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Watchable on Disney, Acorn, Crave Feb. 6 to 12, 2023

February 6, 2023 /

Show of the Week: Kindred (Feb. 8, Disney+)

Micah Stock as Kevin and Mallori Johnson as Dana in “Kindred.” PHOTO CREDIT: Tina Rowden/FX

This miniseries opens with what I can only imagine would seem like twin terrors for Black Americans: a young Black woman is lying in the middle of a room in obvious pain, her back striped with the marks of a whipping, and then, once she’s bathed the wounds and dressed, white police officers come pounding on her door.

The woman is Dana (Mallori Johnson, “WeCrashed”) and, when the show jumps back two days, we learn that she has just moved to Los Angeles from Brooklyn with aspirations of becoming a TV writer.

But she hasn’t even unpacked all the boxes in the house she bought after selling her late grandmother’s brownstone when she finds herself being sent back in time some 200 years to a Maryland plantation. The trips continue, lasting seconds, minutes and hours in the present day (2016) but hours, days and weeks in the past.

And Kevin (Micah Stock, “The Right Stuff”), the white waiter whom Dana has just had sex with, accidentally gets sent back with her where they pose as slave and slave owner to fend off the suspicions of plantation owner Thomas Whelin (Ryan Kwanten) and his wife Margaret (Gayle Rankin).

Those are the broad strokes of this time travel drama based on the 1979 novel by Octavia E. Butler.

Without getting too spoilery, Dana comes to learn that her travel is tied to the Whelins’ son Rufus (David Alexander Kaplan): whenever Rufus is in danger Dana comes back to save him. Likewise, whenever Dana feels her own life is in danger she returns to her own time, but she has no control over when she comes and goes.

She also encounters a relative of hers (Sheria Irving), thought long dead in the present but who has similarly travelled back in time and become trapped.

But Dana’s attempt to confide about these alarming episodes to her aunt Denise (Eisa Davis) in the present day is interpreted as a sign of mental illness; her almost cartoonishly nosy white neighbours (Louis Cancelmi and Brooke Bloom) keep intrusively demanding to know what’s going on when they hear Dana screaming each time she returns to the present; and Kevin’s sister (Elizabeth Stanley) sends the police to Dana’s door when her brother disappears.

From what I have read, Butler’s book was meant to explore how a modern Black woman would experience slavery and there is certainly some sense of that in this adaptation — as well as a sense of Kevin’s disgust at the dehumanizing of the enslaved by the Whelins and other white people he encounters.

(Some reviewers have taken issue with the romance between Dana and Kevin, who is Dana’s husband in the book but a virtual stranger to her in the series. I, however, can imagine how people trapped in a foreign, hostile situation would gravitate to, and draw comfort from, each other.)

But I had a hard time buying Kwanten, an Australian actor known mainly for his role in “True Blood,” as a fearsome slave owner, at least up until the very end when he perpetrates violence on Dana and threatens the life of Kevin. Not that I’m suggesting “12 Years a Slave”-style brutality would have been preferable, but Dana seems to experience a fair amount of latitude on the plantation, at least until she doesn’t.

Johnson is sympathetic as an alternately confused, angry, terrified and guilt-ridden 20-something woman, the latter since the slaves she encounters can’t escape their reality the way that she can.

Despite the flaws in this adaptation — developed by playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins (“An Octoroon”) — you’ll likely be invested enough in what happens to Dana and Kevin to watch all eight episodes.

The bad news is that the cliff-hangers in the final episode might never get a resolution. FX declined to renew the show for a second season, although Jacobs-Jenkins is said to be shopping it around.

Short Takes

James Nesbitt and Victoria Smurfit in Season 2 of “Bloodlands.” PHOTO CREDIT: Steffan Hill/AcornTV

Bloodlands (Feb. 6, Acorn)

I don’t want to spoil anything for anybody, but if you watched Season 1 of this Northern Irish drama you already know that Detective Chief Inspector Tom Brannick (Northern Irish actor James Nesbitt of “Murphy’s Law” and “The Missing”) is not a good cop. Season 2 ties into Tom’s past sins when a crooked accountant is murdered and found to have connections to a trove of gold that was bound for the IRA but disappeared along with the two men in charge of it, whose skeletal remains turned up at the end of last season. Tom leads the official investigation into the murder while also pursuing a clandestine operation to find the gold with the help of the accountant’s widow, Olivia (Victoria Smurfit, “Ballykissangel,” “Once Upon a Time”). How long can Tom keep all those balls in the air without his clever underlings, Niamh McGovern (Charlene McKenna) and Billy “Birdy” Bird (Chris Walley, “The Young Offenders”), catching on? Also in the mix is the gold’s American gangster owner (Jonjo O’Neill, “The Fall,” “Bad Sisters”), who turns up in Dunfolan demanding its return. It can be taxing to connect all the dots in this series, but it moves along smartly and compellingly, with some emotional payoff in the latter episodes of the season. The final episode leaves some big questions unanswered, but it seems there’s still a chance for a third season, so we’ll see.

Acorn also has Season 2 of “The Madame Blanc Mysteries” (Feb. 6), the very light but pleasant series about crime-solving antiques dealer Jean White (Sally Lindsay) and her compatriots in the French village of Sainte Victoire.

Mohammad Saud and Salik Rehman treat a black kite in their makeshift animal hospital.
PHOTO CREDIT: Courtesy of HBO

All That Breathes (Feb. 7, 9 p.m., HBO/Crave)

Beauty can exist in very unlikely places. This documentary finds it in garbage-strewn streets in Delhi, India, where brothers Mohammad Saud and Nadeem Shehzad, and their co-worker Salik Rehman, rescue and treat injured black kites and other birds. The brothers, who were filmed over three years by doc maker Shaunak Sen, do this at great cost — financial, physical, emotional — and also at the expense of their long-suffering wives and children. Their devotion is writ large in one scene in particular, in which Saud and Salik swim through very cold water to rescue a single kite on a far shore; Nadeem has to wade in himself when they become so exhausted on the way back they feel unable to keep going. The brothers initially treat the birds in a dingy and sometimes flooded basement before an international grant enables them to open a hospital for their Wildlife Rescue organization. Adding to the tension of caring for the thousands of birds — injured by pollution and other human-made causes — is the political unrest and violence taking place in Delhi during filming. Saud, Nadeem and Salik persevere, seemingly unable to stop even if they wanted to. “Delhi is a gaping wound and we’re a tiny Band-Aid on it,” Nadeem says. He adds that “one shouldn’t differentiate between all that breathes” hence the title. Indeed, Sen’s camera frequently documents the creatures that share Delhi with its human population, from rats swarming a garbage-covered lot to monkeys, boars, dogs, goats, cows, horses, even invertebrates swarming a murky puddle. As Nadeem says, “Life itself is kinship.” This doc is up for a Best Documentary Oscar and won the Golden Eye prize at last year’s Cannes Film Festival.

Lea Thompson and Stacey Farber in “The Spencer Sisters.” PHOTO CREDIT: Bell Media

The Spencer Sisters (Feb. 10, 9 p.m., CTV/CTV.ca)

Despite all the sexy, serialized TV out there sucking up buzz and awards, the procedural isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, particularly the mystery procedural. So you can’t fault CTV for getting in on the action with this new series, particularly when the cast includes Lea Thompson, a legend for the “Back to the Future” films, and Stacey Farber, no slouch herself thanks to “Degrassi” and other credits. Here they play a mother and daughter who stumble into a partnership solving crimes. Victoria (Thompson) is a rich and famous mystery writer whose star is waning; Darby (Farber) is an ex-cop forced to move back in with Mom despite the huge chip on her shoulder over Victoria putting career ahead of family in earlier years. I have some quibbles — for example, how perfunctorily the blow-up of Darby’s police career is handled in the first episode — but if you’re looking for something light that won’t overtax your grey matter you could do worse than this. Thompson and Farber certainly seemed to have a hoot making the show together (you can read my Toronto Star interview with them here).

From left, Lolly Adefope, Mathew Baynton, Jim Howick, Ben Willbond, Laurence Rickard, Yani Xander, Simon Farnaby and Martha Howe-Douglas in “Ghosts.” PHOTO CREDIT: Courtesy of CBC Gem

Ghosts (Feb. 10, CBC Gem)

No, sorry folks, I don’t mean the American remake that has become a hit for CBS. I continue to prefer this British original version about Alison (Charlotte Ritchie) and the spirts she learns to co-exist with on the country estate she inherited from a distant relative. This fourth season, based on the two episodes I screened, perhaps doesn’t have as many laugh-out-loud moments as past seasons, but it continues to find sweetness and relatability in the relationship between Alison and the ghosts, and between the spectres themselves. There’s an endearing plot, for instance, in which ever cheerful Georgian lady Kitty (Lolly Adefope) teaches the by-the-books Captain (Ben Willbond) how to stop and smell the roses or, in his case, count the ants. Meanwhile, romantic poet Thomas (Mathew Baynton) develops a fan club among the plague victims in the basement and tries to kick his infatuation with Alison cold turkey; cave man Robin (Laurence Rickard) recognizes an acquaintance in a TV segment; witch-burning victim Mary (Katy Wix) finally reveals some details about her past; and Alison and husband Mike (Kiell Smith-Bynoe) soft-launch a B&B at Button House.

CBC Gem also has the CBC Kids preschool series “Mittens & Pants” (Feb. 6), about best friends Mittens the kitten and Pants the puppy, and their other animal friends.

Odds and Ends

Martin Mull and Gina Rodriguez in “Not Dead Yet.” PHOTO CREDIT: Eric McCandless/ABC

In keeping with the topic of TV characters who see dead people, ABC is launching sitcom “Not Dead Yet” (Feb. 8, 9:30 p.m., CTV2), in which Gina Rodriguez (“Jane the Virgin”) plays a down-on-her-luck journalist who gets hired at her old paper as an obituary writer and gets an assist from the dead people she writes about, who hang around until she gives them a proper send-off. Also starring Hannah Simone, Lauren Ash, Josh Banday and Rick Glassman, it tends to a schmaltzy “you go girl” tone, but it has its moments. CTV also has Season 2 of reality series “Auntie Jillian” (Feb. 11, 8 p.m.), starring YouTube personality Jillian Danford, husband Warren and grown-up kids Myles and Milan.

I would image the big release for many people on Netflix this week is Season 4 of “You” (Feb. 9), its drama about a serial killer (Penn Badgley). The streamer also has Season 6 of time travel romance “Outlander” (Feb. 6); the doc “Bill Russell: Legend” (Feb. 8) about the civil rights icon; and Season 3 of reality after-show “Love Is Blind: After the Altar” (Feb. 10).

W and StackTV are going all in on romcoms with “The Love Club” (Feb. 10, 8 p.m.), four original movies that will debut on subsequent Fridays about four friends who form a club to keep each other out of romantic crises. Each film follows a different woman on her quest to find love. How much you want to bet they all succeed?

Prime Video’s releases include another romantic film — it is almost Valentine’s Day after all — “Somebody I Used to Know” (Feb. 10), starring Dave Franco and Allison Brie; and the series “One Night Only” (Feb. 10), featuring Francophone comedians PA Méthot, Dominic Paquet, Rachid Badouri and Mariana Mazza.

Paramount+ has the docuseries “Boys in Blue” (Feb. 10), about a high school football team coached by members of the Minneapolis Police Department in the post-George Floyd era.

NOTE: The listings here are in Eastern Standard Time and I’ve verified the times where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste. The Odds and Ends section includes shows that I have not watched.

Watchable on Disney, Prime Video, Netflix Aug. 1 to 7, 2022

August 1, 2022 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: The Bear (Aug. 3, Disney+)

From left, Jeremy Allen White, Lionel Boyce and Ebon Moss-Bachrach in “The Bear.”
PHOTO CREDIT: FX

First things first, if the behind-the-scenes operation of a restaurant is as chaotic as in the fictional Original Beef of Chicagoland in “The Bear,” it’s hard to imagine anyone wanting to open one.

But it’s to viewers’ advantage that sandwich shop Original Beef is up and running. If you’ll forgive the bad food pun, there’s a lot to chew in this story about a hot shot young chef (Jeremy Allen White, “Shameless”) who returns to Chicago to take over the restaurant he was willed by his dead brother.

When Carmy Berzatto takes on Beef, it has a tired menu, an inefficient kitchen and recalcitrant staff who resist the changes he wants to make, especially his so-called “cousin” Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach, “Girls”), an aggressive loudmouth who was the best friend of Carmy’s brother, Michael (Jon Bernthal).

Michael was a drug addict who committed suicide and has left a pile of debt behind, including hundreds of thousands owed to his Uncle Jimmy (Oliver Platt). Carmy could wipe out the debt by selling to Jimmy, but against all odds he wants to keep the place and fix it up.

New employee Sydney (Ayo Edebiri, “Big Mouth”), an ambitious young woman who has her own ideas about how to run things, tries to help Carmy whip the kitchen into shape, which adds to the tensions among the staff, particularly with long-time employee Tina (Liza Colon-Sayas) and with Richie.

And Carmy, on top of everything else, is still processing his grief about Michael’s death, particularly since they were estranged for a couple of years before the suicide. He also has a tenuous relationship with his sister Natalie (Abby Elliott), who’s partly on the hook for the restaurant’s unpaid back taxes.

Add in mundane screw-ups like incorrect orders from suppliers, kitchen accidents, a bad rating from the board of health, an exploding toilet and a power failure, and it’s a wonder anyone’s getting fed.

Series creator Christopher Storer told Esquire he saw the chaos of a restaurant kitchen firsthand when he spent a couple of days as a line cook, but there was also a lot of research done and the show has a secret weapon in Canadian chef Matty Matheson, a co-producer who also plays the Beef’s resident handyman, Neil Fak.

If it seems like a restaurant kitchen is an unlikely setting for drama, I can tell you the show is fast, intense and never boring, and some of its most dramatic scenes take place in that cramped space .

In particular, in Episode 7, part of which was filmed in one continuous shot, something as ordinary as a restaurant review kicks off a nightmare of a shift in which many harsh words are exchanged, two people quit and another is accidentally stabbed.

But there is a resolution — a little too neat of one, but one that points the way to the already greenlit Season 2 — and the team pulls together.

Cooking is life for people like Carmy, Sydney and aspiring pastry chef Marcus (Lionel Boyce).

For those of us who would rather just enjoy the end result, a show like “The Bear” makes it entertaining to see how the sausage is made.

Paper Girls (Prime Video)

From left, Fina Strazza, Sofia Rosinsky, Riley Lai Nelet and Camryn Jones in “Paper Girls.” PHOTO CREDIT: Amazon Studios

(Note: I don’t normally include shows that have already debuted on the Watchable list, but I missed out on reviewing “Paper Girls” last week because of an embargo.)

There’s been an inevitable linking of “Paper Girls” with Netflix juggernaut “Stranger Things,” but aside from the fact both start in the 1980s with bike-riding preteen protagonists confronted by supernatural forces, they’re not anything alike.

The girls of the title — 12-year-olds Erin (Riley Lai Nelet), Tiffany (Camryn Jones), KJ (Fina Strazza) and Mac (Sofia Rosinsky) — are battling humans, not monsters, albeit ones that possess advanced technology and can jump through time. And our heroines, despite their youth, shed their innocence more quickly than the Hawkins gang of “Stranger Things” and in ways that feel truer to real life.

In the early hours of Nov. 1, 1988, the girls are on their paper routes when they band together to avoid Hell Day hooligans and finish their deliveries. But it looks like nobody in this part of Stony Stream, Ohio, is getting their paper on time, because Erin is jumped by a couple of men in black who steal the walkie talkie that Tiffany lent her and the quartet gives chase.

That pursuit kicks off a series of events that puts them smack in the middle of a fire fight between two groups of time travellers known as the Old Watch and the Standard Time Fighters, or STF.

The walkie thieves save the girls’ lives but at the cost of them travelling 31 years into the future. They spend the rest of the eight episodes trying to get back to 1988, while avoiding an Old Watch assassin (Adina Porter) who is hunting them, with the help of an STF member named Larry (Nate Corddry) and older versions of Erin (Ali Wong) and Tiffany (Sekai Abeni).

That last wrinkle adds depth to “Paper Girls.” Each of them learns disappointing or confusing things about their futures and the people they become. Youthful optimism runs smack into the compromises that adult life demands and the girls don’t take it gracefully.

But they’re 12, so why would we expect them to?

The time-travel plot line is fine if not always well explained. It’s the performances of the show’s young and relatively unknown stars that elevate the material.

These girls have layers that are sympathetically and thoughtfully excavated, whether it’s KJ, who’s from a wealthy Jewish family, glimpsing a sexuality she doesn’t even know how to name; Tiffany, who is African-American, fighting to preserve her vision of what success means; Chinese-American Erin coming to terms with fractures in a once close family; or Mac, who lives in the rough part of town, realizing she might never escape the violent blight of her upbringing.

The girls straddle the line between childhood and young adulthood. One moment they’re eluding Old Watch travellers after seeing people they know die; the next they’re trying to figure out how a tampon works after Erin gets her period.

They start out as near strangers and end up friends, and it feels both earned and rewarding.

There is one other way that “Paper Girls” is like “Stranger Things”: it’s at its best when its young characters come together to grapple with whatever is plaguing them, whether it’s warring time travellers or the pain of growing up too fast.

Short Takes

Concert-goers dance as what’s left of Woodstock ’99 burns in “Trainwreck.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Courtesy of Netflix © 2022

Trainwreck: Woodstock ’99 (Aug. 3, Netflix)

The title of this three-part docuseries is appropriate because, as with the proverbial train wreck, it’s hard to look away as it documents this disaster of a music festival day by day and hour by hour. If it all seems familiar, it might be because HBO’s “Music Box” series also covered the chaos in the doc “Woodstock 99: Peace, Love, and Rage” last summer. The Reader’s Digest version is this: what was supposed to be a three-day sequel to the blissed out hippie vibe of the 1969 Woodstock festival turned into a sort of “Lord of the Flies” nightmare of anger and violence that culminated in a riot on the final night. “Trainwreck” (whose original title was “Clusterf**k,” also very appropriate) is long on details of the mayhem but short on explanations. Promoters Michael Lang and John Scher; musician Fred Durst of Limp Bizkit; untrained security guards; aggressive, young men in the crowd: all get fingered for some part of the blame. Scher, in particular, still seems determined to deflect any responsibility for what happened and still seems to blame the women who got raped at the festival for their own misfortune. As far as I can tell, the die for the catastrophe was cast the minute it was decided the festival would be more about squeezing participants for every possible dollar than keeping them comfortable and safe. And as I said in my review of “Peace, Love, and Rage,” “One does wonder what geniuses thought packing 220,000 or so people onto a largely asphalt surface in searing July heat was a good idea.” This series makes no mention of the one (and only one, surprisingly) death from the festival: that of David DeRosia due to hyperthermia from overheating. But it does provide a cross-section of voices, including Lang (who died three months after he was interviewed), Scher, event staff, musicians, reporters, MTV personalities who covered it live and concert-goers, a couple of whom say they’d do it all over again despite the fear they felt that weekend. Lucky for them and for us, there will never be another Woodstock.

Netflix also has the rom-com “Wedding Season” (Aug. 4) and, of far more interest, “The Sandman” (Aug. 5), based on the comic book series by Neil Gaiman about what happens to the Master of Dreams (Tom Sturridge) and the world after he is imprisoned for a century. Reviews for this one are embargoed until release.

Odds and Ends

CBC and CBC Gem have “FreeUp! Emancipation Day” (Aug. 1, 8 p.m.), celebrating the abolition of slavery throughout the British Empire, including Canada, on Aug. 1, 1834. The two-hour show includes a special about Emancipation Day celebrations across Canada, talks about what emancipation means, and performances by Jully Black, TiKA and Measha Brueggergosman. CBC Gem also has Season 2 of the Quebec series “C’est comme ca que je t’aime” (Aug. 1) and reality sitcom “Bobby & Harriet Get Married” (Aug. 5) in which a real-life couple, Brit Harriet Kemsley and Canadian Bobby Mair, play heightened versions of themselves.

Crave has the second season of workplace drama “Industry” (Aug. 1) about young traders in London, England. And if you missed Guillermo del Toro’s latest Toronto-shot, Oscar-nominated movie, “Nightmare Alley” comes to Crave Aug. 5.

Speaking of movies, “Toy Story” spinoff “Lightyear” is on Disney+ Aug. 3.

Apple TV+ has the animated film “Luck” (Aug. 5) and Season 2 of “The Snoopy Show.”

Finally, Prime Video has another film, “Thirteen Lives” (Aug. 5), a fictionalized account directed by Ron Howard of the rescue of young members of a soccer team from a flooded cave in Thailand. I’m sorry I missed the chance to screen this one because the Disney+ doc about the event (“The Rescue”) was fascinating. Also new to Prime Video is Season 2 of “The Outlaws” (Aug. 5), about ne-er-do-wells banding together while doing community service in London.

Watchable the week of December 21, 2020

December 21, 2020 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Letterkenny (Dec. 25, Crave)

K. Trevor Wilson, Jared Keeso and Nathan Dales, and friends, in Season 9 of “Letterkenny.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Bell Media

Maybe it’s the particular genius of Canadians to make comedies about places in which not much happens. I mean, think about it, “Schitt’s Creek,” our most successful comedy ever based on worldwide acclaim and Emmy Awards won, was set almost entirely in a small, sleepy town and, more often than not, in two motel rooms. Brent Butt and crew spun six seasons out of Dog River in “Corner Gas,” a place where there wasn’t a lot going on. And the “Trailer Park Boys” hatched their hare-brained schemes in a mobile home park.

In “Letterkenny,” the main preoccupations are drinking, fighting, fornicating (or at least talking about it a lot) and, occasionally, chorin’. On paper, it sounds ridiculous. In practice, thanks to the commitment of series creator Jared Keeso and the rest of the cast to their oddball, small-town characters, and the skill with which they navigate the trademark rapid-fire dialogue, it’s pretty brilliant.

Not everything hits the net, of course, if I can use that phrase in keeping with the show’s hockey obsession. The first episode of the new season has one of those big fight set pieces that are so much fun (they remind me a tiny bit of the ones in the old “Batman” show of the 1960s, minus the cartoon “Blam!” and “Kapow!” exclamations and with even cooler music). But the American and Canadian armed forces guys who turn up to help and then hang around shirtless in the bar didn’t really up the comedy quotient for me.

On the other hand, there’s a dialogue in another episode between main characters Wayne (Keeso), Daryl (Nathan Dales), Squirrelly Dan (K. Trevor Wilson) and Katy (Michelle Mylett) about whether whistling sounds can come from parts of the anatomy besides the mouth that had me in stitches.

And you probably won’t want to miss Mark Forward’s master classes in cringe comedy as Coach forces his beer league players, including Jonesy (Andrew Herr) and Reilly (Dylan Playfair), to listen to monologues about his late wife Barb’s erotic skills.

“Letterkenny” also has its sweet moments of caring and camaraderie. Even oversexed bartender Gail (Lisa Codrington) gets a little love this season.

Bridgerton (Dec. 25, Netflix)

Rege-Jean Page as Simon Basset, Lord Hastings, and Phoebe Dynevor as Daphne Bridgerton
in “Bridgerton.” PHOTO CREDIT: Liam Daniel/Netflix

Attention lovers of period drama and star-crossed romance, Shonda Rhimes and her team have a Christmas gift for you.

I’d love to tell you what I think of it, but alas, review coverage is embargoed until Tuesday.

“Bridgerton” is the first original scripted series from Rhimes’ Shondaland as part of her Netflix deal. Created by her “Scandal” protege Chris Van Dusen, it’s based on the “Bridgerton” novels of Julia Quinn, about an aristocratic family in Regency London and their romantic pursuits.

Refreshingly, some of the other aristocrats are played by Black actors, including Rege-Jean Page (“Roots”) as the dashing Lord Hastings, Adjoa Andoh (“Doctor Who”) as Lady Danbury and Golda Rosheuvel (“Silent Witness”) as Queen Charlotte.

Phoebe Dynevor (“Younger”) also stars as Hastings’ romantic interest, Daphne Bridgerton, and Dame Julie Andrews gives voice to Lady Whistledown, the gossip whose scandal sheet keeps all the lords and ladies on their toes.

Soul (Dec. 25, Disney Plus)

Jamie Foxx gives voice to Joe Gardner, the protagonist of the new animated film “Soul.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Disney/Pixar

This new animated film from Disney and Pete Docter (“Up,” “Inside Out”) could be subtitled “The Meaning of Life.”

For main character Joe Gardner (voiced by Jamie Foxx), a music teacher living a fairly mundane life in New York City, there’s only one thing from which he derives meaning: jazz music, which he longs to play professionally at the Half Note club.

He finally gets his shot, asked by a former student to fill in at a gig with legendary saxophone player Dorothea Williams (Angela Bassett), but Joe is so enraptured after his tryout that he doesn’t pay attention to where he’s walking and steps into an open manhole. Next thing you know, he finds himself minus his body, on a conveyor belt to the Great Beyond.

Joe manages to escape to a more hospitable spiritual realm called the Great Before, where souls — portrayed as child-like, amorphous blue-green blobs — are assigned personalities. But they can’t travel to Earth and into bodies until they find a spark, something that fires their will to live. Mentors, experienced souls stopping in on their way to the Great Beyond, help them do that.

In his desperate scramble to get back to Earth and to his gig, Joe gets mistaken for a mentor and paired with 22 (Tina Fey), a soul who has decided she has no interest in living and has already foiled mentors like Mother Teresa, Muhammad Ali and Marie Antoinette.

After they end up in the Zone, a place where lost souls wander, Joe and 22 get help from a hippie mystic named Moonwind (Graham Norton), who leaves his body at regularly scheduled intervals, to get to New York. But the re-entry into Joe’s body doesn’t go quite as planned. I won’t tell you how because that would spoil the fun of a delightful interlude in the film.

Once on Earth, 22 finds delight in almost everything: the taste of pizza, the sound of a trombone, a seedling falling from a tree. Her enthusiasm opens Joe’s eyes to the fact there’s more to life than jazz and that he’s been missing out on a lot because of his obsession.

I won’t spoil the ending for you, although this being Disney you can probably surmise that it’s an uplifting one. It’s a sweet, beautifully animated take on a weighty subject.

Odds and Ends

Yannick Bisson in character as William Murdoch with musicians of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra
on the “Murdoch Mysteries” set. PHOTO CREDIT: Acorn TV

If you’re a fan of the long-running Canadian detective series “Murdoch Mysteries,” the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and classical music, the special “A Music Lover’s Guide to Murdoch Mysteries” (Dec. 24, Acorn TV) will be right up your alley. Seven members of the TSO gather on the series’ police office set to play a selection of songs that Murdoch might have listened to in the early 20th century. The selections include Ravel, Brahms, Canadian composer Laura Gertrude Lemon, Tchaikovsky, Haydn, Scott Joplin and the beautiful “Blue Danube Waltz” by Strauss, as well as music composed by Robert Carli for the show. “Murdoch” star Yannick Bisson hosts in character and there are clips from the series interspersed with the music.

If you’re a fan of rich people behaving badly and/or manufactured reality show drama, tune into “House of Ho” (Dec. 21, 8 p.m., Super Channel Fuse). The docuseries follows Vietnamese immigrant turned wealthy Houston businessman Binh Ho and wife Hue, his spoiled son Washington, daughter Judy and other relations. Frankly, Binh’s patriarchal attitudes and Washington’s seeming neglect of his wife and kids to go drinking and gambling with clients left a bad taste in my mouth.

If you enjoyed the most recent season of “The Mandalorian,” which ended with that blockbuster finale on Friday, you might enjoy “Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian ‘Making of Season 2′” (Dec. 25, Disney Plus).

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