Escape from the Newsroom

I liked it a lot not sure why so many other people seem to dislike this. It is not as good as the TV show was I admit but still good and much better than a lot of other Canadian TV shows.

Most of Ken Finkleman's work has an acquired taste. You have to like his will for artistic creativity and also understand his satiric outlook. The acting is great, though I wish Mark Farrell was in it. But the one thing that sets this apart from the regular Newsroom series is that he goes further to play with satire and reality, this time using his surrealist approach. This is what I'd say to be the best part of the movie, though others who do not accept Ken Finkleman's art over his satiric comedy may be bothered by it. Basically, if you just like the Newsroom series and probably haven't heard of anything else Ken Finkleman has done, you might not like this one. It's not the Newsroom, but just as the title says, it's an escape from it. Others who appreciate Finkleman's body of work, and would probably pay to see him direct a jean commercial if he ever did one (ya right), it is they who would get the most from this.

This is a good show. I don't remember this as much as the TV series they did which I thought was great, it wasn't as good as the series and the later series they did where they brought back the Newsroom was even less good, but this was enjoyable enough. It is about a heartless news producer who uses horrible events as a way to get better viewer-ship numbers for his show, all of the characters have some big flaws. The jokes are good if you like dark humour. Like I said not as good as the original show was but still worth watching if you ever get a chance to see it on TV again. I would recommend it and as a TV show on CBC it is pretty safe for the whole family to watch though like I said there is some dark stuff.

"Escape" begins much like "The Newsroom" did. Finkleman is marvelous with his dialogue. We don't have Mark Farrell or Tanya Allen anymore, but Christian Potenza and Regean Pasternak are worthwhile replacements.

The film reaches a point in which Finkelman's trademark surrealism takes over, and this film jumps into the realm of "art" rather than "entertainment", complete with a blunt damning of the whole concept of reviving this show! Unfortunately, while The Newsroom quite often provided great entertainment, the "art" that is "Escape" does not.

Escape continues the tone established by More Tears, Foolish Heart, and Foreign Objects, none of which were nearly as successful as The Newsroom was, with good reason. Dry, biting satires are wonderful if done with some entertainment value, but lose their effect when they're just downright inaccessible, as this film had become. It's hard to be entertained at jokes about people dying from Anthrax.

Things do start to make sense at the end - you realize what Finkleman wanted to say and he then returns to the same lovable humour we've come to expect from him. Now that his point has been made (roughly 10 times now, from all of his series), he can get back to writing the wonderful satire we've come to enjoy so much.