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The Wild Side of Dogs (2019)
The doc only shows stray dogs in Romania, and not Romania's shepherd dogs like it does with Italy - Smells like propaganda
There are shepherd dogs in Romania as well, why didn't the filmmakers film the shepherd dogs in the Romanian countryside and mountains and instead filmed shepherd dogs in Italy? There are dogs on Italians streets as well. But many are euthanized in Italy. Why didn't they film dogs on Italian streets to stay consistent with the theme of Italian dogs? This seems suspicious to me, it puts Italy in a good light but Romania in a bad light. This smells like propaganda.
In Romania there were years when the street dogs were taken and kept to be adopted and those that weren't adopted were euthanized like in Europe and America. But some loud NGOs stopped the euthanasia and the number of dogs multiplied again. And again dogs were euthanized and NGOs intervened, it's a vicious cycle. Stray dogs killed women, children and even men in the past. But the movie doesn't show that. Things are complicated. It's not just a black and white situation.
Luke Cage (2016)
Great potential derailed into an unfocused mess
After watching and liking Jessica Jones I was really excited for this show. However, it surprised me by being so inconsistent, starting with a bang in the first episode and having a decent first half to derailing into an unfocused mess in the second half. *Spoilers ahead!*
Bad parts of the show:
1) The two main villains: Cottonmouth started as a promising crime lord but in time he was reduced to a failed musician that couldn't pursue what he wanted and was manipulated into being a thug by Mama Mabel. In the end he proved to be a pathetic, but nevertheless tragic character. Diamondback however is irredeemable. He's even more of a cartoony villain than a cartoon villain, he's so unrealistic, the acting is so over the top that it ruined the second half of the show for me. His character was too distracting, it took me out of every scene he was in.
2) There was also a lot of dead time and things were moving at a snail's pace at times, if it had half of the episodes it could have been better, or they should have added more interesting conflicts, the main conflicts with Cottonmouth and Diamondback were disappointing to say the least. I was more engaged in the smaller conflicts: like the flashback episode of Luke's time at Seagate, or the back-stage conflict of the real villains: Mariah and Shades.
3) Also his slap-fu isn't engaging at all, he just slaps or throws people around, the Daredevil quality of realistic fights, where you can hear bones cracking is totally lost here. Sure, there is the difference in power between the two, Matt is only a human with super senses while Luke is a superhuman with super strength and impenetrable skin. When Luke was fighting Diamondback it turned serious, no more slapping or throwing around, so I thought it would finally turn interesting. But it wasn't all that impressive, it was even boring dare I say.The emphasis here should be the lack of technique. The fighting techniques and finesse is what separates Daredevil and Luke Cage so greatly. I bet they wanted to save the budget for other things and barely gave anything to the fighting choreographers, that is if they had any. Hope they'll add more gravitas to the fights and that they'll actually add some stakes and fighting techniques.
So-so parts of the show: 1)Back-stage puppeteers Mariah and Shades. Even though they weren't in control most of the time and they barely regained control through treachery, so saying they're "masterminds" is reaching. They still were by far the most interesting villains of the show. The fact that they weren't always in control was both a negative and a positive: it made them more realistic and it humanized them, but at the same time badass villain points were subtracted. Marvel does have a problem with its villains. Even Marvel's best villain, Magneto isn't a bad guy all the time.
2) Misty Knight had so much potential, loved her smart-ass attitude, she was really badass in the beginning. Loved Simone Missick as Misty, she's a beautiful lady that can convey both strength and fragility. But in the show Misty made so many damn stupid mistakes, and either knew everything that was going on or she didn't know anything. It was very strange, especially for someone who is capable of reconstructing a crime scene in her mind simply looking at the photos. She could see the the shooting of Dante clearly, but when Cottonmouth was killed she couldn't imagine who killed him. Only after she received the information from Candace, she imagined it Mariah who did it. Also, she easily lost her phone and let Shades steal it from her, she didn't notice it or tried to find it but hours later. She didn't check on Candance a lot of time, admittedly, she was busy, but still. Candance's safety was of utmost importance. Misty's power could have been something really cool, but now we can see that it's a little more than useless.
3)People have polarizing opinions about Mike Colter as Luke Cage, saying either that his acting is stiff and doesn't have a varied palette of emotions or that the actor is great portraying the character as close to the comics as possible, he is Luke Cage. I personally liked Mike Colter's acting, he handsome subtle acting moments, so calling him stiff is untrue. But his speeches at the church or the last episode were too cheesy and tried too hard to be epic. I do think he'll improve in time and I hope the writers will bring him in an even more vulnerable place, where he'll show even more emotion, like they did with Daredevil and Jessica Jones. Luke isn't at that level yet.
Good parts of the show: 1) Pity that Scarfe died, the Misty-Scarfe combo was one of the best things in the show. Simone Missick said in an interview she had a great time with Frank Whaley, Scarfe's actor. These two had real chemistry on-screen, either teasing each other or supporting each other.
2) I liked the Harlem references in this show. They give a sense of identity, to both the city and the characters. It feels grounded in reality, shame that the cartoony shenanigans of Diamondback destroyed every semblance of realism.
3) Claire was one of the best parts of the show, the moment she was on screen you knew she'll make the show better, both story-wise by helping Luke and audience-wise by giving us a dependable, badass, likable woman to sympathize with and cheer on. There is actual chemistry between Claire and Luke, as cheesy and awkward at times as it is.
In conclusion, Luke Cage was the opposite of "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts", it had a few great moments but over all it turned into a unfocused mess, mainly in the second part.