Mister Adams, dear Mister Adams...

[stevejrogers]

In the 1960s, the Broadway musical and movie 1776 brought John Adams back from the depths of long forgotten historical figures and placed him in his rightful place among the famous of the Founding Fathers.

Now Tom Hanks and HBO brings David McCullough's engaging 2001 bio to life with a 7 part mini-series starting on Monday.

Paul Giamatti as Adams, and Laura Linney as Abigail in the mini-series that spans over 50 years of America's birth as a nation.

[Guest AG/DC]

May I edit this one before you vote?

[stevejrogers]

To what, This Movie Reeks of Adams, Adams, Admas?

[stevejrogers]

Of course I forget to say, it kicks off Sunday night at 8 for a two hour premiere.

[Guest AG/DC]

SteveJRogers wrote: To what, This Movie Reeks of Adams, Adams, Admas?

I'm not sure what that means.

I want to edit it because (1) it's hard to rate a film on a scale of 2-5, (2) we usually start with the lower rankings first and I suspect peeps oft mis-vote when confronted by the inverse, and (3) it works better with ten gradations than with five, or four as you have here.

[stevejrogers]

AG/DC wrote: SteveJRogers wrote: To what, This Movie Reeks of Adams, Adams, Admas? I'm not sure what that means. I want to edit it because (1) it's hard to rate a film on a scale of 2-5, (2) we usually start with the lower rankings first and I suspect peeps oft mis-vote when confronted by the inverse, and (3) it works better with ten gradations than with five, or four as you have here.

Sorry I thought you wanted a better line from 1776.

Yeah sure, go ahead with the voting scale edit

[Valadius]

It's fantastic thus far.

[stevejrogers]

Am I the only one that finds it amusing that the first Harvard grad to become President is being portrayed by not only a Yalie, but a Yale Legacy as well?

[Guest AG/DC]

Probabably.

[Fman99]

Read the book.

I watched parts 2 and 3 this past weekend on my free HBO preview that I'm getting. I suppose I will miss the rest of them.

Not too bad. Paul Giamatti can act, let there be no doubt of that.

[Valadius]

Watched the final part tonight.

After watching all seven parts, I am convinced that John Adams was an underrated giant of a man who deserves a hell of a lot more respect. He deserves a memorial in Washington. The man was essentially the Father of Independence.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Valadius wrote: He deserves a memorial in Washington.

All seven episodes are sitting unwatched on my TiVo, but I did read the book a few years ago. And I agree with Valadius' statement. They should put it right near Jefferson's. (I think there's plenty of room there, isn't there? I haven't been down that way in a long time.)

[Valadius]

There's room directly between the Washington Monument and the Jefferson Memorial.

[Willets Point]

Valadius wrote: There's room directly between the Washington Monument and the Jefferson Memorial.

Apropos location.

[Guest AG/DC]

Episode one of this was full of deliberate misinformation --- using British propaganda of the time as much as McCullough's work as source material.

It's kind of lousy that McCullough signed off.

[stevejrogers]

AG/DC wrote: Episode one of this was full of deliberate misinformation --- using British propaganda of the time as much as McCullough's work as source material. It's kind of lousy that McCullough signed off.

Examples?

[Edgy MD]

Very beginning. He's a grumpy groan who is dragged into the cause of liberty as martial law comes to Boston in the aftermath of the massacre. NOT TRUE. He had made studious arguments for liberty and the rights of Americans going back over a decade before that, and was a member of societies so devoted.

Sam Adams, rabble rouser to the point of anarchy. NOT TRUE. He was thoughtful man consciuos of his choices.

Worst of all is John Hancock --- in a scene concocted in a seeming attempt to inject grusome inhumanity masquerading as realism --- inciting a crowd to tar and feather a customs worker. NOT TRUE. Hancock was prudent and fair-minded (the disposition which got him the presidency of the Congress), and that incident apart from Hancock appears to have been the product wholecloth of British propaganda. This portrayal --- which left me fiercely (thugh thankfully briefly) sympathic to the British alone by the end of that episode (I wanted to retroactively impose martial law on Boston) ---- is extra upsetting when I read that it was a British director.

Hancock and the Adamses were Whigs, and they pubilckly cried out against vigilantism.

I'll also toss in that the foreshadowing of his disappointment with his son Charles is the sort of heavyhandedness that you come to get used to in telefilms, even on big-budget cable channels. This isn't a biography. It's a MAJOR TELEVISION EVENT, and it doesn't appear to deserve to be taken seriously.