Petzold’s steady, deadpan, unhurried heartbreak harnessed to his contemporary retelling of THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE. He builds suspense and plot momentum out of tiny moments and their massive implications. 

Shit is gripping. If this were a book you would say it’s unputdownable.

As with Rohmer and Kurismaki, Petzold’s camera is never expressive. It’s a calm, emotionless observer. And his characters work overtime keeping their feelings to themselves, so we see only the tiniest expression. But their repression is immersing and moving.

Also, I would happily watch Nina Hoss read the Berlin phone directory, let alone her barely hidden turmoil here.

The laziest, most depressing movie ever made.

(1/2 star for Oits Redding)

The crude, no-budet ore from which MR. INBETWEEN was refined.

Same perfectly observed dumbass conversations. MR. INBETWEEN's "Would ya root an alien?" proves the natural evolution of THE MAGICIAN's "How much money would ya take to eat a bowl of shit?"

Scott's character, like Beat Takeshi's, is cranky, mostly inscrutable, and ready to kill, but on his timetable. And, like Takeshi , he’s always the most badass guy in the room. Any room.

Too bad that it's only streaming in SD, which exaggerates the crudeness and makes the cinema verité visuals pretty much mud.

For Scott completists, and best watched after you finish MR. INBETWEEN.

Why wasn’t PJ Soles a gigantic star?

I’m as surprised as you are…

An American Erich Rohmer?

Jane Austen on the UES?

Like Rohmer, deceptively lightweight visuals and powerful emotional moments.

And, for all you New Yorkers around here, the Yule Log on a B/W TV! That’s an historical artifact.

About the saddest program in the history of television.

Nobody writes like Steve Conrad Nobody sees human beings with his compassion, pathos and darkest absurdity.

He loves language, and his characters speak in to-each-their-own cadences and rhythms, which are Conrad’s, only brilliantly individuated.

First show in television history to feature the signature phrase: “Pop a boner.”

Always happy to watch Richard Jenkins understate with profundity.

Please believe me when I tell you that Conrad’s PATRIOT - a spy show as written by Beckett & Ionesco - is the wittiest, bleakest, funnest, and most heartbreaking show of the last ten years - absolutely the best.

Really fun while Michael Caine, Robert Duvall and Donald Sutherland plan the caper. The actual execution turns cartoonish and is saved by Larry Hagman’s - of all people -astonishingly unvain portrayal of a hilariously vain asshole. Hagman’s in a different movie altogether, along with Treat Williams and his louche aggression. He became such a better actor as he became less arrogant.

Caine. Duvall and Sutherland underplay with steely resolve; they’re great.

But nobody comes close to the charismatic, exquisite naturalism of goddess Jenny Agutter - nobody ever has.

She might not have six minutes total screen time, but she’s totally the reason to sit through this.

Even tryhard genre deserves a chance, I told myself repeatedly, while enjoying Deborah Lovell, Mark Boone Jr., Michael Pitt, Melissa Leo, and Sofia Hublitz - what are these first rate folks doing in a third rate caper wannabe?

Can’t fathom it.

Diverting until the dread 15 minutes left… then an obvious attempt to make a  low budget HEAT shootout and an inexplicable plot twist wasted the good will their stellar performances earned.