Mrs. Bradley Series

[1998, 2000]

Starring:
Diana Rigg
Neil Dudgeon
Peter Davidson
and guest appearances of:
Phyllida Law
David Tennant
etc.

average rating: ★★★★
~
performance: ★★★★
screenplay: ★★★★
plot/storyline: ★★
cinematography: ★★★
~
Mysteries set in the 20's... Rad fashion... Lovely acting...

I personally loved the Mrs. Bradley series. We had picked it up at the library once before, neglected to watch it because it looked really lame, and returned it. We didn't even think about it again until Mom reserved "The Avengers," which Diana Rigg stars in, and somehow we wound up with the Mrs. Bradley mysteries on our T.V. room floor again. And I'm very glad we did.

Diana Rigg and Neil Dudgeon were great. Diana plays a smart, stylish, witty lady (and oldish lady), Adela Bradley, who works as an investigator and is very knowledgeable in all things Freudian. She is really great, her voice is awesome. With her is her endearingly loyal chauffeur, George Moody (Dudgeon), who always helps her with her mystery. If he wasn't in the series, I wouldn't have watched all of the episodes. They act together really, really naturally and it was very cute.

The stories were really silly, with lots of stabbing, bloodiness, choking, screaming and all that jazz. The mysteries were not necessarily predictable (we had fun guessing the culprits) but they were very silly.

The series are set in the 20's, and with the 20's comes the fashion and the music. Mrs. Bradley wears a different outfit every day, consisting of an outrageous hat and dress. At the beginning of each episode there is a really funny little song, and all of the rest is lots of crazy jazz. It's really quite hilarious.

Anyway, however tacky or silly this show might have been, there were many points at which we laughed out loud, wondered (with some concern) what was going to happened, and smiled.

Charade

[1963]

Starring:
Audrey Hepburn
Cary Grant
Walter Mattau

average rating: ★★★★
~
performance: ★★★
screenplay: ★★★★
plot/storyline: ★★★★
cinematography: ★★★★
~
Murder Mystery / Romance

Charade is a very silly movie, actually, though I'm sure that back in the 60's it was considered scary. When we first watched it, however, I do remember thinking that it had a good plot for the era, one that was genuinely unpredictable.

The story centers around a young woman named Regina Lambert (Hepburn) who's husband recently died, leaving her with three thugs on her tail, chasing her for a quarter of a million dollars that they think she simply must have. At first she seems to have a man named Peter Joshua (Grant) on her side, a man whom she falls in love with. But is he really Peter Joshua, and who's side is he really on? Meanwhile, a man from the American Embassy, Mr. Bartholomew (Mattau) claims that this quarter of a million dollars belongs to the government, though he is someone who seems to really be on her side.

Performances of Audrey and Cary are the same as they are in any of their other movies, but just as endearing. One of the best parts of the movie is when Cary Grant, after being coaxed to take a shower in Audrey's room, stubbornly and hilariously takes a shower in his full suit, claiming that it was a "drip-dry" suit and that the manufacturers recommended it to keep the suit in shape.

The movie is quick-paced and funny - definitely worth the watch.

[poster courtesy of moviegoods.com]

The Illusionist

[2006]

Starring:
Edward Norton
Paul Giamatti
Jessica Biel
Rufus Sewell

average rating: ★★★
~
performance: ★★★
screenplay: ★★★
plot/storyline: ★★
cinematography: ★★★
~
19th Century England/Mysteryish

We didn't particularly expect much from this movie, despite the exaggerated praise given by who wrote the review on the back of the DVD case. And as we expected, it wasn't very impressive.

The way the story unfolds is told backwards - beginning with a scene close to the end, and then starting back at the beginning as being told by the Chief Inspector (Giamatti) to the Crown Prince (Sewell).

The story is about a son of a cabinet-maker who was secretly best friends with a upperclass girl, and how they were found out and rudely separated, and how he then learned the art of illusions and ran away to make his fortune performing. And he did. Now older (Norton), he calls himself Eisenheim the Illusionist and he is apparently quite expert. He meets his childhood friend again, (Biel) who is now Duchess Sophie. But Sophie is to marry the Crown Prince Leopold, and can never be with poor Eisenheim. It's all very sad, I'm sure.

The rest of the story tells of how Eisenheim and Sophie concoct a plan that they don't tell the audience about, of how the Inspector is watching their every move - sometimes seeming evil, sometimes on Eisenheim's side - but all along wanting to know the secret of Eisenheim's magic, and of how the ugly Prince finds out that Sophie and Eisenheim are chummy... then, of course, disaster strikes, because he's a very evil Prince.

Generally, this was a sloppy movie. If it had been done well, it would have had a convoluted and mysterious plot, with a jolly great ending that left you wondering how you could be so stupid as to have missed those minor details that gave it all away. But it wasn't. I do think that such a plot was in the filmmakers minds when they started this movie, but it flopped, leaving us with an ending we all knew was going to be there and an explanation that was ridiculously silly.

The performances, costume design, and special effects were all mediocre and kind of flat. In fact, the only really interesting part of the movie was the locket that Eisenheim made for Sophie. Isn't that sad?

[poster courtesty of impawards.com]