A Dog Eat Dog World

FLC001, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons Film Review of The Power of the Dog By Geoff Carter Chronicling the inner world of fictional characters is part and parcel of literature. Since the days of Charles Dickens, Jane Austen and the modernistic stylings of Vladimir Nabokov and James Joyce, novelists have sought to explain the foibles of …
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The Couch Potato’s Guide to Living the High Life

Greg Hume, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons Review of The White Lotus on HBO In the Buddhist religion, a white lotus is a symbol of mental purity found in the state of bodhi, or awakening. It is also linked to a state of enlightenment and strength. In Homer’s epic poem The Odyssey, the lotus-eaters were a society of …
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The Couch Potato’s Guide to the Perfectly Strange

Film Review of Nine Perfect Strangers Photo by Papaioannou Kostas on Unsplash By Geoff Carter The opening sequence of Hulu’s Nine Complete Strangers is reminiscent of classic murder mysteries like And Then There Were None or Clue. A varied assortment of characters, including a dysfunctional family, a disillusioned writer, an alienated couple, an irrepressibly cheerful middle-aged woman, a wise-cracking misanthrope, and a secretive …
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The Couch Potato’s Guide to the New Hollywood: The Legacy of Tom Hanks

Yeoman 1st Class Donna Lou Morgan, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons In the last few weeks, the Couch Potato has looked at some of old-time Hollywood’s greatest actors, discussing the best films of James Stewart, Paul Newman, Audrey Hepburn, Henry Fonda, Katherine Hepburn, and John Wayne. Even though this survey has barely scratched the surface …
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The Couch Potato’s Guide to Downtown Easttown: Review of “Mare of Easttown”

Artwork by Michael DiMilo Review by Geoff Carter HBO’s limited series Mare of Easttown is a compelling seven-part thriller that stretches the boundaries of expectations for the criminal drama genre. Mare Sheehan, Eastown’s veteran police detective, is not a typical TV cop. Although skilled, conscientious, and devoted to duty, Mare is also acerbic, brutally honest, and has–not …
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The Couch Potato’s Guide to the Back of Your Mind

Film Review of The Father By Geoff Carter Florian Zelllner’s film version of his play, The Father, is not only a harrowing chronicle detailing a man’s struggle to deal with dementia, but deftly places the audience squarely into the puzzle box of memory, hallucination, and disorientation that resides at the core of this disease. Like a …
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