Binge-r #182: Feel Good + Tiger King
Bedtime Stories: Mae Martin (Mae) and Charlotte Ritchie (George) in Feel Good
FEEL GOOD S1
Streaming Service: Netflix
Availability: All six episodes new streaming
About to step on stage to perform, comedian Mae (Mae Martin) is told by the London venue’s MC, “get on, get off, do what you got to do.” It’s good stand-up advice, but it doesn’t apply to her life, because when Mae finishes her set she meets George (Charlotte Ritchie), starting a relationship that by the first music montage has them living together after three months. That’s a quick progression, but deliberate, as this Netflix series is about the dysfunctional habits and lurking stresses that we can’t hide away forever. For Mae, a Canadian two years in Britain, it means revealing to Charlotte that she’s a recovering drug addict not keen on 12-step meetings, while Charlotte in turn has avoided telling anyone that after previously seeing men she’s now in a lesbian relationship.
Created by Martin and Joe Hampson, with an autobiographical imprint from the former’s life, Feel Good is not the comedy you might think it is. It has a very funny person at the centre of it, but Mae’s witty retorts soon reveal themselves as signs of her struggle, and this deft, dramedy can push intense moments alongside daft diversions as it deals with the question of what we want from the people closest to us and what we show them to get it. It is insular in its queer politics, looking to strap-on etiquette more than public pride, which connects to the nervous Charlotte having the worst upper-class British friends – take a bow, Binky (Ophelia Lovibond) – you could imagine. The supporting cast is topped by Lisa Kudrow as Mae’s mother, and her visit in episode four really solidifies how this smart series blithely digs into deeply held flaws. Love is not a cure-all here, just a difficult starting point.
Fierce Creatures: Joe Exotic and friend in Tiger King
TIGER KING (Netflix, seven episodes): Murder for hire accusations, illegal big cat breeding, polyamory, peroxide blonde mullets… at a certain point in this sprawling Netflix true crime series – all of 20 minutes in – I stopped noting down the wildly weird story elements and just let this American madness roll itself out. Nominally focused on the bitter rivalry between Oklahoma animal park owner Joe Exotic and Florida sanctuary operator Carole Baskin over his ownership and use of lions and tigers, Eric Goode and Rebecca Chaiklin’s docuseries can’t help finding diversions: every supporting player, including the one who inspired Scarface and the one possibly running a sex cult, deserves and gets screen time in a story spread over five years. The narrative is wayward, and sterner editing can be argued for, but the unrelenting eccentricity, complete with drugs, guns, and severed limbs, is readily watchable. It makes notable Netflix predecessor Wild Wild Country [full review here], where a cult went to war with local authorities, look like a concise, sombre analysis.
>> Good Show/New Season: The second season of the Korean period zombie thriller Kingdom is now on Netflix, with a sharp mix of historic gore and contemporary politics. If you missed the first season, check my positive take [full review here].
>> Further Reading: A wrenching drama about Australia’s mandatory detention regime, Stateless on the ABC is one of the finest local dramas of recent years. The episodes air on Sunday night, but you can catch up on iView. My review for The Monthly [full review here].
NEWLY ADDED MOVIES
New on Netflix: A sad, scalding struggle for official answers, Lost Girls (2020, 95 minutes) is the impressive dramatic feature debut of documentary filmmaker Liz Garbus (What Happened, Miss Simone?) that follows a Long Island mother (Amy Ryan) determined to make the police find – or at least acknowledge – her missing sex worker daughter.
New on SBS on Demand: The most sublime of Hollywood’s run of 1970s paranoid thrillers, Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation (1974, 109 minutes) puts Gene Hackman at the centre of surveillance paranoia and self-destructive enquiry (plus a young Harrison Ford).
New on Stan: An uncompromising study of sexual addiction and deception, Steve McQueen’s Shame (2012, 101 minutes) makes starkly perfect use of Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan; No Strings Attached (2011, 108 minutes) was Natalie Portman’s attempt to master the dark arts of the Hollywood romantic comedy, complete with Ashton Kutcher as her dimly handsome co-star.
>> Missed last week’s BINGE-R? Click here for a review of the very good Netflix London/Tokyo crime series Giri/Haji and a very bad Mark Wahlberg action movie.
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>> Check the complete BINGE-R archive: 222 series reviewed here, 138 movies reviewed here, and 33 lists compiled here.
