Tag Archives: book adaption

The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair

The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair is a 2018 10 part mini series based upon the 2014 book of the same name by Joel DIcker. It was originally shown on the Epix channel starting in September.

We start off following a young author by the name of Marcus Goldman (Ben Schnetzer). He’s had a successful book published but now his Agents and Publishers want another one and he’s got a bad case of the writers block. He reaches out to his old School Teacher and Mentor, the titular Harry Quebert (Patrick Dempsey) to see if he has any advice for him.

Harry Quebert is himself a much celebrated Author and local hero in the town he lives in. He’s originally from New York but moved there to write his book and ended up staying. The book, The Origin of Evil, was a resounding success and is classed as one of the greatest books of the generation.

Life is good for Harry enjoying his low key celebrity life in the town. When Marcus calls him for advice he offers him a place to stay to blow away the cobwebs and maybe get some inspiration from fresh surroundings.

The visit goes well, but as Marcus is preparing to leave news comes out that Harry has been arrested for the murder of a teenage girl, Nola (Ryan Kiera Armstrong), who went missing 33 years before. Nola’s body has been found in the back garden of Harry by the same workers that Harry has employed to do so some work.

Marcus decides he’s to stay and help Harry in any way he can not wanting to believe Harry is guilty. He goes to visit him in jail where Harry manages to slip him a note. On the note are instructions to find some evidence that could incriminate him and burn it.

It turns out that Harry and Lola where in fact closer than they should have been for a man of his age and a girl of her age, but he insists it “wasn’t like that” and that he’s innocent. He knows how it looks however and fears people won’t understand.
Virginia Madsen plays Tamara, she first appears in the second episode as the owner of the road side restaurant that Harry would go on to write his novel in. In the past we see she’s one of Harry’s biggest fans and instructs the staff to treat Harry like royalty. Later we see her after Harry’s arrest and her tune has significantly changed and she can’t wait to tell everyone how she knew he was no good.
We see the story unfold through the eyes of Marcus as he conducts his own investigation as most of the town folk have turned their back on their hero. Obviously there are twists and turns as these things are apt to do. Secrets are revealed, red herrings are, herringed, We see the story play out in both the present day and through flash backs to the time before Lola disappeared and the time immediately after it.

It’d be stupidly easy to spoil something if I continued (I’ve already had to hold back!) and so I’ll leave it at that with a recommendation that if you like this kind of thing then you’d be well advised to seek it out as it’s one of the good ones.

As a Virginia Madsen fan it’s definitely worth a watch. She’s on top form here and it’s good to see her take another role which can show her range. In my head I kind of likened the role to the one she took in the Anna Nicole biopic. It’s perhaps not what you’d expect from her, especially the present day version of her character.

Availability:

I was actually surprised to find you can’t buy this on physical media in any form. Which is a shame. It’s currently available on Amazon Prime if you do want to watch it.

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Heart of Dixie

Heart of Dixie, well. Isn’t a film for me. If you’ve read any of the other pages about Virginia Madsens work in period pieces then you know this. If not, then get ready for a reoccurring them on the other ones.

Heart of Dixie is a film from 1989 that’s set in 1957. It’s an adaption of a 1976 novel, Heartbreak Hotel by Anne Rivers Siddons.

The story of the film follows three Sorority Sisters on their journey through college as racial segregation in Alabama is coming to an end. Maggie DeLoach (Ally Sheedy) is one of these sisters, she’s enjoyed the good life while growing up and slowly comes to realise just how badly African-Americans have been treated in their community which leads her on a bit of a mission about educating everyone around her.

Which of course is good, and it’s good to remember and point to this kind of thing in history and scream about how bad it was.

The other two, Aiken Reed (Phoebe Cates) and Delia June Curry (our heroine) are basically noise for Maggie to be around and bounce off of. Delia is very well realised noise, she does have a few stand out moments within the whole narrative, but noise all the same. AIken, well, I’m not really sure what the point if her is.
I honestly tried to watch this one, and ended up failing. It’s uhm – Well, I don’t know. I get what the film is, and what it’s trying to say and do. But, it does it well, badly. To me at least. Perhaps it’s the fact I’m watching it over 30 years later and times have (allegedly) changed. For want of a better way if putting it, it all seems kind of stereotypical to me. Or, maybe it’s because of films like this I see it as stereotypical.

There are a few scenes towards the end, that are kind of hard to watch, as they should be, but again, it seems out of place here even though it’s exactly where it should be. I don’t know, it’s hard to explain how much I want this film to be better than it is at telling the story that should be told. Again though, I think it’s down to the age of the film and the time it was made more than anything else.
Heck, maybe I just feel bad because I don’t like the film and feel like I should, such as is the world we live in today.

The reviews online for this one place it in the middle ground. iMDB reviews are mostly favourable in the recent ones but those reviews seem a little more in favour of the message behind the movie more than the movie itself. Which I get, whole heatedly, but there are better movies than this that get that point across.

Obviously this is a hard one for me to recommend. I’d recommend anyone educate them on this kind of nonsense the best they can, if this is the kind of film you need to watch to do that, then good. Go watch it.

Anyways. Yeah.

In bonus news for this one – Treat Williams also stars in this one alongside Virginia, they can’t gave filmed that far apart from making Third Degree Burn together earlier. While Virginia isn’t playing a part a million miles away from Anna in that, Treat’s Hoyt Cunningham is worlds apart from Scott in that movie. Love to see this.

Availability:
Not hard to find on Region 1 DVD reasonably priced.

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Mr. North

Not one for me this one – I had every intention of rewatching this but after about 20 minutes I found myself distracted and playing with my phone more than I should have been.

Mr. North is a comedy film from 1988, it follows Theophilus North (Anthony Edwards) as he makes his way through life with a special ability, the power of, well making feel better. A literal special touch along with an uncanny ability to be where he is needed at that moment in time. He plays down these gifts and even denies them beyond an ability to transfer electricity which he puts down to nothing more than a mundane quirk.

The film is based off a book, Theophilus North by Thornton Wilder. The book would later be renamed Mr. North so it would match the film and hopefully increase its audience.

One summer he comes across the Bosworth family, through them he meets many more people who are intrigued by Mr. North.

He gets a job working for James McHenry Bosworth (Robert Mitchum), James is housebound thanks to his over cautious daughter, Sarah (Tammy Grimes). Mr North reads to him but becomes more than that and helps James get out of the situation he’s found himself in by giving him back the courage that has been lost from him.

While there he comes across Sally (Mrs Madsen), a maid for the family. She’s ln love with a man from a wealthy family but fears her lowly status stops her from being able to pursue such a man. Mr. North encourages her that she’s better than that and gives her the courage to chase after what she really wants.Eventually all of his good works catch up to him and he finds himself on trial for being a charlatan, he doesn’t claim to be anything special but that doesn’t stop people accusing him of being. The people he helps come to his defence.

Etc.

I actually can’t put my finger on why I’m not hugely into this film, I think it’s the setting. I tend not to be bothered about rich folk and their problems. It’s a very polite film with well spoken people and good manners and it’s not a world I can really understand.

It scores relatively highly on most sites, think we can put this down to my personal preferences.

Virginia is excellent as always, for her I paid attention while watching. It’s not a role that gives her plenty of screen time, this is very much an Anthony Edwards centric tale, but she does get her fair share to do even if she’s just one of many Mr. North helps along the way.Mr. North is directed by Danny Huston who would later on in life become Mr. Madsen, the lucky so and so. Also notable (by me at least) of being the first film Virginia would make with Harry Dean Stanton also in the cast list)

Availability:
Not bad, but not great either. You can find copies but they tend to be for more money than you want to pay for a film this old – Though that might be just because I’m not a huge fan of the film. VHS copies are also kicking around with some regularity.