#COVID-19 CATCH UP TV - Brave New World

Brave New World only landed in Australia mid this month, however if you were stateside you got it on my birthday, July 15, 2020. Landing on NBCUniversal streaming service Peacock as one of their first original titles. It sadly also becomes the first cancelled series.

Yes it's a nine episode one and done series based on the classic novel of the same name by Aldous Huxley. Starring Demi Moore, Alden Ehrenreich and Jessica Brown Findlay the series now joins many series in 2020 that have fallen under a more brutal axe. We have seen cancellations of renewed series be reversed like the final series of GLOW on Netflix.

Whilst today FOX wasted no time cancelling two of its summer series which ended up filling some fall gaps in the USA. Filthy Rich and NEXT (airing on Foxtel in Australia) have both been given the axe after 5 and 2 episodes respectively.

Back to the utopian society that calls New London home. So the show looks a million bucks (maybe one of the reasons the show has been scrapped) but it does lack substance.

The show has had mixed reviews at best and I wonder whether some of these new streaming services will have enough material in the bag to survive in the long time.

Apple TV+ is already extending peoples free subscription periods. I feel this is mainly due to the lack of content already rolled out by the tech company.

STAN has delivered some good content during this #COVID-19 CATCH UP TV season, however Brave New World is not the best offering, maybe give my new obsession PEN15 a go.

#COVID-19 CATCH UP TV - I Hate Suzie

I Hate Suzie is a British drama television series created by Lucy Prebble and Billie Piper, starring Piper as an actress whose life is thrown into turmoil when her phone is hacked and compromising photographs of her are leaked. 

The series premiered on Sky Atlantic on 27 August 2020, whilst in Australia it landed the day after, late August on STAN. Late August was a strange in Australia, it was mid winter, the gyms were finally back open in NSW so my TV time started to shrink again. However I was not to know content would also start to dry up. STAN had a smart technique of just picking up whatever content it could get its hands on to have something new on the weekly.

The first episode of this series sees Billie Piper totally frantic. The episode had me feeling super anxious. The mood and tempo of the series did however slow down after episode one.

I Hate Suzie will not be everyones cup of tea, however it is very different to a lot of the other sci-fi etc buzzing around at present.

Both Prebble and Piper have previously worked together on Secret Diary of a Call Girl and the play The Effect. Secret Diary of a Call Girl was a real throwback for me, I remember buying those on the DVD sale table.

I Hate Suzie streams NOW on STAN.

COVID-Cinema 2020 - Honest Thief

Honest Thief is the latest Liam Neeson action picture. Also starring Kate Walsh, Anthony Ramos as well as Aussie born Jai Courtney.

The thriller follows a former bank robber who turns himself into authorities, only to be set up by Courtney & Ramos. No spoiler alerts but the song bad boys, bad boys, what you gonna do.... came to mind with these crooked cops.

Honest Thief actually got a cinema release overseas (which is rare these days) and felt to me like Unhinged. A special plot, but a return to more regular B grade action films that can actually get an audience. For my mid Sunday session, it was actually fairly well attended. At least half the small cinema was full. This compared with one person (me) in the last three films, this is a solid result.

Clocking in at under 100 minutes, the film does not waste time with getting to its car chases and action sequences. I love how Liam Neeson and Jai Courtney just dust themselves off falling out of a level two hotel room window.

Honest Thief is nothing super original but it was a decent trip to the cinema. If B grade action films are your thing, which for me, they are!

3 Stars.

(Mini) Monday Spotlight: Great Gable

Celebrating the brilliant Great Gable from Bunbury, Western Australia has been a while coming. The four piece released their debut album Tracing Faces back on 7 August 2020. Yes it's taken me a while to feature Alex Whiteman, Matt Preen, Chris Bye, and Callum Guy. But better late than never.

Following three EP releases in 2020 their singles, All My Friends and Blur gained significant air play on  Triple J.

Great Gable have performed at Groovin' The Moo, Falls Festival, SOTA Festival, On the House Festival and Outfield Festival. The boys from WA have also played alongside Ocean Alley, The Jungle Giants, Thelma Plum, The Jezabels and Psychedelic Porn Crumpets. 

Great Gable are also nominated for the West Australian Live Act of the Year at this years National Live Music Awards.

So let's discover your next favourite Australian act. Could it be Great Gable? See you next week for another great act under the (Mini) Monday Spotlight.

COVID-Cinema 2020 - Borat Subsequent Moviefilm

Amazon Prime dropped a Mulan sized bombshell this weekend with the release of Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.

Oh boy to be Rudy Giuliani right now. Starring Sacha Baron Cohen as Kazakh journalist & television personality Borat Sagdiyev, Baron Cohen this time around is joined by Maria Bakalova as his daughter Tutar.

Vice President Mike Pence is the main target, however its Rudy Giuliani causing all the headlines for all the wrong reasons.

The sequel to hit 2006 film Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. This film comes at a time when the world is watching America shaking their heads and asking why?

Following Who is America? Baron Cohen gives to the small screen once again bypassing the major theatres. Following the Netflix film The Boys in the Band, I have been doing cinema different this weekend.

Now depending on which side of the political fence you sit on this may rub you the wrong way. Like if you read into QAnon this might not be for you or if you think indeed Trump is making America great again, maybe flick on some Fox or Sky News (after dark).

Borat has always been wrong and crossed lines but the second in the film series appears to really push the envelope. I enjoyed this film as it was a super easy watch and the headlines really drew me in.

Amazon Prime did well to score this. Surely this will help with subscribers numbers whilst Jack Ryan and The Boys have now concluded their recent seasons.

Cinema has 100% changed in 2020, from Netflix original films being considered second rate now to be former big screen giants landing exclusively on the small screen.

Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan rates 3.5 Stars.

COVID-Cinema 2020 - The Outpost

The Outpost is the latest in my COVID-Cinema 2020 series.

With a steady stream of films now being released in Australia this is my second war film since the cinemas have reopened. The first was The Eight Hundred, a Chinese war film which I actually really enjoyed. So was this American story based on athe2012 non-fiction book, The Outpost: An Untold Story of American Valor by Jake Tapper any good?

The film is about the Battle of Kamdesh in the war in Afghanistan. Starring hunky Scott Eastwood, Caleb Landry Jones as well as Orlando Bloom this film also ending up overseas hitting the Premium VOD in place of cinemas.

Set back in  2006, PRT Kamdesh (later renamed Combat Outpost Keating) was a U.S. Army outposts in Northern Afghanistan. The outpost was located in a remote valley surrounded by the Hindu Kush mountains. Not long into the movie you realise the base was regarded as a deathtrap for the troops based at the outpost.;

The troops stationed there faced regular Taliban attacks, culminating in one of the bloodiest American engagements of Operation Enduring Freedom. 

Throughout the film we meet some of the 53 U.S. soldiers & two Latvian military advisors based at Combat Outpost Keating. The final battle scene is huge where the US soldiers battle some 400 enemy insurgents at the Battle of Kamdesh.

It's bloody its fierce and at the end there is a respectful dedication to the real life soldiers who lost their lives during the battle. All extremely young which always seems to be the way with war. This makes it even more heartbreaking for the families left behind. The movies tries to give you a look into the lives the soldiers have left behind which adds to the emotion of the film.

If you enjoy a war film, this might get you back into the cinema. We need to support our cinemas folks, this is the third film in a row I have been the only one in the session. Yes it was an early Friday morning session, but folks let's do this. Save our local cinemas and keep some uni students within employment.

3 Stars.

COVID-Cinema 2020 - The Boys in the Band

The Boys in the Band is the latest Ryan Murphy Netflix production. This time it's not a series which is why it can be categorised under COVID-Cinema 2020. Like the new Borat film this weekend on Amazon Prime, cinemas are now being bypassed more and more often.

Based on the 1968 play of the same name by Mart Crowley, the first film version landed in 1970. So fifty years later, the film stars ta number of the cast from the play's 2018 Broadway revival. The good thing is the largely all gay characters are played by exclusively openly-gay actors.

This is a first gay characters are actually 100% played by out and proud men. Jim Parsons works with Ryan Murphy again after Hollywood. Whilst Zachary Quinto, Matt Bomer, Andrew Rannells, Charlie Carver, Robin de Jesús, Brian Hutchison, Michael Benjamin Washington, and Tuc Watkins all star along side Parsons.

The film landed on Netflix on September 30, 2020. Take a look at the very bitchy trailer below.

I have to say this would have really suited the theatre. It had all the hallmarks of a play with limited setting changes and a very wordy script.

Parsons is getting a little type cast now, as a bitchy older, mean gay.

Bomer is handsome AF, however this did not help keep my attention for the entire film. It's just over two hours but did feel very long!

The big question is will Murphy's next Netflix project be any good. It's called The Prom and its out mid December this year.

The Boys in the Band might help prove the point I much prefer movies at the cinemas (call me old fashioned) but we have all had enough time at home in 2020 right?

2.5 Stars.