This American Life - Season One (2007) Review

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(More customer reviews)Ira Glass and company have been producing the lovable radio show "This American Life" for years now. Fans of the radio show will undoubtedly be interested in the television show.
The show is masterfully photographed, and very well produced. I thought at first that if the television show was to be as effective as the radio show, it would be nearly impossible to produce, but apparently not so! Content-wise, it's very similar to the radio show. Every story follows a common narrative arc, but each story also features the unique setting that the radio show is known for. There's really little more to be said, especially if you are already a fan of the radio show. This is real American journalism focused on uncommon people who every day pass for common. Ira Glass and his show bring us these people's stories and do so with great artistry.
Often humorous, sometimes sad, but always interesting, "This American Life" is groundbreaking television!

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The widely popular, award-winning Chicago Public Radio show of the same name is now a Showtime show. Drawing on a different theme each week, viewers hear compelling stories from everyday folks culled from six months on the road. Host Ira Glass and company create a captivating look at the American Life in a series that’s not quite documentary, not much of a news magazine and definitely not a reality show – it’s simply unlike anything else.

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A Prairie Home Companion (2006) Review

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(More customer reviews)I wish I'd said this: A Prairie Home Companion is a lovely film about death, and with some great bad jokes. Death and how we deal with it drifts through the film like a dream, but it turns out to be real. Word has gotten around that the 30-year-old radio program is giving its last show. The theater where it has been broadcast from all these years has been sold and will be turned into a parking lot. A woman in a white trench coat moves dream-like through the place, searching for a person whose time has come, and then finds him. And then she finds another. Memories of past successes are talked about, but sometimes not. Reminiscences are wept over or laughed over. The backstage emergencies happen and are dealt with and the radio show goes on. It's just a marvelous movie. People who dislike the actual A Prairie Home Companion will probably not like this movie. Those who do like the radio show I'm sure are going to run out and buy the DVD of the movie as soon as it's available.
Garrison Keillor is not center stage so much as he's the imperturbable head guy who isn't always there, even when he's there. Most of the regular members of the radio show are present, as well as some new names. Lily Tomlin and Meryl Streep are incredibly authentic and incredibly funny/poignant as the two remaining members, Rhonda and Yolanda Johnson, of a country-music family singing group. Woody Harrelson and John C. Reilly are great as the dim cowboys, Lefty and Dusty. Their bad-jokes song is one of the highlights. Guy Noir looking like Kevin Kline tries to keep a lid on the crises. Streep and Tomlin (and Harrelson and Reilly) sing their own stuff and they are first class. Tomlin, in particular, gives a terrific performance as Rhonda, tough, funny, a little bitter and a trooper.
After 105 minutes you may find death not too frightening, may find a kind of comforting acceptance of life, and may find funny some awful jokes...like the name of the country song Lefty sang on last week's show, "I'll Give You My Moonshine If You Show Me Your Jugs." Or a great new wheezer, "Did you hear about the crate of Viagra that was stolen?" "No! Who took it?" "The cops don't know but they're looking for hardened criminals."
I also wish I'd said this, from the New York Times: A Prairie Home Companion isn't great, it's wonderful.

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A LOOK AT WHAT GOES ON BACKSTAGE DURING THE LAS BROADCAST OF AMERICA'S MOST CELEBRATED RADIO SHOW, WHERE SINGING COWBOYS DUSTY & LEFTY, A COUNTRY MUSIC SIREN & A HOST OF OTHERS HOLD COURT.

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