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Post by domenicaflor on Mar 5, 2004 23:02:16 GMT -5
I am a bit behind, so I am still catching up on the last few weeks of LOCI. Thanks to Elena, I was able to get a tape of "Unrequited" and watch it again. So I am starting this thread with a thumbs up.
I love how this episode was constructed, with the aging, wanna-be actress and dancer in a symbiotic ego-feeding with the ticcy, whiny event promoter. Each one's dreams go unrequited as they each lose a loved one to their own scheming manipulations. It's like a "Gift of the Magi" gone horribly horribly wrong, yet neither partner is willing to admit guilt.
Goren uses physical comedy marvelously in this ep as he does his little "white guy mambo" to poke fun at Marion and her upper class comrades who are "students of the dance". In the acting teacher's office he mimics the motions of the class behind the wall while her reveals that the teacher has ulterior motives for accepting Marion as a student: his unrequited dream to win a Lincoln Center award. No matter how he tries, Goren cannot fake out Mrs. Gruenwald, who steadfastly refuses to let him and Eames into her home and summarily slams the door on them. And finally, in a very Harpo Marx-ish move, Goren grabs hold of Harvey's leg and drags him around in a circle in order to remove his ankle monitor.
Eames, in contrast, get's more of the good lines, as in "What was I supposed to do while I was pregnant, stay home and knit?".
I never knew about Claire Bloom's background until this episode. What could be more perfect than hiring a Shakespearean actress to portray Marion the Diva, whose goal is to revive her child acting career in a production of none other than, Romeo and Juliet.
I love when LOCI surprises the viewers with one of it's dark comedies - I greatly enjoyed "Cuba Libre" and "But Not Forgotten" for the same cleverness. Kudos to Stephanie Sengupta and the casting department.
Domenica
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Lilee
Silver Shield Investigator
Posts: 190
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Post by Lilee on Mar 6, 2004 1:31:13 GMT -5
Amen.
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Post by trisha on Mar 6, 2004 23:44:11 GMT -5
I loved the white guy mambo. He just looked so happy and care free while doing it that it seemed like a straight out happy dance. But, watching him try to get into the mothers apartment is my favorite part of this one, I think. I wonder how I'd fare trying to keep him from crossing my threshold... If he untangled my wind chimes first I'd probably be tripping over myself to offer him a seat and a hot cup of tea.
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Post by LOCIfan on Jun 7, 2004 9:26:15 GMT -5
anybody catch this episode last night in a rerun? i just love the humor in it, and found myself feeling much more sympathy for the tic-ridden Harvey in this viewing. sure, he was still funny, but his genuine affection for his hypercritical mother and his longing for the acceptance and love she could never bestow upon him is terribly pathetic. Harvey wants his mother's love more than anything, and goes looking for it in the fake acceptance and insincerity of brushes with celebrities, and comes up empty. a killer, yes. but mucho sympathetic to me.
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Post by Patcat on Jun 7, 2004 9:41:30 GMT -5
One of my favorite episodes of this season. I can't help but feeling all of these characters deserved each other. I felt a tinge of remorse at the mother's death, but even she was a manipulative, selfish woman. And it was wonderfully acted by a remarkable cast. I'm frequently amazed by the width and breadth of the actors LOCI gets, but clearly they're attracted by the quality of the scripts and I would also think by the chance to duet with Mr. D'Onofrio. Ms. Bloom and he were quite good in their scenes opposite each other.
LOCI has the opportunity to deep into black humor, and this episode was certainly one of its better excursions into that well.
And there was the Goren "happy dance" as well.
Patcat
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Post by Metella on Jun 7, 2004 12:34:49 GMT -5
I didn't realize in the first viewing that the woman threw the picture of herself as a child actress down on the stage floor in mirror to what Goren had just done ..... and Harvey got on his knees and retrieved that one too!
Now, the "my mother had sweaty hands too" is getting a little used ... so this lends me to believe that while she may or may not have taken this drug .... she can't have taken ALL the drugs that these old people swallow; so some of it is made up from Goren's vast knowledge of drugs and their effects. Sure, I know some people in nursing homes take more than a dozen different prescriptions in ONE DAY. But come on, all these people are being treated for a myriad of aliments & his mother's is more specific. Go, you manipulative Dectective, you.
I think he was really impressed by how she kept him at bay at her door. He likes a good tussle, I think.
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Post by romulanavatra3 on Jul 12, 2004 10:03:27 GMT -5
 i just saw this epsidoe the other day and thought it was a really good one. i liked the interplay between eames and goren and eames certainly did seem to be holding her own in this epsidoe slightly more than normal( not that she normally doesnt but she jsut seemed a little bit more involved and goren seemed to be a little less in the lime light). i also liked the part where mrs grynweld refused to le them in dispite ever ploy they tried she came up with a counter. my only question is was she so unobliging if she was the one who sent the letter to police in the first place. mettela i think the seaty palms thing was jsut goren trying despratley to find soem sort of ploy that might allow them to get in to apartment, i dont think he was basicly trying to prove anything by it, rahter just try to get in without mrs gryweld stopping him. i thought harvey was a little odd for instance his reaction to the news his mother had been killed( thank you for comming what a thing to say to the police after they arrived a murder and investigated the cirme). one question what the hell is going to happen to the loan shark who killed harveys mother. reagrds rom .
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Post by Metella on Jul 12, 2004 12:06:02 GMT -5
The thank you for coming line was delivered woodenly - meaning he had no warm feeling when he said that - he was living a life of kissing up to people and being overly polite; so now, all he wanted to do was go away and think about what happened - so he reverted to polite ways just because he working on automatic.
I think he truely loved his mother, although they were odd to each other. He would have never had wanted her dead. He just didn't know how else to act.
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Post by romulanavatra3 on Jul 13, 2004 2:02:35 GMT -5
mettela i agre with oyur take on this one,
your are right he had spent his life kissing up to people and being oveerly polite so i can see that he owuld want to go away and think about it.
i also agree that he was genuilely upset that his mother had been killed, they may have a stange relsationship but i think he was cared about his mother alot.
just one question mettela but do you undertsand what his mothers motive for sending the anyamous letter actaully was, i just wonder why, did she do it how did she know about the other woman had killed her husband. did she know aobut him or did she see harvey taking her respirator apart. iam little baffled by this one thing.
reagrds rom.
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Post by Metella on Jul 13, 2004 8:19:05 GMT -5
I think she wanted to get the haughty people he was dealing with in trouble without getting her son in trouble, she wanted him to pursue a different way of life, a way SHE could be proud of. So she wanted to bring those people down.
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Post by kawaiidragonfoe821 on Feb 16, 2005 11:24:00 GMT -5
LOL i love that quote from her, that still gets me laughing even as many times as i've seen it & i love goren's 'dance of the merry widow' & eames' expression as she shakes her head good naturedly. |
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Post by Patcat on Mar 21, 2006 17:02:34 GMT -5
This episode was repeated on USA last night. It's one of those stories that has a deceptively straightforward plot but has mountains of subplots and resonances, starting with the casting of Claire Bloom as the scorned and scornful widow. A comment I read somewhere noted the irony in the casting of one of the great Shakespearean actress as a a not very good aged child star (among many other roles, Ms. Bloom was a remarkable Juliet and I believe she's played Lady Macbeth). The humor, black and otherwise, is a delight--there are moments when LOCI is the funniest show on TV. But there's tragedy as well--as selfish as she is, the widow is clutching at happiness, the young promoter is trying for legitimacy, and the mother is trying to protect her son.
It's a terrific episode, and that's all before one gets to the obvious joy Goren has in having Eames back by his side, something I can't help but wonder is a reflection of Mr. D'Onofrio's pleasure in having Ms. Erbe back.
Patcat
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Post by spaniard on Jul 24, 2006 21:58:04 GMT -5
I just watched this episode on dvd and a silly question came to my mind...how can a detective with a big cold notice the cinnamon smell?  They should have shot the scene a few days later or give mr. D'Onofrio mint inhalations for his blocked nose. I told you it was silly. |
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Post by madger on Jul 25, 2006 9:18:26 GMT -5
Not at all silly, but he's BG, he can do anything.
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Post by spaniard on Jul 25, 2006 11:11:26 GMT -5
ohhhh...so this is how it works....common ordinary people have the flu, he mirandizes it asking it to remain silent.
You know you're a Bobby Goren fan when you think he can walk on water ;D
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i just saw this epsidoe the other day and thought it was a really good one. 
They should have shot the scene a few days later or give mr. D'Onofrio mint inhalations for his blocked nose.