Aaron Retroband posted a story of a documentary called “Jasper Mall”. Something about it told me to see if it was on Prime, lo and behold. The premise sounded interesting; basically about a dying mall in Jasper, Alabama. Probably one of the most depressing documentaries I’ve ever watched. It’s nothing at all intense. Kinda mundane, actually. But it just feels like you’re watching these random people’s lives fall apart as this mall succumbs to societal emptiness and needlessness of a mall.
Had a look at the first eps of three shows on Netflix tonight: The Forest of Love: Deep Cut, The Naked Director and Re:Mind. Forcing myself to wait until tomorrow to continue with the first two, undecided if I'm going to bother going forward with the third.
I’m retracting this post Two episodes, light entertainment Three episodes, Jeff Goldblum’s quirkiness can border on irkiness (made it up, should be a word) Four episodes, he isn’t likeable, he is actually quite annoying Five, he must have self funded this television road kill Six... oh I give up... Ultimately, it fails where so many factual programs, hosted by actors, falter: they simply cannot entertain the idea that the subject may be more interesting than they are. Therefore, the actor makes it about themselves and the topic, and any interesting insight, gets sacrificed and abandoned on the alter of their egos.
Crime Scene: The Vanishing at Cecil Hotel was equal parts mysterious and weird, and sad. I’d known about the infamous elevator video and the woman in it subsequently goin’ missing, but this docuseries illuminated a lot I never paid any mind towards diggin’ into. Whether you’re familiar with the case or not, it’s an interesting four episode watch.
I'm two episodes into Lambs Of God and really enjoying it. Contained chaos? The three fates vs modernity? Again, I think In & Of Itself is a must-watch. A magic show with stories of mindfulness and humanism. Film-wise I enjoyed A Prayer Before Dawn recently. It does take patience as it is mostly in Thai and purposely without subs.
I'm starting to buy into Wanda Vision on Disney+. I'm not a big Marvel person so I think that was one strike against me initially. Plus it didn't seem like there was any context for where it was going the first couple episodes. But it was just strange enough that I kept watching. I've caught up through episode 6 and I'm pretty invested in the series. It's very unique which I can't say about too many things.
A couple documentaries I watched over the last few days: “Made You Look: A True Story About Fake Art” Despite my wholehearted detest for the “fine art” world I do find documentaries about them interesting at times, particularly when it highlights a bit of what I consider the pretentiousness and up - the - assness of it. This one revolves around an incredibly elaborate “fine art” forgery scheme of fakes being sold as legitimates for millions. Very, very interesting doc, though majority of the interviewees were deplorable to my ears. “Biggie: I Got A Story to Tell” This was an amazing watch. Growin’ up so much of the world was limited to TV and magazine interviews of B.I.G. and his stories bein’ told mainly through his music. This doc had a lot of fantastic interviews from people that grew up with him; best friends, people that hustled with him, his mother, his grandmother, local mentors, etc. Very focused on just him as a person and as an artist. Highly recommended.
My wife and I checked that out a little while ago. We really liked it. Seems like an odd choice to release that show during a pandemic. Haha.
So good indeed! Currently doing a rerun of the show after I read the books. It might be the best sci-fi TV show ever and I cannot understand how this does not get more fanfare. It has been even on the brink of cancellation. What's wrong with people?
It started on Syfy for the first few seasons. Then it got canned, and because Overlord Bezos is such a big fan, Amazon picked it up.
Just started reading Tiamat's Wrath the other night. I've been enjoying the books for quite a while. Initially I only kinda liked the show because the characters didn't match my mental image of them, but that fell to the side and I've really enjoyed the show ever since s2.
^^^Hopefully it's better than that doc about the missing lady at the hotel in LA. Looks like they actually have a real story to tell, rather than conjecture that was easily proven false.
@---NT--- I think Crime Scene: Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel was good for casuals like myself that were aware of the elevator video from years ago, but not at all what had subsequently followed immediately after her body was found. I never looked into it past the whole “spooky security” footage when I first saw it, so it was interesting to see the life it took on with the obsessive Internet personalities and speculators and conspiracists. This Murder Among the Mormons, though. Whew. One hell of a story, in my opinion.
I didn't know anything about the Cecil story, so from my perspective it was all like "OMG, this lady vanished in mysterious, spooky ways! Haha - gotcha! We withheld all the real info from you and spoon-fed you conspiracy theories before giving you the actual, not-that-interesting details." I do agree that, in this time of hyper-conspiracy, seeing the "internet sleuths" getting wrapped up in it was an interesting, cautionary tale of how easy it is to deep-dive into baseless conspiracy. If that was the focus, rather than the actual vanishing, I think it would have been a much better series.
The Cecil suffered from what a lot of docudramas on Netflix suffer from - what was said could have been done so in 25% of the time they took to do it in and it would have been all the better for it. Night Stalker was similar, although if I'm being fair, that had less filler and only felt like they could have cut four episodes down to two/two and a half. I guess the editors get pressure to bulk up the content to maximise length, to give the impression of large quantities of content (specifically unique content). I've bookmarked The Mormons as one to watch
@---NT--- @Mr Fox Agreed on the vanishing aspect being dragged a bit. I think that was on account of how believed and spread it was by bored conspirators and internet obsessives, paired with it even going so far as to painting the black metal artist as the undoubted killer. I wasn’t necessarily bored of it, but I did take notice of how much it was driven into the ground before getting to the actual source of her disappearance. Seeing the submitted videos of people showing up and staying in the hotel, years after the incident, acting like they’d somehow discover something new and solve the case, was pretty irritating. I do feel like the actual case itself could’ve been presented with the video, theories and proof in maybe two episodes, but demonstrating how polarizing it, and similar cases, became was a good source of entertainment, and even history of Skid Row and the Cecil itself. The doc took on several lives of its own; like side quests to the main Cecil subject.
Yeah, the history of the Cecil and the area in general made the show worthwhile for me. I even liked all the conspiracy stuff - I just didn't like how the producers presented it as being a mysterious disappearance when it wasn't. But I suspect you guys are right that they had to pad it out in order to hit an agreed to number of episodes. Which reminds me - Dirty John anyone? It's a podcast, but I think there's actually a show based on the story (dramatized, not docutized). We would go on weekend drives during the winter to get out of the house, and listened to the podcast over the course of a few drives. It was a little repetitive, which felt like padding in order to hit standard episode lengths. But otherwise it was an enjoyable podcast to listen to. Do we have a podcast thread?
Yup! Quite neglected. Bump it, please. Reminds me, any of you down with Homecoming? An excellent narrative fiction podcast from Gimlet, spun into an excellent tv show on Prime. Worth a listen and a watch, I'd say. Mr. Robot fans take note, as the first season of the filmed venture was helmed by Sam Esmail.
