Tag Archives: Claire Danes

Quick Golden Globes Report

15 Jan

I don’t put a whole lot of stock in the Golden Globes as arbiters of quality.  If I had had any respect for the Globes before (which I probably didn’t), I didn’t after the Golden Globes were guilty, just like the Emmys, of failing to even NOMINATE The Wire, probably the greatest hour long show of all time, and in the top five at the absolute least.  This was a complete and utter lapse that would be a travesty if it wasn’t so obviously absurd as to render the award shows as jokes.  The Golden Globes even did the Emmys one worse, as the Emmys acknowledged the show existed in passing with two writing nominations.

I’m glad I got that scathing rant out of the way, but it seems some people still care about the Globes, and their shady Hollywood Foreign Press Association benefactors, so I’ll share a couple of thoughts I had on the awards.  Notice how Golden Globe award titles are needlessly cumbersome (Best Performance by an Actor instead of simply Best Actor, for example).

Pleasant surprises (and non-surprises):

Homeland, Best Television Series – Drama – Well, let’s get it out of the way first.  An award ceremony that does not nominate Breaking Bad in this category does not deserve to be able to give out awards, or certainly to be able to give out awards and have people care about them.  With that caveat, I’m very happy with the choice of Homeland, as it’s in that top tier with Breaking Bad, Mad Men, and Game of Thrones and does richly deserve the award, as does Claire Danes.  I was strangely touched by Danes’ chance to thank her parents after she forgot when she won over a decade ago for My So-Called Life (only strange in that I’m not usually touched by anything).

Idris Elba, Best Performance in a Mini-series or Motion Picture Made for Television, Actor – I’ve never seen Luther, the British detective show for which Elba won.  Still, it was both disturbing and great at the same time to hear The Wire’s Stringer Bell talk with a British accent, and to see McNulty hug him as he went up the aisle to accept the award.

Downton Abbey, Best Mini-series or Motion Picture Made for Television – Let’s get this out of the way.  It’s not a miniseries, it’s a series.  There were 12 episodes of Homeland, and that’s a series.  There were 7 of Downton Abbey.  Where is the line?  (Is there an official line?)  That said, it’s good; I got on the bandwagon relatively late, and I’m encouraging others to jump aboard.  To 1910s Northern England!

Peter Dinklage, Best Performance in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-series or Motion Picture Made for Television, Actor – Not a surprise, as he won the Emmy.  Still, I’m always glad when Game of Thrones gets some recognition.  Tyrion is probably my favorite character in the books, and it doesn’t hurt that my first impression of him was as played by Dinklage.

Unpleasant surprises (or at least not quite pleasant enough to make it to pleasant surprises)

Michelle Williams, Best Performance in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, Actress – This has nothing to do with her performance.  Williams is nominated in the Best Actress, Musical or Comedy.  In what world is My Week With Marilyn a musical or comedy?

Modern Family, Best Series – Musical or Comedy – just kidding.  What’s the opposite of a surprise, doubled, and then cubed?  This is it.

Matt LeBlanc, Best Performance in a Television Series – Musical or Comedy, Actor – I don’t feel strongly about this category, but I thought this was a little surprising.  That said, the more I look over the nominees the more I realize there’s no obvious choice.  If it was three years ago, Alec Baldwin probably would have been.  If only Ty Burrell from Modern Family submitted into this category instead of Supporting Actor. Most of the best comedies on TV either don’t have definitive male leads (Parks and Recreation) or simply aren’t recognized by award shows.

Kelsey Grammer, Best Performance in a Television Series – Drama, Actor – I care less about Grammer than the fact that this should clearly go to Bryan Cranston.  Considering Breaking Bad couldn’t even get a show nomination though, it’s not particularly surprising.

Laura Dern, Best Performance in a Television Series – Comedy, Actress – I’m going to try to watch a midseason episode of Enlightened, and I hope I will personally be enlightened about the quality of the show.  From just the pilot though, I’m not getting the hype.

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Fall 2011 Review: Homeland

15 Oct

There were a couple of candidates for the most interesting new show of the Fall, but I think I’ve found it in Homeland (so far, anyway).  I only kind of understood what the show was about coming in, but I leave the show a lot more intrigued than I was before watching.

At the beginning of the episode, Claire Danes’ character, Carrie Mathison, CIA officer, is in Iraq, and gets a message from an Iraqi prisoner set to be assassinated.  She gets the message after she promises to protect his family after bribing her way into the prison to talk to him.  Ten months later, she’s back in Washington and on the CIA shitlist for bribing her way into the prison.  We then learn two key pieces of set up for the show.  First, a marine taken prisoner of war eight years ago has been found alive by American special forces and is coming back home a national hero, and two, the piece of information Mathison got was that Al Qaeda had managed to turn a prisoner of war, which Mathison guesses to be the marine, Nicholas Brody, portrayed by Damian Lewis.

The episode follows the twin paths of Mathison and Brody.  Mathison, a career-driven agent, who is convinced that Brody is a terrorist, trying to circumvent the law whenever necessary to get the information to prove to her boss and mentor that Brody was turned, and Brody slowly trying to work himself back into a society he’s been out of for eight years, meeting a family he hasn’t seen, and a son he barely knows.

The supporting cast played less of a role in the premiere, but seems interesting.  On Brody’s side are his wife and his good friend, who have been sleeping together in his absence.  On Mathison’s side are her mentor, Saul Berenson, played by Mandy Patinkin, who believes in Mathison’s competence but is concerned about her tendency to take things too far, and her boss David Estes.

Underpinning this all is an intense psychological thriller.  Danes might be right, and Brody is a terrorist waiting to happen, and every moment not following his every move is a moment wasted.  Or, Danes might be crazy or obsessive – we get some hints she’s a little off her rocker in the first episode.  It may slightly lean towards the former in the first episode; we know he lies in his debriefing from quick visions we see inside his head.  Still, I’m counting on the fact that there’s a lot we don’t know and that it can still go either way.  In my opinion, the show would lose a lot if it just spilled the beans too early about what was really going on; part of what’s great is the intense psychological showdown and the lack of clear objective truth.

Will I watch again?  Book it – this is one of the highlights of the new shows, if not the best.  Danes is fantastic, and there’s a lot of different ways this can go, and still be great.  I can’t think of another television show quite like it.  After watching The Killing, I’ve developed a fear that every intense show with a great premiere is just waiting to go downhill, but hopefully this show will start building back my optimism.

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