There’s deceit, betrayal, jeopardy; all the good stuff, basically. If you’ve ever spent an evening listlessly scrolling through Netflix’s infinite library, you’ll know that the Tyranny of Choice is painfully real. Pitiless capitalism? Much like this genius show, in fact. Jack Seale, LovesickNetflixThis winningly sweet yet raunchy sitcom began life as Channel 4’s catastrophically titled Scrotal Recall. In one scene, Tig visits her mother’s grave, only to be visited by her vision. Because, as he discovers, that’s what O’Brien does; she pushes people to become an intrinsic part of her tickling empire, before pulling the rug out from under them by making supposedly private clips available online and defaming the participants. One recommendation: another Finnish series, Bordertown, about a decorated Detective Inspector who moves his family to a small community near Russia that’s more crime-ridden than he … Storyline A top murder investigator from the capital city of Finland moves to a small town of Lappeenranta nearby the Russian border in order to work less and spend more time with his family. It is authentic, richly educational, and an elegantly easy watch. The only difference is that what Farrier discovers is far more insalubrious than just a troubled figure messing with people’s lives online – it’s criminal, and it’s been going on for decades. The delicious, meaty ensemble performances surround Macfadyen as he presides over his grizzly archive: Jerome Flynn as human knuckle DS Bennet Drake, MyAnna Buring’s steely brothel madam Long Susan and Adam Rothenberg’s sexy, liquor-soaked forensic genius, Homer Jackson. The Happiest Day in the Life of Olli Mäki, by Juho Kuosmanen. At all times he must be conscious that he’s not just trying to convince the authorities and his loved ones but a mass TV audience. It was their last. But now he’s free to have phenomenally low-key foodie adventures, which find him slurping down pickled plums and dried mackerel with boyish abandon. Kate Solomon. A satirical reflection on the minority experience … Border. Stranger Things you already know about, because nobody ever shuts up about Stranger Things. There’s Netflix. This isn’t all dead sex workers and Jack the Ripper. This isn't just a matter of haphazard characterization and dialogue: the whole film is designed to make you see Briar as a messianically … He is fantastic, both inexpressibly sad and emotionless. Morally dubious at best, homicidal power junkies at worst, you won’t be able to take your eyes off them. Synopsis:Rotten Tomatoes, home of the Tomatometer, is the most trusted measurement of quality for Movies & TV. It’s a vein of comedy that Notaro has honed and perfected in the years since that set. A compelling meditation on power and religion … The Keepers. A joyful, surreal sitcom … Lady Dynamite. The strength of Bordertown really is Kari Sorjonen himself – a driven, eccentric and instinctive detective, he makes full use of his gifts and his ability to dive into his ‘mind mansions’. Directed by Chris Allen Williams. Border review – into the woods for a body-horror romance 4 5 Ali Abbasi’s dark drama focuses on transgression and taboo as two troubled people living on … He was incidentally the boxing trainer Elis in the recent, excellent Finnish movie The Happiest Day in the Life of Olli Mäki, by Juho Kuosmanen. Funded, shot and distributed by CK, who also played one of the leads, it was as singular a vision as you are ever likely to see. That alone would be sinister, but mixed with the sexual abuse, miscarriages of justice and cover-ups they unearth, this becomes a compelling meditation on authority, power and religion. There’s Now TV. Graeme Virtue, Samurai GourmetNetflixComforting whimsy from Japan, starring Naoto Takenaka as retired gent Takeshi. They both deal with the sad, strange stories lurking behind computer screens, with troubled antagonisers who go to great lengths to deceive others. The celebrated Latino director Gregory Nava (American Family) helmed, scripted, and co-produced (with star Jennifer Lopez) Bordertown -- a suspense thriller with an A-list Hispanic cast. In December 2004, Scientific American Life published an article entitled The Tyranny of Choice. You have more TV than you could ever watch in a lifetime at your fingertips around the clock, and you’re somehow expected to make an informed choice about what’s good and what isn’t. It argued that constantly being surrounded by indistinguishable everyday options is slowing us down. By the end, when she has confessed to killing seven men in cold blood but also pleaded self-defense, you’re left with a sense of the tattered remains of her painful, solitary life. It’s not the most sophisticated production you’ll ever see, and the way that Farrier makes some of his findings is unclear, which makes you wonder how much of the investigation was complete before the cameras starting rolling. Having given most of his life to Reggie Perrin drudgery, he has almost no identity. In the park, mum Meg shakes open a folded bag and pulls out hamburgers and milk for everyone. But all of them, in their own way, are miraculous. She was dead at the bottom of the stairs. The algorithm knows it’s an explicit drama about high-end prostitution, but can’t discern that the other content tagged with those attributes is exploitative dreck with none of the sleek menace or unsolvable moral tangles of The Girlfriend Experience. Yet nothing Penikett does can top the moment when the real-life cop breaks down as he recalls the case a quarter of a century later. JS, 3%Netflix Released last year, 3% is Netflix’s first original series to come from Brazil, and was directed by César Charlone, the Oscar-nominated cinematographer behind City of God. JR. With help from a rotating cast of acting aristocracy, the League of Gentlemen duo have spent three series battering down the divisions between comedy, horror and drama. It goes to dark places, and stays there without flinching. In 1970s New York, while adults were grooving to the disco scene, the kids of the Bronx were spellbound by DJ Kool Herc and Coke La Rock. Tina is astonished and obscurely excited when an insolently confident young man called Vore saunters past in the customs corridor, and is coolly unruffled by her inspection of his belongings: weird insect-breeding equipment. While it may have suffered from launching too close to the visually flashier Peaky Blinders, it’s hard to recall the last time a British drama stretched its imaginative wings like this one does. Inspector Reid’s obsession with the tainted fabric of this neighbourhood sees weekly crime puzzles give way to a more soulful storytelling experience towards the end of series five, as strands from the protagonists’ lives draw together. The flimsy conspiracy theories floated here, coupled with pic's trite thriller plotting, risk trivializing the atrocities while it obfuscates their causes. Kabango’s take isn’t perfect – the impact of female artists like MC Lyte is downplayed – but this offers a real insight into the genesis of the genre. Hours after the cancer diagnosis, she went on stage at Largo and performed a different kind of standup: terrifyingly personal, with much of the humour often coming from the implausibility of this string of events. Abbasi shows how important it is for Vore that he wants to eat insects, maggots and worms. In June this year, a group of rising trans and gender non-binary actors made a campaign video asking the film and TV industry to break with their tradition of casting trans actors in cliched roles – the prostitute, the psychopath, the jester. Laura Snapes, The Wolfpack Amazon PrimeDoc makers wait their whole lives for a story as good as The Wolfpack. There are depressive barflies; there is abuse; there is mental illness; there is cancer. But in 2012, she was beset by a series of unspeakable tragedies: she contracted a serious bacterial infection, her mother died, she was dumped by her girlfriend and found out she had breast cancer. Then you look up, an hour has gone by and you’re really, really hungry. Though internet celebs might seem an easy target, the satire is as bleak as it is witty, and Williams’s attempts to become a YouTube star himself in order to win 10 grand turn increasingly dark. That is the level the show tends to operate on: the unspeakably real. For Crystal Moselle, it arrived when she saw six teens in Reservoir Dogs suits walking in Manhattan. The characters drink theirs in high-ceilinged LA bars, or in the cavernous kitchen-diner of faded web guru Alex (Tommy Dewey), whose sister Valerie (Michaela Watkins), a shrink who needs therapy more than her clients do, lives with him because they’re both such hopeless romantic screw-ups. His film peels back layers around the ethics of executing the mentally unwell Wuornos, whose life as sex worker is never truly understood. With uncanny prescience – given that this would be anything but a routine case – Lestrade began filming his documentary just weeks after Kathleen’s death, the end result reduced from 600 hours of footage. This presents a problem since "The Take" is just really lousy. Aside from ploughing through a barrage of hearty subjects seamlessly, the series also manages to remain light and full of savvy humour. Oh, sure, there are the buzzy shows; the shows that cut through and make a dent in the mainstream media. The set was discussed everywhere from the New York Times to This American Life, and Notaro exploded. “Bortdertown” premieres Sunday Jan. 3 at 9:30 p.m. Ville Virtanen as Kari Sorjonen in Bordertown Kari Sorjonen (Ville Virtanen) falls into the mentally gifted, socially awkward detective category. All of which makes Disneyland Dream wildly disarming. They run businesses and commit murders and have as much agency as the male counterparts. It centres on chief investigator Kari Sorjonen (played by Ville Virtanen) who moves with his wife and teenage daughter to the small town to enjoy a more peaceful life. A chilly Icelandic crime drama; yes, another one. There’s regular telly, and then there are the catch-up services. Border: a Nordic noir romance with cinema's weirdest sex scene. Hardened by fake news, we distrust any meme exploiting childhood innocence. As the pair become close, Allie learns about the ways in which trans people navigate life on a daily basis – from micro anxieties (Violet’s fear of people noticing her voice or appearance which stops her from feeling present) to macro-aggressions (Violet’s abusive partner). The Dolls' House (Part One) 58m. Audience Reviews for Bordertown: Season 1 Dec 08, 2020 Absolutely brilliant writing, not too much personal drama, great acting, can't wait for more. All of this eternally frustrates Turkington, who just wants to discuss his extensive VHS collection. The impact of The Killing on UK crime drama has been so notable that it … But from the docks to the music hall, a sense of evil that’s as strong as the porter that flows from the tavern taps looms over the residents. BA, Inside No 9 Netflix Witch trials, office karaoke, snuff films, party games, incestuous cannibalism: no subject matter is too terrible, or trivial, for Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith’s hair-raisingly inventive anthology series. Indeed, the film leaves it up to us to see how Roland is interested only in what he has mistaken for canine qualities in Tina. While the starriest casting is Michael Madsen as a Texas Ranger who thinks rich locals are covering up a murder, the standout episode sees Tahmoh Penikett play a Portland cop hunting for a serial child-killer in 1989. Now he has found the town where his daughter is being held and the pimp who's keeping her. That’s probably because – as it transpires over the course of this smart, disturbing doc – it isn’t a sport at all. Gavin Haynes, Last Chance U Netflix You don’t have to care about American football to fall for Last Chance U. Death on the StaircaseiPlayerMichael Peterson was a Vietnam veteran who wrote three successful novels based on his experiences during the conflict. Overall, Her Story is a series so nourishing and skillfully woven that the YouTube comments overflow with thankful and abundant praise. Best enjoyed with the subtitles on, unless you’re a fan of overplayed dubbing. Hampshire Constabulary had investigated his disappearance as a missing persons case, but there’s much evidence to suggest that he was murdered. As per the title, only 3% will be chosen. One MississippiAmazon Prime In the last few years there’s been a tendency for TV comedies to deal with more serious subject matter, but One Mississippi takes the sadcom to the next level – a quasi-autobiographical show which deals with death, child abuse, mastectomy and a rare intestinal disease. Dancing on Ice, episode 1 review: Lady Leshurr falls foul of the public in a laboured launch event. In another show this would be played cutesy but it gets dark quickly: her mother had a relationship with her married art teacher, Tig was molested by her grandfather. New Zealand-based TV journalist David Farrier narrates the story of how he became entangled in a world where amateur athletes are paid to touch each other in a way they’ve been assured is in no way sexual, but which seems a bit suspect. O’Brien has humiliated and stalked people across the decades, all in the name of … what exactly? Rather, it’s set in Whitechapel just after the notorious killer has ended his spree; the streets buzz with fear and the local law, led by Matthew Macfadyen’s Detective Inspector Edmund Reid, a troubled tombstone in a brown hat, try to maintain order. Mark Gibbings-Jones, Disneyland Dream archive.orgSocial media has killed the home movie. He was never seen again. It is beyond morbid, yet there is a dark humour to the scene. “Bordertown,” 8:30 p.m. Sunday (Jan. 3), Fox. Dad Robbins was an early home video enthusiast and decided to film the process, from creating their entries to their subsequent victory and vacation. Tina is a customs officer working in the port of Kapellskär in Sweden, standing all day wearing a bland uniform in the grim nothing-to-declare corridor as passengers off the ferry from Finland walk past. 1. The Bordertown TV series is a beautifully filmed thriller, clean and modern, with unsettling cases involving abduction, murder, and more. Season 1 Review: Bordertown, despite sometimes stooping to pick low-hanging fruit, is actually surprisingly smart and funny, an equal-opportunity offender that energetically rips into every side of the immigration debate while demonstrating enough of an absurdist streak to balance out its snark. A fascinating doc which zips along at a brisk clip. Julia Raeside, The Girlfriend Experience Amazon PrimeWarning: this will knacker your Amazon recommendations. Human life crams the thoroughfares, bringing stories of horror, survival, redemption and regret. Instead, Heidecker’s character persistently derails any film chat in a Monty Python-like manner, even turning their set into a restaurant in one episode. Real detectives are interviewed about their personal nemeses, with their recollections becoming narration. Spellbinding … Grandmaster Flash on the decks in Hip-Hop Evolution. Through her journalism, Allie befriends Violet, who transitioned to a woman. From brutal true crime sagas to dark comedies, here’s our writers’ guide to the best underrated shows to stream right now, Last modified on Wed 24 Oct 2018 03.33 EDT. (His debut feature Shelley in 2016 was a fertility horror nightmare with some ideas similar to those in Border.). This film, written and directed by Gregory Nava ('Mi Familia', 'El Norte', 'Selena', etc), approaches a public service campaign on the part of Nava and the rest of his cast and crew - especially producer/star Jennifer Lopez. Others you might have heard of. Bordertown (Finnish: Sorjonen) is a Finnish crime drama and Nordic noir television series created by Miikko Oikkonen and starring Ville Virtanen as Detective Inspector Kari Sorjonen. In BBC3’s first foray into true crime proper, dedicated journalists Alys Harte and Bronagh Munro spent over six months digging into the cold case, trying to decipher the truth from the rumours and half-remembered testimony of his acquaintances. 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