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MASTERS OF SCIENCE FICTION
Episode 1 (of 4)
“A Clean Escape”
Teleplay by Sam Egan; based on the short story by John Kessel; directed by Mark Rydell
Right off the bat, this sister series to Masters of Horror gets a leg up: I mean, in two seasons of MoH, I never saw thespians like Judy Davis or Sam Waterston on the billing, and MoSF gets both in their first go-around! Directed by Mark Rydell (who was nominated by a number of award-giving bodies for On Golden Pond)! Talk about coming out with guns blazing…
Davis plays Deanna Evans, a psychiatrist conducting sessions with Waterston’s Havelman. But as the sessions progress, we gradually come to realize there is more to this that we can readily see and what we initially assumed.
The fantastic thing about this episode is that not only do we get excellent performances from both leads (and a majority of the hour is spent on the one-on-one psychiatric sessions, so this is basically a showcase of great acting), but the narrative takes some twists and turns as it builds towards its climax.
I’d like to get into the themes of the narrative too, but that could tip off the astute and the observant as to what “A Clean Escape” is all about, so I’ll just have to leave this at a recommendation to check out MoSF.
This is a promising start and if the other three episodes are as good as this one, then one has to wonder why there are only four episodes to this series.
Parting shot: MoSF is narrated, Rod Serling-style, by Professor Stephen Hawking.
(Image courtesy of projo.com.)
Episode 1 (of 4)
“A Clean Escape”
Teleplay by Sam Egan; based on the short story by John Kessel; directed by Mark Rydell
Right off the bat, this sister series to Masters of Horror gets a leg up: I mean, in two seasons of MoH, I never saw thespians like Judy Davis or Sam Waterston on the billing, and MoSF gets both in their first go-around! Directed by Mark Rydell (who was nominated by a number of award-giving bodies for On Golden Pond)! Talk about coming out with guns blazing…
Davis plays Deanna Evans, a psychiatrist conducting sessions with Waterston’s Havelman. But as the sessions progress, we gradually come to realize there is more to this that we can readily see and what we initially assumed.
The fantastic thing about this episode is that not only do we get excellent performances from both leads (and a majority of the hour is spent on the one-on-one psychiatric sessions, so this is basically a showcase of great acting), but the narrative takes some twists and turns as it builds towards its climax.
I’d like to get into the themes of the narrative too, but that could tip off the astute and the observant as to what “A Clean Escape” is all about, so I’ll just have to leave this at a recommendation to check out MoSF.
This is a promising start and if the other three episodes are as good as this one, then one has to wonder why there are only four episodes to this series.
Parting shot: MoSF is narrated, Rod Serling-style, by Professor Stephen Hawking.
(Image courtesy of projo.com.)
2 comments:
Actually, 6 episodes were made, but only 4 will be aired. It's like the network knew right off the bat that this wouldn't take... Because when you think about it, the average watcher will expect something along the lines of Star Wars and Star Trek, right? Not two people talking in a room.
yeah, i think i read somewhere that abc basically pronounced the show dead even before it aired.
which is too bad. if ep1 is anything to go by, the show looked really ambitious.
i just wonder if the show would have fared better at the sci fi channel, instead of a major network like abc.
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