Trust

I saw the movie, so I had some hesitations before giving this serie a chance. But I was pleasantly surprised. Of course they spiced it up a little, so you get a mix of something inspired on true events and a juicy family soap. If the level of production doesn't crumble (like American crime story) the following episodes, I'm in for a nice season.

8 reviews thus far, that surprises me. It also doesn't surprise me at all. It is not fast paced, semi-funny, cheap Netflix content, therefore not appreciated.

The synopsis is very interesting, the story-line intriguing. The acting rock solid, no-one exempted. Characters al have proper backstories and are interesting from the get go. The pilot had all the ingredients of a great show.

So, I want to start by saying this series was fricken awesome! This was my first time hearing of this kidnapping, and it felt like I was in the 70's. Great cast as well, this is hands down a good show to binge with a friend or close loved one.

It's 1973. John Paul Getty (Donald Sutherland) rules his family and oil business empire with an iron fist. His guests have to use the payphone inside his home. When his son George kills himself in Hollywood, he squashes any suggestions of a suicide in the family. Every one of his children is a disappointment to him. He pits his family and his live-in mistresses against each other. His free-spirited 16 year old grandson J. Paul Getty III shows up at the family English compound for George's funeral. The grandfather is taken with his relatively smart grandson and installs him as his heir apparent. While they clash over his need for cash, they do bond over their womanizing ways. The boy's estranged father outs his hard partying ways and the grandfather disowns him. Back in Rome, the grandson is kidnapped by criminals for ransom. Gail Getty (Hilary Swank) is the kid's desperate mother. James Fletcher Chace (Brendan Fraser) is the Getty cowboy investigator.

Sutherland is superb. This is fun. It's rich people dysfunction and it's a kidnapping caper. It's a lot of great stuff. There was supposed to be a second season but I don't think we're getting it at this point. That's fine. This show is half acting and half story. I'm sure they could come up with a similar level of story but it was going to be hard to do this without Sutherland. As a limited series, this is a solid ten episodes.

I recently saw the Ridley Scott version of this story (you know, the one that does not have Kevin Spacey in it any more) and I just had to post and say, this just totally blows that out of the water.

That was a mediocre movie, not even beautiful, which is the least I'd expect from Ridley, but this is just fantastic, on every level.

The sheer charisma of this film-making is an utter joy to behold and evident across the direction, the performances, thumps out of the soundtrack, every part of this production is innovative, dazzling, fizzing.

My only slight, slight criticism is that the 4th wall breaking stuff from Brendan Fraser is too inconsistent and should have either been ditched or made much more of, more often. I guess they thought it was gonna be a big 'feature' when they were writing it and filming it, but then in the cutting room found they just had so much gold, they just didn't know what to do with it all!

Jump on the ride here, its fab and you wont regret it.