Kevin
Can F Himself: Season 1
(2020/AMC*)/Nine Days
(**)/Our Ladies
(**2020/both Sony Blu-rays)/South
Of Heaven (2021/*both RLJ
Blu-rays)
Picture:
B+/B-/B/B- Sound: B+/B-/B-/B Extras: C+/C-/D/C Main
Programs: C+/C/C+/C
Here
are some dramas which might have touches of comedy, yet are not
always intending humor...
Annie
Murphy (Emmy winner for the hilarious Schitt's Creek) stars in
the interestingly made black comedy/drama Kevin
Can F Himself: Season 1
(2020,) which is now on Blu-ray from RLJE and AMC.
Allison
(Murphy) is a typical woman stuck in a literal sitcom marriage with
an unappreciative husband named Kevin. One day she snaps and ends up
on a journey of self discovery in which she gets into as much trouble
as possible in an effort to break free of her constrained marriage
and a 'free' woman. Seeking out an ex, getting wasted, and meeting
new people and getting into all sorts of bizarre situations, Allison
gets a new handle on life in a pretty funny and often times endearing
way.
The
show also features Eric Petersen, Mary Hollis Inboden, Alex Bonifer,
Candice Coke, and Jamie Denbo to name a few.
Episodes
include Living the Dream, Living the Dream; New Tricks Part 2,
We're Selling Washing Machines, Live Free or Die, New Patty, The
Grand Victorian, Broken, and Fixed.
Special
Features:
A
Look at the Series
Meet
the Characters
and
Making of the Show
Annie
Murphy is an interesting actress and does a pretty great job in this
series even if some aspects of it seem a bit silly and formulaic.
The filmmaking aspect of her being in a sitcom in the way its filmed
and complete with a laugh track vs. a more cinematic and serious form
of filmmaking is an interesting mix into her psyche, but the back and
forth grows a little tiresome.
Edson
Oda's Nine Days
(2020) has a man (Winston Duke) gets a group of people to watch the
recorded lives of many people in the past (a past best known for home
movies in the obsolete VHS format) and present (still VHS?) seeing
their lives and being a voyeur in a way that is not too healthy.
Then he gets some people to join him in different ways that seems
like a bad game, but it eventually leads to him having to deal with
his own past, not necessarily caught on tape.
Of
course, this is creepy and sounds like a horror film, yet never quite
gets there, yet it is also almost a thriller (Sharon Stone's Sliver
with a brain, poorer video equipment and no sex?) and trying to make
some kind of statement. It never really adds up, though some people
like this one, but I was not as impressed and it could have done more
at just over 2 hours. The rest of the cast (including Zazie Beetz
and Bill Skarsgard) are not bad here at all, but it just never adds
up to a big surprise or conclusion. At least they tried.
A
Making Of clip is the only extra.
Michael
Caton-Jones is a journeyman director with an interesting feature film
output with its highlights (Memphis
Belle, This
Boy's Life) as well as
bad moves (Basic Instinct
2, probably The
Jackal remake) and
ambitious films that at least tried to work (Scandal,
Rob Roy,
Doc Hollywood)
even if they were not totally successful. Our
Ladies (2020) falls in
the latter category, about a group of female Catholic schoolmates in
Scotland more interested in Rock music and going out to party than
entering a choir competition. The cast of young, unknown female
actors are not bad, but the script hardly offers nothing new.
Feeling
like a belated entry in such small, smart films like Alan Parker's
The Commitments
a good while ago, it at least feels authentic and this could be one
of those films where we look back and see some of these actresses
after they found commercial and/or critical success years later as an
early curio, but it also drags on and on more often than I would have
liked for its 106 minutes. Music choices are at least not bad, but I
was a bit disappointed.
There
are sadly no extras.
Finally,
we have Aharon Keshales's South
Of Heaven (2021) with Ted
Lasso star Jason Sudeikis
as a convicted criminal with an early parole, trying to out his life
back together, helped by a woman who loves him and waited (the
underrated Evangeline Lilly, convincing us easily why he had a reason
to survive and stay well behind bars!) except that she is now
suffering from a cancer she might not survive from.
His
parole officer (Shea Whigman) gets him an odd job, but soon, he is
dealing with a big local criminal (Mike Coulter) whose going to make
his life awful at the worst time. The film has more than enough time
with Sudeikis and Lilly, time that looks good, but cuts down on the
needed exposition the film lacks and that makes it a little more
cliched and dull than it should have (I was waiting for Lilly to do
an Annie Lennox/Eurythmics medley to break up the repetitive parts)
and that leaves the film with too many missed opportunities in its
two hours. Sudeikis makes this a curio, but it is Lilly who is the
rising star and both should make this a curio of sorts in itself,
even though I was disappointed.
A
trailer and behind the scenes clip are the only extras.
Now
for the technical performance of each release. Kevin
Can F Himself is
presented in 1080p high definition with an MPEG-4 AVC codec, a
widescreen aspect ratio of 1.78:1, and an English DTS-HD MA (Master
Audio) 5.1 lossless mix. All of which are of a high standard for the
aging Blu-ray format. This is still quite an improvement over the
original television broadcast.
The
1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image transfers on the rest of
the HD-shot theatrical releases are a little softer than I would have
liked, save Ladies, which is more consistent and the color
might also be a bit better.
All
three films also offer the same kind of sound mix, lossless DTS-HD MA
(Master Audio) 5.1, but it is usually dialogue-based and
underwhelming, save Heaven,
which is simply recorded, mixed and edited better for a more
consistent soundfield. Otherwise, the sound is fine in all cases.
-
Nicholas Sheffo and James Lockhart (Kevin)
https://www.facebook.com/jamesharlandlockhartv/
