"The Tudors"

I’ve only done this once before, but I have a TV series that I must put on here for those who have not seen it, or may not even know about it. This show is an absolute must see. I can only describe it as watching an A+ movie but you get to watch it every week!

The Tudors in a nutshell is basically the history of King Henry VIII. While at a first glance some might say, that history is boring, but if you look at the life and times of King Henry in detail, I would have to disagree. What this fantastic series brings to light is some of the most intriguing history to happen between the Kings of England, and the Roman Catholic Church. Power corrupts totally, and in this particular time line, it was never as true as with Henry. As a youth he was athletic, highly educated, was fluent in many languages, and a musician of many instruments, but as an adult his lust for women, and power shattered the religious world as it was back then into a thousand pieces.

While Jonathan Ryhs Meyers would not have been my first choice for playing the part of King Henry VIII, I will admit as the series progresses, his acting continues to improve and form up nicely with the way King Henry’s life and times were chronicled. Another bright star, Natalie Dormer plays the part of the king’s mistress (eventually crowned queen) Anne Boleyn, and she is outstanding in every way. The Estranged Queen, King Henry’s first wife Queen Catherine of Aragon, is played by Maria Doyle Kennedy, and although she is not on camera a lot, the times she is she is masterful in her role. There are a dozen other actors scattered through the plot line, and I can’t say that a single part played that was not of great caliber. Even Peter O’Toole as Pope Paul III is amazing.

Already knowing full well the brilliance of creator / writer / producer Michael Hirst from his breath taking work in Elizabeth the Golden Years, he continues with film sets, landscapes, wardrobes, and an overall look of fantastic proportions that has only been seen in huge feature films, and yet this is a TV series. All be it a program only available on Showtime, this single program alone is worth buying the monthly subscription. If you do have Showtime, I highly suggest going to Showtime on demand where you can go back and watch the entire first season episode, by episode.

While admittedly there is some free lance creating / writing going on from scene to scene, the historical accuracy with which they tell this story is spot on as far as my research has gone. Not only do you get top notch acting, beautiful pageantry, and A+ content, but you get a history lesson on top of it all. This is a win / win TV series that is worth watching in every way.

My rating for this TV series is 9.00 out of 10.00

"Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind"

I’ve got a Jim Carrey movie for you to check out if you’re looking for a movie to watch in between the release of the bigger movies this month. “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless mind,” is one of those mind twisting movies that you may even end up watching twice just to catch some of the subtleties you missed trying to keep up with the plot on the first go around.

I don’t think this movie ever really got much play either in the theaters, or the rental stores because of its bizarre nature, but I do think it’s worth a look just because of the very interesting scenes Director Michel Gondry creates towards the ending part of the film.

The basic plot involves a couple Joel Barish (Jim Carrey) and Clementine Kruczynski (Kate Winslet) who are both a little on the strange side of the street to begin with but find each other and at the beginning they both enjoy the relationship. As the story continues the relationship sours, but something more then strange happens when Clementine finds a doctor who actually has found a way to literally erase a person from your mind. She has the procedure done, and Joel no longer someone she even knows exists. Angry and despondent that she would do such a thing, Joel has the same procedure done to erase her from his mind. From there the story unfolds as each memory is slowly deleted from Joel’s mind.

This movie is spotted with some fantastic acting by both Kate, and Jim, but also there are some scenes with the secondary characters (the people that do the erasing via a computer program) that were down right obnoxious. Just for originality alone this movie received high marks from me. Very few original concepts are tossed out there in Hollywood land these days that I applaud anyone that goes out there and tries something different then just remaking an old movie that has already been done.

Warning, this movie does take a little while to take shape, but once it gets going, it goes places not very many story lines have gone before, and along with the story line being original, there are a lot of great scenes where Joel’s mind fights the erasing process that are filmed in a way that really stretches your imagination. In the end it makes you stop and think about your life, and relationships. While some may have ended in a very bad way, would you give up all the good that happened just to get rid of that bad ending? If you had the chance, would you erase some one from your mind? This movie asks this question, and answers it in many different ways.

Being a wannabe film writer / director I look at any movie I see closely, and I usually find a way that the story could have been told better, or filmed better, and this movie is no different. This really could have been a stellar film from start to finish with just a few small changes, but when all is said and done, I will take the good with the bad just because of the thought provoking nature of this story.

My rating for this movie is 7.5 out of 10.00