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david simon's "the plot against america" on hbo

henrygandorf

By henrygandorf
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henrygandorf

henrygandorf 29194

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created by david simon (the wire, the deuce, homicide, treme) and based on novel by phillip roth (portnoy's complaint, american pastoral, the human stain) about an alt-history where charles lindbergh defeats fdr in the 1940 presidential election.

limited series starts march 16th on home box office.

 

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DDD Dad

DDD Dad 14346

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I read this book about 10 years ago after I heard an interview with Roth on NPR. Always thought it would be a great story for movie or series. Was psyched to see Simon was doing it, but in light of current events I just can’t bring myself to watch this yet. It’s sitting in my Directv queue and probably will for at least another week.

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Player

Player 4575

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Enjoyed the episode, and although it was a little slow, thought Simon did a great job setting the stage.

The theater manager, Michael Kostroff, was Maurice Levy in The Wire. Great character who stole a lot of scenes imo, so looking forward to seeing his role expanded in this.

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F250

F250 28813

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On 4/2/2020 at 7:45 PM, RPM said:

Still watching. Has a Man in the High Castle vibe.

I like it better than MitHC because there was a time in our history where we were undecided on where to stand. The show reveals part our history we don't spend much time discussing.

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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31527

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On 3/22/2020 at 10:09 AM, Player said:

Enjoyed the episode, and although it was a little slow, thought Simon did a great job setting the stage.

The theater manager, Michael Kostroff, was Maurice Levy in The Wire. Great character who stole a lot of scenes imo, so looking forward to seeing his role expanded in this.

He's in almost everything Simon does.  His sister is always Simon's casting director.  For the first time, shes Nina K. Noble, instead of Kostroff.

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Steamboat1874

Steamboat1874 4081

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My wife and I really enjoy this but she finds it more disturbing than me. I think it is fascinating when someone writes about an alternative reality. There are really no boundaries when doing so and you get to peer into the imagination of the writer. It also looks like that time period would look in my eyes. Great sets and color hues. Acting is exceptional.   

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Player

Player 4575

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So what did Winona say at the state dinner in response to the rude remark from Henry Ford? The line that prompted Turturro to quip “do you know what that means?”

I assume it was some kind of “go fuck yourself” retort, but it rolled out way too fast for my extremely limited Yiddish.

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Js1

Js1 85507

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2 hours ago, Player said:

So what did Winona say at the state dinner in response to the rude remark from Henry Ford? The line that prompted Turturro to quip “do you know what that means?”

I assume it was some kind of “go fuck yourself” retort, but it rolled out way too fast for my extremely limited Yiddish.

Gay Kocken Offen Yom

"Go poop in the ocean"

This is a common Yiddish phrase used in reply to something that makes no sense or is ridiculous. It's basically a way of telling the person you have no interest in their nonsense.

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BNB

BNB 100

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Netflix Binging has changed the game.  I look for my Shaggy "critics" to tell me what is good.

I have not wasted time on a lot of stuff thanks to you all.  I still need to "binge watch" a few.

I have all my notes on my Kodi.

Thanks and keep it up.

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Rougarou

Rougarou 594

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Just finished through episode 5.

This has been a really well acted and directed series. It's more of something you'd see on Broadway-- definitely more theater in structure and pacing and I think for the most part it really works because the acting is phenomenal. The one nit I had was with John Turturro at first, but he's grown on me as the Southern genteel Jew. It felt really forced and contrived at first, but he's stuck with it and I'm buying what he's selling now.

I'm really digging how a lot of the action is off screen and you are left with the characters dealing with the consequences-- and it takes acting chops to pull that emotion off when the catalysts are implied. There is a lot of assumed activity and dramatic endings to the episodes feel like ending scenes in theatre. It's not what we are used to in cinema, but I think it works and it's respected the source material as well as the intelligence of the audience. I can see how it's not for everyone.

Basically the opposite of the other HBO binging I'm doing in Westworld season 3.

Edited by Rougarou
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Player

Player 4575

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Well we won’t be seeing Seldon around anymore.

It has been slowly simmering along, but it looks like shit is about to get real.

Rabbi Turturro is being led down the primrose path by Lindy, and he in turn is leading his flock to slaughter.

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Biff Tannen

Biff Tannen 45708

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15 hours ago, Rougarou said:

I'm really digging how a lot of the action is off screen and you are left with the characters dealing with the consequences-- and it takes acting chops to pull that emotion off when the catalysts are implied. There is a lot of assumed activity and dramatic endings to the episodes feel like ending scenes in theatre.

Very much agree.  I'm a big fan of this show, in fact, I wish it were longer than 6 episodes.

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Biff Tannen

Biff Tannen 45708

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4 hours ago, Ths71 said:

Enjoying it but wish I would have read the book first. Assuming in this scenario Pearl Harbor didn’t happen?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Correct.  Last episode skipped from Sept '41 to April '42 and no mention of it.  And we are, you know, pals with the Nazis.  

Edited by Biff Tannen
Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?
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Ths71

Ths71 472

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Correct.  Last episode skipped from Sept '41 to April '42 and no mention of it.  And we are, you know, pals with the Nazis.  

Figured so. Lindy backed off his isolationist stuff after Pearl Harbor.


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NOMAAA

NOMAAA 1696

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On 4/14/2020 at 11:38 PM, Player said:

Well we won’t be seeing Seldon around anymore.

It has been slowly simmering along, but it looks like shit is about to get real.

Rabbi Turturro is being led down the primrose path by Lindy, and he in turn is leading his flock to slaughter.

maybe they are setting us up for a spinoff based in Kentucky. 

Young Seldon.

I'll show myself out.

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Js1

Js1 85507

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29 minutes ago, NOMAAA said:

man i hope so.  you think the monday night slot is a sign its one and done?

It's just supposed to be a one season miniseries like Watchmen.

Not everything needs a season 2.  A season 2 would go past the source material - like we need more crappy tv like Big Little Lies season 2, Westworld season 2-3, Handmaid's Tale season 2-3

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Red Five

Red Five 40881

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1 minute ago, Js1 said:

It's just supposed to be a one season miniseries like Watchmen.

Not everything needs a season 2.  A season 2 would go past the source material - like we need more crappy tv like Big Little Lies season 2, Westworld season 2-3, Handmaid's Tale season 2-3

I was thinking that if there is so much to cram into one episode, maybe they don't finish it in one season?

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NOMAAA

NOMAAA 1696

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6 minutes ago, Js1 said:

It's just supposed to be a one season miniseries like Watchmen.

Not everything needs a season 2.  A season 2 would go past the source material - like we need more crappy tv like Big Little Lies season 2, Westworld season 2-3, Handmaid's Tale season 2-3

forgot it was based on a book.  no shit not everything needs a season 2.

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Js1

Js1 85507

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3 minutes ago, Red Five said:

I was thinking that if there is so much to cram into one episode, maybe they don't finish it in one season?

I mean, there's a lot if you're curious but I think it's doable - maybe they'll run over an hour to get it all done.  This is everything that happened in the book after the Winchell rally riot: 

Spoiler

While addressing an open-air political rally in Louisville, Kentucky, on October 5, 1942, Winchell is shot to death. Winchell's funeral in New York City is presided over by Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, who praises Winchell for his opposition to fascism and pointedly criticizes Lindbergh for his silence over the riots and Winchell's assassination.

After returning from delivering a short speech in Louisville on October 7, 1942, Lindbergh's personal plane goes missing. Ground searches turn up no results and Vice President Wheeler assumes command. The German State Radio discloses "evidence" that Lindbergh's disappearance, as well as the kidnapping of his son, were part of a major Jewish conspiracy to take control of the US government. That announcement causes further anti-Semitic rioting. Wheeler and Ford, acting on this evidence, begin arresting prominent Jewish citizens, including Henry Morgenthau Jr., Herbert Lehman and Bernard Baruch, as well as Mayor LaGuardia and Rabbi Bengelsdorf. Seldon calls the Roths when his mother does not come home from work. They later discover that Seldon's mother was killed by Ku Klux Klan members who beat and robbed her before setting fire to her car with her in it. The Roths eventually call Sandy's exchange family in Kentucky and have them keep Seldon safe until Philip's father and brother drive there and bring him back to Newark. Months later, Seldon is taken in by his mother's sister. The rioting stops when First Lady Anne Morrow Lindbergh makes a statement asking for the country to stop the violence and move forward. With the body searches for President Lindbergh called off, former President Franklin D. Roosevelt runs as an emergency presidential candidate, and is reelected. Months later, the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor, and the US enters the war.

As an epilogue, Philip's aunt, Evelyn, confides a theory of Lindbergh's disappearance, the source for which was First Lady Anne Morrow Lindbergh, who disclosed the details to Evelyn's husband, Rabbi Bengelsdorf, shortly before Mrs. Lindbergh was forcibly removed from the White House and held prisoner in the psychiatric ward at Walter Reed Army Hospital. According to Evelyn, after the Lindberghs' son, Charles, was kidnapped in 1932, his murder was faked, and he was then raised in Germany by the Nazis as a Hitler Youth member. The Nazis' price for the boy's life was Lindbergh's full cooperation with a Nazi-organized presidential campaign by which they hoped to bring the Final Solution to the US. When Lindbergh informed them that the US would never permit such a thing, he was kidnapped, and the Jewish conspiracy theory was put forward hoping to turn the US further against the Jewish population. Philip admits that Aunt Evelyn's theory is the most far-fetched and "unbelievable" but "not necessarily the least convincing" explanation for Lindbergh's disappearance.

 

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