Word: mannes
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Director Brosh knew that the absurd plight of Eleanor Mann's family had to be acted out with comic melodrama. But, as it has often been said, it takes very good acting to portray bad acting well. And unfortunately, the actors portraying the Mann family and their various persecutors aren't quite that good, so that the audience isn't sure how much of the bad acting is intentional. Indeed, it is a relief when the melodrama is dropped, and Eleanor opts for more sincere tones...
Best by default are Thomas E. G. Hale as Ronald and Jacqueline H. Sloane as Elaine May Alcott, who play God's practical jokesters on earth. Sloan must create a huge variety of characters who torment Mrs. Mann, and though she doesn't quite get them all, it's great seeing how much she does pull off. I mention Hale because, while his role is admittedly unstraining, he, at least, doesn't stumble over...
...must go largely to two men. One of them, Steven Bochco, was the co- creator (with Michael Kozoll) of Hill Street Blues, the police drama that brought the genre a gritty new look, bustling narratives and a recognition that police officers are adults, not cartoon heroes. The other, Michael Mann, gave the formula another new twist a few seasons later with Miami Vice, which used flashy visuals and a thumping rock sound track to transform familiar cops-and-robbers tales into moody morality plays...
...rushes to help folks in trouble while trying to keep her marriage afloat, a yuppie update of Hart to Hart. In CBS's Downtown, a tough cop gets crime-fighting help from four oddball parolees, a sort of B-Team. In addition to the routine fare, however, Bochco and Mann are introducing second- generation shows of their own. If neither is as groundbreaking as its predecessor, both exhibit a quality rare in prime time: they are unmistakable products of their creators, not of the TV assembly line...
...show has a grim, pounding energy, a bracing sound track that mixes Todd Rundgren with early rock (Del Shannon has rerecorded his hit Runaway for the show's theme) and an impeccable cast that seems to have emerged from the street, not a Hollywood casting call. Mann and Director Abel Ferrara indulge in few of the stylistic flourishes of Miami Vice but revel in the shadowy bars and gleaming tail fins of their seedy milieu...