Category Archives: Uncle-Nephew relations

1994, Action sequences, Bad Acting, Classic, Conspiracy, Drama, Good Brother - Bad Brother, Jealousy, Kanopy streaming, Mediocre, Mother-son relations, Murder, Norse Tale, Nudity, Old-Fashioned, Period Piece, Personal Betrayal, Political Conspiracy, Revenge, Sometimes seems silly, Uncle-Nephew relations

Royal Deceit (1994)

From Kanopy:

An ancient Danish story of evil, power and human spirit, that subsequently inspired William Shakespeare on his tragedy, Hamlet. When the king of Jutland is murdered by his brother, the dark prince claims both the throne and Queen Geruth. Although her son saw the murder, he feigns madness to spare his life.

From Kanopy you can stream this 28 year old film lasting 108 minutes.

Somehow, way back in 1994, the film got past the censors.  Have you ever seen a naked Helen Mirren?  Indeed, there is a lot of nudity in the film.

Give credit to the fact that the filming of this medieval tale hopefully stayed true to the Norse conditions of the time.  Buildings are humble and crude. Clothing is rudimentary.  Weapons and warfare are amateur affairs.  Somehow, killing a man  by simply sticking a short knife somewhere in his body just does not look convincing.

Delivery of the spoken lines is a bit stilted.

Watching a film that is 28 years old gives us a chance to see what familiar actors looked like way back then. And what a difference!

  • Christian Bale as prince Amled was 20 years old.
  • Gabriel Byrne as the evil brother Fenge was 44 years old.
  • Helen Mirren as queen Geruth was 49 years old.
  • Kate Beckinsale as Ethel was 21 years old.
  • Tom Wilkinson as king Hardvendel was 46 years old.

 

2021, Acceptable for teenagers, Alcoholism, Antique Cars, Based on a Book, Based on true facts, Bloody scenes, Brother-Brother relations, Bullying, Clever Plot, Could Be Hard To Watch, Dancing, DO NOT MISS, Drama, Embarrassing episodes, Emotional child abuse, Erotic Tension, Family Conflict, Gay theme, Homophobia, Netflix Streaming, Nudity, Period Piece, Puzzling Conclusion, Sexual Tension, Suicide, Suspense, Uncle-Nephew relations, Western

The Power of the Dog (2021)

From IMDB:

Charismatic rancher Phil Burbank inspires fear and awe in those around him. When his brother brings home a new wife and her son, Phil torments them until he finds himself exposed to the possibility of love.

From Netflix:

A domineering but charismatic rancher wages a war of intimidation on his brother’s new wife and her teen son — until long-hidden secrets come to light.

From Netflix you can stream this stunning 2 hour 8 minute film.

Filmed in New Zealand (and supposedly taking place in Montana), Jane Campion’s mystery film ended with my saying “Whoa! What just happened?”  After sitting for awhile in a daze, I thought I finally figured out what was going on in the story.  To check my conclusion I googled for “The Power of the Dog” and discovered that my own reaction was typical for the film.  There are lots of discussions and explanations concerning the plot. To my satisfaction, I had correctly solved the whodunit. And not a word more from me about the details. (Out of desperation, you might read a review.)

Needless to say Benedict Cumberbatch (as the villain Phil Burbank) shows off his consistently amazing skill as an actor-chameleon.  Note that his American English is pitch perfect.

But credits are due also to:

  • Kirsten Dunst as Rose Gordon, the fragile wife of George Burbank.
  • Kodi Smit-McPhee as her son Peter Gordon.
  • Jesse Plemons as Phil’s soft-spoken but steady a rock brother George Burbank.

Be prepared for Phil’s nasty cruelty. Let me know if you solved the puzzle.

DO NOT MISS!

2022, Abandoned child, Acceptable for teenagers, Alcoholism, Amazon Prime, America of the 1950s, Amusing banter, Based on a Book, Based on true facts, Brother-Sister relations, Coarse manners, Could Be Sad, Crude Talk, Disrespect toward women, DO NOT MISS, Eccentric cast of characters, Failed Father, Father-son relations, Fatherless child, Feel Good Not For Children, Friendship, Happy ending, Husband leaves wife, Local color, Sex Scenes, Social class differences, Uncle-Nephew relations, Vulgar, Wife Beating

The Tender Bar (2022)

From Amazon Prime:

​​From director George Clooney and based on the best-selling memoir, The Tender Bar follows an aspiring writer (Tye Sheridan) pursuing his romantic and professional dreams. From a stool in his uncle’s (Ben Affleck) bar, he learns what it means to grow up from a colorful group of local characters.

From Amazon Prime you can stream this gem of a film which lasts for 1 hour 46 minutes.

Ben Affleck’s resumé has seen its ups and downs, successes and embarrassing flops.  But with this wonderful film he has nailed a really memorable role.  Even one critic who found the film “bland” still conceded that Affleck (as Uncle George) delivered an excellent, terrific performance.

Although that Long Island neighborhood, home of a lot of foul-mouthed but warm-hearted men and women, was rougher than anything I ever experienced, nevertheless I admired their tight friendships.

Expect notable acting from:

  • Tye Sheridan as the young JR.  Naïve, plain looking, and hopelessly attracted to
  • Briana Middleton as Sidney. Did she ever love JR or was she looking for “experience” (as in “sex”)?
  • Quincy Tyler Bernstine as Sidney’s mother, whose sneering, smug, cruel treatment of JR left me boiling.
  • Daniel Ranieri as young JR.
  • Christopher Lloyd as Grandpa. “Don’t tell anybody I’m a good grandfather, everybody will want one.”
  • Lily Rabe as the  Mom whose life is centered on her son JR.
  • Max Martini as JR’s cringe-worthy drunk of a father.

In the IMDB entry for this movie, there is a sizeable user review that is much harder on the film than I have been. Still —

DO NOT MISS!

 

2020, Accidental Death, British, Brother-Sister relations, Complicated, Cooking, Creepy, Dark, Drama, Extramarital Affair, Flashbacks, Ghost story, Good Production Values, Horror, Lesbian Theme, Love Story, Mother-daughter relations, Netflix Streaming, Revenge, Strange Ending, Uncle-Nephew relations, Uncle-Niece relations, Unusual, Unusual ending

The Haunting of Bly Manor (2020)

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From Netflix:

A bright-eyed American au pair hopes to make a difference caring for two orphans in a grand English manor. Yet the feeling of dread is undeniable.

From Netflix you can stream 9 episodes of this one season “horror” story. Each episode lasts about 50 minutes.

Probably it is fair to call this series a “horror” story.  But there are no cheap theatrical tricks or ugly monsters.  Almost unfortunately the acting and production details are so good that I was willing to watch the complicated plot to the end.  Little by little the underlying premise and explanation for the strange events are revealed.   But this show is easily one of the strangest I have ever seen and is clearly not for everyone’s tastes.  By way of warning you to avoid spending time here, do NOT expect a happy ending.

If, however, you are determined to watch a well-done “ghost” story, then hopefully you will enjoy it.

2018, Abduction, Addiction, Ambiguous Conclusion, Bicycles, Bloody scenes, Conspiracy, Corruption, Crime thriller, Detective, DO NOT MISS, Dog episode, Drugs, Ethical struggles, Family Conflict, Flashbacks, Forensics, Greed, Hunting, Kidnapping, Made For TV, MHz Choice, Mother-son relations, Murder, Murder Investigation, Personal Betrayal, Police Corruption, Police cover-up, Suspense, Swedish, Swedish Detective, Thriller, Uncle-Nephew relations, Violent, Wrongful Arrest

The Hunters (2018)

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From IMDB:

Erik returns to the northernmost of Sweden after a lifetime with Stockholm police [seeThe Hunters (1996) and False Trail (2011)]. Retirement doesn’t become him so he helps his nephew Peter, a rookie at the local police.

From MHz Choice:

Rolf Lassgard stars as a retired Stockholm cop drawn into a mystery in Sweden’s far north.

From MHz Choice you can stream the 6 episodes of this Swedish detective thriller. Each episode lasts about 45 minutes.  Swedish sound track with English subtitles.

Evidently (from IMDB) “The Hunters” was a Swedish TV series that began in 1996.  Rolf Lassgard has played the same Stockholm cop in other installments.  His role as Erik Bäckström is played superbly.

THRILLER is an understatement. You have the privilege of being able to stream all the episodes as fast as you wish, where I had to wait not so patiently for each Tuesday’s new episode to be available.

But then I am always a sucker for plots in which the villain (or in this case villains) is so smoothly corrupt and knows how to seduce others into his corruption while framing others for the crimes. By the time I watched the last episode I was literally shaking with anticipation. Up to the very last moment the bad guys seemed to be winning.

DO NOT MISS!

 

2019, Acceptable for teenagers, Bad Acting, Barely Acceptable Trash, Beautiful Seaside Town, Blackmail, Bloody scenes, Career Competition, Chick Flick, Child Molestation, Contract Killing, Contract Maiming, Corny, Corruption, Dancing, Detective, Drama, Drug Dealers, Drugs, Eccentric cast of characters, Ends in Cliff Hanger, Ethical struggles, False Imprisonment, Family Conflict, Fist Fight, Frame someone for a crime, Friendship, Gangs, Gay Bashing, Gay theme, Improbable details, Latino Culture, Love Story, Male Prostitutes, Mediocre, Melodrama, Mental Illness, Mother-son relations, Motorcycles, Murder, Murder Investigation, Must suspend disbelief, Netflix Streaming, Nudity, Personal Betrayal, Plot twists, Police Corruption, Police cover-up, Police Politics, Rape, Revenge, Ridiculous plot, Soap Opera, Sometimes seems silly, Somewhat trashy, Spanish, Telenovela, Uncle-Nephew relations, Unjust crime conviction, Various Romances, Violent

Toy Boy (2019)

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From Netflix:

A stripper sets out to prove his innocence for a crime he didn’t commit and was unjustly incarcerated for seven years earlier.

From Netflix you can stream the 13 episodes (each episode about 70 minutes) of this Spanish telenovela.  Many spoken languages and caption languages are available.

Spanish telenovelas inhabit a world of their own.  Chief among their attributes are “corny”, “amateurish”,  and “sometimes really stupid.” So why on earth did I watch this unintentionally laughable marathon? Netflix seemed to promote this series, so I started. Injustice and villains always get me going.  Because I have to see justice done I just keep plodding along to the end.

Before you waste your time let me list some of the “features” of this charmer:

  •  You might enjoy listening to the original Spanish (as in Spain, not Latin America) sound track. You might want Spanish captions. At the very least it could possibly be a learning experience although there are better options.
  •  Each tension point is almost immediately resolved so you don’t have to get all worked up.  Sometimes those immediate solutions seem far fetched or just too convenient.
  • Recall that telenovelas for all their involvement with sex are really very chaste.   Certainly the endless number of male stripper dance sequences are as innocent as they are boring.
  •  Warning: From the very last scene, it is obvious that there will probably be another season or even 100 more seasons. Possibilities are endless.

You can do much better, but in a certain sense the whole production is a hoot!

2017, Abduction, Abuse of Women, Blackmail, Bloody scenes, Boating, Brother-Brother relations, Brother-Sister relations, Child custody, Corruption, Could Be Hard To Watch, Crime, Cynical, Dark, Drug Dealers, Ethical struggles, Extramarital Affair, Family Conflict, Father-daughter relations, Father-son relations, FBI, Financial malfeasance, Gambling, Gay theme, Grim, Large-scale gang activity, Lawyers, Mafia, Money Laundering, Mother-daughter relations, Mother-son relations, Murder, Murder by poison, Netflix Streaming, Orphans in Foster Care, Police Corruption, Prison, Revenge, Suspense, Teenagers, Torture, Uncle-Nephew relations, Uncle-Niece relations, Violent, Vulgar, Wonderful acting

Ozark (2017)

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From IMDB:

A financial adviser drags his family from Chicago to the Missouri Ozarks, where he must launder $500 million in five years to appease a drug boss.

From Netflix you can stream two seasons. Each season consists of 10 one-hour episodes. You need to watch both seasons to come to a conclusion of sorts. Conceivably  there could be another season.

Before saying anything more let me warn you that this series is very VIOLENT!

In several places I have read that Donald Trump debases everything and everybody he touches. For a step-by-step detailed textbook showing how evil spreads to engulf even the originally most innocent souls, this series will more than suffice. The process of moral debasement portrays at the same time the “Wages of Sin.” Many involved characters receive harsh retribution, most especially the loss of life, love and respect.

Those of you with strong stomachs may well find these episodes captivating for their attention to detail in the plot, excellent dialog, and superb acting. No wonder the series received 9 Emmy award nominations!  Personally I was as hooked as I was horrified.  Seems I have become very jaded.

Hats off to some remarkable performances:

  •  “Arrested Development” was my first encounter with Jason Bateman who plays Marty Byrde. In both cases Bateman exudes a somewhat-repressed, matter-of-fact, nerdish comportment. Nothing seems to rattle him.  At each shock, after a thoughtful and facially inexpressive pause, during which you can almost hear his brain cells clicking, he manages to smooth talk his way through the crisis. You must wait for almost 20 episodes before you can see his despair.
  •  Laura Linney, who plays Marty’s wife Wendy Byrde constantly flashes the always beautiful smile that launches a thousand crimes.  After a while I finally realized that for the most part Wendy is one of the most evil characters.  Here I am reminded of Hannah Arendt’s phrase “the Banality of Evil”.  One rationalization leads to another.
  •  Julia Garner, who plays Ruth Langmore, turns in a bravo performance as a “white trash” daughter of a convicted criminal. Ruth’s character, while never innocent,  grows to recognize the lowness of her given state in life and does mature to rise above and take responsibility.  Her improvement owes much to the fact that she was born with a very intelligent mind.

Assuming you can get through the first stomach-churners, you may well become as addicted as was I.

2017, Acceptable for teenagers, Alcoholism, Blackmail, Bloody scenes, Brother-Brother relations, Car Chase, Child abuse, Complicated, Conspiracy, Corruption, Detective, DNA, DO NOT MISS, Drug Dealers, Dysfunctional Lives, Ethical struggles, Extramarital Affair, Father-son relations, Gay theme, Homophobia, Murder, Murder Investigation, Netflix Streaming, Norwegian, Norwegian Crime Story, Norwegian Detective, Personal Betrayal, Police Corruption, Suicide, Uncle-Nephew relations, Uncle-Niece relations

Borderliner (2017)

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From IMDB:

To protect his family, police detective Nikolai covers up a murder case. But when his co-investigator Anniken suspects foul play, he is trapped in a dangerous game on duty, blurring the line between right and wrong.

From Netflix you can stream Season 1 of this Norwegian production which consists of 8 episodes each lasting about 45 minutes.

As Sir Walter Scott wrote in his play Marmion: “Oh! What a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.”  Nikolai, a police detective on leave, visits his widower policeman brother Lars and Lars’ two children just when a suicide victim is found hanging in a nearby woods.  Special Agent Anniken arrives on scene because the suicide is really a murder and Nikolai is ordered to join in the case.

Not until the eighth episode will you learn the truths of the story But lies begin when Lars confesses to Nikolai that he, Lars, killed the man (who was a drunk and child abuser). Nikolai decides to cover up the murder and from that point that lie leads to an entire stream of lies.

Complication one is that Lars and many others (especially the police themselves) are involved in the drug trade.

Complication two is that Nikolai is a closeted gay policeman, which seems to be frowned upon in Norway.

Things just get messier and messier until the final somewhat satisfying conclusion.

Throughout the focus is on Nikolai’s relentless pursuit of the truth combined with his guilty complicity (and the brooding looks to go with his regrets.)

Somehow the Norwegians just get it right! DO NOT MISS!

2014, Abduction, Action Film, Action Hero, Arson, Bloody scenes, Brother-Brother relations, Car Chase, Complicated, Computer geeks, Confusing Plot, Conspiracy, Contract Killing, Corruption, Emotional child abuse, Father-son relations, Financial malfeasance, Good Brother - Bad Brother, Greed, Grim, Grisly, MHz Choice, Mother-son relations, Murder Investigation, Newspaper Culture, Norwegian, Norwegian Journalists, Suicide, Suspense, Thriller, Uncle-Nephew relations, Violent

Mammon (2014)

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From IMDB:

A newspaper journalist revealing fraud in a large multinational company, finds his family involved, ruining his career, family relations, and entangles him in a following mystery.

From MHz Choice you can stream season 1 (2014) of this thriller. Each of the 6 episodes lasts about an hour. Season 1 is a complete story. Norwegian with English subtitles.  In the Spring of 2018 MHz Choice will offer Season 2 (2016).

For me the plot was complicated and a bit confusing, possibly because there were so many characters. Nevertheless the episodes were tense and exciting.  Peter Veras (played by Jon Oigarden) is placed in one difficult situation after another. Just watching him escape fatal traps set by all sorts of really evil people is exhausting.

Exciting enough to binge watch.  Thankfully, the story ends in episode 6.  Otherwise a cliff-hanger would have killed me.

2016, Acceptable for teenagers, Basically Sad, Boating, Brother-Brother relations, Child custody, Depression, Drama, Explicit sexual discussion, Failing Marriage, Family Conflict, Fishing, Netflix DVD, Possibly depressing, Sex Scenes, Teenagers, Uncle-Nephew relations, Violent

Manchester by the Sea (2016)

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From IMDB:

A depressed uncle is asked to take care of his teenage nephew after the boy’s father dies.

Such a sad film from beginning to end.  Just be prepared to get involved in a story that almost certainly cannot have a happy ending. For two hours you will see an emotionally numb Lee Chandler (played well enough by Casey Affleck) trying as best he can to find a solution for his nephew whose father (Lee’s brother) has just died. That problem is made more difficult by the all-around family dysfunction in which marriages have failed such that wives and mothers have moved away from their families.  Patrick, the nephew, is a normal adolescent seemingly more interested in getting laid by his multiple girl friends than in the death of his father. In this regard Lee is very permissive.  In general the relation between Lee and Patrick are begrudgingly positive.

Only when Lee gets drunk and boils over in a bar is there any violence in the film.

See also the Wikipedia article.

For some reason, it was not until the very end of the film that I realized that Lee is clinically depressed (for very legitimate reasons). Forgive my point of view, but couldn’t anyone have stepped in and suggested that Lee get professional help in this regard? But then that would spoil the story.