tags: Japanese dorama, Mei Nagano, mystery, Netflix streaming, revenge
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Anzu (Mei Nagano, charming and enigmatic) watched her family home go up in flames when she was young. Her mother, Satsuki, apparently left the stove on. All her material possessions were lost and, soon afterward, her family broke apart.
Satsuki developed generalized amnesia, and her husband, Osamu, married her former best friend Makiko. The two of them now live in the same house, which has been restored.
Working with her sister Yuzu, Anzu adopts the identity of Shizuka Yamauchi and gets a job as Makiko’s housekeeper.
Anzu: "That woman stole my home and my family…”
Lovely Mei Nagano as Anzu is all grown up and starring in a revenge family drama. I first saw her in Rurouni Kenshin when she just 13 years old. She's now 24!
Mei Nagano in 2016 Japanese high school dorama, Koe Koi
Highly recommended for Japanese manga live action drama series fans. I loved it!
A politician and his actress wife have been married for five years... but their domestic bliss now faces a crisis, including a fling, an affair and potential divorce!
What should be an issue between just the two of them causes an uproar that sweeps up everyone in their orbit! Where will this dizzy divorce drama end up?
Laugh and cry along with this divorce comedy featuring a star-studded cast, including main co-stars Tori Matsuzaka and Riisa Naka, as well as Ryo Nishikido, Yuka Itaya, Koji Yamamoto and Arata Furuta.
The show revolves around Rakugo, a traditional Japanese comedy that can look back on a 400 year long history. It tells about a Yakuza who goes to a Rakugo performer to collect debts, and a talented comedian who tries to change his destiny.
This 2005 Japanese series is streaming on Netflix. It is goofy and hilarious, a true dramedy with bursts of comedy and heavy drama. I love the over-the-top acting and contrived personal stories that only the Japanese can do without the viewers rolling their eyes.
tags: Becky, Japanese reality dating show, Netflix streaming
4 episodes every Tuesday, 30 - 35 minutes, total of 18 episodes
Becky has a new dating reality show to comment on. The dating show is for more mature unmarried people and those who have been married before looking for a second or a third chance at love. The participants are all older than the usual romance seekers on reality TV, a version/mash-up of Terrace House and the Korean dating show Single's Inferno. The youngest is almost 40 and the oldest is 60.
The show is definitely different from other romance oriented reality shows. They help in renovating the old rundown house and grow vegetables in the garden to supplement their food allowance. The group is more open to sexual discussions because they are old and had more experience than shows with much younger people. The 2 oldest men had an argument early on which I've never seen in any Japanese reality shows. Japanese people are usually not prone to arguments.
At the end of the fourth episode the 2 oldest men left and were replaced by 2 40 year old men and one woman. There will be 5 women and 4 men next week. Interesting and addicting series, just like Terrace House and Love Wagon. Next 4 episodes will air on May 9.
BTW, Becky looks prettier and doesn't seem to age.
Shin Sung-Han majored in piano and became a professor at a music university in Germany. One day, Shin Sung-Han hears shocking news. To find out the truth, he travels back to South Korea and works on becoming a lawyer. He eventually begins to work as a lawyer, specializing in divorce. He made the choice to specialize in divorce, due to reasons from his childhood. Shin Sung-Han faces his clients, with various unfortunate stories, and stands up for them. While doing this, he approaches the truth that he has been seeking.
I like it already with just 2 episodes. Cho Seung-Woo playing the title character is not the best looking guy in Kdramaland and is very short in stature but he is excellent in all the Korean dramas I've seen him in. He can also do comedy and credible as a sci-fi action hero.
One hundred contestants in top physical shape compete in a series of grueling challenges to claim the honor - and cash reward - as the last one standing.
The reality show has 100 athletes, special forces soldiers, fitness influencers, MMA fighters, firefighters, mountain rescuers, cross fit trainers, models, dancers - all strong men and women compete against each other.
The first elimination of 50 contestants, one on one rugby-like fight for a round ball with mud wrestling and physical agility. I like that some women chose a man to challenge and so far 1 woman has already won against her male opponent. She's a real athlete unlike some sissy male American athletes using the transgender insanity to compete with women because they know they cannot win against a man.
When the past catches up with the newly appointed head of MI6, in the form of a Russian spy with whom he shares a complicated past, he is forced to question everything and everyone in his life.
Secrets, lies and diplomatic relationships will all come to light.
Entertainment companies don't make compelling and intelligent spy thrillers anymore. *Sigh*
This new series, very short at 5 episodes with 37 to 45 minute episodes, is written, acted, and directed oh so badly. Adam Lawrence is elevated to acting Chief of MI6 when the chief was poisoned. EVERYBODY starts acting stupid as soon as his family was introduced - the wife, the children, the "friend" of the wife. Gahhhh! Whispering disease is worse than covid. Everyone is afflicted. Sheesh. .Amateur and convoluted much. The whole production and actors should be ashamed of themselves. 👎👎 Avoid!
“The Fabulous” is about the work, passion, romance, and friendships of young men and women who have thrown themselves into the fashion industry. It will portray their struggles to survive in the competitive fashion world and their flamboyant and passionate daily lives in the nation’s trendiest industry.
Best Netflix series and my favorite (along with Enola Holmes 2) for 2022. To fully enjoy the series, do not compare it and the cast with past TV shows and movies. This is titled Wednesday, not The Addams Family.
The dance scene is awesome.
And playing the cello - The Rolling Stones' Paint It Black - already downloaded from Freegal. Can you tell I'm obsessed? 😉
Welcome to Slumberland, the world of dreams! Jason Momoa plays “Flip” an eccentric outlaw on a mission to help a young girl travel through dreams and flee nightmares, in hopes of reuniting with her father.
I never heard of the comics and cartoons this movie is based on. I loved this bittersweet, cute, and funny children's movie. Jason Momoa is good as "Flip" and one of my favorite characters is the little boy with a pompadour driving a huge garbage truck.
Don't listen to professional and armchair critics. This is a fun movie for all ages.
tags: coming of age, drama, mystery. Netflix streaming
⭐⭐⭐
From IMDB
Abandoned by her family, Kya Clark, otherwise known to the townspeople of Barkley Cove as the Marsh Girl, is mysterious and wild. "Where the Crawdads Sing" is a coming-of-age story of a young girl raised by the marshlands of the south in the 1950s. When the town hotshot is found dead, and inexplicably linked to Kya, the Marsh Girl is the prime suspect in his murder case.
The movie is based on a best selling book which I haven't read and I never had the interest in reading it. I'm not into books about being one with nature and have "spiritual" themes (according to reviews on Goodreads).
Kya, the youngest of 3 children, is abandoned first by the mother who couldn't take anymore her husband's alcoholism and physical abuse. The older brother and sister also leave for the same reason. Kya is left alone with her father who at first is tolerant of her but she ends up all alone in their house. What a depressing story. Who does that to a little girl? Where are the grandparents? Uncles? Aunties? And who enjoys reading such a stupid story? The mother never came back nor check up on her. She wrote once but the letter was burned by the father.
Kya had to use her smarts in order to survive, digging up shellfish and sells it to the Black couple who runs a goods store. The couple are the only people who are nice to her. They give her used clothing so she can go to school where the children make fun and gossip about her and call her names. Discouraged, she runs back home and to the marsh where she is at peace. How she lived alone for 10 years since everybody left is a mystery to me.
She learns how to read when she is already a teenager. A friend of her brother shows up one day and sees she is talented in drawing. He teaches her how to read and suggests she submit her work to a publishing company. He becomes her boyfriend, her first love. But he also abandons her for university. 5 years she waits for him then another young man starts paying attention to her and she accepts him. The boy has a fiancée but still wants to have Kya as his sex toy. She rejects him when she finds out about the fiancée. He becomes aggressive and tries to rape her. Then the young man dies, either murdered or by accident.
The movie focuses more on the murder mystery, her trial, and acquittal. The ending reveals if she really killed him. All the clues are there. You just have to pay attention to Kya's poetic and metaphorical dialog. She dies as an old lady with gray hair and still married to her first love but the truth will never be revealed. There is no point anyway.
It is an okay movie, good not great. The acting and cinematography are good.
Third and final season of Derry Girls is now streaming on Netflix. Liam Neeson does a cameo on Episode 1 and is absolutely perfect looking tired and weary interrogating the girls. He gave up after listening to Uncle Colm. Great acting and I wonder if he was trying not to laugh.
Will Spann is driving his wife to her parents’ house. They stop at a gas station on the way where his wife mysteriously disappears. He is bewildered and begins to panic, but then suspects foul play. He alerts the authorities but becomes a prime suspect. Detective Paterson leads the investigation and suspects that Will may have a hand in his wife’s disappearance.
Hollywood is hopeless. Good entertaining movies from Hollywood are very rare these days. The only ones I enjoyed this year are Uncharted and Father Stu and I'm not even a fan of Mark Wahlberg. I watched to see if Gerald Butler's acting and Hollywood have improved. No to both.
This movie has no entertainment value to me. I couldn't decide who is the most annoying character because everyone is super annoying: the wife, the parents-in-law, the policeman, the side characters, and Gerald Butler as the husband. I'm sorry but Gerald simply cannot act. In the the first few minutes he and his wife are whispering. In the car. While driving to her parents' house. Why?
His driving also annoyed me. He is constantly moving the steering wheel left and right left and right left and right. On a straight paved smooth highway. Who drives like that? Then he drives like a maniac at the gas station. Idiot.
The wife is approached by a man just outside the door of the convenience store and disappears, her phone off. Frantic husband goes looking for her inside the store and around the gas station, shouting her name loudly every 2 feet. He looks and sounds familiar. Wait a minute, I've seen this lousy scene before. Yep. Same inferior acting. Sigh.
Annoying husband goes to the parents-in-law who are also extremely annoying. Their exchange of dialog is exasperating. Now he goes to the police. What do you know, the policeman is also annoying and an even lousier actor than Gerald. I soon realize this movie is becoming a contest as to what character will annoy me the most. Sheesh!
The story has been done a gazillion times before so nothing is fresh and will put one to sleep. Adding to Hollywood cliché the group who kidnapped the wife are involved in making illicit drugs. But of course!
Not recommended unless you are a fan of Gerald Butler.
tags: based on true story, Catholic priest, drama, family, redemption, streaming on Netflix
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Based on a true story, Father Stu is an unflinchingly honest, funny and ultimately uplifting drama about a lost soul who finds his purpose in a most unexpected place. When an injury ends his amateur boxing career, Stuart Long moves to L.A. dreaming of stardom. While scraping by as a supermarket clerk, he meets Carmen, a Catholic Sunday school teacher who seems immune to his bad-boy charm. Determined to win her over, the longtime agnostic starts going to church to impress her. But surviving a terrible motorcycle accident leaves him wondering if he can use his second chance to help others find their way, leading to the surprising realization that he is meant to be a Catholic priest. Despite a devastating health crisis and the skepticism of Church officials and his estranged parents, Stu pursues his vocation with courage and compassion, inspiring not only those closest to him but countless others along the way.
The movie is currently Number 1 on Netflix and I can understand why. It is well scripted and acted, inspiring for everyone not just for Catholics but for all faiths. It's superior to any current movies Hollywood is churning out these days. The soundtrack is awesome also.
tags: action, adventure, based on video game, Magellan's lost treasure, Netflix streaming
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
A very short synopsis from IMDB
Street-smart Nathan Drake is recruited by seasoned treasure hunter Victor "Sully" Sullivan to recover a fortune amassed by Ferdinand Magellan, and lost 500 years ago by the House of Moncada.
Tamara Falcó is the 40 year old daughter of Filipino Spanish socialite Isabel Preysler and the late Marquess of Griñón, whatever that is. She is the half sister of singer Enrique Iglesias on her mother's side. She is a TV personality and influencer [her mom is the original trendsetter - influencer in today's lingo], also a chef and now she wants to open a pop-up restaurant in their rundown castle which her father inherited from an aunt. It is a large property with its own chapel and pet cemetery but the castle itself needs major renovation with its crumbling roof and peeling walls.
After learning her estranged father is a hotel mogul, Belinda bumbles her way through a new, sophisticated lifestyle with the help of a charming lawyer.
Why oh why was this horrible movie made? I'm not fond of Filipino movies and this one made me more than cringe. This movie is garbage and I hate it. The acting is over the top and dialog is atrocious. The girl Belinda is so vulgar using all the crude stuff [vomit, poop, fart, stomach growling, Brazilian wax, the attorney's d*ck] for what she thinks is "comedy". She is a loudmouth, obsessed with sex ugly lead character and almost everything that comes out of her dirty mouth has sexual reference. When she gets startled or stumbles, she utters male or female sexual anatomy. Each. And. Every. Time. I wanted to drag her into the bathtub and wash her including her mouth with disinfectant soap.
The writer and director think this is funny. Even the poorest people in the Philippines are not as crass as this Belinda creature. I am so ashamed for the Filipino people for creating this dreadful abomination they call a comedy movie and streaming on Netflix.
Valley of the Dead is a Spanish zombie movie set during the Spanish Civil War. Two opposing sides agree to a temporary alliance to deal with an army of the dead created by the Nazis. It uses a historical setting and I like it for its combination of zombies and smart comedic dialog but tells a good story. My only complaint is the English subtitles. Why are the names of people translated into English. Example: one guy named Mecha is translated to Fuse. It's a nickname like the female Matacuras (priest killer) but still. Just leave the Spanish names, not the English translated.
