SlovakPrincess
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Posts posted by SlovakPrincess
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Good grief, Sunny is creepy.
I died laughing at the reactions to her first attempts at using the deep voice - "do you have a cold?" Also Rajesh trying to convince the new engineer a box with an empty Snapple bottle was a package he needed to bring into the restricted lab.
Wow. She really thought she could just bullshit her way through it. It's amazing the company didn't crash down much, much sooner.
Poor Edmond -- although, in retrospect, probably a giant relief to him now to have gotten out early!
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It's Stephen Fry! Love him.
Holmes' turn to the dark side came pretty quickly, apparently! Poor Edmund. And that assistant who got fired for no reason.
All the blood everywhere in that hotel room in Switzerland, as they tried all night to get the prototype to work ... 🤮
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So far this is working for me a lot better than the Anna Delvey miniseries. Telling the story in a chronological fashion, really focusing on Holmes' slow-building self-delusion -- instead of creating an unnecessary, obnoxious reporter character to constantly tell us how fascinating and enigmatic the con artist is, like in Inventing Anna -- makes this a much better production. I'll have to reserve judgment 'til the end, though ... I'll be annoyed if the miniseries' point of view is that Holmes was wholly innocent and Balwani completely manipulated her.
Amanda Seyfried is great in the role. Not sure how I feel about the casting for Sunny Balwani ... they picked a much more attractive guy to play him!
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Todd at least had an ethical obligation to keep helping Anna. His only other option was to ask the judge to postpone the trial and allow him to withdraw, which the judge might have rejected anyway (this can actually happen close to trial, even if your client refuses to pay you).
Vivian was just being ridiculous.
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Yeah, I didn't really buy the other "Scriberia" reporters cheering for Anna beating some of the charges. Their loyalty was to Vivian, and her continued series about Anna's story was going to be successful no matter the outcome of the trial. The occasional "I like this girl!" comments (as they did Vivian's work for her and researched Anna's scams) were annoying enough, but they knew damn well she was probably guilty.
The real low point for me was when Vivian was yelling at Todd the lawyer after the sentencing, in this awful self-righteous manner. I would've drop kicked her into the ocean -- bitch, you talked my crazy client out of the plea deal!
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On 2/8/2022 at 1:17 PM, kittykat said:
I haven't seen Nightmare Alley it's the Don't Look Up Nom that has me rolling my eyes. I mean, I get what they were doing but I can't stand films that spend the whole time telling us how clever they are and Don't Look Up is THAT film.
As stars if maligned film franchises, I hope that Jamie Dornan, Kristen Stewart and even Dakota Johnson continue taking roles with some better material the way Robert Pattinson has. If Jamie was going to get a nom it should have been for Barb and Star go to Vista del Mar 😁.
I'm kind of surprised Ruth Negga got snubbed for Passing. I thought she was a lock.
Nightmare Alley and Don't Look Up have the dubious distinction of being movies in which Cate Blanchett was just kinda ... meh. I was not a big fan of either movie (though Nightmare Alley was at least competently edited and had great art direction), but what was most baffling was how blah I found Blanchett's performance in both movies. Because she's usually mesmerizing (see Elizabeth, Blue Jasmine, The Gift). Maybe poorly written femme fatale is not the right role for her?
Ruth Negga and Tessa Thompson were both so good in Passing, honestly surprised neither got a nomination.
Kristen Stewart ... I've really grown to like her in more recent projects (Happiest Season and Spencer), and she was actually quite good as a child / teen actress (Panic Room). What in the world was going on in the Twilight films that made her acting so bad? I mean, the material itself was unserious, but that doesn't fully explain the night-and-day badness in those films compared to her acting in other films.
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On 2/16/2022 at 1:26 AM, Lethallyfab said:
Cynthia Nixon continues to put her foot in her mouth, claims that Miranda has always been this messy. Among the highlights:
“A feminist show shouldn’t be agitprop, it shouldn’t be propoganda showing women as these sensible, wise, kind, attractive people.”
….
She also claims Miranda has “never been level-headed” which makes me wish I knew how to insert the Sure Jan.GIF.
Oh for crying out loud. Maybe Nixon needs to go watch some reruns, because she’s clearly forgotten what the Miranda character was like for years. People liked the character precisely because she had to balance a demanding, level-headed career with the uncertainty of dating in NYC as a modern single woman. She could be tactless at times but usually because she was being pragmatic when she thought a friend was being unrealistic.
And it’s “feminist agitprop” to depict female characters as kind or wise? Um … shouldn’t we all strive to be kind and wise? On SATC, each of the women were by turns kind to each other, wise, sensible — and often they screwed up or acted immaturely and had to acknowledge that. Carrie was probably the only “messy” character, whose life seemed chaotic at times, but SATC used to acknowledge that this was not a great thing (the cheating on Aiden, her financial issues, following Alek to Paris without a plan for herself). It wasn’t treated as a “rom com”.
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https://time.com/6147088/inventing-anna-true-story/
According to this article, in real life, Anna pretended at some point that the fake family accountant / business manager, "Peter Henneke", had died, and then made up a new fake business manager, "Bettina Wagner".
How did they not include this in the mini-series! This is hilarious and I'm kinda mad it didn't make it into the show!
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1 hour ago, FozzyBear said:
I did notice (although I don’t think it was something the series was trying to point out)that Anna’s circle was either rich & older or young & not rich. Maybe the older, rich crowd though they hadn’t met her because she was so young and the young, not rich crowd thought it was because she was so rich. As long as she avoided the young, super rich crowd that should have met her she was ok?
That's an interesting point, and would've been interesting to explore ... Anna realizing she had to avoid the young super rich because they kept asking what schools she'd been to or were like "why don't you know so and so?"
Maybe some of the time spent watching Vivian yell and swear and make faces at people for no good reason could've been devoted to that ...
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On 2/15/2022 at 2:51 AM, Hava said:
This may be a shallow observation, but the movie really reminded me of There Will Be Blood with its vast landscape setting and the ominous music set against a ponderous story.
Not shallow at all! I can see the similarity -- gorgeous sprawling landscapes, slow burning scenes, psychological intensity, an ominous feeling throughout.
This worked for me a lot better than There Will Be Blood, though. I love Daniel Day Lewis, but he just made me so ... tired watching him in that movie.
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I did like the little view we got into how the concierges, drivers, and other service industry professionals formed connections and worked together, in both New York and Morocco. I wish we had more of that!
Overall, for all my complaining, I did enjoy the series. But at the end of the day, I was disappointed because I don't feel like I actually learned anything new about how the super-rich operate (and manipulate each other), and how Anna was able to infiltrate that world. How did she even end up on the New York party scene?? She had to start somewhere, but we just get kinda dropped into the middle of her long con.
I promise I'm not looking for an instruction manual on how to run scams, LOL, but the series seemed to want to say something about social climbing amongst the super-rich and how, psychologically, they could manipulate and be manipulated, and then ... really didn't. We didn't even get a scene showing Rachel and Anna meeting, which seems like a huge oversight.
I also don't get how Anna could keep working with the architect and other folks she met through Nora after Nora realized Anna stole $400k from her -- like Nora wouldn't find a way (even if she was embarrassed) to warn all her connections and kill Anna's reputation in a heartbeat??
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20 minutes ago, greekmom said:
Exactly. What I don't understand is Racheal knew that Anna was having "credit card issues" and there's the internet. So why in hell did they a) not google how much the Gucci tour is and b) not go since no one had cash?
Yeah, that was weird. How do you not ask how much the house tour and tea service are before you go through it? However, that was still a ridiculous, laughable amount to charge for a tour of a mansion and one meal. How can you charge $2000 for that? Insanity, but I guess they can get away with it because very silly rich tourists will pay for a "VIP" experience. Rachel should've known better, but I can see her thinking it would be in the hundreds, not thousands - at most - for the fancy tour, she didn't realize Anna and Noah had no cash or anything to kick toward it, and she was just so grateful to finally do something fun on the trip.
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On 2/15/2022 at 9:15 AM, FozzyBear said:
I’m still not sure why so many people were supposed to be enamored with Anna either before or after she was discovered. For Neff and Vivian and the other writers I think we were supposed to believe it was a mix of administration for her moxie and disgust at the rich people she was fleecing…but she was hardly a Robin Hood. She wanted a bunch of money so she could start a rich person club. She wasn’t trying to challenge the system, she was trying to start a rich person club. And why did everyone take for granted that if she had gotten the loan it would have gone to her business? I doubt that. Judging by the numbers being thrown around the loan would not have been enough to start her “business” (I’m sorry but I CAN NOT take her rich kid club house seriously) but not to do that and fund her lifestyle. I know it’s a ton of money but the building and renovations alone would have taken up most of the loan and then she wanted incredibly expensive everything. Even 20 million will run out. Why in all of this did not one mention she obviously meant to continue living the high life with that money. She had no other means of support, of course a bunch of that money would have gone to her lifestyle. I thought the German translator had the most interesting take. That maybe she’s just a shallow con artist. Maybe there isn’t more there with Anna and that’s the problem.
So much this. The show - and Vivian - seemed to want to make this into a much more deep situation than it actually was. "Wall Street gets away with this stuff, but Anna gets screwed?? Aren't we all users and opportunists, when you think about it?? Doesn't this really make you think about society and capitalism??" LOL ... um, no. This is one very troubled, delusional, and unpleasant woman whose elaborate cons finally blew up in her face, and all the hand holding and enabling is not actually helping her.
Anna wanted to create an exclusive club for only super-rich people to admire art, smell each other's farts, and avoid the poor and unattractive (even more than they already do). She lied and forged fake papers in an attempt to get a multi-million $$ loan ... this is still criminal attempted fraud even if the bank ultimately rejects the loan and whether or not Anna intended to someday pay the money back if her ridiculous business ever got off the ground. And as you point out -- she did get a line of credit and blew all that money on clothes, expensive hotel suites, and other bullshit, she didn't put it toward her business venture.
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The confrontation between Anna and Todd was actually quite good, and I enjoyed that scene immensely.
I think it was a bit of a gray area with Rachel -- ultimately she turned out more than fine, and I can see that count being a closer call for the jury and them losing sympathy for her. But I don't think she's the bad guy - if she hadn't helped the police catch Anna, she might've still been in trouble with the credit card company and her employer. The book deal is quite a windfall ... but unlike Anna's schemes, it's actually legal to write a book about your own experience and get paid for it!
Kacy's attitude toward Rachel was so shitty by the end. Does Kacy actually think Anna was in luxury rehab because she needed it and Rachel and the cops somehow deprived her of treatment? LOL.
Vivan is so unethical and inappropriate. She's literally buying access with clothing and trying to collaborate with the defense lawyer. Then the dramatics when Anna gets convicted and sentenced. Ridiculous.
Todd's wife - a LAWYER at a big law firm - would NOT be screaming at him because his trial went long, or demanding that he hand a case over to "co-counsel" mid-trial. Other than his young, likely inexperienced associate, he has no co-counsel! Nor would Todd or the wife expect him to hand his just-convicted client over to the young associate. Also, he would not have scheduled an international vacation so close to a trial that he knows could go for days and might need post-trial motions and other work. This. would. not. happen. Stupid.
The phone call between Todd's kid and Anna was so dumb and contrived.
I really kind of actively hated Neff by the end of this series. She's annoying and judgmental as all get out. She ropes Natasha into styling an inmate who's known for not paying for services (good luck getting paid, Natasha, hope the publicity from styling a literal criminal for her trial works out for you!) Then when Anna throws a tantrum over the clothes going missing, Neff peaces out with a shitty attitude and refuses to help her supposed bestie not fuck up her own trial. But she thinks she's a good friend because she comes back to post it all on social media and sneer at Rachel. Uh huh.
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LMAO. Seriously, Vivian, are you dumb?? Spinning all these fantasies to redeem Anna's lies somehow. And claiming that "A boring life doesn't produce Anna!" Um, yeah it absolutely does, if you're an insecure narcissist who believes they deserve more than their simple life and develops a compulsive spending habit to inflate themselves. Vivian is supposed to be this sophisticated New Yorker who's been covering the rich and quirky of Manhattan for years. And she has already been scammed once by an insecure young person desperate to seem wealthy and special.
I don't understand the obsession Vivian has with making Anna's crimes about something more than a scam artist caught scamming. If she wants to feel bad for Anna, feel bad that the woman has a personality disorder and a compulsive and ultimately self-destructive need to do this shit. It's not about her parents, or social structure, or capitalism, or feminism and oh-poor-Anna because "men get away with doing the same things!" (laughable, since the show highlights McFarland and Shkreli ... both of whom also ended up in prison).
I ultimately just felt bad for the German translator. And the parents. And Jack.
Anna realizing there are luxury rehab facilities and then scamming her way into one was kind of funny, in a sick way. Am I supposed to feel bad Rachel tricked her and got her arrested before she could take a drug rehab center for thousands, as well? I do not.
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Maybe I'm just a bad person, but I really did not care about the pregnancy at this point, and, no, I did not find it cute or clever that Vivian was using Anna's mean-spirited "you're not special" words to somehow motivate herself during labor. It was weird.
I was happy for Vivian when everyone in the newsroom, even Paul, was rooting for her to get Kacy's ok for the story, and cheered for her when she did.
What was with all the unnecessary split screen in this episode? It was too much.
Rachel made some pretty dumb decisions, but it's not like she had any good options when things were going down in Morocco, and once she was back, there wasn't much she could do but beg Anna to pay her back. The actress did a great job portraying someone falling apart from stress. I was happy when she finally stood up for herself at work in the disciplinary meeting.
Why were they all so shocked Vanity Fair got Rachel's story first? I mean ... Rachel works there? I wonder if giving Vanity Fair a good story to run is what really saved Rachel's job, since she was in deep shit over the credit card.
Neff just appearing in the newsroom was annoying. I love how this show thinks people can just wander into office buildings in New York unannounced. Neff's just popping into the newsroom, Vivian's barging into Todd's office all the time, Anna was just hanging out in Alan's office without an appointment ... that's not how this works.
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On 2/13/2022 at 10:49 PM, Melina22 said:
Up until now I thought this show was really throwing shade on Rachel, but this episode seemed to even things out a lot. Obviously Neff is still blaming Rachel and not Anna, but that's realistic. Sometimes it can take years for someone to stop believing the lies of a malignant narcissist, despite what everyone around them is saying.
Yeah, I liked that by the end Rachel was helping Kacy to not back down to Anna, and Kacy realized Rachel could be a good friend - that was nice!
This actually was the best episode for me, so far. The show ratcheted up the tension in the scenes and let it build, and Kacy, Rachel, and Noah actually seemed like relatable, imperfect but basically good people who were actually put at serious risk by Anna's actions. I hope Kacy made up with her boyfriend after Anna ruined their night. And yikes for Rachel - not only is she in serious debt now, she has to explain to her employer why the business card got charged!
I get why Neff feels like Anna is just being misunderstood -- after all, Anna magically paid the hotel bill and repaid Neff. (Would be nice if the series ever explained how she got the money for that!)
I absolutely loved Kacy's apartment.
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Neff's boyfriend was certainly the voice of reason this episode! I wanted to like Neff (and I'd watch the actress in something else, she's great), but she really grated on me ... so much so that when her boyfriend finally told her point blank "you were scammed" and "you're making excuses not to film your movie", I was like "thank you!!" Maybe it was her being so impressed by being at dinner with Martin Shkrelli -- like, really? Even before he really got in trouble with the law, people knew he was a nasty little shit for deliberately jacking up medication prices. Anyway, it's hard to care too much since Neff apparently got paid back, unlike everyone else.
I guess I'm supposed to be touched by the Neff / Anna friendship? Eh.
Ok, so I finally get why Vivian hates her editor so much. She still should do the interview, though. Why let the kid who lied to her for the disastrous story - and apparently gave her fake bank statements and had his parents lying for him, too - drive the narrative?? That's just self-defeating and silly.
The actor playing Anna's lawyer is great, but they clearly have no idea what to do with him (for some insane reason, we've seen zero interactions between him and his client, the actual subject of this miniseries) ... so we get contrived silliness like Vivian flouncing into his office uninvited every episode just to shoot the shit. As lawyers and journalists famously do all day long. 🙄
I enjoyed the exasperated guard's face at Neff and Anna high-fiving in the prison, against the "no touching" rule. Even for his non-speaking role, the actor nailed it, and I appreciate that!
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OMG it's Anthony Edwards.
The high points of the episode were: (a) Edwards; (b) the gorgeous banking woman who manages to make explainers on high scale loans and law firms interesting (I may have a girl crush on her now -- she really classed up her parts of the episode); and (c) the kid who played Billy McFarland ... he made the most of his time onscreen and I got a chuckle out of him.
Alan and his wife really got turned on by cutting off funds to their annoying, lazy daughter, huh? Hee.
Did I need to see Vivian peeing on a toilet? No, no I did not. Are her vulgar, hostile comments to her husband and constant groaning about her pregnancy contributing to the story or making her a more sympathetic character? No, no they are not.
Once again, the older journalists are the ones actually finding the biggest parts of the story!!
At some point, an actual document that looked like a deed of trust and other financial documents would have had to be created and sent to even start the loan applications. Did Anna create fake documents? Is Alan so dumb he didn't obtain and review them carefully before passing them on to banks? It's not that easy to forge these kinds of documents, and the show simply telling us Anna was Peter Henneke the whole time using a voice distorter over the phone doesn't actually explain anything.
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I think I'm just hate-watching at this point.
The handling of legal aspects of this story is going to drive me out onto a ledge. No lawyer would just leave a journalist alone in their office with boxes of confidential documents. If Anna wanted to share her stupid "pitch deck" with Vivian, she would just tell her lawyer "please give a copy of my pitch deck to her" and the lawyer would first review the document and determine if it would hurt the case to provide that one document (and then probably argue about it with Anna first). I also seriously doubt the prosecutor would have given Vivian information about a fraud victim who changed their mind about pressing charges.
Chase also being a scam artist would be more interesting if Chase himself had a personality.
I did chuckle at Anna's look of mild horror and disgust at the "live, love, laugh" sign in the garden in Ohio. Although would she even know that this is a stereotypically suburban middle class kind of decoration to have?
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Vivian is just the absolute worst. Stomping into a lawyer's office and demanding that he "team up" with you and give you information about the defense of his client? Lady, you are not Anna's lawyer and not within the attorney-client privilege, why the fuck would he share anything with you?? You are a journalist! Neither he nor his client should even be talking to you right now!
And why do the nice older writers have to do her job for her, scouring Instagram for her when she should have thought of that herself? Like they don't have their own work to do?
Is the goal of this show to make me hate Vivian more than Anna?
On a positive note, I enjoy the group of older writers banished to the "Scriberia" section of New Yorker ... I mean, Manhattan magazine. I would rather watch a show about them, the caftan mogul lady, and Val and Nora's unusual relationship.
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Gah. Some of the dialogue is just so cringe-inducingly bad.
Vivian just seems deranged. Hoping someone won't take a plea deal (that they should probably take for their own good) so she can get her big story? Manipulating someone she knows is probably mentally unwell to not take the deal? Screaming swears at the ultrasound of your baby because "oh no, baby's real now, I've run out of time to save my career!"? Actually putting her crazy conspiracy collage on the wall? I mean ... we're not supposed to like this character, are we?
In these kind of movies / shows, I'm usually cheering on the scrappy underdog and mad at the love interest who doesn't understand their commitment to their work -- but here, I'm feeling really bad for the husband. Vivian is deeply unpleasant, and I'm starting to think whatever issue ruined her career probably arose out of the same kind of unethical behavior she's displaying with Anna.
In real life interviews, yes, Anna Delvey seems charmless and off-putting and I think Julia Garner is probably doing an ok job portraying that. But does such a person make for a good mini-series? Are they even going to try and explain how someone so annoying and not particularly interesting was able to con so many people? So far, it seems the answer is no.
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Wasting valuable things, for any reason, just bothers me immensely. 🤷♀️
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On 8/30/2018 at 12:41 AM, voiceover said:
Hm. Totally missed the cash Cal stuffed into the pockets until I read it here. I'd always assumed Rose pawned the necklace for money, then made it back & retrieved it from some sympathetic pawnbroker. (Some handwaving & fanwanking involved here, for sure) But it was the only way I could reconcile her keeping it all those years.
Because the part about the necklace that bugged me was that: it was Cal's gift to Rose. The only connection Jack had? he included it in the portrait he drew.
And yet -- that whole last flinging of the necklace overboard seemed to be some sort of JackRose tribute. Which makes no sense. It's one of those McGuffin moments that doesn't bear close scrutiny.
That necklace was annoying as hell. As you said, why else was she holding onto it, if not for some money -- how else was she supporting herself when she first landed in the US? Payment from the company that owned the Titanic? Though I could see them skimping on payments to anyone they assumed came from the "lower levels" of the Titanic, as she was hiding her affluent past to avoid being anywhere near Cal on the rescue ship.
I guess since she wore it while posing nude for Jack, it had some connection to Jack in her mind, but a girl's gotta eat and she was starting over entirely! Did she ever reconnect with her mom or just let the woman think she drowned -- I mean, damn, not sure her mom deserved that!
And then she throws the damn thing in the sea ... so much for leaving an inheritance to the grandkids. If nothing else, give it to a museum or sell it and give the money to charity or something! For cripes sake ...
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S01.E02: Satori
in The Dropout
The singing and dancing actually work for me (in the small-enough doses we've had so far, at least -- we'll see if it wears out its welcome in future episodes). It illustrates how Holmes' go-to was always pumping herself and her company up, rather than allowing herself to critically examine the feasibility of her idea and her own ability to pull it off. And it shows how invested she is in happy-talk motivational bullshit ... even when she's alone.
The show's thesis seems to be that Holmes genuinely deluded herself, and believed she would eventually create reliable blood testing -- but it doesn't (so far) shy away from emphasizing the immorality of her lying to and manipulating everybody while the technology is failing. It's a tricky balance, but so far this is working for me. Holmes and Balwani are unlikeable people - but this show lets them be interesting without excusing them. (The issue I had with Inventing Anna is that it showed Anna being horrible and manipulative, but then used other characters to wring their hands about "oh poor Anna is in jail!", make unconvincing excuses for her, and imply some of the people she scammed deserved it).