One Viewer’s Opinions

Posted on by

If i had access to any more TV channels I wouldn’t have time to watch the true crime story unspooling daily from Washington, DC. Admittedly there’s a lot of dross to sift through in our expanding TV multiverse, but lots of nuggets of gold to discover, too

ironically, several of my recent favorites also take as their theme crime in high places. the best of the bunch is “Babylon Berlin” set in the Weimar era and concerning a provincial cop (Volker Bruch), seconded to the capital to iron out a problem for his father, and a plucky flapper (Liv Lisa Fries) from the mean streets who ends up working alongside him to unravel a dark plot that the powers that be would rather keep hidden.

The two leads are fabulous, especially the endearing, tough as nails Fries, and the supporting cast of corrupt cops, crypto-Nazis, White Russian exiles plotting against Stalin from afar, and louche denizens of the cabaret underworld is equally fine. The historical period is brilliantly evoked in the German production for Sky Deutschland from best-selling German thrillers. Available from Netflix. And if you get hooked, two more seasons are coming.

A second European import from Amazon Prime is also well worth a look. “Riphagen” is the true story of a Dutch mobster of that name who conned Jews fleeing the Nazi occupation to entrust him with their valuables. He promptly betrayed them to the SS and pocketed the proceeds. The series alternates between flashbacks to his misdeeds and postwar efforts to bring him to justice. Jereon van Koningsbrugge as the title character embodies the villain’s combination of a beguiling ability to charm and utter ruthlessness.

Closer to home, fans of the Harry Bosch series starring Titus Welliver have a third season to enjoy, and Billy Bob Thornton is back in a second season of “Goliath” as the not quite washed-up attorney trying reluctantly to procure justice for those unlikely to get it. Both set in a dangerous Los Angeles and both from Amazon.

I probably don’t need to tell anyone to watch “This Is Us.” I came to it late and can only say I am glad to have caught up, but also to have a respite, before it returns in the fall, from the weep-a thon that had myself, my wife and daughter blubbering. There may never have been a more efficient and shameless tearjerking machine.

I moderately enjoyed “Patrick Melrose” from Showtime, but am not rushing off to read the five novels about flamboyant dysfuntion by Edward St. Aubyn from which they were adapted. And it must have taken some adapting to condense five books into five hour-long episodes. But fans of Benedict Cumberbatch and upper class British perversion won’t be disappointed.

Speaking of wealth and its corrosive effects, I have now sat through a feature film, “All the Money in the World,” and a TV series, “Trust,” concerning the kidnapping of the heir to the Getty oil fortune. The best thing about each was the actor playing the reptilian paterfamilias John Paul Getty — respectively 88-year-old Christopher Plummer and 82-year-old Donald Sutherland who put their youthful costars in the shade.

In “Trust” Getty’s cowboy-hat-and-boots wearing, Bible-quoting fixer played drolly by Brendan Frazier is noteworthy aa are the cruel, reluctant, and hapless villains. The Ridley Scott picture is played for suspense, the more flamboyant series by Danny Boyle for black comedy.

“Civilizations,” (PBS) inspired by “Civilization,” the wonderful 1969 Kenneth Clark survey of Western Art (available on YouTube by the way), tries to expand his field of focus to the entire globe and is organized around several themes rather than chronologically. Sometimes the cross-cultural connections are illuminating. Sometimes they seem to be straining to prove a point that doesn’t need to be made.

“The Fourth Estate” from Showtime is a peak inside the New York Times newsroom during their coverage of Trump’s first year. As a former denizen of Podunk papers, it is heartening to see one of the last surviving great news organizations in an industry ravaged by disruption rising to the challenge with zeal, impressive resources, and daring.

They are covering the story of a lifetime and know it, and know that getting it right matters a whole lot when the stakes are so high for the country and their own institution and profession. Doing so with brisk competition from other news hounds and deadlines starring you in the face makes the anxiety and adrenaline rush all the greater. This is the way real news-gathering works at its best, no matter how much its critics may bray ‘fake news.’

Finally, a limited British series, The Split, concerns the three daughters of a martinet mother who runs her own law firm for which one daughter works and another has left to get out from under mother’s thumb. The latter is played by Nicola Walker who is omnipresent lately. She is the farmer daughter in “Last Tango in Halifax,” the mother in the NTLive production of “The Curious Case of the Dog in the Nighttime,” a reverend torn between church and state in “Collateral,” a cop in “River,” both BBC, and a cop on the cold case squad in “Unforgotten” from ITV.

A third sister is about to get married, though she is conflicted. And their father, who vanished years ago, turns up to play father of the bride and claim a share of the business. In the brouhaha that results, it develops that, far from failing to communicate with his children for years, his wife has deliberately withheld knowledge of his attempts to stay on touch. Lies, bad faith, conniving and other soapy complications ensue in court and out. All are fun to watch a fine cast fool around with.

When you can’t stand anymore news, try these on for size.

Survivor: Singapore

Posted on by

So, who outplayed, outwitted, outlasted his opponent — Little Rocket Man or The Dotard? Though it pains me to say it, both won. It was a remarkably successful summit, so long as the viewers weren’t interested in reality from their TV.

The North Korean dictator agreed to denuclearize the Korean peninsula without defining what that means or when and how it will happen. Similar promises have been made many times over the last sixty-five years in such negotiations. Then talks drag on for years without North Korea ceding anything of significance. In the meantime, research and development on WMD can continue unimpeded and uninspected.

Trump promised sanctioned would be lifted “at a certain time” and to dial back military exercises with South Korea, as recommended by Vladimir Putin, and even used Kim Jong Un’s own description of them – “provocative.” He wouldn’t want that since the president is loath to provoke anyone, unless they are Democrats, disloyal Republicans, the news media, or members of the G-6.

Trump’s rationale for not keeping the military in a state of readiness was that it would save a lot of money. By that logic, disbanding the armed forces and surrendering would be a bonanza. No word yet from Defense Secretary Mad Dog Mattis about how the idea of strategic unpreparedness sits with him.

Trump’s own lack of preparedness was on display when he said he was stunned to learn bombers fly six hours from Guam for the exercises, which he knew was very expensive since “I know about planes.” Yes, he managed to crash and burn the Trump Shuttle in just 14 months, but walked away by defaulting on its debt. The usual Trump parachute.

Toting up the takeaways, the meeting looks like a tremendous victory in every way for North Korea. So what did we get in return? Not much. Unless you conclude that Trump was negotiating not to benefit the United States of America but its president. He got a fabulous photo op, and it only required him to spend 25 hours in a foreign country and three hours in a boring meeting.

And that was followed by a full hour-long press conference in which he could force the fake news media to watch him preen. He got to claim he had done something historic that no other president had ever done — meet with a brutal Korean dictator as an equal and give him legitimacy. This, of course, is why no previous president chose to score such a historic first.

However, Trump will be able to use this supposed breakthrough as a talking point until the November midterms, describing himself as a tough negotiator, a man who defused a deadly threat, a bringer of peace in our time. In short, Singapore can be for Trump what Munich was for Chamberlain, a proud moment for a country weary of conflict. Carping critics can be branded as warmongers, backstabbers, or tools of the fake news media.

Even better, the longer Singapore leads the news Russian election meddling, Mueller indictments, porn star lawsuits, crony capitalism won’t. So, if Singapore gives Republican candidates something to distract voters with for five months, who cares if the Potemkin deal comes to naught in December? Trump will have won what he cares about. TV time.

Of course, the “win” might have seemed more plausible, possessed a bit more gravitas, if Trump could have kept quiet or, failing that, rehearsed his act instead of ad libbing. Instead his off-script remarks revealed, as usual, how out of his depth he is on the world stage, unless he’s slapping his name on a golf course.

His press conference was pure amateur hour, a festive reprise of the favorite theme of 19th Century satirists — the innocent abroad. He bragged about showing Kim a video envisioning a world in which he could turn North Korea into South Korea, perhaps not realizing Kim aims to turn South Korea into North Korea.

He also said he shared an epiphany with Kim. While watching a video of North Korean shore batteries practicing the shelling of invaders, it came to him. Kim should get rid of the cannons and build beach front condos. It could be a gold mine, with China to the North and South Korea to the, well, South. Location, location, location. If only Churchill and Ike had sold Hitler on the condo idea, all that blood on the Normandy beaches would never have been spilled.

Asked what the timetable was for denuclearization, Trump revealed another recently acquired revelation. Scientifically, getting rid of nukes isn’t easy. Scientifically, he repeated several times, as he does when he learns a new word, “I’ve been watching and reading a lot and it does take a long time, a lot of things happen.”

Wow, if only he’d known that when he reneged on the Iran deal. Like healthcare, this nuclear stuff is harder than it looks from Trump Tower. But then he immediately took it back, suggesting that “once you start the process it means it’s pretty much over.” Translation: “I’ve done the hard part, now if it’s screwed up it’ll be Pompeo’s fault, or the pencil-neck nuclear nerds.”

Trump, the spymaster-in-chief, also let slip classified information on how North Korean targets are identified by heat signature, and the fact that maintaining sanctions is increasingly difficult since Xi Jinping has weakened enforcement of them in the last couple of months.

Not to worry, however. When asked about Kim’s vile human rights record, he said “They will be doing things.” When asked about the specifics of the agreement, he said “a lot of things are included, a lot of things are not included.” Reminded that North Korea has habitually cheated on promised disarmament deals, no problem. All is well because of him. Previously, the Koreans “never had confidence in an American president.”

One can only wonder what Kim is so confident about. How little Trump knows? How much he’ll give up if you flatter him? How easy he will be for a third generation head of a survivor dynasty to outplay, outwit and outlast? Maybe, despite Trump’s claim that “North Korea is no longer a nuclear threat,” we shouldn’t pave over the backyard bomb shelter just yet.

A Head of Lettuce

Posted on by

Here’s a sign of the times, and the shape of things to come. I needed a couple items for a dinner menu and ran into the vast food emporium near home. The few checkout lines that were manned had long queues. So, I pivoted toward the scan-it-yourself line and waved my purchases at the all-seeing eye.

All went well until I got to a head of Bibb lettuce in a plastic clamshell. The reader read the code and even recorded the price but refused to let me continue. A human’s attention was required. None were anywhere in sight. After a long wait, I finally caught the eye of a passing employee.

“What gives?” I asked a haughty young man decades my junior. He gazed at me with contempt and told me to enter the quantity. I pointed out that the head of lettuce was individually packaged, priced and bar coded. “You have to add the quantity,” he said, and punched in the number “one.”

He clearly felt the technology was only as smart as the customers, and that when the last old fool died he and his robot overlords would find life much easier. I felt the technology was only as smart as the programmers, and that the one responsible for this one had merely annoyed me, but that the odds were not insignificant of the next glitch, bug, coder’s typo or oversight, hack, or enemy assault killing me.

Already GPS devices have routed inattentive or overly trusting drivers into lakes or other dangerous situations. One self-driving car has already killed a pedestrian and another failed to identify a barrier ahead and when it got close accelerated rather than braking. This managed to total the car as thoroughly as a joyriding teen or DUI recidivist.

Despite innumerable examples of cyber devices making life more trouble rather than less (quit spying on me, Alexa!), the spread of their hegemony seems inevitable. Why? In the words of Cabaret’s Master of Ceremonies — Money, Money, Money, Money.

Scanning a lousy head of lettuce may have raised my blood pressure and made me less likely to think well of my grocery, but having a few dim-witted scanners installed is a lot cheaper than paying people to serve your customers. Remember, I was scanning in the first place because the lines were long because there were so few remaining flesh and blood employees. This is the house that silicon built.

When I was a kid, I visited a daily paper where dozens of skilled workers were sitting at clattering linotype machines setting the next day’s edition in hot type. By the time I was writing for a paper, fifteen or twenty years later, the linotypes and their compositors were gone, and phototypesetting was the rule, allowing pages to be assembly by cutting and pasting pictures of print, not actual type

A few years later, digital technology put the compositor’s job on a desktop, and moved much of it to the news department where writers and editors had to worry about layout because whole layers of unionized tradesmen had been eliminated.

It goes without saying that the savings realized in this transition did not go into the pay packets of the survivors but into those of the owners and shareholders. The victory was short-lived since free, if often unreliable, news on the internet and alternative destinations for advertising dollars destroyed the daily newspaper. One where I used to work was certainly valued in the hundreds of millions, then. What was left of it sold recently for $34 million.

Perhaps the world-altering creative destruction we are witnessing daily will create a better world. But for whom? And who will decide if whether it’s better or not? Probably not the customers or even the employees. The owners and investors perhaps, or the financial engineers, or maybe only the algorithms themselves.

The logic of the cyberverse has shown itself to be impervious to cries of compliant, disappointment, sorrow at what is being lost, suspicion of what is being gained, or even ballads that keen we have paved paradise and put up a server farm. They do not compute. And, perhaps neither do we. How long until the machines decide we are as obsolete as hot type. We’ve grown accustomed to pulling the plug on yesterday’s tech. Will tomorrow’s tech pull the plug on us?