Q&A 36: if it's entertaining, it's entertainment (Patreon)

Brian Durcan writes:"A couple years ago, I watched the film Our Little Sister after you shared your thoughts on it. I really liked it. Do you have any recommendations for nice TV or film (stuff that isn't just fluff, but also isn't about absolutely horrible stuff)?"

The TV landscape is now so atomised that sometimes, when someone describes what they're watching to me, they may as well be describing a dream where they fly up into the sky and eat a hippopotamus. So with that proviso firmly established, here are some things I've watched recently. I don't like absolutely horrible stuff but there is one thing that is perhaps "not so nice" and I have flagged it as such. These are brief reviews, and I give nothing away in any of them. But I like to go in knowing as little as possible.

TV: A Very Peculiar PracticeThis is a very lauded comedy-drama from the late 80s about a university campus medical practice. I had known about it for a long time but never seen it, and it was nothing like I expected; it felt like something I would have written. Crammed with loveable weaklings and pumped-up grotesques, and treating both with humanity, it's an appallingly prescient satire on higher education, but also just a nice, silly world to visit for an hour at a time.

TV: FiskThere are two Australian sitcoms in this list. Fisk is about a very buttoned-down wills and probate lawyer who brings a no-nonsense approach to a small Melbourne law firm. Every episode is a beautifully resolved little play, filled with slightly - but only slightly - outlandish characters. My brother told me to watch this.

TV: Colin From AccountsOn the other hand, everyone told me to watch Colin From Accounts and so I didn't, because they were putting too much pressure on me, man! I watched it when I was good and ready and found it to be one of the best-written sitcoms of recent years. It's an age-gap relationship comedy built out of a skilful (and terrible) meet-cute, stacked with beautifully naturalistic detail and memorable characters. I found myself watching it slowly, eking it out to make it last.

Film: FriendshipFriendship is a Tim Robinson vehicle co-starring Paul Rudd; it takes the tension of an I Think You Should Leave sketch and dilutes it down to a 90 minute (or so) running time, as Robinson's protagonist makes a friend in Rudd then proceeds to handle that friendship poorly. I enjoyed it because it was never too horrible. The appeal for me of Tim Robinson's comic persona is his indestructibility, in that even when he is in the wrong, I still somehow want him to come out on top. Nine times out of ten, he is utterly destroyed, but the tenth time, when he triumphs, we share his joy.

Film: Memories Of MurderBong Joon-Ho is a star name now thanks to Parasite, Snowpiercer etc but I had never seen this 2003 film, which a friend recommended to me. It's a police detective thriller, set towards the end of the second South Korean military junta. It's not super-violent, but deals with some unpleasant themes. At the same time, there is some ersatz-80s fighting that is quite funny, and the parts of it in the squadroom seem to have been filmed to look exactly like Homicide: Life On The Street, which I found a fun stylistic choice. Later in the film, it becomes more dreamlike and impressionistic. It's a morally complex film, to the extent that at one point you as the viewer are forced to take sides in a way I have never experienced before. I was gripped by it.

Documentary: Genghis Blues Genghis Blues is a 1999 documentary about a blind American blues singer, Paul Pena, who goes to Mongolia to compete in their national throat singing competition. It's a charming and uplifting film which taught me a lot about a form of music that I had experienced live once or twice and always been fascinated by. It's on Youtube for free.

I hope there is something here for you, Brian!