frukuk's reviews

Does the American narrator, an outsider commentating on the strange Brits, indicate that this is targeted at the US market?

Is it meant to be a kids programme, because it is remarkably tame and the adults are empty shell stereotypes?

The woman who comes from a rich family, apparently out of the blue, writes a book on raising teenagers that sounds like some sort of vanity press offering. It's all ridiculously unbelievable.

I bailed on this big bore after watching the first two episodes of the first season.

It's so terribly written, especially the character of Cassie (played by Kaley Cuoco) and the "imagined" conversations with the dead Alex (played by Michiel Huisman).

I think it wants to be a comedy-drama, but it is essentially a farce -- and a poor farce at that. What a waste of Kaley Cuoco.

I suspect I saw this when it was first shown on the BBC in 1992. I don't remember what I thought about it at the time, though I'm guessing I found it rather disappointing.

Watching it now in 2025, it is hard to take it seriously. The run up to the "silent" (but subtitled) interview with Kendo Nagasaki -- or at least with the person "channeling" him -- made me seriously wonder how much of this whole "documentary" was scripted.

Watching this in 2025, having read the novel back in the 1990s, it struck me that there was so much dialogue here that much of it was added by Nigel Kneale.

The novel is far superior to this verbose dramatization. Everything seems to be ladled on so thick that it becomes insufferable. You might argue that that is the point, but the novel has much more subtlety and restraint and benefits from it.

While the novel is a must-read, this Nigel Kneale dramatization is really not worth watching.

Having watched the first two episodes of the first season, I'm not sure how much more of this I will watch.

The big problem I have with it is that the FBI are implausibly incompetent. Especially when, rather than remove a highly likely target to a safe location that they can easily defend, they leave that person in their own sprawling home without even doing a thorough search to ensure that their home is secure.

The other, almost as big problem, is that Joe Carroll, played by James Purefoy, just doesn't seem to be anywhere near as charismatic as he should if he could really inspire a cult.

The first episode was very well done. They've clearly spent a lot of time and money on making this as authentic as possible.

Far more thoughtful than I was expecting. Perhaps down to being based on a novel.

Looking forward to watching the rest of this online, though it's good enough that it probably shouldn't be binged.

You CAN choose your parent(s). But you can't choose his name.

A truly heartwarming tale with wonderful performances from the two leads, Barbie Ferreira and John Leguizamo.

The only slight negative is that Lily, played by Barbie Ferreira, seems amazingly chipper. Though perhaps that is simply a mask she wears.

Highly recommended.

"Putting out fires. With gasoline."

Far more enjoyable and thought-provoking than I was expecting.

More than anything, this film shows the problems that can arise in a relationship. You "say" things at an early stage that you subsequently wish you hadn't. It's hard to extricate yourself in an assertive (and not passive nor aggressive) manner.

Recommended.

This is such a confused film, flowing from a confused story/screenplay.

While this does have horror elements, it feels like they were added simply to draw attention away from the implausible story. And is Eloise really "able to return to 1960s London"?

While I understand that the multiple appearances of Eloise's dead mother were there to show Eloise was "sensitive" to spooky phenomena, I think this film would have worked much better if Eloise simply started having weird dreams when she moved to London.

And the idea that the stink of rotting "garbage" would be hidden by the smell of garlic coming from the adjacent French restaurant, is ridiculous.

Is the final scene on the rocks, the whole point of this film?

Are you supposed to be paying sufficient attention that you work out what is going on as the film progresses?

I must admit I was distracted by the strange carelessness of the participants. I certainly didn't work out who it was who was being pursued.

This is very nicely made and pleasantly entertaining.

I wasn't sure how things were going to be resolved, but this has an ending which seems quite fitting and draws things together rather nicely. (I felt a little more exposition would have helped, but that's probably down to my need to have things explained on screen.)

Definitely recommended.

John Thaw's inability to maintain a consistent accent was jarring.

There's an interesting joke about not liking the Welsh, given George Jones (played by John Thaw) is supposed to represent Neil Kinnock (who is Welsh).

Looking back at this from 2025, it does seem to speak to a very different period in which, pre Black Wednesday, the Tories did indeed have a reputation for economic management. But given the rather different political situation in 2025, it is far from essential viewing.

Laugh out loud in several places. A little too long, but definitely entertaining.

Jeffrey Wright is wonderful as Monk. A totally believable performance. His mellifluous voice, definitely helps sell this.

It did begin to drag at around the 1h20 mark. I think it could have been edited down to below 1h30 without losing anything significant.

The feel of this film really reminded me of the TV series Channel Zero (2016-2018).

Unfortunately, there is far less here than there is in either of the two seasons of Channel Zero. Indeed, it felt like there was virtually zero content here.

This is so slow to get anywhere that I found myself losing concentration. So it may be that there is some significant content here that I simply missed. But that is no more than a "may be". Not recommended.

(The Bare Necessities.)

I have some sympathy for the reviewer who wished they made a movie with just the Paw Paw bits (Paw Paw being represented by a pair of oversize puppet paws). Some of what this anthropomorphized cat says, as it awaits the return of its new "parents", is truly heart-breaking, .

This is a much narrower and less inventive movie than Me and You and Everyone We Know (2005). But it is still worth watching, even if only for the Paw Paw bits.

An interesting and enjoyable film.

For some reason, I was reminded of the restaurant "L'Idiot" (pronounced "Lee-dee-oh") in Steve Martin's L. A. Story (1991): "Part of the new cruelty?"; "I'm afraid so."

It's clear that this is not (simply) going to be about a restaurant that takes itself far too seriously.

It's less obvious how the meal is going to build to a climax. Clearly the chef doesn't (just) want to serve food that will baffle and astonish the diners. And the existence of "cheeseburger" as a safe word, does that imply that the diners are complicit in what unfolds?

I was hoping for something uplifting and more focussed on the music the women were making together, but it seemed to want to dwell on the difficulties they faced and focus on the adoption storyline. (I stopped watching after the first four episodes as it was too bleak for me.)

Despite adoption being an important subject, it felt like that storyline is given far too much prominence. Whereas the disturbing Police storyline could have done with more prominence. (Yes, things do seem to have actually gone backwards when it comes to sexism.)

Absolutely essential that this programme reminded of us of the challenges women face, but I wish it had shown that making music together could make those challenges more tolerable.

Oh dear. More fun in the Spanish sun with "cuddly" British villains. Winstone (sic), lose some.

One very decompressed episode was as much as I could take of this. And, at the very end of that first episode, the trailer appeared to spoil the remainder of the season.

Where is the chemistry between the two leads? I can't believe they were ever involved in any joint activity of any kind.

A fun watch, with an inventive script which is pleasantly unpredictable.

One wrong note: the casting of Sharon Horgan as Olivia. I'm sure there are Irish natives in the US film industry, but I felt former film makeup artist Olivia should have been played by an American.

While there's nothing here that's life changing, it is rather entertaining.

An interesting film with pitch perfect performances from the two leads.

But this must be set in a fictional England, because we don't treat asylum seekers in this way.

I guess they have to be "bound" to the house and so they are supposed to be on bail (for what offence?) and forbidden from moving to another location. Still, it made it harder for this Englishman to suspend disbelief.

Watching the first episode, I just couldn't get the sense that there is any chemistry between the two leads.

BBC3 shows some excellent comedies, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps (2001-2011) and Him & Her (2010-2013), for example, so there's really no need to watch a comedy drama as poor as this.

The only bit that made me smile was the "I'm a lawyer, not a plumber" line. Otherwise, it was remarkably low energy and rather depressing.

Music/karaoke has a significant role in this film. At times it felt like it was about to turn into a full blown musical. That might have been an interesting way to go.

I'm not convinced there is much chemistry between the two leads. They seem more like young children at school who describe themselves as boyfriend and girlfriend when they are really just friends.

So this is a wannabe musical that is more a buddy movie than a romcom.

DI Aoife Regan is, as others have noted, so impossibly abrasive that this is painful to watch at points.

She is particularly hard to take in the first two episodes ("Hens", parts 1 and 2). So if you're tempted to watch this (first?) season, I would strongly recommend you skip the first two episodes.

Both DI Aoife Regan and DCI Philip Boyd are given "interesting" backstories, I assume in the hope of making viewers care for them. But I'm afraid I didn't take to either of them.

I enjoyed the first two thirds of this, but I felt the final third undermined things and so couldn't recommend it.

I'm not sure whether Felice is really naïve and actually thinks he can return after an absence of forty (sic) years to pick up where he left off. An alternative possibility is that he is either consciously or subconsciously seeking to make amends.

But whatever the co-writers are trying to say here, I ultimately just couldn't accept Felice and Oreste as real people.

I can't believe that this very poor effort was written by the same person who created and wrote the wonderful Foyle's War (2002-2015). This is absolutely not worth watching.

The excessive exposition at the end of the final episode is surely a sign of some very poor writing.

It feels like Anthony Horowitz had the idea of a plane crash followed by the murder of the survivors and then had to come up with a convoluted explanation as to why they were murdered.