Tag Archives: review

Lisa Marie’s Week In Television: 7/27/2025 — 8/2/2025

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Big Brother 27 (24/7, CBS, Paramount, Pluto TV)

I’ve been writing about Big Brother over at the Big Brother Blog.

Diff’rent Strokes (Tubi)

On Sunday morning, I watched an episode in which Mr. Drummond was being sued by an employee who had lost out on a promotion because Drummond felt he had a responsiblity to give the promotion to a black executive.  At first, Willis was all in favor of handing out jobs based on race but then, when he was cut from the school basketball team to make room for a white player, Willis realized that he was actually against Affirmative Action.

I followed this up episode up with a two-parter in which Arnold wore a wire to take down two bullies at his school.  Is that really something that the police needed to get involved with?  Of course, the middle school bullies did appear to be in their mid-20s so maybe it was a good idea to get the police involved.

On Monday, I watched an episode in which Mr, Drummond gave a promotion to a woman.  Willis was all like, “How can you promote a woman!”  Kimberly thought the woman was going to try to steal her father.  It was a dumb episode.  I’m probably not getting the plot right because I was bored.  I followed this up with an episode where Arnold wanted to join a football team but the football coach was a jerk.  Mr. Drummond told the coach off.  Then, I watched an episode where a baseball coach wanted to recruit Willis but Mr. Drummond didn’t approve of the coach’s tactics.  Mr. Drummond was kind of a busy body.

Gordon Ramsay’s Secret Service (Hulu)

Gordon Ramsay helped a restaurant that was owned by a woman and only employed women.  The owner said that her goal was to empower women.  So, of course, she brought in Gordon Ramsay to save the restaurant.  This restaurant had a dead rat in the kitchen.  Close that place down!

The Prisoner (Night Flight Plus)

I watched two more episodes on Saturday night.  Rover is my favorite character.

Untold: The Fall of Favre (Netflix)

I watched this Netflix documentary earlier today.  It was about how Brett Favre went from being a beloved football hero to a somewhat shady figure of scandal.  It really didn’t dive that deeply into the story but I guess it worked as a reminder that a celebrity’s public self is often far different from their private self.

Untold: Johnny Football (Netflix)

Johnny Manziel was trending on twitter for some reason so Erin and I decided to watch this Netflix documentary about him.  The documentary explored why Johnny Manziel failed to make much of an impression as a professional football player.  The main reason would appear to be that he was kind of dumb.

Untold: Malice at the Palace (Netflix)

This was a documentary about a brawl that broke out during a basketball game.  It was interesting to watch, even though I’m not really into basketball.  Both the fans and the players came across as being spoiled and immature.  I recognized Metta World Peace from his brief stint on Celebrity Big Brother.

Watched and Reviewed Elsewhere:

  1. 1st and Ten
  2. The American Short Story
  3. CHiPs
  4. Degrassi High
  5. Fantasy Island
  6. Freddy’s Nightmares
  7. Good Morning, Miss Bliss (Review will drop in 90 minutes)
  8. Highway to Heaven
  9. Homicide: Life On The Street
  10. The Love Boat
  11. Miami Vice
  12. Pacific Blue
  13. St. Elsewhere

 

 

The Hong Kong Film Corner – THE WHITE STORM (2013), starring Lau Ching-Wan, Louis Koo and Nick Cheung!

Posted on by Bradley Crain

THE WHITE STORM (2013) centers around three lifelong friends and police officers in the Hong Kong Narcotics Bureau: Chief Inspector Ma (Lau Ching-Wan), undercover agent So (Louis Koo), and Inspector Cheung (Nick Cheung). The story follows their mission to take down a powerful Thai drug lord, Eight-Faced Buddha (Hoi Pang-Lo), in a high-stakes undercover operation. So, tired of his undercover work and wanting to just go home and take care of his pregnant wife, finds himself in more and more danger as the operation unfolds. A botched raid in Thailand leads to an impossible choice for Ma that comes with devastating consequences for the three friends. Five years later, those who survived must overcome feelings of guilt and betrayal in a final attempt to bring down the drug lord.

I enjoy director Benny Chan’s THE WHITE STORM for two primary reasons. First, THE WHITE STORM is a modern example of the “heroic bloodshed” genre of action film that was so popular in Hong Kong in the 80’s and 90’s, beginning with the John Woo / Chow Yun-Fat classic, A BETTER TOMORROW (1986). This genre is defined by stylized violence, as well as themes of brotherhood, loyalty, and extremely difficult moral dilemmas. THE WHITE STORM definitely delivers on the stylized violence inherent in the genre, giving us even bigger action set-pieces based on the expectations of more modern audiences. While not necessarily as innovative as John Woo’s best work, the action sequences are exciting and further develop the emotional dynamics between the main characters. The central emotional conflict at hand in THE WHITE STORM seems to be the value of friendship versus each of the cop’s civic duties to stop a drug trade that is crippling Hong Kong. In the best heroic bloodshed tradition, the characters are continually forced to make impossible decisions that may be for the greater good, but are bad for somebody. These decisions lead to a lot of melodrama over the course of the film, but the drama is done well for the most part. 

A “heroic bloodshed” film like THE WHITE STORM cannot possibly work without strong performances, and Benny Chan gets excellent work from some of Hong Kong’s best actors. Lau Ching-Wan’s stoic intensity, Louis Koo’s conflicted desperation, and Nick Cheung’s emotional vulnerability create a chemistry that sells the “brotherhood” of our main characters. It’s a delicate balancing act as each character has their own motivations for their actions, but we can understand where they are coming from and still believe that they truly care about each other. Of course, this emotional connection makes the film that much harder to watch as the story heads into more tragic directions.

Overall, THE WHITE STORM is a solid action film that showcases excellent action scenes and emotionally satisfying drama, delivered by some of Hong Kong’s best actors. If you’re a fan of the Hong Kong’s heroic bloodshed genre, in my opinion, it’s a worthy addition and a must-watch. 

THE WHITE STORM is currently steaming on Tubi. I’ve included the trailer below:

The TSL Grindhouse: Bummer (dir by William Alan Castleman)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1973 film Bummer tells the story of a California rock band known as The Group.

The Group plays groovy music with a mellow feel.  The music they play doesn’t sound so much like actual 70s California rock as much as it sounds like what someone from the big band era would have assumed mellow 70s California rock sounded like.  The Group is led by the charismatic Duke (Kipp Whitman).  The lead guitarist and the drummer look like groovy dudes as well.  But then there’s Butts (played by the great character actor, Dennis Burkley), the bass player.  Butts is a big fat slop with a beard, unwashed hair, and a genuine aura of grime.  Duke’s girlfriend tells Duke that he really should kick Butts out of the band.  The problem is that Duke owns the van that the Group travels around in.  It’s the type of 70s van that was probably nicknamed “The Second Base Mobile.”

Well, Duke really should have considered kicking Butts out of the band because it turns out that Butts is crazy.  He’s a sociopath with a mother fixation and, when he realizes that he’s the only member of the band who isn’t getting laid on a regular basis, he goes crazy and starts assaulting and murdering groupies.

It’s a bummer!

This film was produced by David Friedman, the genial sexploitation producer who is best-known for his collaborations with Herschell Gordon Lewis.  Lewis did not direct Bummer and I have to say that I was a little bit surprised to discover that because there’s a scene at a strip club that goes on for so long and which features so many pointless close-ups of pervy men staring up at the dancers that I immediately assumed that Lewis must have, at the very least, snuck onto the set and supervised it.  Instead, the film was directed by William Allen Castleman, who also did directed Johnny Firecloud and The Erotic Adventures of Zorro.  So be it.  I’m still convinced that Lewis has something to do with this movie.

Bummer is one of those films about how wasteful the younger generation is, with their mellow rock music and their bongs and their groupies.  The film’s main message seems to be that anyone under the age of 30 is intellectually vapid and spiritually empty but at least they look good without their clothes on.  It’s a mix of exploitation and nostalgia.  “You know who didn’t murder groupies?” the film seems to be saying, “Glenn Miller, that’s who.”

The film is pretty dull.  Scenes drag.  It takes forever for any sort of plot to develop.  Most of the cast is forgettable but Dennis Burkley makes an impression as the unhinged bass player and watching him in this, it’s easy to understand why be became such a busy character actor.  There’s an authentic edge to Burkley, one that comes through even in this film.  One of the groupies is played by Carol Speed, who would later appear in Disco Godfather and warn people about the dangers of “whack attack.”  Oddly enough, the film looks surprisingly good.  Cinematographer Gary Graver worked on films like this in between working on Orson Welles’s The Other Side Of The Wind.

In the end, Bummer lives up to its title.

Retro Television Review: The American Short Story #9: Soldier’s Home

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Saturdays, I will be reviewing The American Short Story, which ran semi-regularly on PBS in 1974 to 1981.  The entire show can be purchased on Prime and found on YouTube and Tubi.

This week, we have an adaptation of a short story by Ernest Hemingway.

Episode #9 “Soldier’s Home”

(Dir by Robert Young, originally aired in 1977)

Having gone from attending college to serving in the Army during the Great War, Harold Krebs (Richard Backus) returns home to Oklahoma.  He arrives home later than most of the other soldiers who served.  (He stayed in Europe until 1919.)  As a result, there’s no big parade waiting for him.  Everyone in town seems to have moved beyond the war and they no longer have much of a desire to talk about it.

Harold, who was once a popular and optimistic member of the town’s social set, no longer feels that he fits in.  He feels detached, watching people as they go about their lives but never feeling any desire to join them.  His mother (Nancy Marchand) pushes him to go out and date and have a good time but Harold feels lost, regardless of how much she prays for him.

Ernest Hemingway’s short story was one of the first to realistically deal with the feelings of soldiers returning from combat.  Though Harold doesn’t talk much about his experiences, one can tell that he saw and experienced things that left him scarred.  After surviving the horror of The Great War, there’s no way Harold can just slip back into his normal routine.

The adaptation sticks closely to Hemingway’s story.  Unfortunately, it doesn’t really find the visual style necessary to capture the power of Hemingway’s words.  Hemingway was a deceptively simple storyteller and Robert Young’s film is a fairly straight-forward portrait of a young man who doesn’t want to do anything, one that fails to truly capture the subtext of Hemingway’s story.  Richard Backus’s blank-eyed acting style worked well when he was playing a member of the undead in Deathdream but, in this one, he just makes ennui seem boring and petulant.  Nancy Marchand, not surprisingly, is far stronger in the role of his well-meaning but clueless mother.

As was almost always the case when it came to attempts to adapt Hemingway, it’s best just to read the original.

20 Films For The Weekend (8/2/25)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Here’s twenty films for this weekend!  It’s the start of a new month and that means there’s some new movies to chose from on your favorite streaming services.

10 New(-ish) Arrivals

Let’s start with a few Scorsese films.

Over the course of his long career, Martin Scorsese has only received one Oscar for Best Director and that was for directing The Departed (2006).  The Departed is also the only Scorsese film to win an Oscar for Best Picture.  For the longest time, I was kind of annoyed by that fact because Scorsese has definitely made better films than The Departed.  That said, The Departed has grown on me with subsequent viewings and I now appreciate it a lot more than I did originally.  Jack Nicholson’s performance — his final performance that can really be called great — is a devilish delight.  Matt Damon is wonderfully amoral.  Leonardo DiCaprio’s performance seemed shrill the first time I watched the film but I’ve come to better appreciate it as a portrait of growing instability and paranoia.  Mark Wahlberg brings some subtle humor to his profane cop.  Even Martin Sheen and Alec Baldwin are better than usual!  The Departed is now on Netflix.

Raging Bull (1980) tells the story of boxer Jake LaMotta (Robert De Niro), a brute of a man who is only capable of communicating through his fists.  Raging Bull is not one of my favorite Scorsese films, just because LaMotta himself is such an abusive jerk that I find it hard to really care about him, regardless of how good of a performance Robert De Niro gives in the role.  To me, the film is far more interesting when it concentrates on Cathy Moriarty as LaMotta’s abused wife and Joe Pesci as LaMotta’s brother.  That said, the film’s black-and-white cinematography is gorgeous, the fight scenes are brutal, and the final scenes of LaMotta as an overweight night club comic have a certain karmic justice to them.  It’s a testament to Scorsese’s talent that he can make even a film about someone like Jake LaMotta compelling.  Raging Bull is on Prime.

The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) is one of my favorite Scorsese films.  It’s a long and chaotic film but it totally draws you into its world and it features not only Leonardo DiCaprio’s best performance but also excellent work from Margot Robbie, Kyle Chandler, Matthew McConaughey, and Jonah Hill.  I know that some critics have complained that the film doesn’t explicitly tell the viewer what to think of DiCaprio’s Jordan Belfort but I think they miss the point.  Scorsese trusts the viewer to be able to come to their own conclusions about Jordan Belfort.  If Belfort’s lifestyle wasn’t fun, he wouldn’t have gone to so much trouble to preserve it.  As well, Belfort may be a crook but he’s absolutely right when he calls out Kyle Chandler’s SEC agent for just being a frustrated broker.  The Wolf of Wall Street is now on Tubi.

Last week was Arnold Schwarzenegger’s birthday.  Conan The Barbarian (1982) features a perfectly-cast Schwarzenegger as Robert E. Howard’s famous barbarian.  John Milius was the perfect director to bring this character and his world to life and, even if you’re not a fan of Arnie’s, it’s hard to resist a film that features James Earl Jones as the leader of a snake cult.  Conan is now on Prime.

Conan the Destroyer (1984) is a sequel that was not directed by John Milius.  Instead, it was directed by Richard Fleischer, who is almost Milius’s exact opposite when it comes to filmmaking.  Milius had a vision.  Fleischer directs like a man on a deadline.  Whereas the first Conan was a grim and serious barbarian epic, Conan the Destroyer features Conan punching a camel and getting spun around in a circle by a lizard monster.  That said, Conan the Destroyer is campy but enjoyably silly.  It’s best to think of it is a stand-alone film and not a continuation of Milius’s epic.  Conan The Destroyer is on Prime.

With all of the back-to-school sales starting, this might be a good time to revisit Shermer, Ohio.  The directorial debut of John Hughes, Sixteen Candles (1984) is a film that, today, tends to be dismissed as being problematic.  In many ways, it definitely is but you know what?  I can forgive the film its less-than-tasteful moments because Sixteen Candles captures something that feels very real.  I defy anyone to watch this film and not relate to Samantha Becker (Molly Ringwald).  If your heart doesn’t melt a little when Jake Ryan says he’s looking for true love, you don’t have a heart.  Sixteen Candles is definitely a product of its time.  Today, parents have a thousand apps available to them to make sure they never forget a birthday.  That said, the film still captures the timeless feeling of being young, annoyed, and in love.  Sixteen Candles is on Prime.

Fast Times At Ridgemont High (1982)  is one of the greatest high school films ever made, one that may be dated but which still captures the universal experiences of being young and confused with an empathy and an honesty that few films have ever been able to match.  It’s a comedy but it’s also a drama, much like high school itself.  Jennifer Jason Leigh gives one of her best performances.  Judge Reinhold’s life goes downhill.  Sean Penn is so hilarious that it’s odd to consider how serious almost all of later work would be.  Forest Whitaker, Nicolas Cage and Eric Stoltz make their film debuts.  Robert Romanus’s Mike Damone is the wannabe bad boy who, had I been in highs school in 1982, I probably would have crushed on to my eternal regret.  How could you abandon Stacy like that, Damone!?  Fast Times At Ridgemont High is on Netflix.

From director Catherine Hardwicke, Thirteen (2003) is a harrowing coming of age story, one that I always kind of cringe at while watching just because of how much I relate to it.  I was a handful when I was thirteen.  Every time I watch this movie, I wish my mom was still here so I could apologize to her.  That said, Thirteen is a good film that features excellent performances from Evan Rachel Wood and Holly Hunter.  Thirteen is on Netflix.

I’ve always wanted to like Clueless (1995) more than I actually do but it’s still a likable and influential high school film.  (When I first saw it, I assumed that, when I started high school, it would be just like the one in Clueless.  Was I ever depressed to discover that my family didn’t live in Beverly Hills!)  Director Amy Heckerling brings the same empathy to her characters that she previously brought to Fast Times At Ridgemont High.  Seen today, Alicia Silverstone’s tendency to oversell every moment gets on my nerves but the performances of Paul Rudd and Brittany Murphy hold up well.  Young Lisa has a massive crush on Breckin Meyer.  Stop laughing.  Clueless is on Netflix.

10 Things I Hate About You (1999) is the perfect high school romance.  Heath Ledger singing in the stands, Julia Stiles reciting her poem, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Larisa Oleynik having their own little love story, this is a film that makes me smile and cry every time I watch it.  This is an adaptation of Shakespeare that’s worthy of the association.  It’s now on Hulu.

10 Odds and Ends

Today is Dinosaur Day.  While some people might observe this day by rewatching one of the Jurassic Park films, I’m going to recommend a charmingly low-budget film called Planet of Dinosaurs (1977).  In the far future, a group of human crash land on a planet that has a lot in common with Earth.  They soon find themselves being preyed upon by dinosaurs!  The stop-motion dinosaurs are really charming in their own way.  This silly but enjoyable film can be viewed on Tubi.

Yesterday was Spider-Man Day.  In the late 70s, there was a Spider-Man television series, starring Nicholas Hammond as the man who could climb any wall.  This led to three Spider-Man made-for-television movies, Spider-Man (1977), Spider-Man Strikes Back (1978), and Spider-Man: The Dragon’s Challenge (1981).  The movies are a bit uneven but I like Nicholas Hammond’s performance as Spider-Man and the first film featured an enjoyably villainous turn from character actor Thayer David.  These three movies are very much a product of their time and it’s interesting to compare them to what’s coming out of Disney and Marvel today.  Spider-Man, Spider-Man Strikes Back, and Spider-Man: The Dragon’s Challenge can all be viewed on YouTube.

Robert Altman’s Fool For Love (1985) is an adaptation of a Sam Shepard play, one that stars Shepard himself.  Kim Basinger, Randy Quaid, and Harry Dean Stanton also appear in this southwestern love story.  The film can’t quite escape its theatrical origins but Shepard, Quaid, and Stanton all give excellent performances.  (Basinger is good but doesn’t quite have as much romantic chemistry with Shepard as one would hope.)  This film was a part of Cannon’s ultimately unsuccessful effort to escape its reputation for producing violent schlock.  Personally, I like it.  Shepard was both a great writer and a great actor and this film proves it.  It can be viewed on Tubi.

The Cutting Edge (1992) is a personal favorite of mine.  A hockey player learns how to become an Olympic figure skater.  An Olympic figure skater learns how to loosen up and enjoy life.  Moira Kelly and D.B. Sweeney are so adorable together that you can’t help but smile when Kelly realizes that she’d rather be with Sweeney than with her boyfriend, Stuffy Q.  McBorington.  Not many films make me cheer but this one does.  Go for the gold, USA!  The Cutting Edge is on Tubi.

Bring It On (2000) is another favorite of mine and my sister’s.  Erin was a cheerleader at our high school.  I was asked but I turned down the opportunity because I was trying to do the whole emo thing.  It’s probably for the best.  Erin was the greatest cheerleader ever but I’m a natural-born klutz.  As for the film, it’s great.  Kirsten Dunst, Eliza Dushku, Jesse Bradford, and Gabrielle Union all bring a lot unexpected depth to their roles.  Spirit fingers!  Bring It On is on Tubi.

Over the Edge (1979) is a far darker portrait of being a teenager.  In a desolate Colorado “planned’ community, a group of directionless teens finally rebel while their parents are all at a meeting about what to do about their children.  Young Matt Dillon is incredibly charismatic as a doomed teen.  Harry Northup plays Doberman, the cop of everyone’s nightmares.  The climax is violent, disturbing, and — considering how terrible the grown-ups are in this movie — totally understandable.  This a powerful and ultimately sad movie.  Oh, Child, things are going to get easier….  Over the Edge is on Tubi.

Lovers of conspiracy theories should be happy to know that Peter Hyams’s deliriously paranoid and enjoyably absurd Capricorn One (1977) is on Tubi!  Hal Holbrook fakes a mission to Mars.  Astronauts James Brolin, Sam Waterston, and OJ Simpson are considered to be expendable.  OJ eats a snake!  Elliott Gould investigates the case!  Karen Black and Telly Savalas have bizarre cameos.  Peter Hyams is a filmmaker who deserves more attention than he gets.  This film is a hundred times more effective than it has any right to be and it’s on Tubi.

Finally, Gotti (2018) has a terrible reputation but I find it oddly compelling.  Whether it was the director’s intention or not, the film does force us to consider how someone like John Gotti could go from being a brutal gangster to becoming an almost beloved cultural institution.  (Remember Growing Up Gotti?)  So, sure …. I’ll defend Gotti.  It’s less a film about John Gotti and more a film about those of us watching and our fascination with gangsters.  It’s most intriguing moments may be accidental but so be it.  The fact that John Travolta’s Gotti gets visibly older through the film while his son always remains in his mid-20s is your first clue not to take the film literally.  Gotti can be viewed on Tubi.

Click here to check out last week’s movies!

Song of the Day: Now You’re All Alone by David Hess

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today’s song of the day comes from Wes Craven’s infamous Last House On The Left.  Of course, many people might know it better from it’s use in Quentin Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight.

This haunting piece of music was composed by David Hess, who played the murderous Krug in Craven’s film.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Freddy’s Nightmares 1.2 “It’s A Miserable Life”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Freddy’s Nightmares, a horror anthology show which ran in syndication from 1988 to 1990. The entire series can be found on Plex!

Let’s see what’s happening in Springwood!

Episode 1.2 “It’s A Miserable Life”

(Dir by Tom McLoughlin, originally aired on October 16th, 1988)

Bryan Ross (a young John Cameron Mitchell, giving a performance that really can’t be described as being anything less than lousy) is the son of the owner of the Beefy Boy hamburger joint in Springwood, Ohio.  Bryan wants to go to college.  His dad (Peter Iacangelo) and his mom (Annie O’Donnell) want him to take over the family business and join them in singing “Chew me, eat me, you can’t beat me.”

Bryan is working the overnight shift alone when a scruffy man (Michael Melvin) pulls up to the drive-through on his motorcycle and threatens to kill him.  Bryan passes out but, when he wakes up, he’s got a throbbing headache and he keeps seeing blood dripping on the floor.  Bryan’s girlfriend, Karyn (Lar Park Lincoln, giving a good performance), takes Bryan home.  At his house, Bryan discovers his mom and dad are acting weird.  Bryan tries to convince his parents to let him leave home.  Dad tries to stick his head in the oven.  Mom tries to seduce her son and then climbs into the refrigerator.  On the radio, there’s a news story about “another” drive-by shooting.  What could it all mean!?

Oh, you know what it all means.  Even if you haven’t watched the episode, you know that the motorcycle man obviously shot Bryan in the head and everything that happens after Bryan leaves Beefy Boy is just his dying vision.  It’s not a bad idea but it’s ineffectively executed.  We don’t really know enough about Bryan or his parents for Bryan’s hallucination to carry any impact and, from what we do see, they all appear to be broadly-drawn caricatures.   This episode also commits the sin of introducing a memorable character — the man on the motorcycle — and then not exploring just who or what he was meant to be.

Bryan’s story was wrapped up in 20 minutes.  The second half of the episode dealt with Karyn.  Shot in the same drive-by attack that killed Bryan, Karyn ended up at the hospital and …. well, I guess her story was another collection of hallucinations that really didn’t add up to much.  The story was effective because hospitals are scary and Lar Park Lincoln gave a better performance than John Cameron Mitchell did in his story.  That said, the entire story was basically Karyn getting upset because everyone kept saying that her parents were on their way.  Finally, Karyn finally revealed that — you guessed it! — her parents were dead and that they died at the same hospital where she was taken after getting shot.  As the episode ended, Karyn saw her parents standing in the doorway and screamed and thrashed around in bed while the doctor and nurse tried to calm her.  And …. that was it.  I mean, is Karyn dead?  Is that why her parents showed up?  Is Karyn hallucinating again?  Much like a drunk frat boy, this story didn’t reach a climax as much as it just stopped.

As for Freddy, he showed up to introduce each story.  There was a cool moment where he emerged from the restaurant’s fry cooker.  For the hospital scene, he put on scrubs.  He didn’t actually interact with either Bryan or Karyn but he still took credit for their suffering.  I think Freddy was just bragging on himself.

This episode was pretty uneven.  For the most part, I’m just glad I don’t live in Springwood.

Retro Television Review: St. Elsewhere 2.9 “AIDS and Comfort”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing St. Elsewhere, a medical show which ran on NBC from 1982 to 1988.  The show can be found on Hulu and, for purchase, on Prime!

This week, St. Elsewhere makes history.

Episode 2.9 “AIDS and Comfort”

(Dir by Victor Lobl, originally aired on December 21st, 1983)

A city councilman named Anthony Gifford (Michael Brandon) has checked into St. Eligius under an assumed name.  He’s complaining about fatigue.  His lymph nodes are swollen.  His immune system seems to be shutting down.  Dr. White and Dr. Westphall look at the man’s x-rays and Dr. White says that it looks like Gifford might be suffering from a newly discovered disease that no one knows much about.  The name of that disease is AIDS.

“Could he be …. gay?”  Dr. White asks.

Westphall initially scoffs.  He points out that Gifford is married and has two children.  When Gifford is asked directly about his personal life, he admits to having affairs but is quick to say that they were all with women.  Westphall later says that Gifford is either lying or they’ve discovered something entirely new about the virus and they need to call the CDC….

Today, with all we know about HIV and AIDS, it’s a bit jarring to hear some of the dialogue in this episode.  Doing some research, I discovered that this was the first ever episode of network television to deal with the AIDS epidemic and that it aired at a time when there were still a lot of unanswered questions about how the disease was spread.  (For instance, the episode aired shortly after the HIV virus has been discovered.)

When words get out that Gifford is a patient at the hospital and that he has AIDS, panic erupts.  No one donates to the hospital’s blood drive because they’re scared the needles have somehow gotten infected.  Even usually sympathetic characters — like Luther and Dr. Fiscus — refuse to be anywhere near the isolation ward.  Gifford’s doctor, Peter White, requests that Gifford’s case be given to another doctor.  Later, White asks everyone is Westphall is mad at him.  Morrison replies that White acted unethically.  White blames his wife and her fears of him contracting the disease by being in the same room as Gifford.  (Not surprisingly, White is also the one who, because he won’t stop whining about his job, is responsible for word spreading about Gifford having AIDS.)

After spending nearly the entire episode denying it, Gifford finally admits to having had affairs with other men.  As he leaves the isolation ward, he’s besieged by reporters.  Getting in the elevator, he sees that someone has spray-painted “AIDS” on the wall.  Before he leaves, he asks Westphall how long he has.  Westphall grimly replies that most AIDS patients die within two years.

Later, while talking to Dr. Craig and Nurse Rosenthal, Westphall says, “Yeah, I know that’s how I felt about it at first. Then I started to think, Who am I? Why should any of us be penalized, fatally, for choosing a certain lifestyle, especially when you realize that it all boils down to chance anyway? And I tell you something I don’t give a damn for all this talk about morality and vengeful gods and all that. If you have AIDS, you’re sick, you need help. That’s all that matters. And that’s why we’re here, right?”

And yes, it’s a bit jarring to hear Westphall refer to being a gay as a “choosing a certain lifestyle,” but you again you have to consider when this episode aired and that it was also the first network television show to feature a storyline about AIDS.  When this episode aired, saying that “If you have AIDS, you’re sick, you need help …. that’s all that matters,” took a certain amount of courage.  For many viewers, this episode was probably the first they ever really heard about AIDS.

This episode dealt very honestly with AIDS.  It actually helped that all of the character didn’t have the type of “perfect” reaction that television shows often present characters as having.  Even Dr. Westphall, usually presented as being this show’s beacon of moral clarity, had to deal with his own prejudices.  When it comes to a controversial topic, television shows too often portray their lead characters as being saints.  This episode portrayed the staff of St. Elsewhere as being flawed and imperfect and, as such, it was a very effective and thought-provoking hour.

Scenes That I Love: The Underground Chaos From Skyfall

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today, the Shattered Lens wishes a happy birthday to director Sam Mendes!

Now, it’s true that Sam Mendes won an Oscar for directing American Beauty and he probably came close to winning a second one for his work on 1917.  However, my favorite Mendes film remains Skyfall.  Skyfall is one of the best of the Bond films and I say this as someone who was never really a fan of Daniel Craig’s mopey interpretation of the character.  Based on his previous films, Sam Mendes may not have been the first name that come to mind when people talked about someone who could make a great Bond film but, with Skyfall, he did just that.

Here, in a scene that I love, James Bond pursues Silva (Javier Bardem) through the London Underground.  It’s very suspenseful, very droll, and, most importantly, very British.