The content machine never stops, and this summer is no exception. Get ready for fabulous series premieres with women front and center.
“Land of Women,” led by the incomparable and unfairly gorgeous Eva Longoria, is a guilty pleasure all the way. You’ve seen this one before. Beautiful, hard-working woman is deserted by [fill in the blank] husband who absconds with all their cash. But this is 2024 and Gala (Longoria) is not your typical lady in distress.
On the cusp of opening her chic wine store in Manhattan, Gala, a stunning, rich socialite, is in the limo with husband Fred when he suddenly remembers he forgot something and he’ll meet her at the store. Gala’s gala is a big success but there’s no sign of Fred. What there is a sign of is two thugs who pressure her about his whereabouts. He’s stiffed their boss of $15 million, and that just isn’t done. If they don’t find Fred, they’ll come after her, her mother and her daughter.
Terrified, Gala is on the flight side of the fight-or-flight scale and moves to gather up whatever resources she can and skedaddle. Packing up what little of value is left, she drives to her mother’s retirement home. Julia (Carmen Maura, one of Pedro Almodóvar’s muses) is an expert con woman; she’s got a million scams going and doesn’t want to leave. She’s also on the slow descent into dementia, so she remembers little of what has just been said. Off they go. Next stop, pick up daughter Kate at college. Kate (Victoria Bazua) is having a grand old time with her girlfriend and wants to stay put. Gala thinks quickly and whispers to Kate that Julia is dying and this is a last girls’ trip to Julia’s village in Spain.
One step ahead of the bad guys, they make it to the tiny, middle of nowhere village, but not until Gala creates an international incident with her reckless driving, upending a tractor pulling the town’s harvest. Gala’s natural elitism kicks in and she makes things worse for all of them and then has to eat a fair dose of humble pie when they are forced to hitch a ride with tractor driver Amat (Santiago Cabrera) into town. He tries to direct them to a B&B in the next village, but she’s having none of that. Her mother owns a house in town, or at least she shares ownership with her sister, and that is where they’ll be staying. But they haven’t hit rock bottom yet. They discover that the house they thought was hers now belongs to Amat, who bought it from Julia’s sister, the aunt Gala didn’t know she had.
So there you have it, damsel on the run, duplicitous missing husband, chased by bad guys and runs into (literally and figuratively) an incredibly handsome man who she repeatedly alienates in the tiny village where she should be keeping a low profile. The characters, situation and premise are all there, right in the first episode, with each subsequent episode full of surprises. This is a trip you definitely want to take. Every subsequent episode brings with it new and interesting twists, each of which, if mentioned, would be a spoiler. So my advice is, watch this show.
In Spanish and English with English subtitles.
Now playing on Apple TV+ with new episodes dropping on Wednesdays.
“Mastermind: To Think Like a Killer” is a three-part documentary series about someone you have probably never heard of. Ann Burgess, Ph.D., psychiatric nursing professor and prolific author, is an unintentional superstar and groundbreaker. Her book entitled “Rape: Victims of Crisis,” published in 1974, looked at rape from the standpoint of the victims, an unusual perspective at a time when most victims were blamed for the attacks, either because they dressed provocatively, walked alone at night or traveled in bad company. The courts allowed victim shaming and police often didn’t treat rape as a crime. Burgess’ book began to change that perspective because soon the FBI came calling. They were interested in her approach of looking not just at the crime but also at the victim. She gave seminars to agents, trying to change their mindset. Law enforcement officers, the majority of whom were men, needed to understand the severity of this crime from the victim’s standpoint. Her presentations, enhanced with graphic visual evidence, started to do just that.
In her long study, she was able to discover general patterns of behavior by rapists and this was immediately applicable to the work of the nascent Behavioral Science Unit (BSU) at the FBI headed by John Douglas and Robert Ressler. Ressler recognized that Burgess’ methods of analysis and the patterns she saw could apply to the interviews they wanted to conduct with serial killers. She eventually became part of the interview team and spearheaded the team’s outreach. Her analysis of patterned behavior was instrumental to the new art of profiling criminal behavior. She and the members of the BSU knew they needed to teach profiling techniques to a wider base of law enforcement. And yet, as fundamental to their work as she was, she was never an acknowledged part of the team. She continued because the work was important and a great deal of profiling methodology was thanks to her.
The excellent Netflix series, “Mindhunter” explores the FBI’s BSU and the profilers who changed the hunt for serial killers. In the second season a woman, Wendy Carr, a Ph.D. in psychology, is introduced to aid in their interviews. Although the names were changed for this docudrama, their real-world counterparts were John Douglas (Holden Ford played by Jonathan Groff), Rob Ressler (Bill Tench played by Holt McCallany) and Wendy Carr (Ann Burgess played by Anna Torv). “Mastermind,” an actual documentary, is an excellent counterpart to the “Mindhunter” docudrama. I found myself asking, however, why the writers of “Mindhunter” portrayed the Ressler and Douglas characters so close to their real-life personae but found it necessary to make the Burgess counterpart a confrontational psychologist who was often in conflict with “the boys.” Nothing could have been farther from the truth, a blot on this otherwise outstanding docudrama series.
While working with the FBI in Quantico, VA., Burgess wrote prolifically on the subject of rape, victimology and homicide. “Mastermind” is a thrilling, must-see series with a down-to-earth relatable protagonist who is, in reality, larger than life. And as a final note, this 87-year-old superstar continues to teach at Boston College.
Now playing on Hulu.
Neely Swanson spent most of her professional career in the television industry, almost all of it working for David E. Kelley. In her last full-time position as Executive Vice President of Development, she reviewed writer submissions and targeted content for adaptation. As she has often said, she did book reports for a living. For several years she was a freelance writer for “Written By,” the magazine of the WGA West, and was adjunct faculty at USC in the writing division of the School of Cinematic Arts. Neely has been writing film and television reviews for the “Easy Reader” for more than 10 years. Her past reviews can be read on Rotten Tomatoes where she is a tomato-approved critic.
