony Curtis and Angie Dickinson, it's set in 1944 and centered on a doctor who is in charge of the neuropsychiatric ward at the Army Air Corps hospital. The cast includes an array of familiar faces from film and '60s and '70s television, including Robert Duvall, Eddie Albert, James Gregory, Dick Sargent, and Vito Scotti - in several cases, faces you'll know even it you hadn't put a name to them before.

     Over on facebook, there have been a few celebrities present I've come across who I've enjoyed following there. Among them is comedic and voice actor Larry Storch. Larry's just recently passed his 98th birthday, and will be having what's scheduled to be a final public appearance for his fans over in New Jersey this weekend, on the 11th. It's at a western-themed venue, as his tv run as Corporal Agarn on F-Troop is likely the thing most people know him for. That's beside the point. As recollections have been churning up, one of those serendipitous nudges came my way within half a day of watching Beyond the Sea, via a still from the film, as Larry was part of the cast. A shot of Larry holding forth in a scene with the film's star, Gregory Peck. Combined, these nudges got me to seek out the film -- one that, as mentioned above, I'd only heard of within the previous 24 hours.
     Here's a print of it sitting out on YouTube.(Though it seems you'll need to follow it over to YouTube to see it, due to permissions not being given for off-site viewing.)

    Another biographical piece I watched fairly recently, also on HBO Max, was the 2018 documentary on Fred Rogers, Morgan Neville's Won't You Be My Neighbor? (1h 34 m)
     An ultimately moving overview of the life and career of someone I'm ashamed to say I was dismissive of for most of my life.

     Returning to the present, I want to at least briefly mention a series that's still early in its first season on the CW. The Republic of Sarah airs Monday nights, and debuted June 14, so the fourth episode aired this week.
     The show is set in the small New Hampshire town of Greylock, where the residents find out very suddenly that a rich vein of the highly valuable mineral coltan has been discovered beneath their town. It quickly becomes apparent that the discovery was covertly made much earlier, and that both the mayor and the governor had agreements in place that placed the importance on the influx of funds rather than the well-being of the town. Effectively, their town would cease to exist, or at best would become a very, very different place, and not one one would want to raise a family in. The powers that be ultimately wanted the landowners to take the pay day and move somewhere else, and for everyone else to shrug and either move or adapt.
    High school history teacher Sarah Cooper (played by Stella Baker) tries to save the town by mobilizing her friends and students to protest and block the planned demolitions and development. As the back and forth escalates, it leads to a desperate move for breathing room by getting the town to vote on independence from the U.S., predicated on some dodgy map-making that technically left the town in a no man's land between the U.S. and Canada due to the changed path of the local river. As each move is countered by another, what started as a protest becomes the ongoing birth of a nation. Layer in copious amounts of character backstories and Harper Valleyesque small town romantic relationships and secrets, and there's a lot, constantly, going on.

     I cannot give it a ringing endorsement, but I have been following it, week to week, having found enough details to maintain threads of interest. So far I'm interested in seeing how far this gets to go. I don't have a sense that the show's a relatively strong performer for the CW, but it's still early, and they've seen the benefit of giving shows time to develop an audience. Also, I think they're interested in cultivating different types of shows. All episodes are available on the CW's website and via their app.
     Starting on the CW this Sunday is an import series from New Zealand, the supernatural comedy horror mockumentary Wellington Paranormal. Co-created by Taika Waititi and Jemain Clement, it's a spin-off from the 2014 film What We Do In the Shadows, with the series leads, officers Minogue and O'Leary, having appeared in that film.
     As it's already run for three, 6-episode seasons, plus a 2019 Christmas special episode - and a fourth season is currently filming - we should have a steady supply of these. They're airing two episodes back to back this first Sunday night, then one per week after that. Based on other Taika Waititi projects this is one I'm looking forward to.

     As a life-long comics fan, and a Marvel one in particular, Disney+ is getting more attention from me this week in particular. Aside from the penultimate episode of Loki, which just ran Wednesday, and which I've been greatly enjoying, today (July 9th) is the theatrical and Disney+ Premier Access debut of the repeatedly pandemic-delayed Black Widow.

     I'm not yet ready to go back into theaters to sit in the dark with strangers for close to three hours, so I'm opting to pay the $29.99 for what amounts to full home access to the film as a Disney+ subscriber. I usually end up paying for at least one other person, then add drinks and popcorn... and that I can pause it when and where I wish, and watch part or all of it repeatedly, and it's a win:win for me.
     The film is set in the Marvel timeline just after 2016's Captain America: Civil War, and in large part is meant to firm up the character's origin, along with setting one or more characters up for appearances in future shows and/or movies. If you're reasonably up to date on the Marvel Cinematic Universe you'll know what that's about, and if you aren't then you likely don't care... at least not today.
     I expect to be back later today to add some comments about it. But first, I have a work week to wrap!
     Got back to the rest of it Friday night. An enjoyable action film, if perhaps one that both gets as graphically violent as they can get away with under a PG-13, but where our hero manages to take superhuman levels of abuse without more than a grunting note of inconvenience, and without bruising and swelling, much less a need for a protracted convalescence.
     The interruption by the pandemic year+ meant that this big screen (intended) kick-off to the Marvel Cinematic Universe's Phase IV was badly delayed, and so is carrying an unfair burden. I'm already trying to mentally shuffle it into its correct timeline position between Captain America: Civil War and Black Panther (which Disney+, which has quietly been upping its curation game over the past year, has already done), and will be interested to see how well the emotional tones carry through during another pass through the expanded timeline. Nat dealt with huge factors in her past in this story, reexamining her experience of family, and ultimately reevaluating it to find that she has much more than she'd realized. Because this is set in the past, even while we occasionally getting lost in the details, we know how her story plays out. As we rejoin the MCU with contemporary projects, it will be interesting to see which characters introduced in this movie will ultimately get to interact with those remaining who knew Natasha Romanov. This film's left us with more characters to watch for in upcoming projects, some of them to potentially be fleshed out. There's an aspect to this film's aftermath that reminds me pointedly of what was unlocked in the final episode of Buffy The Vampire Slayer, as a wave of potential was left in play. This film has left the MCU with a sudden wave of skilled, powerful young women who are now presented with potentially deciding what they're going to do with their lives and skills -- not to mention a huge network of others with similar backgrounds who are out there, to potentially be freed or have their leashes land in other hands. Then I remember that all we saw was set a bit in the past, so now we know something of what may have been going on out there, behind the scenes.
     While watching it, and I can't recall at which specific point in the story it was, I remembered that my reaction to the announcement of a Black Widow solo feature never really rose above the level of  realizing I'd see it. Did it seem necessary to me? No, but I realized I was unfairly making that call without knowing what it was some storyteller wanted to convey with it. Kevin Feige and those behind the MCU since they launched all this back in 2008 have never really let me down, even as they made character and story changes I wouldn't have, involving characters I've been familiar with in print for decades.
     While on the one hand I knew it as a matter of simple fact, I had to roll back through to list to confirm and try to appreciate that Black Widow is the twenty fourth (24th!) movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. That's an amazing accomplishment. In timeline/story order it's only the 16th, so in the aftermath of watching Black Widow I have to consider that there are eight movies telling stories set later than the main events of this film, and wonder what future movies and streaming shows will tell us about what various characters have been up to off-camera during all of that.
     For those who want a more obsessive look at what officially constitutes the MCU show and movie timeline to date, here's a Digital Spy piece that is attempting to keep that list sorted and updated. I have my own thoughts on what portions of that (items from a now-defunct tv projects division at Marvel) can and should be skipped - and would be happy to tell anyone interested - but that's well beyond the scope of this piece.
     Keep safe, cool, and find something to help keep you happy. See you next Friday. - Mike
     I'm going to close, atypically, with the Bobby Darin standard that started this week's piece.