MovieHoliks
I'm just about all the way through this terrific six-episode mini-series off HBO GO, and this is television at it's finest! "Show Me a Hero" is based on the 1999 nonfiction book of the same name by former New York Times writer, Lisa Belkin. The book detailed a white middle-class neighborhood's resistance to a federally-mandated scattered-site public housing development in Yonkers, New York circa late '80s/early '90s, and how these tensions affected the city as a whole. The show is fueled by the performance of Oscar Isaac as Nick Wasicsko, a former police officer, then Yonkers City Council member running for election to be mayor of Yonkers- eventually the youngest big-city mayor (1987–89) in the nation. This series really shows how that radical loud minority can sometimes rally political and public attention to negative stereotypes and misinformation- all based on unrealistic fears. Hmmm....sounds like what's kinda going on now with this whole "war on terror", ISIS, Iran, the Middle East, etc..???Isaac's performance as Wasicsko is the heart of the project, but also look for some really good performances from veterans Peter Riegert, James Belushi, Catherine Keener, Alfred Molina, Wynona Ryder, Bob Balaban, "The Walking Dead"'s Jon Bernthal, etc... Also, for Springsteen fans like myself, a total of TWELVE of his tracks (especially the earlier ones) were used in this to represent Wasicsko's mind set!
Charles Herold (cherold)
I had such high hopes for this show. Creator/director Paul Haggis is a brilliant guy who has created shows like Due South and The Black Donnellys. The show is written by the folks behind The Wire. The subject of the integration battles of the 1980s seems like a good subject for a series.Alas, I only made it through the first episode, which was remarkably slow moving. I kept thinking something would happen that would explain why I should care, but nothing did. A somewhat smarmy guy runs for mayor, boosted by his mild opposition towards a desegregation plan that has white folks up in arms. This is inter-cut with scenes of people of color in bad neighborhoods, but nothing in the first episode ties them to the main story in any way at all. I'm sure they connect eventually, but their stories aren't inherently interesting, so the entire episode has a "so what?" quality to it.The first episode of a mini-series needs to sell you on watching the rest of it, and this one in no way did that. I find the positive reviews for this inexplicable. Perhaps it gets better later, but I was given no reason to find out.
hitch-34
I'm a HUGE David Simon fan. Will read anything he's written (yes, I read the Corner, all 800-some-odd pages of it), and watch anything he produces. Homicide, The Wire, you-name-it. But I feel that he completely lost the plot here, no pun intended. The overall theme seems to be "integration and giving poor people houses in middle-class residential neighborhoods that don't want them is GOOD." I wondered, half-way through this (still determined to watch it in its entirety, because, hey, David Simon, right?) if Obama had picked up the phone and called HBO, saying, "hey, couldja find a book to convert into a series about forced low-income housing, and how great it all worked out, because I'm getting ready to jam that issue nationwide down the throats of other residents," rather than anyone in their right mind thinking that this was worthwhile *as entertainment.* ****SPOILERS START BELOW*****Was it worthwhile as, perhaps, a documentary? Sure--in about 1/6th of the time. Watching it for SIX HOURS simply to watch a real-life character disintegrate? And that's the "hero" of the show? Uh...???? The mayor--the guy who gets nominated for the JFK Profile In Courage award, self-destructs and eventually suicides. There's really no correlation, unless you want to assume that the only reason this guy didn't have a meteoric rise is because the evil councilmen hosed him on the housing issue.Which, mind you, he didn't actually CHAMPION. He just elected (yes, intentional pun) NOT to fight it because a) the City of Yonkers would go bankrupt if he didn't, and b), I think from the subtext that he didn't want to be sued, personally, if he didn't support it. He was elected, in fact, not because he CHAMPIONED the housing--but because he campaigned AGAINST it. So...sorry, where's the heroism here? If anything, the council people that fought it, even if utterly in the wrong, were more heroic because they stuck to their guns. They didn't switch horses in midstream, just because it was politically expedient. The entire award nomination was utter Political Correctness.Which--if you're watching with an educated and critical eye--is sort of the theme of the entire show. Political correctness run amok. Yes, a perfectly normal middle-class neighborhood is torn apart, in order to forcibly slam low-income housing right in the middle of it, in townhome groupings in something like 28 locations. The neighbors--even without being remotely bigoted (not to say that they weren't, but as a property owner) are vehemently opposed, as it will affect their property values.Throughout, the predominantly or all-white residents are effectively all portrayed as EVIL, except for the ONE resident who "sees the light" and decides to welcome the newcomers. Not one of the existing residents is shown as a perfectly normal person who would, quite naturally, have misgivings about what low-income housing, across the street from them, will do to their own property values. Nope--they were all stereotypical ranting bigots. {sigh} ALL the residents are low-income women of color with no man in the house, and with multiple children. (Stereotypes much?). Again, sure, it's story-telling, and by definition, has to be condensed and compressed, but--no pun intended-there are no shades of grey here. All the low-income residents are good; all the opponents are BAD. Only the mayor who changes his stance--not by choice, mind you--is "good." The performances are great. No doubt. But none--NONE--of the characters are particularly likable. The mayor is not. The council people basically all suck. The poor families have the only really likable characters. Again...stereotyping.It's just...it's a 60 minute tale, at MOST, bloated and inflated out to six hours. There aren't any heroes here, ironically. Rather than an enjoyable story that carries a moral lesson, it's a moral lesson and political and sociological stance forcibly rammed down your viewing throat, disguised as a story. And that disguise isn't very good.If you waste your time, don't say you weren't warned.
gvenditto
The production is impeccable, with beautiful cinematography, and a realism that captures both the middle class neighborhoods and poverty with almost chillingly accurate detail.The performances by Oscar Davis, Bob Balaban and Winona Ryder (just to pick a few) are perfect. But the exposition is just so tedious that I found it a chore to watch. I really want to know what happens. I live near Yonkers and even though this drama played out while I considered buying a house there, I don't even know how it was resolved.The problem with this series is not the slow pace of the courtroom and council meetings. At least they have some pomp and ceremony that defines the proceedings. Its the very slow pace at which each character moves ahead at like two steps per minute. There's not a bit of nuance or shading to the characters - they're all just tortured by the dilemma they face. In the end, watching it feels like a chore.