Gary SteelA regular review column in which GARY STEEL sifts through the mountain of available streaming TV and brings your attention to 10 of the great new and old shows as well as those to avoid.
Abbey Road: If These Walls Could Sing (Disney+) 5/10
Having thoroughly enjoyed the McCartney 3.2.1 documentary series I figured this feature – directed by Paul McCartney’s daughter Mary – on the iconic recording studio where The Beatles made their music, might make for a fascinating companion piece. Instead, it’s a bit dull, really. Released in 2022, the film takes a piecemeal approach to the studio and its story and, disappointingly, highlights several bloody awful artists (Oasis, Kanye West). Abbey Road (then known as EMI Studios) was started in 1931 but we hear precious little about those early years and the artists that recorded there, with only an Elgar performance mentioned before we’re brought right up to the rock and roll era with Cliff Richard. But even Richard gets short shrift given how phenomenally popular he was.
If These Walls Could Sing includes interviews/reminiscences with the likes of Paul McCartney, Elton John, Roger Waters and Dave Gilmour of Pink Floyd, Kate Bush (audio only), Giles Martin (son of late Beatles producer George), Jimmy Page (of Led Zeppelin), Nile Rodgers and Star Wars theme composer John Williams. Unfortunately, it also wastes time with footage of Kanye’s embarrassing rapping/orchestral extravaganza and Celeste’s (who?) very ordinary performance. This lavish ode to a fantastic recording studio (or studios, as there are three of them) could have been so much more had it given up more detail. We’re given very little info about the early engineering innovations and the near sell-off earlier this century before it was sold to UMG isn’t mentioned at all. Somehow, manages to be merely perfunctory when it could have been compelling.
Becoming Led Zeppelin (DocPlay) 8/10
I was wary of this first-ever band-approved documentary on Led Zep, but fears that its two-hour-plus running time would be bloated by guarded interviews with the group’s former members and endless laborious live footage proved unfounded. Importantly, this Zep timeline finishes with the group’s second album and their victorious UK homecoming in early 1970. It’s a huge relief not to have to sit through ‘Stairway To Heaven’, which came out a year or so later. Although Becoming Led Zeppelin errs short of innovation in its format, its producers cannily decided to eschew the usual roll-call of talking heads and rely instead on the recollections of the group’s three surviving members. Drummer John Bonham, who died in 1980, appears via a rare audio interview, and it’s touching to watch Jimmy Page, Robert Plant and John Paul Jones hear his reminiscences from beyond the grave.
The film gets the balance just right between interviews with its somewhat gnarled members, judicious use of rare footage, photographs and key live performances. The editing is tight and frankly, the story of the individual members’ pre-Zep journeys is worth the price of admission alone. I knew, for instance, that Page was an in-demand session guitarist but had no idea of his wealth of experience, which included playing on Shirley Bassey’s Bond classic, ‘Goldfinger’ as well as loads of easy listening orchestral pieces. One flaw is the film’s tendency to use the studio recordings of songs poorly matched to live footage, but that’s a rare misstep. I would have liked to have listened to Page expound more thoroughly on his thought processes and recording techniques on those radical early Zep releases, but maybe sometime a set of complete interviews will appear for the hardcore fans. It’s astonishing that it’s taken this long for a proper film on the biggest band of the ‘70s. I guess they’ll be looking at a sequel, but for me, this one covers the essence.
Dark Desire (Netflix) 7/10
We don’t get to see too many Mexican TV shows on streaming TV, so I was intrigued by this 2020 thriller, which runs to two seasons and no less than 33 episodes. And highly watchable it is. The incredibly convoluted plot involves Alma (Maite Perroni), a 30-something law professor whose marriage to high court judge Leonardo (Jorge Poza) has gone soft, and who consequently finds one night of sexy fun with a young chap. The trouble is, the scene of the “crime” involves another on the same night: the death of her best friend. It turns out that the handsome buck had more than just nookie on his mind that night.
Each bite-sized episode reveals some new twist in surefire soap opera fashion, but this is no ordinary soap. In truth, it’s a kind of fusion between genuine thriller, with an added spoonful of “erotica” and a pinch of soap to create a show that’s really rather watchable. Perroni – who is apparently also a successful singer, songwriter and producer – is terrific in the lead role and the rather lurid cinematography squeezes every drop of her conflicted emotions. On the other hand, there’s a bit of over-acting from Erik Hayser (who plays her husband’s angry, debilitated brother) but both Speitzer and Regina Pavón as Alma’s geeky daughter Zoe are great at portraying their nicely drawn characters.
Harold And The Purple Crayon (Neon) 7/10
This 2024 adaptation and expansion on the 1955 children’s book was a genuine box office bomb, apparently. Its ratings on aggregator sites are miserably low. And yet, both adults and children in our family thoroughly enjoyed it, pronouncing Harold And The Purple Crayon a raging success. Why the disparity? It turns out that the critics hated it, while audiences loved it… those ignored the critics and saw it anyway. Harold (Zachary Levi) exists only as a cartoon who – with his friends Moose (Lil Rel Howery) and Porcupine (Tanya Reynolds) – can draw any imagined scenario with his purple crayon. In the film, he imagines himself into the real world and goes in search of his father/author, befriending schoolboy Mel (Benjamin Bottani) and his mum Terri (Zooey Deschanel) and, as you would expect, getting into all sorts of unintended mischief along the way.
Harold’s naivety (not to mention his inventive skills with that purple crayon) will appeal to fans of Elf or Big or Forrest Gump, but that’s not the only card the film holds, as it has both a deep humanism and a wicked sense of humour to match its special effects. What really makes it worth a watch, however, is the performance of Jemaine Clement as Gary, an egocentric fantasist (and total loser) who happens to be the local librarian. Some of his dialogue is so redolent of Flight Of The Conchords that I couldn’t shake the notion that he’d had a hand in creating his own scenes. Yes, it is a movie for kids (and perhaps the likes of me, nearing my second childhood) but it makes for fun light viewing and comes with a great message that has resonance in these dark times.
The Mission (Disney+) 5/10
It hit the headlines in 2018 when deluded Christian wannabe missionary John Chau was killed by tribesmen of one of the last isolated people in the world. Really, Chau should have won the Darwin Award and faded into obscurity, and The Mission does nothing to convince otherwise. With scant filmed evidence of Chau’s missionary manoeuvres and none whatsoever of his fatal encounter with the Sentinelese tribe, this documentary is forced to add cartoon-like graphics that somewhat dissipate interest. It has been commended for having a balanced view, and indeed, in telling Chau’s story, The Mission does get limited access to his family and former friends/colleagues, but none of their testimonies add up to more than the idea that he was a foolish lad who wanted to be Jesus.
The film is almost worth seeing for one particular interview with a real former missionary who lived with natives for more than 20 years and finally gave up, knowing that they would never convert to Christianity and losing his own faith in the process. A more interesting film would have been made around this chap’s story and his ultimate belief that missionary work (at least, when it involves converting natives from their own beliefs for humanitarian assistance) is a crock of shit that stems from colonisation and that GOD IS NOT REAL!
The Old Man (Disney+) 10/10
When was the last time you saw a thriller with conversations that felt real, where the characters really spoke in voices that felt like they belonged to them; conversations that took their time when they needed to and even used multisyllabic words with satisfying regularity? Hardly ever, right? The Old Man does all this and more and is a real doozy because of it, and the way it combines it uncondescending intelligence with all the excitement you would expect in a thriller. Starring the phenomenal double-banger of Jeff Bridges and John Lithgow – the former rogue FBI operative Dan Chase and the latter FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence Harold Harper – the two characters go way back and have a complex relationship that’s part respectful and part outright hatred.
When Dan is targeted for termination after 30 years in hiding, damaging secrets from the past threaten Harold’s job and reputation. Dan goes on the run and hooks up with unhappy divorcee Zoe (Amy Brenneman of Judging Amy), who ultimately becomes his most lethal weapon against those who conspire to kill him. The complex plot runs on two timelines and part of it is set in Afghanistan, where Dan first made his name as a deadly assassin. But it’s the detailed web of relationships and the way that The Old Man dares to take time out for conversations that humanise the protagonists and make the two seasons (2022 and 2024) special. Bridges (The Big Lebowski) is fantastic, as are all the main cast members. Highly recommended.
Savior Complex (Neon) 7/10
This three-part HBO documentary series from 2023 takes an even-handed look at the well-publicised case of Renee Bach, an evangelical American teen who was driven to found a nonprofit organisation, Serving His Children, which worked to help feed malnourished children in Uganda. Bach was targeted by an anti-missionary group called No White Saviours, which discovered that she was acting in a medical capacity without a licence or the training to do so; and more seriously, that 105 children had died during the years her organisation was active.
Savior Complex features plenty of footage from that time along with interviews with Bach and her mother, the nurses she worked with and those who opposed her. Ultimately, No White Saviors managed, through their utilization of social media, to level claims of murder against Bach and Serving His Children was closed down. It’s great to see a documentary that shows both sides and the complexities involved in this story. Ultimately, neither Bach nor the individuals involved with No White Saviors emerges without blots on their characters. Was Bach a murderer? Who knows, but regardless, Savior Complex is a worthwhile look at the issues around Christians whose intentions might be good but wrongly think of themselves as God-appointed.
Sympathy For The Devil (Neon) 7/10
Nothing whatsoever to do with the Rolling Stones, this Sympathy For The Devil (2023) starts out like an unpromising low-budget talkfest but eventually explodes into a very violent one-night road trip with a surprising reveal. Joel Kinnaman (Suicide Squad, For All Mankind) plays David, an average Joe who is just about to arrive at hospital where his wife is having a baby when – ta-da! – Nicolas Cage (who is known only as ‘The Stranger’) jumps into his car and takes him hostage on a drive deep into the American night. Cage specialises in unhinged and psychotic characters and this one is especially so.
It turns out that Cage thinks that David is hiding under a pseudonym and that he’s a killer with whom ‘The Stranger’ has a very personal grudge, and as the film progresses he does his best to wear him down and make him admit the shady past that David denies. Cage’s behaviour gets more psychotic and more murderous and that eventually gives the film an edge, though it takes a while to get there. It’s quite gory, for those who like that kind of thing (me! me!) although the Big Surprise, when it comes, isn’t really that surprising. A kind of modern noir and though no modern classic, it’s worth a watch for those interested in that kind of thing.
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (Disney+) 10/10
I feel like I’ve been waiting for this film to turn up for half my life. It’s that good. Released back in 2017, Martin McDonagh’s film surprises on just about every level, and satisfies wholly. On one level, Three Billboards… is a drama about Mildred (Frances McDormand), a small-town mother whose teenage daughter was raped and murdered, and who tries to get some action from the local police by paying for inflammatory slogans on three disused billboards. The multi-levelled narrative then moves to local sheriff Bill (Woody Harrelson) who we learn is dying of cancer. When he kills himself, Mildred is blamed and things begin to intensify.
This is no ordinary drama and while all of the acting performances are superb, viewers should be aware that the R18 certificate denotes some shocking violence. What’s utterly brilliant about the film is that it has a deeply humanistic heart, yet is free of the kind of sickly sentiment that destroys so many American dramas; kudos to the British-Irish McDonagh for turning something that could have been laced with sentiment into a gritty but still deeply moving experience. Not surprisingly, Three Billboards… was fairly universally acclaimed on release, though I doubt that too many supporters of the orange-haired budgerigar saw it. Almost enough to make you want to subscribe to Disney+.
Tsunami: Race Against Time (Disney+)
I’m not a fan of disaster documentaries as they tend to sensationalise subjects that deserve sensitivity, but the four-part 2024 National Geographic documentary on the 2004 tsunami that killed more than 200,000 people in Indonesia, Thailand and Sri Lanka does it right. Its secret is to combine first-hand accounts with footage that more or less matches their testimonies, thereby telling personal stories of horror, loss and bravery.
The series sensibly provides a timeline from the original earthquake in the Indian Ocean to the tsunami reaching land where there were varying levels of devastation, the worst being in the Indonesian resort town of Aceh. At times the shaky 2004 video footage is dizzying but Tsunami: Race Against Time is an excellent deep look at one of history’s most calamitous events, and the viewer can’t help having respect for the immense power of nature after watching it.
The Best & Worst Streaming TV is a regular column in which Gary Steel assesses the worth – or otherwise – of the vast trove available to stream. Unlike other media, our policy is to dig deep and go further than just Netflix or what’s new this week.
