1972 - Girls: season three

I didn’t love the second season of this show - but I found this season to be back in fighting form, and probably at it’s strongest.  It’s lose, but we’re starting to see some serialization happening.  I guess my largest critique of this season would be the underuse of some of the supporting characters.  Don’t give me wrong, I love watching Hannah being a selfish twat as much as the next person - but I also really love checking in with the rest of the foresome.  And for a show about girls, the guys really do steal it for me, especially Adam Driver, who is enjoying being a break-out star, I imagine - and deservedly so.  I love how self aware this show is - and it really is the kind of thing that makes me jealous as a storyteller.  I think what Lena Dunham has done here is something a lot of us would love to be in the position to do - and I think she’s doing a bang-up job.  I’m very curious to see how the end of this season will resolve itself moving forward - but I’ll be there for sure.  If you haven’t started yet Season 1 is widely available - and while I don’t love Season 2 it’s worth blasting through to get back to the good stuff in this most recent season.

1815 - Girls: season two

The first season of this series was easily one of my favourite things about television last year.  It was one of those things that made me jealous to my core.  It had a language, a style, that I was envious of.  Whenever I thought of a series I wanted to create I'd often ask myself "What is MY 'Girls'?"

And then this second season happened.  And… well… I don't know… If I'm honest I'm not sure that I entirely recognize this show right now.  It's characters just felt like they wanted to be angry and terrible to each other for an entire season only to become happy again at the VERY end.  A lot of reviewers have commented that this seasons end doesn't feel earned and I'm inclined to agree. 

There is so much about this series that I love still.  I'll still be tuning in when season three comes around.  I adore Adam Driver, and all the other guys on this show.  The women are a bit frustrating for me.  Hannah's, out of the blue, OCD, just felt like another crutch for a character who's entire existence appears to be about making excuses for why she isn't further along with life.  She's, clearly, a self saboteur, and we know that - and while I admire Lena's decision to do that with her character, it makes you not like her a whole hell of a lot. 

It's a series that is not for everyone.  I loved the first season, and found this one enjoyable in parts and frustrating in others.  I remain cautiously optimistic about the next season.  I want to love the shit out of it.  I really do.  I hope this review doesn't turn anyone off.  That's not my intention whatsoever.

1795 - This is 40

I'm a big fan of Judd Apatow - I like how much he throws himself into and this little empire and network of people that he's created - it's quite something.  Throw that and Paul Rudd into the mix and I'm a happy camper.  This is by no means a perfect film.  And it's not for everyone - if you like slice-of-life family drama that connects pretty deeply, you'll dig it - but if you like big stakes then I imagine a film about middle class white people not being able to afford their amazing lifestyle isn't going to quite do it for you.  And that's fine too.
The Apatow "method" of improv heavy films has never been quite so obvious as it is here - and I'm not passing judgement or suggesting that it doesn't largely work, but at the same time I find it difficult to justify the running time for this sort of film.  There's no need for a 2hr, 14 minute film about a mid-life crisis comedy.  Good for Judd for getting away with it, but I think that this is a film that could benefit from a good deal of pruning.  As it is I like it, but I probably could have loved it.
If you've liked his previous films, this one is worth checking out - although I feel like it's his less heart-filled film.  At the end I don't know if I felt like Pete and Debbie so much resolved their issues as they just stopped bitching at each other about their current problems.  I sound like I didn't like the film, but I swear I did.  Can't wait for the special features that'll be loaded to the tits on the BluRay.

1747 - Girls: season one

I'd seen Lena Dunham's Tiny Furniture a while back (still on netflix, I believe) - you can find my thoughts on it by clicking her tag below.  And I was pretty intrigued to see that she'd scored a show with HBO and Apatow working with her.  And then I totally forgot about it until twitter went all ablaze the day after it's debut.
No point in burying the lead - I loved it from the get-go.  The characters were all real and interesting, fucked up, yet loveable.  It's the world of people just trying to figure out who the hell they are and what they hell they're doing - and it's done with such a strong sense of self mockery that you can't help but be absolutely charmed by it.  The show has this bizarre backlash to it, that was almost condemning it for being the level of quality that it is, feeling the need to attack it in other ways like saying that the cast was "too white".  I know it's the hip thing to do, but any time I see a show where there's the token black friend I almost always roll my eyes.  I'm not against ethnic diversity in casting at all.  My rule is always - best person for the job.  But there's a lot of people in this industry that cast roles and enforce racial diversity where it doesn't perhaps fit.  And that's all I'll say on that.
It's hard to describe this series.  It's about a group of twenty-something women who are trying to find their place in the world - pretty low concept idea - but the execution is wonderful.  Dunham is a tour-de-force on screen, but then when you realize that she penned and directed a good bulk of the series as well, you realize just what a tremendous talent she is.  She's not interested in making herself or her cast mates look pretty or likeable.  She makes them interesting and that's more than enough.  This isn't Entourage where the characters go through hell and then some magic offer comes in that puts the characters back on top - this is the real world where the characters go through hell… and then they are stuck in hell for a little bit and have to fight their own way back out.
I'm trying to avoid spoilers so that you can discover this beautiful show on your own, but one thing I will say that was the absolute stand-out of the season for me was the relationship between Adam and Hannah - the way they shifted perspective and gave you insights into these people and then turned that around on us was absolutely masterful. 
The only thing that sucks now is having to wait till season two comes back around.  I want to do a spec of this show for my writing portfolio and so now it's just a matter of coming up with the perfect episode concept.  Other than that I can't wait to check in on these girls when they return.  It'll make my wife happy too (it's her new favourite show - and could be mine as well...).

1666 - Tiny Furniture

I remembered there being some buzz about this film when it was first being released so I was pretty excited to see it end up on netflix.  This is my first intro into Lena Dunham, but she seems to be doing pretty well for herself - on top of this successful indie she's got a series in the works at HBO with Judd Apatow.  No small feat.
It's hard to describe this film without resorting to the cliches - it's a coming of age story about a girl who thinks her life is far more tragic than it is.  Now that sounds like it's terrible but it's truly not.  Dunham is always aware whenever her character is acting a little out of sorts and the scenes play accordingly.  She has absolutely no issue making herself the butt of the joke - all to our pleasure.  This could have been a terribly pretentious film but thanks to the vision of the film it actually works quite well.  There are loads of stuff that's never truly resolved and it's got a, more or less, anticlimactic and somewhat unsatisfactory ending, but there's some really lovely stuff in and amongst all of that.  Dunham is also exciting as an actress and you really do find yourself falling for this woman as the film goes along. 
If you're not into somewhat arty films you won't like this at all, and if you're into really arty films this might not be your bag either.  If you live somewhere in between those two than you might just want to give it a try.  I'm glad I did.