Husband and Wife?in a "Laughing Mediterranean Way"

Advantages: Well written
Disadvantages: Quite disturbing

...Betrayal (1978) by Harold Pinter (1930- ) Do you think you know how complicated extramarital relationships can be? Well, what Harold Pinter is trying to tell you in this play is that you have absolutely no idea. The story involves two families: Robert, his wife Emma, and their two children; a boy and a girl, and Jerry, his wife Judith, and their two children who happen to be a boy and a girl as well. The only characters we meet are Emma, Robert and Jerry, and the main betrayal in question is the one that involves Emma and Jerry's affair although other forms of unfaithfulness take place. Falling in love and having an affair with the spouse's best friend looks like a clichéd and outworn subject that might evoke nothing but a sigh of boredom at first, but Pinter's touch transforms it to a very interesting and thought provoking issue...

sottovoce82 29.11.2007 (09.12.2007) · Read review
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Review of Betrayal - Harold Pinter

More than a Monologue

Advantages: Short and complex
Disadvantages: Not Pinter's best play

...Monologue By Harold Pinter (The play was first shown on BBC Television on 13 April 1973 with Henry Woolf as MAN) In around 10 pages only, this play allows the speaker to tell us his story through a monologue as the title indicates. The speaker, sitting in a chair, addresses his friend who is supposed to be there also in the empty chair that the man talks to. What we understand from the story is that both the speaker and his friend, a white man, get involved in a relationship with one black woman. Through recalling this relationship, the speaker seems to be eager to have the friendship that he and his friend used to have. We also understand from this monologue that the speaker has not seen both his friend and the woman for a while. It does not look like an interesting story, does it? The fact that it is a monologue, that it...

sottovoce82 17.02.2008 · Read review
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Review of Monologue - Harold Pinter

"I decided against it"

Advantages: Open for interpretations
Disadvantages: Well? nothing happens

...Landscape By Harold Pinter (Landscape was first presented on radio by the BBC On 25th April, 1968, with Peggy Ashcroft as BETH and Eric Porter as DUFF) There are two characters in this play, a middle-aged married couple, and yet you will not find a single dialogue between them. It is by no way a comic play, but the manner in which each of the two characters is talking about a completely different thing becomes a little funny as you read/watch more of the play. The stage directions read: "DUFF refers normally to BETH, but does not appear to hear her voice. BETH never looks at DUFF, and does not appear to hear his voice. Both characters are relaxed, in no sense rigid." Indeed, Duff seems to be aware of his wife's presence and he talks about daily issues, while Beth's images appear to be more abstract. The man talks about the day he...

sottovoce82 20.02.2008 · Read review
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Review of Landscape - Harold Pinter

Mountain Language

Advantages: Clear and important political message
Disadvantages: Direct, dim, and disturbing

...Mountain Language (1988) By Harold Pinter (1930- ) Mountain Language is a very short one-act play by the English playwright Harold Pinter. The first scene shows a young woman and an elderly woman as they go to visit one of their relatives who was accused of speaking the forbidden mountain language. The older woman was bitten by one of the dogs in the prison, and yet the officer and sergeant torture her and her companion with stupid questions and harass the latter sexually. We see in the second scene that the elderly woman was in the prison to visit her son. The woman tries to talk to her son with the mountain language she is used to, for she doesn't know the capital language, yet the officer starts jabbing her with a stick. Still, she manages to tell her son that his wife and three kids are waiting for him. In the third scene...

sottovoce82 26.12.2007 · Read review
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Review of Mountain Language - Harold Pinter

Psychological Torture

Advantages: It's painfully real
Disadvantages: Dim, disturbing, and political (in case you don't like political theatre)

...One for the Road (1984) By Harold Pinter The play begins with a supposedly religious man-in-authority called Nicholas' interrogation of Victor who is just an intellectual. The title "One for the Road" is a reference to the glasses of whisky that Nicholas keeps pouring to himself: "I think I deserve one for the road." As he drinks, he keeps on chatting to himself mostly since Victor remains silent most of the time. He starts telling Victor casually how his books were kicked about, his rugs were urinated on, and also he begins mentioning Victor's wife and son. He simply says how hot the wife is and how everybody is falling in love with her, and asks Victor about whether his son was alright. Victor asks Nicholas to kill him but the latter refuses to do so. Here there's a blackout followed by a heart rending interrogation of Victor...

sottovoce82 16.01.2008 · Read review
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Review of One for the Road - Harold Pinter

The performance at London's Comedy Theatre

Advantages: A good play, entertaining with a very skilled cast
Disadvantages: Overacting, and a tendency for Cheap laughs from a west end audience

...The lack of a theatre section means I have placed this opinion, on this play as performed at the London Comedy Theatre in the Autumn/Winter 2001 here: Analysis of the performance of Harold Pinter’s Homecoming. The homecoming is a play about the relationships in a very dysfunctional family, and their reaction to the homecoming of a woman, into their male only society. It also focuses on the change of roles, and the position of the dominance in the family. It moves from the father, Max, through to the sons, who challenge his position of power, and mock his previous position of dominance over them. Finally Ruth, the new women introduced into the situation, has the power at the end of the play. This means that Max and Ruth hold the two most important roles in the play, and the actors who play these hold the play. Max is...

Barrysruk 17.11.2001 · Read review
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Review of The Homecoming - Harold Pinter

Still seems fresh after nearly 50 years

Advantages: Landmark British drama
Disadvantages: Don't expect everything spelt out for you

...The Birthday Party was Pinter's first full-length play and still stands as one of his best. It has been (over-) analysed over the years, almost as much as Waiting For Godot and yet, like Godot, can be summarised quite simply. Stanley is holed up in a dingy seaside borading house run by dotty Meg and her husband Petey, a deckchair attendant. He bullies Meg, who has some sort of queasy hold on him (a sexual relationship is hinted at) and flirts in a half-hearted manner with neighbour Lulu. When Meg announces that two men are coming to stay at the house, Stanley becomes agitated. It becomes clear that there is something dark lurking in Stanley's past. The two men, Goldberg and McCann, duly arrive and submit Stanley to a terrifying interrogation that reduces him to a gibbering wreck. A birthday party held in Stanley's honour (he...

Drdad 25.08.2005 · Read review
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Review of The Birthday Party - Harold Pinter

Harold and Kumar Escape From The Humor

Advantages: The title explains the whole plot
Disadvantages: Predictable, unfunny jokes

...In the seventies, we went "Up In Smoke" with Cheech and Chong. During the eighties we went on an "Excellent Adventure" with Bill and Ted. And in the ninties we discovered life on "Waynes World" in the form of Wayne and Garth. Movie-goers have a had a long term relationship with storylines involving the expolits of two guys, recreational drugs and no respect for authority. The 'noughties' follows this long-standing tradition and has given us Harold and Kumar. In Harold and Kumar's first outing, (Harold and Kumar Get the Munchies), we witnessed the hapless duo - as the title suggests - get the munchies after smoking a large quantity of weed. The movie follows their adventures as they attempt to get to a fast food burger bar called White Castle. What would seem a simple journey turns out to be a mammoth (and pretty hilarious...

SRowlands 30.01.2009 · Read review
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Review of Harold And Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay (DVD)

FREE DVDs

Advantages: Free trial, large choice, post included,new realeases
Disadvantages: see review

...I like movies and I like freebies, so when you get offered both in one swoop you?re bound to accept! I used my two week free trial with this company and remained with them for a couple of monthsbefore moving on to try many other companies free trials (and winning a new DVD player on Tesco DVD rental site on their free trial offer). I then had an email from DVDs 365 asking me to go back, and offering me a free DVD if I did so. I had just left Tesco (with my new DVD player) so I chose to go back with them. ∆◊◊ THE SERVICE THEY OFFER ∆◊◊ Basically it?s like going to a video shop and hiring films on DVD, except you don?t pay for each film you chose ? rather a monthly fee for which you can watch as many movies as you can fit in, for us this is usually around 8 a month (2 a week usually weekends...

dabmim 15.11.2004 · Read review
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Review of dvds365.com

A brief pause...

Advantages: Superb dialogue & excellent characterisations
Disadvantages: Meaning is ambiguous and elusive

...This (obviously) is the second of Pinter's collected works. It contains the following plays: The Caretaker The Dwarfs The Collection The Lover Night School Trouble in the Works The Black and White Request Stop Last to Go Special Offer If you haven't heard of the last five, don't worry. They're very short plays, almost sketches, that are no more than 3 or 4 pages long. As for the full-length plays...well, if you like Pinter (and I do!) then they are all excellent. His terse and fluid prose works exceptionally well, and his trademark pauses only serve to contribute to the escalating tension. Our Harold is the current master of subtext. On the surface, his characters discuss inconsequential things, whilst underneath there simmers sexuality, brutality, cruelty and, in the case of NIGHT SCHOOL, cake. Also, in this age...

Amadahn 14.02.2001 · Read review
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Review of Harold Pinter Plays (2) - Harold Pinter