Checking in to "The Four Seasons"

Based on a 1981 Alan Alda comedy, "The Four Seasons" is about three married couples who make up a longstanding friend group.  They're all well-to-do Gen Xers who take turns planning trips together.  We see the four times that they all meet up during one eventful year, when one of the couples hits the skids.  Spoilers for the first two episodes ahead, as It's hard to talk about some of the best parts of the show without getting into how some of the relationships progress.

The main couples are Jack (Will Forte) and Kate (Tina Fey), Anne (Kerri Kenney-Silver) and Nick (Steve Carrell), and Danny (Colman Domingo) and Claude (Marco Calvani).  We find out that Anne and Nick are the ones with the marriage in trouble during the spring trip to their lake house, which results in new partners and much awkwardness on subsequent trips as their friends try to navigate the new dynamics.  A key player is Ginny (Erika Henningsen), who becomes a regular in the group when she starts dating Nick.  The series is eight episodes long, with two episodes spent on each trip.  Each episode runs roughly 30 minutes, so it's a quick and easy watch.     

Co-created by Tina Fey, this is a very character and performance-driven show.  So, whether you like it or not will come down to how much you like hanging around a bunch of fifty-somethings and listening in on their middle-aged problems.  Nick and Anne aren't the only ones who find themselves at odds.  Danny is navigating a health scare, and doesn't appreciate Claude's smotherly level of concern.  Friction also develops between Jack and Kate as they try to be supportive of Nick and Anne, which makes them more aware of their own issues.  All of the characters, including Ginny, are pleasant, generous, and very open with each other.  And even when they're being terrible they're still entertaining.  This isn't a "White Lotus" style dissection of the rich and privileged, but there is acknowledgement of privilege, and it does color some of the interactions.  

I watched the original 1981 film for background, which stars Alda, Carol Burnett, Rita Moreno, and Len Cariou among others.  The new series features totally new characters, but the structure and the sequence of events is almost the same.  The biggest change, which I appreciate, is that we get to spend much more time with each of the characters and get to know them more intimately.  We learn that Danny and Claude have an open marriage, but their hangups have nothing to do with their sex lives.  Jack and Kate are the most boring and basic of their friends, but also seem the best equipped to weather their own ups and downs.  There are also a couple of changes to the character dynamics because this version of the story adds more characters than it subtracts.    

Domingo and Calvani have the showiest and most fun performances, and Fey and Forte are as solid as always, and I love them all dearly, but I think Steve Carrell is far and away the MVP this time.  Carrell is playing the guy who is the most often in the wrong, while still being sympathetic and worth rooting for.  Runner up would be Kerri Kenney-Silver, who plays a different kind of oddball here than she did on "Reno 911."  I also appreciate how Ginny is treated, coming in as the outsider but eventually the show flips the dynamic and shows us the situation from her POV.  The last few episodes involve some big emotions and Erika Henningsen is fantastic at getting us to care.   

"The Four Seasons" will be best enjoyed by people of a certain age, as as I'm getting older I'm not turning my nose up at any media aimed at this demographic.  This isn't great television,  but it earns its laughs and its poignant moments.  It gently addresses relationships, getting old, and how to handle what life throws at you.  I'm very curious what a second season would look like, as the ending of "The Four Seasons" definitely leaves open the possibility for one.  However, I also won't be too disappointed if this is where Fey and her collaborators decide to leave these characters.   

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The 2025 Video Essay Recs

These are all videos I watched for the first time within the last calendar year.  I'm fairly sure none are older than that, but there are a lot of entries on the list this time, so I apologize if I've lost track.  Here goes:

Every Frame a Painting: The Sustained Two Shot - They're back!  Tony Zhou and Taylor Ramos returned to Youtube after eight years with a series of new film essays, as part of their promotion of their new short film, "The Second."  Each essay topic is framed by the duo working through filmmaking choices during the production.  So what is a two shot, what is it good for, why is it rarer than it used to be, and why choose it now for this particular circumstance?

Moviewise: I Dont' Care!  This is the Best Scene of the Century - While we're talking about filmmaking, I love comprehensive breakdowns and analyses of filmmaking, and especially appreciate when it's talking about fairly basic scenes that most viewers won't think twice about.  Here, Moviewise breaks down a two very simple shots depicting a man buying a car, revealing how much thought and care was put into a sequence that I scarcely registered while watching the film. 

Yhara Zayd: American Honey & The Detriment of Ambiguity - And speaking of things that completely went over my head the first time I saw them, here's Yhara Zayd examining the way race is used in Andrea Arnold's 2016 film "American Honey."  I clocked that Sasha Lane's character Star was practically the only non-Caucasian character in the film when I watched it, but missed so many of the little hints about her background, and how so many questions about her status and identity went unanswered. Zayd argues that the choice to keep things ambiguous may have been well intentioned, but fails to serve the main character of color because of the context in which she exists. 

F.D. Signifier: The Green Lantern Colorism Controversy - And for another discussion of race and media, I found F.D. Signifier's reaction to the casting of Justin Pierre as the newest superhero in James Gunn's DC universe to be a lot of fun.  After "Rebel Ridge," I don't think anyone was surprised that Pierre was tapped to play the John Stewart Green Lantern.  However, this video didn't go how I expected it to, because while there's plenty of acknowledgement that colorism is a problem, this particular colorism controversy has some interesting nuances related to gender and masculinity.

Pop Culture Detective: The Myth of the Alpha Male and Human Nature, Hope, and Ice Cream - Pop Culture Detective offers two nice, accessible refutations of some common fallacies that have been passed around in the popular culture lately, namely that the idea of the "Alpha male" somehow comes from observable science related to wolf pack dynamics, and that we should be cynical about human nature because people tend to do the selfish thing.  The media, of course, is not helping matters by perpetuating these ideas in movies and TV shows.  However, as PCD explains with the help of some nicely edited clips, there's no male hierarchy observable in wolves, and Noam Chomsky's "ice cream" thought experiment reveals that humans aren't really so bad.  

Mina Le: Why Does Hollywood Love an Age Gap Romance? - I've been watching Mina's essays for a while for her takes on fashion in media and various pop culture trends.  Here, she takes a look at age gaps in screen romances, particularly Gen Z's interesting resistance to them.  This includes a rundown of famous Hollywood age gap romances (Bogey and Bacall, Leo DiCaprio and nobody over age 25) and discussion of some recent films, including "The Idea of You," and "Call Me By Your Name." I appreciate that there's a significant amount of attention paid to the rise of the "MILF," and examining some of these issues from a female POV. 

Strange Aeons: A Famous Fanfiction With Some Weird Cult Ties - For a video that's just plain entertaining, here's a little slice of "Harry Potter" fandom history.  While I was never really in the fandom myself, I was active in fanfiction circles when "Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality" was at its most popular, and was definitely aware of it.  And of course the author turned out to be a "rationalist" weirdo trying to run his own cult.  Strange Aeons' channel is full of these strange tales of internet fandom, and I recommend checking out some of their other videos if you're in the mood to rubberneck more insanity. 

Thomas Flight: The Brilliance of Severance's Disturbing Precision - There have been several strong pieces about "Severance" this year after the release of the show's second season.  Thomas Flight offers a look into some of the influences behind the show's eye-catching cinematography and production design, especially the eerie liminality of the Lumen office environments.  For those of you who have not seen "Severance," this one has almost no spoilers to worry about.  

Patrick Willems: The Daniel Craig James Bond Era is the Weirdest Franchise Ever - Patrick Willems posits that the Daniel Craig starring James Bond movies reflect the evolution of modern blockbuster filmmaking trends better than any other franchise, and as a result are an incoherent mess in their totality.  I enjoyed several of the movies discussed, but I can't disagree with any of Willem's points here.    

Verilybitchie: The Fashion of Sci-Fi Futures - So, why are the decadent ruling class fashions of the future seen in so many science-fiction films usually feminine or gay coded?  Especially when we know that in real life, fascists usually show up in uniforms and suits?  To find the answer, consider a history lesson on the Great Masculine Renunciation - when fashion stopped reflecting class differences and started reflecting gender, a tour of common science fiction tropes that heavily espouse conservative gender ideology, and lots of clips of science fiction's most degenerate hunks looking absolutely fabulous.  

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"40 Acres" Hits Home

I know we're not supposed to use the term "elevated horror" anymore, and "40 Acres" isn't quite a horror movie, but the label fits here.  "40 Acres" is technically a dystopian survivalist story that seems to have a pretty flimsy premise at first glance.  It takes place a few decades in the future, when civilization and food production have collapsed, leading to widespread famine.  There's an eyebrow-raising sentence in the opening text that claims that farmland is now the most valuable resource on earth.  The Freeman family survives on their family homestead in Canada, trusting no outsiders and keeping to themselves.

Initially, I thought that there wasn't going to be much to the film's worldbuilding beyond providing an excuse for a siege scenario, similar to the "Purge" films.  The Freemans consist of mother Hailey (Danielle Deadwyler), her son Manny (Kataem O'Connor), father Galen (Michael Greyeyes), and daughters Danis (Jaeda LeBlanc), Cookie (Haile Amare), and Raine (Leenah Robinson).  The kids range in age from under ten to late teens.  The opening sequence reveals that all of them are combat trained to some degree, and are very comfortable with shooting intruders on sight, which is a common occurrence.  "40 Acres" features multiple sequences of bloody, prolonged action and fight sequences, including a nail-biting standoff involving the two youngest girls having to fend for themselves.

However, it's the scenes of the family trying to hold things together between the eruptions of carnage that are the most fascinating.  Hailey is black and Galen is indigenous, and both are from historically marginalized and persecuted peoples.  They have a blended family between them and are both very tough on their kids.  Hailey is especially strict with teenage Manny, her son from a previous relationship, who increasingly chafes under her restrictions.  A major point of contention is that the Freemans choose to self-isolate in order to protect themselves, having little to do with the network of farming families in the area, who communicate through CB radios.  Hailey's only regular outside contact is an old friend of hers from the armed forces named Augusta (Elizabeth Saunders), who has her own farm nearby.    

So when a new threat to the farm emerges, and the Freemans' bonds are tested, there are all these wonderful underlying tensions in place to up the stakes.  Parent-child relationships, community building, and historical context all come into play.  It's no accident that the invaders are mostly Caucasian and the Freemans are descendants of those who fled oppression, and are now put in the position of having to defend their legacies.  This is the feature debut of R.T. Thorne, a Canadian filmmaker, who pointedly includes the characters' pride in their cultures and identities in the film, but keeps the focus firmly on the stories of survival and bridging the generational divide.  The action is excellent, but the thematic content definitely helps deliver a more satisfying film than the usual post-Apocalyptic shoot-em-ups.  

Danielle Deadwyler is the standout of the cast, playing Hailey as this wonderfully tough, infuriating maternal figure who cares so much about protecting her family from all possible harm that she threatens to alienate them.  It's the type of role more commonly associated with male characters, and I enjoyed Deadwyler's performance immensely.  She's a fantastic actress all around, and here she proves her action prowess as well.  There is never a question that this is a lethal, capable woman who can get into scraps with multiple assailants twice her size and come out on top.  Michael Greyeyes and Kataem O'Connor are both also very strong onscreen, and I hope to see more of them in the future.    

I think it helps that I wasn't expecting much out of "40 Acres," but it does everything right, and delivers such an entertaining, crowdpleasing experience that I'm a little puzzled why it didn't get a bigger release.  Maybe the level of violence involving children meant certain limitations, but I doubt that couldn't be overcome.  I'd put this right up there with "A Quiet Place" and "The Last of Us" on the growing list of excellent dystopian family dramas.  And I guess that's a genre I need to keep an eye out for now.  

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My Favorite Quentin Tarantino Movie

I've been in something of a standoff with Quentin Tarantino for years now.  One of my rules for this director series is that you don't get written about  unless I've seen ten of your films, or half of your output if you're dead.  If you count "Kill Bill" as a single film, Tarantino has directed nine features.  Since he only intends to direct ten features in total, he's in no hurry to make that tenth film.  It's been six years since "Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood," and there is absolutely nothing new from him on the horizon.  Since I've been enjoying Tarantino's work less and less with each new movie, I think there's little chance of me taking much of a shine to that theoretical tenth film.  So, instead of waiting around, I'm counting "Kill Bill" as two films, and now I finally get to write about "Jackie Brown."

Tarantino has a reputation for reviving the careers of older actors who have hit a slump.  Pam Grier, a former '70s blaxploitation star, is one of the major examples.  "Jackie Brown," adapted from an Elmore Leonard novel, is clearly a star vehicle designed for her, and full of little tributes and references to Grier's past work and the era she came up in.  Tarantino changed the main character's name and ethnicity specifically so that Grier could play her.  And Grier does not hesitate to remind us that she is a movie star.  From the opening title sequence, which combines "The Graduate" with "Across 110th Street," she dominates the frame.  Yes, the lead of the movie is a black woman in her forties, and the movie isn't shy about that for a second.

Much has been made of Tarantino's more prurient obsessions, but I love how Jackie Brown is portrayed in this movie.  She's treated as an object of desire, but never fetishized or overtly sexualized.  Jackie is not the over-the-top action heroine of "Coffy" or "Foxy Brown," but an aging flight attendant caught in a bad situation, who faces either doing time or starting her life over again at 44.  A possible third option means taking a risk to get herself in the clear, and putting some long-dormant criminal talents to good use.  Pam Grier's onscreen presence is instantly commanding, yet vulnerable enough for us to believe that men like Max Cherry and Ray Nicolette would fall in love with her.  We see Jackie wielding a gun, briefly, but she's smart enough that she never has to use it.  And when she has her third act glow-up, her outfit is a badass black suit, the kind favored by Tarantino characters in "Reservoir Dogs" and "Pulp Fiction."  

"Jackie Brown" also boasts one of the greatest supporting casts ever assembled for a motion picture.  You've got Samuel L. Jackson in a "Superfly" wig being the most charming evil bastard you ever met.  You've got gum-chewing ATF agent Michael Keaton who sympathizes with Jackie in spite of himself.  You've got DeNiro and Bridget Fonda hanging out and watching "Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry," before embarking on one of the worst criminal partnerships of all time.  And then you've got Robert Forster.  So much of "Jackie Brown" lives in his wistful reaction shots and long silences.  And I so appreciate that Tarantino lets his characters have long silences and private moments to themselves, where they're allowed to just exist with their thoughts.  

No discussion of "Jackie Brown" can be had without mentioning the soundtrack, built on favorites from Tarantino's record collection.  The meticulous curation, with many scenes written with specific songs in mind, lends so much to the way the film feels from moment to moment.  Jackie and Max's relationship sparking to The Delphonics records, the tracks playing in Ordell's car with the levels just the way he likes them, and Jackie finally singing along to Bobby Womack in the closing scene, all reflect a deep love and appreciation for the music that is part of the film's DNA.

While "Jackie Brown" didn't do well upon its initial release, being such a departure from Quentin Tarantino's earlier films, it's quietly grown in stature over the years to become widely recognized as his most mature and well-written feature.  It's definitely the one I've appreciated more with age, as I've come to relate more to Jackie and Max's view of the world.  And it's why I've been a little disappointed with every Tarantino film since.  His movies have gotten bigger and bigger, but at the same time they've also gotten further and further away from matters of the heart.

What I've Seen - Quentin Tarantino

Reservoir Dogs (1992) 

Pulp Fiction (1994) 

Jackie Brown (1997) 

Kill Bill: Volume 1 (2003) 

Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004) 

Death Proof (2007) 

Inglourious Basterds (2009) 

Django Unchained (2012) 

The Hateful Eight (2015) 

Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood (2019)

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Rank 'Em - The "Chucky" Movies

I filled in one of my horror blindspots this year, which was the long-running, genre-hopping "Child's Play"/"Chucky" franchise.  The quality of the individual movies was all over the place, but I enjoyed my weird, nasty journey with Chucky and friends.  Below, find my rankings of all eight films, from best to least.

Child's Play (1988) - The original "Child's Play" is still far and away the best film in the franchise, because there's nothing else that can match that great reveal where Chucky finally gets to let loose on Catherine Hicks.  It's a ridiculous premise, but the execution is fabulous.  Chucky is viscerally repulsive and scary in this movie, to a surprising degree.  Effects supervisor Kevin Yagher and his team deserve so much credit for their work bringing everyone's favorite Good Guy to life.

Child's Play 2 (1990) - Much less effective as a thriller since we know from the start what Chucky is up to.  However, the finale sequence in the toy factory is the high point of the franchise for me, with the best kill sequences and some potent nightmare fuel imagery.  I also have a soft spot for Alex Vincent as Andy, who I'm glad got to come back for another round.  The movie also sports a surprisingly deep bench of beloved character actors, including Jenny Agutter, Grace Zabriskie, and Beth Grant.

Child's Play (2019) - The recent remake is a lot higher on this list than I had originally intended to put it, but the film really is a pretty good watch on its own.  The actors are all solid, especially Audrey Plaza and Brian Tyree Henry.  Chucky being the result of misused smart technology works decently enough, plotwise.  The biggest problem is that the redesigned doll voiced by Mark Hamill doesn't hold a candle to the original Chucky.  The new guy just doesn't have as much personality or panache.  

Seed of Chucky (2004) - This one is a lot of fun as a Hollywood spoof, with Jennifer Tilly getting a chance to make fun of herself.  It's not great as a "Chucky" film, however, especially if you're here for the horror and gore.  Also, the new character of Glen/Glenda voiced by Billy Boyd didn't work for me at all.  What pushed this one over the top, however, was the participation of John Waters and the weird finale - which is the closest thing to a happy ending that I think the characters were ever going to get.  

Bride of Chucky (1998) - I applaud the creators for pushing the movies in a new direction by leaning into the comedy and the camp value of the Chucky character.  The addition of Jennifer Tilly as Chucky's longtime paramour, Tiffany Valentine, creates  a fun Bonnie-and-Clyde dynamic, and the opportunity for an epic glow-up sequence.  Unfortunately, I find Katherine Heigl and the other humans pretty forgettable, and Ronny Yu's direction and I have just never gotten along (See "Freddy vs Jason").

Child's Play 3 (1991) - I didn't find this nearly as bad as the reviews made it out to be, and it's definitely not the worst of the series.  If anything, the third "Child's Play" suffers from a lack of imagination, just sticking Chucky in a military academy as part of his latest attempt to steal Andy's body.  Andy now being a teenager played by Justin Whalin adds absolutely nothing.  However, there are still a few decent kills and Chucky still manages to come across as a real menace, which is more than I can say for… 

Curse of Chucky (2013) and Cult of Chucky (2017) - These are the two direct-to video features that are officially the last in the original continuity, not counting the 2021 "Chucky" television show.  And they're both fine.  I understand that some fans were happy to have Chucky back in fairly straight horror films again, but it was very noticeable that the budgets had shrunk and the effects work was much more limited.  Kudos to the heroic efforts of Don Mancini for keeping the franchise going for as long as he did, but by the end of "Cult of Chucky," it was clearly time for a break.  

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My Top Ten Episodes of 2013-2014

So, I went on a hiatus with this feature while I was figuring out what I wanted it to be.  Should I take the opportunity to go back and watch the highlights of these years that I hadn't seen?  Did I want to try to be comprehensive with these picks?

I quickly came to the conclusion that I didn't have the time or the resources for that.  It was better for me to take the more personal approach and make lists of favorites based on what I'd already seen, as if I'd made the lists at the end of the years they covered.  I'll continue to watch older shows, so you will see picks from programs like "Lost" pop up here and there, but I'm not going to seek out programs specifically for this list, or put off writing these lists until I've seen certain shows.

So, find my top ten episodes for the 2013-2014 television season below, in no particular order.  And a few spoilers ahead. "Breaking Bad" and "Hannibal" newbies, watch your step.

Review, "Pancakes, Divorce, Pancakes" - "Review" was a black comedy, but it wasn't clear how dark it was willing to go, or how much Forrest MacNeil was going to involve his personal life in his absurd reviews, until this episode rolled around.  Bookending the divorce segment with the two deranged pancake segments is perfect, emphasizing the cruelly arbitrary nature of the forces that Forrest has allowed to take over his life.  

Game of Thrones, "The Mountain and the Viper" - Pedro Pascal became a star thanks to his role as Oberyn Martell in the fourth season, and he got one of the show's most memorable fight sequences.  The buildup to the climactic clash was perfect, with the stakes slowly being raised until everyone was ready to see the Mountain go down.  Arguably, this was the high point of the entire show, and the last big surprise that the showrunners pulled off.  

Orange is the New Black, "The Chickening" - I didn't watch much of "Orange is the New Black," but this one always stuck with me for the way it deftly humanizes so many of the characters, like Kate Mulgrew's Red.  This can be treated as a transitional episode of sorts, where the narrative becomes less concerned with Piper, and spends more time on the diverse community around her,  The Diaz ladies get the spotlight and Pennsatucky makes her first appearance in this episode.  

Kitchen Nightmares, "Amy's Baking Company" - Reality programming doesn't make many appearances on these lists, but occasionally there is a cultural milestone so undeniable that to leave it off would be unthinkable.  So it is with this episode of "Kitchen Nightmares," a show I don't normally watch or enjoy.  However, there are some television trainwrecks that are so infamous that they are transcendent.  Behold, the folly of Gordon Ramsay and the madness of Amy and Samy Bouzaglo.

Person of Interest, "The Devil's Share" - The third season of "Person of Interest" had a run of fantastic episodes, including one of the best exits I've ever seen for a regular on a network show.  This episode is about the aftermath, where the good guys are embracing rage, retribution, and a lot of wrath as part of the grieving process.  However, what makes it an all timer is Enrico Colantoni's badass villain monologue at the end, when we find out who actually gets to see justice done.  

True Detective, "Who Goes There" - I'm making the obvious choice with "True Detective," the show that made the TV/movie star distinction obsolete, and choosing the most technically impressive episode.  This is the one with the famous six-minute long take action sequence, a hallmark of the work of director Cary Joji Fukunaga.  Within the narrative, it's something of a digression, but it's also indicative of the momentum ramping up and the past starting to catch up to the present.    

Community, "Cooperative Polygraphy" - I wasn't planning on picking anything from the rocky fifth season of "Community," but then I stumbled across the COVID table read of this no-frills bottle episode, with Pedro Pascal filling in for Walton Goggins, and I remembered how much fun it was.  The absence of Chevy Chase's Pierce is milked for all its worth, and I'm not smart enough to make the obvious sperm sample joke here.  Let's just say the best was made of a ridiculous situation.

Breaking Bad, "Ozymandias" -  Walter White has his day of reckoning, and it's spectacular.  His entire criminal enterprise has fallen apart, the police are closing in, and the fallout is affecting all of his remaining relationships.  Every single goodbye, from Hank and Jesse to Skyler, Walt Jr., and even baby Holly is absolutely gutting.  Directed by Rian Johnson, the episode is tense, full of little misdirections, and very good at ramping up the emotional intensity to dizzying heights.     

Mad Men, "Waterloo" - The moon landing episode, which features the farewell performance of Robert Morse as Bert Cooper, singing "The Best Things in Life Are Free" as he dances off into the unknown.  As the show prepared for its final stretch, Don found himself in another round of corporate politicking, escaping the executioner's axe again, and facing another divorce.  However, some changes are inevitable, and the season ends with Don facing both mortality and the 1970s.

 

Hannibal, "Mizumono" - Let's end with one of the most jawdropping season finales ever aired on network television.  The bloody culmination of the second season of "Hannibal" involves a showdown with all the remaining players at Lecter's house.  In hindsight, it would have had so much more impact if the show had ended right here, with four major characters on the brink of death, and a serial killer at large and seemingly invincible.   

Honorable Mention:

Doctor Who, "The Day of the Doctor"

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Going Into "Deep Cover"

Orlando Bloom, Bryce Dallas Howard, and Nick Mohammed are three actors that I've had some trouble with.  It's not that they're bad actors, but they're actors who haven't always had the best material, resulting in some less-than-stellar performances in sub-par roles.  The prospect of them starring in an action comedy together wasn't necessarily a deterrent, but it did give me pause.  So was the premise, where the three of them play aspiring improv comedians who are recruited to play buyers in a police sting operation.  I tend to find pretentious hammy actor characters in comedies grating.  This is why "Deep Cover" was pretty low on my "To Watch" list for a couple of months, but I'm glad that I finally caught up with it.    

"Deep Cover" is a British production, directed by Tom Kingsley, and written by two British and two American screenwriters.  Kat (Howard), Marlon (Bloom) and Hugh (Mohammed) are all participants in the same London improv class.  Once promising comedian Kat teaches the group, Marlon is a struggling actor whose biggest role has been in an embarrassing commercial, and Hugh is a lonely IT worker just trying to gain some social skills and confidence.  They're approached by DI Billings (Sean Bean) to work undercover on a small operation, but their decision to play badass criminal characters inadvertently puts them into contact with dealers and operators higher and higher up the chain, including middleman Fly (Paddy Considine), his boss Metcalfe (Ian McShane), and enforcer Shosh (Sonoya Mizuno).  Soon Kat, Marlon, and Hugh, are pretending to be Bonnie, Roach, and The Squire, while getting involved in criminal dealings with London mobsters, and being hunted down by another pair of cops, DI Dawes (Ben Ashenden) and DS Beverley (Alexander Owen).

The last thing I was expecting from "Deep Cover" was a well-written, well-plotted script, but that's exactly what I got.  After seeing so many lazily put-together action comedies over the past few years, it was such a nice change to have one where the story supported the farce.  There are lots of twists and curveballs thrown at the audience, and the story is genuinely unpredictable.  The pacing is also very well controlled, with none of the scenes going on too long or the jokes being overplayed.  You can tell that there probably was some improv with the dialogue, such as a scene where Kat lists all the drugs she's tried, or one where Hugh has to do cocaine, or the whole body disposal situation, but it never gets into unwieldy, Judd Apatow territory.  There's also minimal cringe or embarrassment humor, and no fixation on sophomoric content, unlike too many American comedies I could name.  

The leads are all great.  Bloom's Marlon is the only one who qualifies as a pretentious hammy actor character, but he's unsuccessful and insecure, and an awful lot of fun to watch.  The other two are normal human beings who just happen to enjoy improv.  It helps that all three turn out to be pretty winning underdogs, who are smart, good in a crisis, and play off of each other well.  The line delivery is great, the slapstick lands well, and I'm sure the film can sustain plenty of rewatches.  And it felt good to watch these actors show that they do have solid comedy chops, and can turn in great performances, given the chance.  Mohammed's found a good niche for himself over the past few years as a character actor, but Bloom and Howard have been floundering for a while with crummier projects like "Argylle" and "Gran Turismo."  If they want to stick around in comedy circles for a while, I'd be all for it.         

As for "Deep Cover," it's going on the short list of modern adult comedies that I really enjoy, along with "Game Night" and "Barb and Star."  I hope all the talent involved don't wait too long to make me laugh again.

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