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Yeah,MTV was the only channel even broadcasting this show back in the '80s (1985,to be precise.) I was in junior high at time and had been watching British comedy on CBC Channel 9 in Windsor since I was 11---which used to show locally in the Detroit metro area (it's only available on cable now,darn it.) The only real frame of reference I had for anything as crazy as hell/flat-out weird as TYO was Monty Python's Flying Circus,which I would always sneak up to watch on PBS late Saturday nights. I also ended up having to sneak up to watch TYO because it only came on late Sunday nights on MTV at something like one damn o' clock in the morning, after some of their other underground shows like 120 Minutes,Headbanger's Ball,and a British music showcase called The Tube. If MTV had put the show at an earlier time slot on a Friday or Saturday night ( like maybe 10 p.m.,when I could have actually seen it on a regular basis) it may have gotten more notice,but,yeah, it was genuinely too weird and whacked-the-hell out to be anything but an underground cult classic back in those days. Plus I had to go to bed early for school, and only caught a handful of episodes because of that. The only other recent Britcom I can think of as equally weird and reaching similar levels of gleefully deranged insanity, is The IT Crowd from a few years back.
But,yeah,it's always nice to see that other people remember this show,too,and that it made such a WTF-is-this-crazy-s*** kind-of-impression on them like it did me as a teen. My mother joked that I watched all this weird stuff all the time,and I still do after all these years--and damn glad to,lol.
Great film,and one of the best films Motown ever made during the '70s. And, yeah, it still is criminally underrated next to most sports films---don't know why,since it has a great cast from top to bottom,excellent direction,great acting, and a story that's extremely entertaining (and really funny at times) from beginning to end. I got it myself on DVD,since I've always liked it after catching it on the CBC way back in the day. Plus it's got Richard Pryor,James Earl Jones, and Billy Dee Williams in it (all in their prime at the time) that's a real triple plus right there that alone makes it worth seeing.
What a silly thing to say--many "white" films have been remade with black casts. Nothing weird or unusual about it. Both black and white Americans speak the same language (English) so it's not like you'd be remaking a foreign film or anything.
Okay,I misunderstood your post----I thought you meant white films being remade with a black cast like Death At A Funeral. Both versions were good,but some racist idiots claimed they couldn't stand the remake even though it pretty much sticks to the original. They just couldn stand the fact that it had been remade with a mostly black cast,that's all.
Screw those haters,lol. That being said, I like USN mainly due to the great cast in it. Incidently, the third film Poitier and Cosby
made together,A Piece of the Action,was remade into a Bollywood film called A Man's Job (1988).
Here's my top 5 surrealist films:
Jean Cocteau's Blood of a Poet
Carl Dreyer's Vampyr (which was actually made bwt 1930-1932,but it's still an excellent surrealist horror near-masterpiece worth checking out.)
Maya Deren's Meshes of the Afternoon
and Rituals of Transfiguration (both are excellent at capturing that hazy, languid, unreal feeling one has when you're not sure whether you're awake or dreaming just before you wake up.)
Can't think of a fifth, so I'll just go with these four,lol. Forgot to mention that Barry Jenkins' Moonlight has a number of surrealist elements in it,too.
I'm intrigued by Borderline mainly because Paul Robeson's in it,and I'd love to check it out,as well as the subject matter itself.
Sweet-- I love me some old-school, weird, crazy-as-hell, whacked-out experimental Dadaist surrealist films. Will definitely be looking for this one.
Seriously? Have you ever seen Blood of a Poet (1930) a nice little weird and imaginative piece of surrealism that's fun to watch. Beauty and the Beast is also fun to watch too. Obviously the OP hasn't seen enough of his films to even be qualified enough to say anything about said films. Check out BOAP on the tube,though---it's worth it.
Thought I was one of the few people who had ever heard of this film---nice take on it there.
Ha ha ha ha hs! The family that's fckd up together stays together---depending on the family,that is,lol.
Love: Chicago P.D.
Hate: Undatable. I hated this show so damn bad,because it was so stupid and unfunny as hell---watching it was like getting a tooth pulled. The fact that it was about a bunch of goofy weird friends set in Detroit (where I'm from) was little consolation,because it still fckg sucked no matter what. Even having it filmed live with a different band opening every week couldn't save that piece of s@#$,because it still continued to unilaterally suck regardless. Thank goodness it was canceled last year.
So true,so true.
I love the View----people who usually hate the show hate it because of stupid sexist reasons----apparently a show can't be serious if it's dominated by women,no matter how seriouIs the topics they deal with are,according to the idiots who always whine about the female hosts. Also you have male talk show hosts like Hannity and O'Reilly who are nothing but arrogant blowhards themselves. Goldberg is merely stating her opinion,and with the facts to back it up. If the View was hosted by men you nor anyone would even be complaining about it. Anyway,I've always liked Goldberg as an actress,so I was glad when she came on the show--- she tells it like it is and has really added to the show's watchability for me (along with Joy Behar,a longtime favorite of mine.z)
No,I don't agree at all. As a black TV viewer I'm damn glad to see TV reflecting more and more of what society actually looks today,and frankly,diversity makes some shows a hell of a lot more interesting to watch---nothing "forced" about that. Most of TV is still white-dominated,so I don't see what the hell you're complaining about. The fact is,there are more black writers,directors,and producers working behind the scenes that have created these diverse new shows,such as Lee Daniels (Empire,Star) Shonda Rimes (Grey's Anatomy,Scandal,How To Get Away With Murder) Kenya Barris (Black-ish) Mindy Kaling (The Mindy Project--yeah,I
know she's not black,but she's still a woman of color.)
The only people whining about diversity are usually white racists who can't stand to see non-white people anywhere,let alone TV. F--- -them----these idiots just can't stand the fact that society has changed,and that everything dosen't revolve around white people anymore, like it always has. What the hell is wrong with seeing a non white face on TV,or a TV show where the main character is black (like 24:-Legacy,which some idiot racists had the nerve to complain about) Not one damn thing. White people are not the only people on this planet with interesting stories to tell about.themselves---they never have been. Black TV viewers and othet viewers of color want to see characters that look like us that we can relate to,too. And we're seeing more and more of that,which is great. Screw the racist haters who can't deal with that--too damn bad. Ha ha ha!
vapor8:
There was always plenty of good stuff to watch on TV back in the day (for me that would be the '80s) pre-internet. I mean life did exist before the net,you know (lol.) And back in my time cable was just becoming all the rage,so there were more than plenty of channels to watch,and a hell of a lot to watch on most of them. But,yeah both movies and TV have gotten not only stronger and better over the past 50 years,they're gotten far more realistic and more relatable by dealing upfront with everyday issues people actually deal with.
The changes in both film and TV are also simply a reflection of how society and some of its attitudes toward certain issues have changed over the past 50 years or so alone and it's been pretty fascinating to see.
There are attractive female cops in resl life so saying a woman looks "too hot to br a cop," is ridiculous, stupid,and sexist. Nobody ever says an attractive man is too "hot" to be a cop. And every attractive woman in the world isn't interested in being a model,anyway.
Oh,please---the film was made by some conservative named DiSouza,who is a racist and a total suck up to the right wing. He just hopped on the "let's bash Obama to make a name for himself again,but it didn't work.
No,it's conservative minds that are more narrow and close-minded than anything else. Being liberal is the complete opposite of that mindset.
Police Story (early '70s TV show)
The Sweeney (mid-'70s British TV police series)
Hill Street Blues
Homicide:Life On The Street (of course--my fave and almost a precursor to The Wire.)
Simon & Simon
Chicago P.D. (my current cop show fave)
DaVinci's Inquest (classic Canadian cop show----loved this one.)
This Is Wonderland--another good Canadian drama about lawyers and criminals within the Canadian court system----it was whacked out and funny in a dark way too.)
And Carl Dreyer's Vampyr (which actually started out as a silent film,and was actually made before Universal's Dracula) but was independently made,and took a longer time to make. It's worth seeing not just because it's a good and truly genuinely eerie flick, but also as an example of how silent films were transitioning into sound flicks back then. It's also what I call a postmodern vampire film (one of the earliest ones, I believe) in the sense that it has some of the then-traditional trappings of an average vampire film of that era,but then it starts to deconstruct those same trappings before your very eyes,by not being a traditional vampire film at all. Which is why it was a flop in its time,but it's since been recognized as the true genuine work of art it really is. I think it would be fun to deconstruct it in a film class,lol.