Pitch: Pilot

This is a show that isn't true, but it has the potential to be true. Major League Baseball finally has its first female player, Ginny Baker (Kylie Bunbury, who spent months training for this role). Ginny is a pitcher and most of her teammates are not thrilled that a girl is on their team.
The cast is great: Ali Larter is the cut-throat agent, Amelia, who believes that Ginny is the best thing ever, telling the limo driver point blank that Ginny is the most important passenger he's ever driver with Dan Lauria as the team's manager, pissed at a girl disrupting the status quo and Mark-Paul Gosselaar as the team's catcher, not pleased with having to share his spotlight with a woman. Bob Balaban is the team's owner with Michael Beach as Ginny's overbearing papa, thrilled that at least one of his children loves baseball, but tough, determined to give her a secret weapon which results in the waste of perfectly good nectarines.
Ginny also has her own private locker room where she can hear what her teammates truly think through the vent, dealing with mixed comments from Mike Lawson (Gosselaar) who thinks she's talented but still isn't fond of her.
Ginny is the heroine of many little girls and has so much pressure on her. She isn't nervous, at first, but as it gets closer to her start, the nerves kick in and she's wild on the mound, disappointing in her first, brief appearance. She insists on leaving the game after just ten pitches, none of them any good. She is furious at herself and urges the little girls to find another role model, because she just can't cut it. And she's experienced, with five seasons of minor league and two seasons of winter ball under her belt. They don't send her down because they can't stomach the bad publicity it would bring. So she gets another chance, and takes it, after some great, inspiring words from the womanizing Mike.
The only problem I have with the show is that you, the audience, is lied to. That's right. Ginny's dad, unable to smile at his only daughter as she makes her major league debut, is actually dead, killed in a tragic car accident just after a major league scout selects Ginny. It's all an hallucination. I hate being lied to and I think that this could cause problems in the long run. And the fight in the locker room after her first victory sours the moment. A new coach may be found soon as he hasn't completely changed with the times.
Now, the show is very stylized, great to look at and amazing, with the life-sized stadium, all realistic. Nothing is out of place and Bunbury is up to the task of an important and difficult role and fortunately, she just like Baker does have a good support system, but unlike Ginny, she doesn't need it. I just hope this show, unlike Empire, doesn't turn into a huge mess. And the camera work is amazing. Grade: B+

Speechless: P-I-Pilot

Well, this show finally has a character with a disability as one of its main characters. It only took Hollywood long enough for that to happen.  And it is done with grace without the nitty, gritty for sure, but instead treats him as another character.
Minnie Driver is top-billed as Maya DiMeo, a hover mom with three kids, including the disabled JJ (Micah Fowler) who is wheelchair bound and can't speak though he can still be understood with some limited hand gestures and a light attached to his head which points to letters, giving him a way to spell out words so he can be understood.
Her other son, Ray (Mason Cook) on the other hand, isn't thrilled with Maya always making decisions based on what is best for JJ and disregarding her other two children. Daughter Dylan (Kyla Kenedy) is a brilliant track star and is disgusted with her track coach praising everyone even if their times aren't spectacular. Ray likes astronomy and is actually enjoying sixth school in two years, but Maya isn't thrilled with the janitor (Cedric Yarbrough) who calls a wheelchair bound grandmother crippled and is livid that her son has to enter the school on a garbage ramp in the back of the school. She wants to switch him to somewhere else. And, for the first time, Ray puts up a fight, exclaiming in a stunner that JJ did get the right mom.
Meanwhile, Dad (John Ross Bowie) is thrilled that she still has hope that each situation will be better than the last. He and Ray bond over watching cars not handle a sudden speed bump well. But he is also the voice of reason, urging his wife to finally consider her other children. Which she does, only to discover that Ray ran off to attend the school's fair.
The ending of the episode is terribly rushed with JJ finally his voice through Kenneth, the janitor, who does mostly get him and Ray does something typical only to discover that his astronomy friend has a boyfriend and a jock one at that. JJ decides to divert attention away from Ray. Maya does apologize, something that doesn't come easily for her and, for now, at least, the family is fine and functioning normally. They will stay in the new area.
The show has a good cast, with Micah Fowler as the true breakout star, brilliant without saying a word. Driver is also good and it is nice to see John Ross Bowie as a character I can actually like without an annoying lisp. Cook and Kenedy are also good and will get better once their characters are more developed. It is also great to see another truly crappy house on TV. So far, this is the pilot to beat. Grade: B+

This Is Us: Pilot

Well, suffice to say EW's Henry Greenblatt was correct, I suppose, this show did contain one of the best plot twists in a pilot, but I can't say I'm thrilled with it, plus it feels cheap to me and yet, everything becomes clearer.
Spoiler Alert: Jack (Milo Ventimiglia) and Rebecca (Mandy Moore)'s plot line takes place thirty-six years ago, which makes sense. Rebecca goes into labor with triplets six weeks earlier. When they arrive at the hospital, I am shocked that they don't take her in right away for a cesarean section and why they are no cords attached to her monitoring her babies' heart rates. This isn't revealed until the very end when Jack looks at his two surviving babies (the third one died at birth) and is offered a smoke by a fireman who dropped off a baby found at his fire station. I couldn't believe that, knowing it is illegal to smoke in hospitals, but not apparently thirty-six years ago.
Okay, now to the other plot lines. First of all, that baby found abandoned at the fire station grows up into a perfectly good human being named Randall (the recent Emmy winner Sterling K. Brown) who is adopted by Jack and Rebecca as a replacement for the baby they lost. Yeah, I don't know if I agree with two grief-stricken people taking on a third child, but Jack made it abundantly clear that there were three cribs in their house and his untalented mother knitted three blankets so they were leaving the hospital with three babies, which is exactly what they do, nature be damned. So back to Randall. He is married to a lovely and mostly understanding woman, Beth (Susan Kelechi Watson) and is a businessman but after all these years, he has found his biological father, William Hill (Ron Cephas Jones), a former drug addict who left him at that fire station, an event he doesn't even remember clearly. Randall doesn't even truly understand why he sought out his birth father, which is just crap, as far as I'm concerned. Still, he can't help but get to know William and even invites him to meet his family and his two soccer playing daughters. Then, William drops the bomb, he has terminal cancer (I'm assuming). So, they have a lot of work to do quickly.
Then there is Kevin (Justin Hartley) who looks good even with his shirt on. He is a decent actor, better than the crapping material he is given, but he is stuck in this dead-end acting job on a TV sitcom, The Manny, where he can even seriously make the joke about breastfeeding his ward himself. He throws a fit and quits his job just like that. But he doesn't know what is next.
His sister, Kate (Chrissy Metz) also faces an internal battle, one that requires her to lose weight as she is heavyset and sick of it. She even joins a weight-loss group where she meets the funny Toby (Chris Sullivan) who is thrilled to discover that Kevin is her brother. Hopefully, that romance will go well, as her life hasn't turned out the way she thought it would.
Now, though I wasn't thrilled with that stunning plot twist and wish they would have dealt with the devastating stillbirth with a little more grace and detail and had the discussion of adopting the abandoned baby without just showing it. Though it will probably be mentioned much more in the future.
That all being said, the characters are interesting and the acting is good, though the characters need to become more developed, but there are so many of them, so that will come through with time I'm sure. Still, I'm intrigued and need to see more. This is still a good show, I just felt it could have been better. Grade: B

Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

This is a great film, a beggar wins the most money ever awarded in the history of Indian television, but, and this is more important to Jamal (played by Dev Patel, Ayush Mahesh Khedekar and Tanay Chheda at various ages) is that he gets the girl, Latika (played by Frieda Pinto, Rubina Ali and Tanvi Ganesh Lonkar at various ages).
Jamal had a rough childhood, one which he was orphaned at a young age when his mother was killed by some insurgents killing all Muslims in sight. This is how Jamal and his older brother Salim (played by Madhur Mittal, Azhauddin Mohammad Ismail and Ashutosh Lobo Gajiwala at various ages) are 'rescued' by a man who uses them in a way similar to how Oliver is used in Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist, using them for an income. But Salim does rescue Jamal as Maman (Ankur Vikal) is about to blind him as blind children beggars get more money. One of their friends doesn't fair as well.
They brave the rails of India together, scraping a living by hustling people. They live hand to mouth but while Jamal stays sweet and somewhat innocent, Salim is toughened up by the streets and shoots Maman to get the young dancer Latika away from his grasp. But he is already working for Javed (Mahesh Manjrekar) a gangster who rules Mumbai. While somehow Jamal gets a job working as a chai wallah (tea server) at a large call center, soaking in some important information along the way, Salim kills people for Javed and Latika is his mistress, whom he abuses whenever she upsets him. Jamal additions for the show solely because he believes that she will be watching. Which she is.
However, Jamal has difficulties on the show. He is doing brilliantly and is gutsy. Even when the host (Anil Kapoor) fed him the wrong answer, he picks the correct one. But he is arrested and charged with fraud, as no one can believe he knows the answers. He tells the investigator (Irrfan Khan) his life story. Sure, he did get lucky with the questions, as there is so much he doesn't know. But he is also far too honest, admitting that his brother is a murderer to his torturers. 
Then, comes the final night. The very last question awaits him. He doesn't know the answer, though in his limited schooling The Three Musketeers was one of the few books he knew of. Fortunately, his brother finally has a change of heart and sets Latika free, and will deal with the aftermath himself. Latika is the one who answered the call as Jamal only knows the number to his brother's phone. He is thrilled that she is safe and picks the correct answer to the question he doesn't know. He has won the game.
Needless to say, his victory came at a price. His brother meets his death just after killing Javed. But he knew that was coming, as he piled into a bathtub filled with money when he shot Javed.
Jamal rushes to meet Latika and they have finally reached their destiny. They kiss and the film ends. 
This film is good, with great acting all around. Good music and soundtrack only add to the greatness of the film, in addition to it being well put together as a whole, though the timeline can be hard to follow for some. The sets are authentic and this is a fell-good story that everyone needs every once in a while. The dance number was great at the end. I just hope that Jamal and Latika can truly have the happy ending they both deserve. Grade: A-

Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

This movie is hilarious, even watching it for the third or fourth time.
Olive Hoover (Abigail Breslin) competes in beauty pageants but her mother, Sheryl (Toni Collette, great) isn't a stage mother. Olive's hair isn't curled, hair-sprayed or teezed. But she has heart and talent, misguided talent, but talent nevertheless.
She, out of the blue, gets to participate in this contest nearly nine hundred miles away. Her father, a misguided optimist/motivational speaker, Richard (Greg Kinnear) isn't thrilled with this though he likes her attitude, doesn't want them to fly as they don't have the funds, which means that her whole family will drive to get there.
That includes her gay uncle who is depressed and was literally just released from a hospital after his suicide attempt, Frank (Steve Carell) and her Nietzshke loving brother who has taken a vow of silence and hasn't spoken a word in nine months, Dewayne (Paul Dano) and her heroin addicted, porn loving grandfather, Edwin (Alan Arkin).
The trip has its issues, such as the clutch breaking almost immediately on the family's old bus which means that they need to run and jump into the car. Then, poor Grandpa dies and they can't leave the body there but they can't legally take it with them as they are crossing state lines. So, they sneak the body out the hospital window and make a run for it. They are even pulled over by the cop just after the horn breaks, but fortunately, the dead body isn't discovered as Grandpa's porn falls out in from of the cop and he likes it, letting Richard off with a warning. Dewayne discovers that he is color-blind and his dreams of flying planes for the air force is dashed so he royally freaks out and breaks his vow of silence. So they arrive at the hotel a few minutes late and the woman in charge (Beth Grant) doesn't care about their sob story but fortunately, Olive is still allowed to compete, which she does, despite the objections of both her father and Dewayne. Her dance is offense to say the least. She performs a strip-tease but at least she has genuine confidence. She is banned from beauty pageants in California for life as a result of the dance she performed in memory of her grandfather, something he helped her plan.
The plot may be fairly basic, but the characters are complex and great with equally great acting and truly hilarious scenes, especially the one where Grandpa tells Dewayne to have a lot of sex with a lot of different women, but don't do heroin until you're old. He also loved the retirement home he was kicked out of, but he loved the amount of women there.
Sure, there are some scenes that are odd, like when Frank runs into his ex-lover at a gas station in the middle of nowhere and what about Richard's failed book deal with Stan Grossman (Bryan Cranston)? I wish we had a little more background about that, but whatever.
It is wonderful showing a real family on film, one that has money struggles and petty arguments about petty problems, or real problems. This is a family that will stick together, despite all their problems and disagreements and that is a wonderful sight. Grade: A-

Sayonara (1957)

This film is very kind to women. And the Japanese.
It is 1951, America is at war with Korea but for Lloyd Gruver, an ace flyer for the American Air Force, his air time is grounded, thanks to his shaky health. So he is taken to Japan, where they are still largely regarded as the enemy. Here he has some lame desk work. He believes, probably correctly, that he was moved here to be closer to the general's daughter and his fiance, Eileen Webster (Patricia Owens). However, their romance has long grown stale. Sure, she's beautiful, intelligent and has good breeding, everything he wants in a wife. But nothing specifically about her.
In addition to Lloyd being reassigned to Japan, one of his colleagues, Joe Kelly (Red Buttons, who would win an Oscar) is also there, but he is thrilled with the prospect as he had previously fallen in love with a Japanese woman, Katsumi (Miyoshi Umeki, who also won an Oscar for her role). They get married against everyone's wishes, the Japanese and the US army not to mention Lloyd himself. He can't believe that he would want to marry someone with slanted eyes. How sweet of him.
However, he would have the last laugh as he falls in love with a Japanese woman himself, a famous and celebrated dancer, Hana-ogi (Miiko Taka), who begins by being cool and aloof to him as he basically stalks her every day when she crosses the bridge from her performances to her dormitory where she lives with the rest of her troop.
Finally, Katsumi and Joe are able to successfully set the two of them up. Hana-ogi apologizes for her ingrained prejudice of Americans as they are the ones who dropped the bomb which killed her father. The two begin an illicit romance, hiding from people on both sides. Eileen doesn't mind, as she is the one who ended the relationship.
Then, tragedy strikes. Joe is transferred state side and he can't take his wife with him, despite all of Lloyd's pleading, never mind Katsumi being pregnant. They both kill themselves and poor Lloyd discovers the bodies along with his friend, Mike Bailey (James Garner, in an unwritten role).
He is devastated but what is worse is that his plan for marrying Hana-ogi has just shot up in flames. She is unable to marry him because her father sold her to the dance troop to save his other younger children and Lloyd doesn't take the news well. He's use to getting what he wants. But she's been transferred to another troop in Japan and he is going back to the states. She is devastated as for the first time in her life she had been thinking about marriage and her own children, but she doesn't want Lloyd to settle and though he was willing to resign as he can't bring her with him and find something else to do with his life. He, on the other hand, isn't thrilled but takes the transfer just as the law finally passes, which will allow service men to bring their wives home with them, just as should have always been the case. It came too late for Joe and Katsumi.
On his layover in Tokyo, he once again seeks out Hana-ogi and once again begs to her to toss away tradition and traditional thinking and marry him. They need to get the paperwork started right away. That's so hot. But she does agree, after he finally gives her a breather to collect her thoughts. She meets him outside and tells the reporters what her true hopes and dreams are. She delivers her speech brilliantly though she had never spoken publicly before. Lloyd lets her talk, simply telling the reporters a polite way to shove it. They leave with their arms linked.
Of course I have issues with the film. It doesn't show the Japanese in a very good light. After discovering the bodies, Mike and Lloyd are beaten up by a group of Japanese thugs. But at least it doesn't glorify or justify the bombs that the Americans dropped, though Lloyd did say that lots of people died on both sides. Which is the truth. Lloyd does say that he didn't drop the bomb personally.
Also a distressing scene is when Joe becomes furious at the pregnant Katsumi as she wants to get this slapstick surgery which will make her eyes look more American. He tells Hana-ogi to "tell this stupid dame I love her exactly how she is," talk about a lovely compliment. What Lloyd tells Hana-ogi about their mixed race children is also something nice hidden with an insult: "So our children will be half yellow, half white. They will also be half you and half me." But what is worse is the casting of Ricardo Montalban as a Japanese Kabuki actor. Thank goodness his role is small, mostly as a potential love interest for Eileen, but seriously, they couldn't get a Japanese actor for the role. Then again, Hollywood cast Emma Stone as a half-Japanese character in last year's Aloha, so some things never change.
Now, I truly feel that Taka should have been nominated and won the Oscar over Umeki, especially since this was her first film. Brando was the best, though he wasn't nearly as good as he was in On the Waterfront, and also, it is not attractive for someone to kiss you when you have a cigarette in your mouth.
Still, the mechanics mostly work as the set is excellent though the score could be pretty overwhelming at times. Still, it is a solid film and an important one. This is also one of the few films that, to me at least, cries for a sequel, one that addresses all the hatred heaped upon the happy couple once they arrive in the United States. Grade: B+

Broadcast News (1987)

This was an interesting film. Good, but not great filled with some good performances and some that are just okay.
Holly Hunter truly shines as Jane Craig, who works as a producer for a Washington D.C. news station, but she is devastated at the current state of affairs. The news is becoming more sensational with less substance and she wants to keep the people informed. Enter William Hurt, who is Tom Gurlich, a new reporter who feels that though he is good at his job, he doesn't have the substance nor degree to back up his success and this hurts Jane, though she still tries to pursue him romantically.
Tom climbs the ropes at the station and even delivers a brilliant story on the horrors of date rape, something that is still relevant today. Though Tom is new, he still gets the better stories and the coveted night anchor position away from the more senior, Aaron Altman (Albert Brooks, excellent), who doesn't take the news well. Then, even worse and also still relevant today, there are all the budget cuts which means that so many people will lose their job so Aaron finally gets the opportunity to anchor as everyone else will be at this big, important government dinner. His big chance goes horribly, as he literally sweats through his clothes. Awkward.
But ultimately, Aaron has the last word, though Jane is going to go on a trip with Tom, Aaron is the one who warned her that his reaction to his highly-praised date rape feature was staged, with only one camera, the tears he did shed were added in later, after the victim was finished with her devastating story. Jane is livid and says that something like that could have gotten him fired. It certainly was dishonest, but they manipulate the news in other ways, showing only what they want the public to see so it can have the biggest impact. That is also dishonest, but in a different way.
Still, the film is great with Hunter and Brooks delivering performances worthy of an Oscar though Hurt was a bit of a disappointment though he was also nominated. Jack Nicholson is the main news anchor in New York who is upset over the budget cuts though he refuses to take a cut in salary to help others out. Joan Cusack deserved an Oscar nomination just for the scene where she runs the tape up to the control room in the nick of time so everyone can view it, tripping over everything in her way. She is always excellent.
I am also glad that Jane didn't end up with either Tom nor Aaron, a bold move, but neither would have been right for her. She wouldn't have been happy with either of them. It is a shame that Tom gets a promotion while Aaron takes the high road and quits, but ends up happier in the end. Isn't that what matters most? Grade: B+

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (2012)

I watched this film for one reason, to see if Emily Blunt and Ewan McGregor would end up together. And, spoiler alert, they do, though I still would have liked a more permanent ending to confirm that, after they rebuild the dam.
The film isn't bad, it just isn't particularly great or extraordinary though both Emily and Ewan are two of my favorite actors and at least they deliver pretty good performances in a merely mediocre film.
Emily is Harriet Chetwole-Talbot who works managing the finances of the Sheikh (pronounced Shake) of Yemen's finances and he (Amr Waked) wants to have salmon fishing as he loves fishing and believes that it will improve the environment and economy of his country. Though Dr. Alfred Jones (McGregor) doesn't think the project will work, he is forced to pursue it because it is a positive story coming out of the Middle East and the PM's Press Secretary (Kristin Scott-Thomas) needs that for the press. So he does that reluctantly. He almost resigns, hoping to have a baby with his career-minded wife, Mary (Rachael Stirling), but she goes off to Geneva instead while Alfred goes to Yemen to scout out the location and figure out how the fishing would work. In the meantime, Patricia Maxwell (Scott-Thomas) tries to find the salmon to fill the lake and rivers in the Yemen.
Everything sort of comes together, even Harriet's soldier boyfriend Robert (Tom Mison) is miraculously alive. But someone is out to kill the Sheikh and destroys the whole new dam, even though the farm grown salmon did manage to swim upstream.
Alfred has nothing to go home to as he wants to divorce his wife and even admits to Robert that he loves Harriet, but she believes he is dead so she needs more time before they can be anything. So he will stay behind the rebuild the dam as a few salmon survived. Harriet decides to be his partner, leaving Robert to return to England alone. They end the film just holding hands. It disappointed me.
Again, the film wasn't great, wasn't funny though it was classified as a comedy at the Golden Globes. Blunt and McGregor deserved better material. Still, it was far from the worst way to spend my time. Grade: B

Indignation

This film was good in many ways.
First of all, you feel like you are truly being transported back to 1951. The actors really embrace their roles and master the mannerisms of the time period.
Marcus Messner (Logan Lerman) is a brilliant student who has overprotective parents, namely a paranoid father (Danny Burstein) who owns a butcher shop where Marcus works part-time. It is during the Korean War and of course both of Marcus's parents, Esther (Linda Emond) is his kind and silently strong mother, are thrilled that he will avoid the draft.
But he has his struggles in college, not in his classes or his after hours job at the library. His personal life is up for debate. He does finally have a date with the beautiful and older Olivia Hutton (Sarah Gadon) who is fairly liberal with her sexual favors. He moves to a drab single room and doesn't want to join the Jewish fraternity, opting to focus on his studies.
Then, he meets with the Dean (Tracy Letts) in one of the best scenes I have seen recently. It is a long scene where the Dean wishes to know about his personal life and why he objects to chapel, as Marcus, though raised Jewish, is actually an atheist. The scene is brilliant with every sentence reacted to perfectly and you can see Marcus getting ill in front of your eyes, before he collapses and wakes up in the hospital minus his appendix.
His mother does come to visit and wishes to divorce her increasingly verbally abusive husband which breaks Marcus's heart. Esther is less than thrilled that Marcus is seeing someone who attempted suicide. She agrees to stop the divorce proceedings if Marcus doesn't see Olivia further. Which he reluctantly agrees to do.
However, Marcus loses interest in his classes when he doesn't see Olivia around anymore and even opts to meet with the Dean again where he is grilled about his sexual life. He also learns that Olivia had a nervous breakdown and is back in the mental hospital. In one of the most shocking moments that had the whole theater gasping, Marcus tells the Dean to well, it certainly isn't family friendly but well deserved.
That isn't what gets him kicked out of college. His proxy is caught attending chapel for him and thus is forced to go to Korea. Where he is killed, bringing the film back to the beginning.
It ends just as it started with an elderly, but married Olivia staring at the wallpaper with a vase of roses, just as she arranged in his hospital room.
The film is well-done though I wish the ending had been happier but life has a series of interesting consequences for people's actions. Still, the acting is fantastic with both Letts and Lerman delivering Oscar-worthy performances, plus the set and costumes are totally authentic and it cannot be easy performing in a period piece, yet they do so effortlessly. Grade: A-

Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)

This was an odd, little film.
Llewyn Davis (Oscar Isaac) is a homeless folk singer who lives in Greenwich Village New York in 1961. He is poor, his agent pathetic. And several people think he's a complete jerk, namely Jean (Carey Mulligan) who is livid that he slept with her without using a condom. She doesn't blame herself. Plus, she's the one who cheated on her lovely, but possibly homosexual long-term boyfriend, Jim (Justin Timberlake) and now is forced, her words, to have an abortion. I guess she goes through with it. And, yes, Llewyn knew where to find a doctor to perform the illegal act, as he had gotten another woman in trouble before, though this one, never seen, didn't go through with it. He was never told that he had a child, out there somewhere.
Llewyn sleeps on couches and at his first place, the cat accidentally escapes and then escapes again, from Jean and Jim's apartment. He finds the cat, only it isn't the right cat, this one is female. Fortunately, the right cat returns to his loving owners by the end of the film. He also endures a thoroughly fascinating and bizarre car ride to get to Chicago to see another agent (F. Murray Abraham) who thinks he is good but should go back with his old partner, as his voice would work better as a harmony. Too bad his former partner is dead, having thrown himself off a bridge.
The car has two of the oddest companions, Johnny Five (Garrett Hedlund), a man of few words and the opinionated and drug addicted Mr. Turner (John Goodman), who nearly overdoses but Johnny just piles him back into the car and continues with the journey. It is oddly funny.
Then, Llewyn tries to join the merchant marines again, but he can't even afford to do that. He goes back to singing only to heckle a newcomer and gets beat up by her husband, but life moves on.
Sure, the film doesn't have much going on, just an odd week in the life of Llewyn Davis. The singing is very good and hopefully that weird song Llewyn records with Jim and this other guy, Al Cody (Adam Driver) goes big. It is also interesting to see all the authentic sets from the early 60s. The ending is depressing and you just wonder what will happen to the sorry individual. Grade: B+