Maneater
(2009 TV Mini-Series/Sony DVD)
Picture:
C Sound: C+ Extras: D Episodes: D
Terms
like “based on a true story” or “based on a book” are so often abused that when
you hear them, you know you might be in trouble. When it involves safe-at-best
writer/producers like Suzanne Martin and Gigi Levangie (Hot Properties, The Starter
Wife), you know you might be in trouble.
Maneater (2009) is a TV
mini-series/elongated telefilm about a young woman trying to use the idea of
getting married (she is planning to tie the knot, but does not have a groom
yet) and wants to make it in the entertainment business.
It is the
kind of cynical-is-fun fluff that we have been getting far too much of since
the 1980s, is highly unentertaining and is everything we have seen in this
formula to death. No surprise this is
made for the infamous Lifetime Network, a network for women if that is a woman
who is against feminism or progress. Sarah
Chalke is the practical title character and both Gregory Harrison and Maria
Conchita Alonzo also show up, but they can’t save this dud either.
Play the
Hall & Oates hit song over and over again instead. You’ll have more fun, it will be less
annoying and it is also now handled by Sony.
The anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image is very
soft for a new production and adds to the phony feel of the whole venture,
while the Dolby Digital 5.1 mix sounds like 2.0 Stereo that has been stretched
out too much for its own good. The
recording of the sound elements is also TV-flat. There are no extras, as expected.
- Nicholas
Sheffo
