Oh, lost opportunities. In 1931, Anna Pavlova, lodestar of the Imperial Russian Ballet and dancer of the “Dying Swan,” refused a surgery that would have cleared her lungs, but rendered her unfit to dance. She died of pleurisy before she hit 50. In 2013, I traveled to New Zealand for two weeks and failed to procure the national meringue-based dessert named for Pavlova. Tragedies both large and small.
Just in time for the Easter season, Reelz Channel offers up a ham-handed, hammily acted mini-series of mostly dubious Biblical provenance. Given that our tolerance for corny, overproduced, excessively long Biblical epics is at a seasonal high, though, perhaps some of us are in the mood for a little ham.
The massive success of Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland three years ago kicked off an at-times wearying string of fairy tale updates (Red Riding Hood, Snow White and the Huntsman, Mirror Mirror, Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, Jack the Giant Slayer, ABC’s “Once Upon a Time”). That film’s $330 million domestic box office certainly incentivized Disney to come up with more family fantasy reboots. Oddly enough, instead of dipping into the deep well of already Disneyfied fairy tales, the company has decided to go with a story made famous by crosstown rivals at MGM.
It began at an art party when two friends were overtaken by the music, the movements and the camaraderie surrounding them. Like a hippie commune-induced acid trip, they started projecting their minds’ reaction to what was going on around them on a piece of paper and by playing music.
Reelz Channel, still testing the boundaries of its slogan “TV About Movies,” decides maybe it should try invading Syfy Channel territory with its new mini-series, the disasterrific Ring of Fire. Like every Syfy movie that doesn’t involve an oversized monster mashup (Sharktopus or Boa vs. Python), Ring of Fire features an environmental disaster, a bunch of vaguely familiar TV stars and lots of CGI. Reelz takes it to the next level, though, offering us full-fledged C-list stars (sorry Debbie Gibson and Dean Cain), some more expensive CGI and a couch-busting four-hour runtime.
