‘THE GENTLEMAN’ ON NETFLIX
Early in his career, writer and director Guy Ritchie scored hits with the crime comedies “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels” and “Snatch.” Then he had a few duds, including “Swept Away” with his then-wife Madonna.
Acknowledged as the series’ creator, and with his partial writing and directing of the TV series on Netflix, “The Gentlemen,” based upon his 2019 film of the same title, Ritchie appears to have regained his groove.
Aside from having fast-talking characters and peppy dialogue, Ritchie’s known trademarks, according to the Internet Movie Database (IMDB), include the use of frequent narration and “numerous plot threads that intersect and assist in each other’s payoffs.” That’s what you’ll find with “The Gentlemen.”
For openers, Army Captain Eddie Halstead (Theo James) is part of a UN peacekeeping force near the border of some global hotspot when he is summoned home to the British estate of his dying father, the Duke of Halstead.
Arriving at the palatial mansion, Eddie is greeted by his mother, the stoic Lady Sabrina (Joely Richardson), his younger sister Charly (Jasmine Blackborow), and his older brother Freddy (Daniel Ings), fueled by a coke addiction and an unstable nature.
Family discord erupts when the reading of the father’s will reveals that Eddie, the second son, inherits the estate and all the problems that go with it, including the hitherto unknown existence of a lucrative marijuana operation on the 15,000-acre property run by the notorious Glass mob family.
With the expectation that as the first son would inherit the estate, Freddy becomes more unhinged than usual, but it’s obvious the father knew his eldest was too reckless and impulsive to keep the family afloat.
Eddie’s first instinct is to get the mob off his property, and of course, this will be tricky. While the patriarch (Ray Winstone) resides in a comfy cell, the daughter, Susie (Kaya Scodelario), is a tough cookie who won’t give up the land without posing a serious threat of retribution.
As much as Eddie may think he wants to extricate himself from a dangerous scenario, he wastes much of his time and energy trying to save his older sibling from serious gambling debts and an unerring ability to infuriate all the wrong people.
In Ritchie style, the plot threads are numerous, starting with American billionaire Stanley Johnston (Giancarlo Esposito) who persists in trying to buy the Halstead estate. Then there is the band of nomadic types known as travelers, moving about in RVs, who believe they have a stake in the property and finagle a way into the drug business.
Crazier still is the Liverpool crime organization run by the unstable, alarming quasi-religious figure going by the name of The Gospel (Pearce Quigley), who shows uninvited to the estate with his henchmen. Even a lunatic Nazi gets in the picture.
The less said about the overall plot and the machinations of Susie and Eddie the better. “The Gentlemen” has plenty of thrills, zippy dialogue, inscrutable plot twists, and everything you would expect from a Guy Ritchie crime comedy.
‘GLORIA ESTEFAN: SINGING THROUGH STRUGGLES’ ON YOUTUBE
From Life Stories, a nonprofit media organization that produces and distributes films about people whose lives inspire meaningful change, YouTube streams the documentary interview series “The Thread” about exceptional individuals.
Season One of “The Thread” features activists, politicians, media personalities, philanthropists, authors, and athletes – all of whom ostensibly inspire viewers to find meaning in their own lives.
A great recording artist and winner of eight Grammy Awards, Cuban-American Gloria Estefan has an interesting story of being raised in a Cuban family upon immigrating to the United States in a harrowing escape from her homeland in the aftermath of the coup that brought Communist dictator Fidel Castro to power.
“Gloria Estefan: Singing Through Struggles” allows the singer to discuss being a child victim of sexual abuse and the advocacy work this experience informed, and the need to seek justice and put offenders behind bars.
Estefan tells the story of the journey of her father from Cuban police officer to participant in the failed Bay of Pigs invasion by Cuban exiles, to ultimately a U.S. military officer, as well as her own early work as an immigration translator and near-brush with a career as a spy for the CIA.
From her humble upbringing among a sisterhood of female Cuban refugees, Estefan discusses her path from a child musician performing for family at home to joining the Miami Sound Machine and stardom.
In 1975, she met keyboardist Emilio Estefan, who led a band called the Miami Latin Boys. Estefan became the lead singer and the band was renamed the Miami Sound Machine, before going on to score several Top 10 hits in the 1980s and 1990s. She married Emilio in September of 1978, and they have a son and daughter.
This deeply moving episode of “The Thread” is Estefan in her own words, telling her personal story before the glory and record-breaking stages in her career, the Grammy Awards, the Super Bowl halftime performance, and the Kennedy Center Honors.
Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
