Femme Fatales

Finally caught up with this show after a few of my friends told me it was really good. Given it was a show on Cinemax, I didn't' really have any high expectations, but after downloading a few episodes from Amazon I was really surprised. The thing that caught my eye immediately was how good the show looked. Like classic crime thrillers from the 40s, it had a very unique style and some of the same kind of dialogue you expect in an old classic pulp film. Although the twist endings were usually surprising and cool, the thing that really grabbed me was the way characters moved in between episodes giving it the feel of a shared universe in a comic book. And there is even a comic book episode at the end of season 2 which was a ton of fun. For the most part, there are also some really strong performances and memorable femme fatales or femmes fatales, more accurately. There is a dark nihilistic quality to the show that I personally liked and it combines darkness and hmor in the way of a Breaking Bad does. I probably watched about 10 episodes so far and I liked them all, some I loved. The requisite women in prison episode is really a great homage to the 70s classics and the lead performances are all very engaging and the twist totally caught me by surprise. The second episode, Something Like Murder, feels like it came right out of the 1940s, if it weren't for some very sexy and beautifully photographed love scenes with an incredible twist at the end. But as soon as I thought I had this show pegged, it threw a change up with the antic Speed Date, a delightfully wacky screwball comedy with Girlfriends Reggie Hayes who's hysterical as a befuddled dating fraud. It's just a wonderful mash-up of some of my favorite movies. I also enjoyed The Clinic which featured Angus Scrimm, one of my favorite horror actors and The White Flower which had another great twist ending and one of the sexiest femme fatales in the entire series, Tina Casciani. I've only just started watching the second year of the show, other than skipping ahead to the comic book episode because I couldn't help myself. So far the episodes that have been even better and each one has had some of my favorite character actors like Chris Mulkey and Eric Roberts who are in two of the standouts so far. I also really liked Vivica Fox in the Femme Fatales goes to college episode and there's a strange sci-fi episode that feels like an old 70s TV series, the old evil twin chestnut, which got a neat spin, although it wasn't one of my favorites. All in all, I highly recommend the show and am looking forward to watching the rest and may even have to subscribe to Cinemax to watch the third season when it airs.

*****UPDATED REVIEW******

I HAD ORIGINALLY rated this Cinemax "after hours" series a two. Based on a single lack luster episode (entitled "Help Me Rhonda" - I honestly could not envision myself, at the time, watching the series again after this)that I still maintain, failed to deliver on multiple levels.

However after recently viewing another earlier episode (ironically and by no planning of my own, CONNECTED to the previous episode I'd reviewed)I found it to be shockingly conflicting to the PREVIOUS episode I'd watched, as well as the subsequent review.

The episode "Behind Locked Doors" proved to well surpass my earlier designation of the "adult action" in this series as "feather core" and move well into the standard (albeit, still somewhat lack luster) "softcore" range and while the acting won't be winning any awards, it was far more palatable than the unfortunate assembly of actors had been apparently capable of delivering in the first episode I reviewed.

Overall the after hours fare in this respect lived up to and surpassed my most minimal expectations and the knowledge that it tied into a later episode (again, strangely enough the first one I'd previously suffered through) was an especially alluring and surprising bonus.

Being somewhat partial to a "presentably" made W.I.P. storyline (Jailbait 2014, anyone?) I felt compelled to give this series its day in court and revise my earlier rather scathing review.

Again, this is no award winner, but at least in the case of THIS episode, it delivered MORE than I expected and deserved a retrial and pardon.

Of note: I noticed the latest particular episode reviewed (premier ep.)was almost 43mins long where the later episodes are only in the neighborhood of 30mins. Comparably I'd say even an extra 12 mins could make a world of difference in both the storyline and plot. So let's just call this "probation," for now.

I was pleasantly shocked when I saw this show. I expected the usual late night fare, but instead both of the first two episodes of Femme Fatales featured fun, fast-paced stories, recognizable actors, really nice production values, and great entertainment value, along with a heavy dose of sex and nudity. Unlike a previous reviewer, I think adding more sex would just ruin the pacing and make this just another late night show. As it is, it's a big step up into the big leagues of real programming for Cinemax. If this is indicative of what's coming from Cinemax in the future, I'll start watching the channel regularly. For now, I'll definitely be watching more of Femme Fatales.

This might sound nuts to you, but with no Mad Men on TV this summer, my favorite television show right now is a little late night guilty pleasure called Femme Fatales. I know, I'm shocked too. But after seeing a few commercials on Cinemax after a movie I was watching, I thought I'd hit the record button on my DVR and check it out when I was really, really bored when my girlfriend wasn't around. Last night, I ended up starting the first one and watched all three ofthe first episodes and I didn't just like it, I loved it. There's a lot sex but the stories are so interesting and completely different from anything else on TV that I wondered if I was crazy so I actually sat down and showed a few minutes to my girlfriend and I ended up watching all three again with her who liked it as much as I did. The acting across the board was great. I really liked the lead in the premiere and in the second one, the guy I loved in Niptuck was in it and he was great. I almost spit out my soda when he started quoting lines from White Heat which is probably when I realized there was something a tad subversive about this show which I thought was just some late night stroke show and turned out to be something else entirely. So far, none of the three episodes I watched had anything to do with each other which kept me surprised since I didn't know what to expect. And in last night's episode there was girl that I thought was one of the most stunning women I ever saw on TV, the blonde who kills her husband. This is not the kind of show I would have expected to like or even watch but I will definitely be watching from now on and if you happen to be reading this and don't know if it is for you, I would say give it a chance because it's a pretty smart, hip, fairly subversive little show. Who knew?

I've watched three episodes of this so far and have become a fan.

As someone who is tired of reality crap and the same stale, safe plot formulas playing out on network and cable (please kill me before I watch yet another cop/CSI show), "FF" takes a collection of familiar elements and tosses them in a pop culture mix master set to high. Yeah, it's corny at times, but it's also alternately funny, suspenseful, sexy, smart and scary — all depending on the episode.

There are a lot of "grindhouse" elements here but without the gore or general "torture porn" mood of that genre. And while "Skinamax" fans are offered plenty of eye candy, the female characters are never debased or pointlessly exploited, and generally have the upper hand in the end. Yes, the femme fatales are the stars of "FF."

The most recent episode, "Something Like Murder" offers the most traditional "film noir" style of the show so far. And while it depends heavily on familiar characters — the plot was pretty clever, and the cast game. Dialoge-wise, it reminded of what Pauline Kael said about the modern noir classic "Body Heat": "Sounds like the characters have been boning up on Chandler novels." But is that so wrong? Just a wink and a nod to the source material inspirations.

I'm not sure where "FF" is going, but I'll stay along for the ride.