My Top Three This Week
Greetings to all my semi-constant readers. In past years we have always said that November was the month of gratitude and giving thanks. I think we can add hope to this.I am grateful and hopeful that in the months ahead good things are coming. Christmas is on the horizon, but in the meantime I have some Fall favorites for you.
1) The Undoing ( streaming on HBO Max) is only three episodes in and I cannot wait for the next one. This thriller starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Grant as Grace and Jonathan Frazer a wealthy , happily married New York couple. She is a clinical therapist and he is a talented oncologist and they have a well adjusted son in a private elite school. But then her husband goes missing and a mother from the school is found murdered and her neat and tidy life is blown to pieces. Jonathan was keeping a lot of secrets from his wife and Grace is thrown into a whirlwind of deceit, a murder investigation and an illicit affair. Written and directed by David E. Kelley ,this is a ever deepening psychological thriller and Kidman is at her best as Grace and breathes life into every scene and Grant is fantastic as a smarmy doctor. Some other greats in this is the beloved Donald Sutherland as Grace's father and Edgar Ramirez as Detective Joe Mendoza. This is a high recommend .
2) Utopia streaming on Prime is a hallucinogenic acid trip in the best possible way. Members of an online chat room are obsessed with this graphic novel called Dystopia that features a young girl named Jessica Hyde who has been fighting to stay alive while her scientist father is forced to create world ending viruses ( too close to home right now, just wait) for some very powerful people to keep her alive. The motley crew have become so entangled in the story and the easter eggs embedded that when a new novel is unearthed called Utopia and is being auctioned off at a convention they agree to meet in person and buy it. It turns out that Jessica Hyde is real, the story is real and people are being murdered to find her and get their hands on the pages from the story. This is one of the most gory, trippy series I have seen and it is riveting. There are some great actors in this. John Cusack, Rainn Wilson. Camryn Manheim. But some of lesser known young actors Ashleigh LaThrop, Dan Byrd (Cougar Town) Farrah MacKenzie, Desmin Borges (fantastic Ross Geller energy) and Sasha Bianca Lane as the unflinching Jessica Hyde. Christopher Denham is a standout as Arby in this brilliant cast.
3) Emily in Paris is my favorite guilty pleasure. A Netflix Original created by Sex and the City's Darren Star and is the perfect antidote to all the chaos in the world. Emily (Lily Collins, who happens to be Phil Collins daughter) is hired to be the American counterpart for a marketing firm in Paris. It is the perfect fish out of water story - a midwest girl coming to glamorous Paris . She is media savvy and finds herself at odds with her new team and especially her new boss Sylvie ( the wonderful Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu) who has no time for a typical American girl who speaks no French. She slowly makes a new best friend( Ashley Park-Mean Girls The Musical) and has some great flirtations basking in The City of Lights. Some beautiful cinematography and a wardrobe from Patricia Fields and witty dialogue and lots of eye candy make this a November binge.
Bonus: I Am Not Okay With This has been sitting in my Netflix queue for a while. I decided to try an episode and I was hooked. Starring two "IT" alumni Sophia Lillis and Wyatt Oleff , this is the story of Sydney, a high school girl dealing with the normal high school drama and an unfortunate situation at home. She has some anger to deal with and it is coming out in an unusual way.She has a couple of big secrets and when the uncontrollable anger starts building things start breaking , trees uproot and people get hurt. She confides in a good friend and they try to figure out how much power she has and how to control it. This is a unique take on the super hero and I enjoyed it. Lillis and Oleff have a great chemistry and Sofia Bryant shines as her best friend Dina.
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