Because I love television. How about you?

Tag: Remembrance Day

Watchable on Netflix, Crave, StackTV Nov. 7 to 13, 2022

SHOW OF THE WEEK: The Crown (Nov. 9, Netflix)

Elizabeth Debicki as Diana, Imelda Staunton as Queen Elizabeth and Dominic West as Prince Charles
in Season 5 of “The Crown.” PHOTO CREDIT: Netflix

This Netflix drama — emphasis on the word “drama” — debuts its fifth season amid criticism from people who should know better that it’s in danger of being confused with historical fact. I’m looking at you, Judi Dench.

Hackles have evidently been raised since the series has now advanced to covering subjects within living memory, particularly the breakdown of the marriage of Prince, now King, Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales.

Here’s the thing: acting is make-believe, even when real people are being portrayed. While I can’t imagine it’s pleasant for members of the Royal Family to have selected bits of their dirty laundry dramatized for other people’s entertainment I also don’t think the series is damaging the monarchy.

Besides, I found Season 5 relatively balanced in its portrayal of Charles’ and Diana’s marriage failure. It includes well-known events — the Andrew Morton biography of Diana, Charles’ and Camilla’s “Tampongate” tape, the 1994 interview in which Charles admitted to being unfaithful, Diana’s incendiary “Panorama” interview — but doesn’t paint either side as wholly villain or victim.

If there’s a criticism to be made it’s that — despite terrific acting, beautiful sets and costumes, and other attention to detail — this season doesn’t live up to Season 4, which was one of the best, if not the best since the show began.

Imelda Staunton, ostensibly the star of the series as wearer of “The Crown,” doesn’t get all that much to do here besides keeping a stiff upper lip through her children’s divorces (Andrew’s and Anne’s marriages also imploded in the ’90s), the fire at Windsor Castle and other tribulations. She does, however, imbue Elizabeth with dignity and a staunch devotion to duty that seems of a piece with the real queen. (Staunton’s best scene is one in which she has a frank talk with Diana, well played by Elizabeth Debicki, just ahead of the airing of the Panorama interview.)

The series’ attention seems scattered this season with diversions that detract from its overall cohesiveness: one entire episode is devoted to Mohamed Al-Fayed, father of Diana’s eventual boyfriend Dodi; another, in large part, to the thawing of relations between Britain and Russia and the fate of royal cousins the Romanovs.

Diana and Charles, played less convincingly by Dominic West, remain much of the focus of the season, although the spotlight is also ceded to Prince Philip, given a sympathetic portrayal by Jonathan Pryce, and Princess Margaret, played by Lesley Manville as a woman coming to terms with life’s disappointments.

In fact, there’s a melancholy throughout the episodes that touches all of the characters. It’s not just the events portrayed — the divorces, the bad publicity, the “annus horribilis,” the queen’s distress over the decommissioning of the royal yacht — it’s that we as viewers know what’s coming next: the death of Diana (producers, mercifully, have said they will not portray the car crash that killed her).

There is also tenderness and love, between Elizabeth and Philip; Elizabeth and Margaret; Elizabeth and Anne (Claudia Harrison); Diana and sons William and Harry; Charles and Camilla (Olivia Williams); even between Charles and Diana in a post-divorce attempt at detente.

The show also posits a fond, respectful relationship between Prime Minister John Major (a nice turn by Jonny Lee Miller) and the queen.

The real John Major has blasted the show for imagining a meeting between him and Charles that he says never took place, in which Charles floats the idea of acceding to the throne sooner than later. But as I said earlier, this is make-believe. TV shows and movies routinely play with facts in the name of storytelling.

And, despite all the criticisms and the shortcomings, I still find “The Crown” worth watching.

In its portrayal of the royals as fallible humans — ones that even immense wealth and privilege cannot spare from heartache and other ordinary emotions — “The Crown” makes me like them more, not less.

Netflix also debuts the soccer doc “FIFA Uncovered” and “The Soccer Football Movie” (Nov. 9); the docs “State of Alabama vs. Brittany Smith” (Nov. 10), “Capturing the Killer Nurse” and “Is That Black Enough for You?!?” (Nov. 11); and second seasons of “Warrior Nun” (Nov. 10) and “Down to Earth With Zac Efron” (Nov. 11).

Short Takes

Dunie Ryan, former leader of Montreal’s West End Gang. PHOTO CREDIT: Cineflix Media

Kings of Coke (Nov. 7, Crave)

Amid the flood of true crime content from the U.S. comes this worthy Canadian entry. The Crave original, directed by former “Fifth Estate” journalist Julian Sher, tells a fascinating story that would be right at home in a film noir. While it’s no secret that Montreal has long had a thriving underworld dominated by bikers and the Mafia, this film tells the story of the West End Gang, a group of Irish Canadian criminals that was once just as powerful as the Hells Angels and the mob. A cast of colourful characters — ex-gang members Melvin Mingo and Jimmy Holt, ex-homicide and holdup squad cop Andre Savard, former crime journalists Dan Burke and D’Arcy O’Connor, on whose book “Montreal’s Irish Mafia” the doc is based, to name just a handful — trace the gang’s rise from highly proficient bank robbers to murderers and drug lords. As the conduit through which cocaine flowed into Montreal’s port and to others parts of North America, the gang had direct connections to Colombian cartels as well as sources in the legal system that helped keep leaders Dunie Ryan, Allan Ross and Gerry Matticks out of jail. All eventually met their downfalls, either at the hands of law enforcement or fellow gang members. With the use of news footage and animation, the film takes us to the scenes of the various shootings and bombings that marked the West End Gang’s increasingly violent path. It also gives us a glimpse of the Montreal of the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s when the West End Gang thrived. The gang is gone, felled by greed and hubris and violence, but the doc reminds us that organized crime and the drug trade still flourish in Montreal.

Crave also has “Don’t Worry Darling” (Nov. 7), if you didn’t get enough of Harry Styles last week with the streaming release of “My Policeman,” or you want to parse the film for signs of antipathy between star Florence Pugh and director Olivia Wilde. And Daniel Levy’s latest TV venture, “The Big Brunch,” a made-in-Hollywood food competition — so maybe “Schitt’s Creek” was a Canadian content one-off for him — debuts Nov. 10.

Samuel Watts, centre, a World War I veteran featured in “Our War.” PHOTO CREDIT: History

Our War (Nov. 11, 9 p.m., History/StackTV)

On my personal list of regrets is the fact I never asked my grandfathers — one of whom fought in the First World War and one in the Second — about their wartime experiences. It’s entirely possible they wouldn’t have wanted to talk about it, but I still feel a loss of valuable family history nonetheless. This series features Canadians who, likewise, know very little about their relatives’ war service but are able to piece it together with the help of military historians and others, thanks to the show. In the two episodes I watched, the histories uncovered included that of Samuel Watts, a Black World War I soldier who died of wounds suffered in the Battle of Hill 70; Edward Drost, a member of the elite WWII First Special Service Force who survived but was haunted all his life by the fighting in Anzio; famous Indigenous marathon runner Tom Longboat, who took on the dangerous but vital job of dispatch runner in WWI ; and Harry Symes, a WWI vet who survived the Battle of the Somme but came home in ruined health and died not long after. Their family members’ journeys are emotional ones, even in instances where they never met the veteran whose story they’re researching. I suppose people who have no direct connection to the two — and hopefully last — world wars might wonder why shows like this are necessary. I would argue that knowledge of our history is never a bad thing and particularly war history at a time when anti-Semitism is on the rise and Vladimir Putin, like Hitler before him, has invaded a sovereign country with complete disregard for international law.

Chaske Spencer and Emily Blunt in “The English.” PHOTO CREDIT: BBC/Amazon Studios

The English (Nov. 11, Prime Video)

I don’t usually include embargoed titles in the Short Takes and, as far as I can tell, I’m not allowed to review this until 3 p.m. on Monday, but since I watched two episodes and found it had merit I’m including it here. It stars Emily Blunt, who also executive produces, as Englishwoman Lady Cornelia Locke, come to America to find the man who killed her son, who crosses paths with Eli Whipp (Chaske Spencer), a Pawnee ex-Cavalry scout who just wants to ride north and claim a few acres of land. I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that Cornelia and Eli will find themselves enmeshed in this western created by Hugo Blick (“The Honourable Woman”).

Prime also has the series “Mammals” (Nov. 11), described as a darkly comic drama about marriage, which was written by Tony-winning playwright Jez Butterworth (“The Ferryman,” “Jerusalem”); and Rihanna’s fashion extravaganza “Savage X Fenty Show” (Nov. 9), which is drawing heat for including Johnny Depp.

Odds and Ends

If you’re in the mood for more Remembrance Day programming, CBC Gem has Season 2 of “My Grandparents’ War” (Nov. 11), in which stars Keira Knightley, Kit Harington, Toby Jones and Emeli Sandé explore their ancestors’ wartime experiences; as well as Season 2 of “Sorry for Your Loss” (Nov. 11), starring Elizabeth Olsen. CBC has the comedy special “Just for Laughs 40” (Nov. 8, 9 p.m.), celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Just for Laughs festival.

If you’re a movie aficionado, Hollywood Suite has a 4K restoration of “Tales From the Gimli Hospital” (Nov. 9), the feature film debut of Winnipeg auteur Guy Maddin.

Disney+ has “Save Our Squad With David Beckham” (Nov. 9), in which the soccer great tries to turn around the fortunes of an underachieving boys’ team in East London.

Apple TV+ has Season 3 of the workplace comedy “Mythic Quest” on Nov. 11.

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 the week of Nov. 9, 2020

SHOW OF THE WEEK: The Crown (Nov. 15, Netflix)

Emma Corrin as Diana, Princess of Wales in “The Crown.” PHOTO CREDIT: Des Willie/Netflix

The fourth season of this classy drama is my favourite since it first knocked my socks off in 2016. It has given me that “I must watch the next episode right now” feeling I didn’t necessarily get from the second and third seasons, although they were still excellent.

For one thing, there’s a wealth of historical events in this instalment (the season begins in 1979, which truly is history no matter how current it might still feel to those of us who lived through it).

There’s the assassination of Lord Mountbatten (Charles Dance), the Falklands War, the Buckingham Palace break-in during which intruder Michael Fagan (sympathetically played by Tom Brooke, of “Preacher” and “Sherlock”) chatted with the Queen in her bedroom, but the season really belongs to two women and how they shaped events.

First, the always wonderful Gillian Anderson plays Margaret Thatcher and shows us the woman behind the politician, who translated her adoration for her up-by-his-bootstraps father into a tough love prescription for Great Britain and austerity policies that still resonate today.

Of course, no one really knows what Queen Elizabeth II (Olivia Colman) thought of Thatcher, but the series depicts the monarch as so disquieted by the unemployment and unrest stirred up by Thatcher’s policies and, particularly, her disdain for the Commonwealth and refusal to support sanctions against Apartheid-era South Africa that she gives her tacit consent to a Sunday Times article saying she finds Thatcher “uncaring, confrontational and socially divisive.”

The article is real; the rest is likely just Peter Morgan exercising his creative licence.

But the woman who, in the show as in life, really draws our attention and our sympathy is Diana, Princess of Wales, played by Emma Corrin (“Pennyworth”), who nails the late princess’s “Shy Di” mannerisms.

The portrayal will do nothing to diminish the cult of “Princess Diana” or make people feel warmer toward Prince Charles (played by Josh O’Connor). The show’s take is of a young woman who really thought she had found her Prince Charming only to run headlong into his devotion to Camilla Parker Bowles (Emerald Fennell).

The series shows Diana’s own dalliances and her battle with bulimia (with appropriate trigger warnings for viewers), but she is more victim than perpetrator, whereas Charles comes off as selfish and insensitive as he singlemindedly pursues his fantasy of a life with married mother of two Camilla no matter the cost; as well as petty as he becomes increasingly jealous of Diana’s growing popularity.

Nor does the Queen present as particularly sympathetic to the struggling Diana, offering stiff upper lip “keep calm and carry on” advice instead of kindness and understanding. Even Princess Margaret (Helena Bonham Carter), who we see weathering her own loneliness and depression, does nothing to help a fellow sufferer.

“The Crown” has always been a family drama underneath the pomp and circumstance. This season, it’s a particularly sad one but no less absorbing for the pain it portrays.

Dash & Lily (Nov. 10, Netflix)

Midori Francis as Lily in “Dash & Lily.” PHOTO CREDIT: Courtesy of Netflix

I’m usually a bit of a grinch when it comes to young adult-oriented entertainment, but “Dash & Lily” managed to worm their way under my skin. Perhaps it’s because the tweeness of the holiday-themed romance series is balanced by dollops of cynicism.

You see, Dash (Austin Abrams, “Euphoria,” “This Is Us”) hates Christmas; he calls it the “most detestable time of the year.” Lily (Midori Francis, “Good Boys”) loves Christmas — or at least she did until she learned her parents and grandfather were going out of town and her brother (Troy Iwata) was preoccupied with his new boyfriend.

Too shy and self-conscious to meet guys the usual way, literature lover Lily leaves a red notebook on a shelf at New York City’s famous Strand bookstore with a series of dares for whoever finds it, which obviously is equally bookish Dash, a child of divorce who’s soured on people in general since his girlfriend left him.

And so it goes, with Dash and Lily falling for each other sight unseen as they trade the notebook back and forth, while certain realities — including the reappearance of people from their pasts — threaten to derail their romantic fantasies of each other.

Of the two, Lily is the more fully drawn. Her insecurities, spawned by the meanness of other kids in middle school, leaven her sweetness and give her some depth.

Another thing to love about the show (based on the David Levithan and Rachel Cohn book series) are its glimpses of New York all decked out for the season. Seeing places I’m unlikely to revisit in person for some time to come, like the Union Square Holiday Market, the Rink at Rockefeller Center or Fifth Avenue store windows, warmed my heart.

Fight to the Finish (Nov. 11, 9 p.m., History)

Soldiers in Ortona, Italy, during World War II. PHOTO CREDIT: 52 Media

Lest we forget is the Remembrance Day motto, something that becomes ever more a threat for the two World Wars as we move further away in time and people with direct connections to them die off.

In Barry Stevens’ documentary — which arrives 75 years after the end of World War II — more than 50 veterans from all over Canada, as well as one Holocaust survivor, tell frank and heartbreaking stories of what it was like. 

Supplemented by archival footage and photographs, the men’s (and women’s) memories are still vivid, encompassing not just sights but sounds and smells, from the Battle of Hong Kong and imprisonment in Japanese PoW camps, through the Blitz, the Battle of the Atlantic, Dieppe, the Canadian campaign in Sicily, D-Day, the Battle of the Scheldt and the final battles in Germany, including the discovery of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. There are pleasant memories too, of the liberation of France and the Netherlands, Victory in Europe Day and the return to Canada.

It’s emotional and haunting territory, but — having had a grandfather who fought in the First World War and another who fought in the Second — I believe it deserves to be remembered.

B.C. vet Bernard Finestone calls war “the failure of humanity, but when situations like Hitler present themselves 600,000 Canadians like me have to do something about it.” 

And for a look at how Hitler became the threat he did, PBS has “Rise of the Nazis” Nov. 10 at 9 p.m.

Temple (Nov. 15, 9 p.m., Showcase)

Mark Strong as Dr. Daniel Milton in “Temple.” PHOTO CREDIT: Corus Entertainment

The idea of a doctor starting an “underground” medical clinic doesn’t necessarily sound like the most promising — or believable — idea for a drama, but a strong cast and non-linear storytelling help sell “Temple.”

Mark Strong plays Daniel Milton, a respected surgeon who’s been driven to desperate measures by a tragedy in his personal life. He teams up with Lee (Daniel Mays), a maintenance worker with an obsession with the end of civilization and access to an expanse of rooms and tunnels deep under the Temple subway station in London, England.

There’s a necessary suspension of disbelief in the idea of a secret clinic operating below one of the world’s busiest and, one presumes, most electronically monitored cities, but Strong and Mays manage to sell it. 

Daniel, already used to playing god in a sense, has a powerful emotional incentive for pursuing off-the-grid medical research while Lee, who’s what’s known as a prepper, seems fairly rational when you consider what the world is currently going through. (To be fair, the series, based on a Norwegian original, debuted in Britain long before the COVID-19 pandemic.)

The question is how long the clinic can stay off the radar, particularly since one of the patients, Jamie (Tobi King Bakare), is being hunted for a robbery that led to the grievous injury of a police officer.

Other cast members include Carice van Houten (Melisandre in “Game of Thrones”) and Catherine McCormack.

Odds and Ends

Myha’la Herrold and Marisa Abela in “Industry.” PHOTO CREDIT: HBO/Bell Media

Unbridled capitalism isn’t the most popular subject these days, but “Industry” (Nov. 9, 10 p.m., HBO/Crave) at least attempts to freshen things up by showing the goings-on inside a London investment bank from the point of view of the newbies who are fighting for permanent jobs there. The most interesting of these are the two women in the bunch, smart outsider Harper (Myha’la Herrold) and rich girl Yasmin (Marisa Abela).

“A Teacher” (Nov. 10, 10 p.m., FX) depicts what happens when a young female educator (Kate Mara, “Pose,” “House of Cards”) crosses boundaries with a high school senior (Nick Robinson, “Love, Victor”).

CBC’s “The Nature of Things” (Nov. 13, 9 p.m.) has an episode that will surely resonate with parents during this pandemic: “Kids vs. Screens,” hosted by biologist Dan Riskin, which explores the potential harms being caused by children’s attachment to their smartphones, tablets and video games, and what parents can do about it.

Apple TV Plus has the Werner Herzog and Clive Oppenheimer doc “Fireball: Visitors From Darker Worlds” (Nov. 13) about meteors that fell to Earth and their impact on science, history and mythology. It’s also got the animated series “Doug Unplugs” and “Becoming You,” a documentary series narrated by Olivia Colman about child development around the world, releasing on Nov. 13.

Acorn TV has “The South Westerlies” (Nov. 9), an Irish dramedy about an environmental consultant (Orla Brady, “Into the Badlands,” “Fringe”) going undercover in a small town to deal with objections to a wind farm.

OUTtv has the premiere of “MixedUp” (Nov. 11, 9 p.m.), an exploration of what it means to be BIPOC and LGBTQ+ by director, actor, singer, dancer and visual artist Howard J. Davis, a.k.a. HAUI.

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