MovieChat Forums > The Undoing (2020) Discussion > Finale ... a total mess just to try to c...

Finale ... a total mess just to try to clean everything up ... 2/5

posted 4 years ago by brux (14731)
22 replies | jump to latest

"The Undoing" follows the pattern of many, many other detective or
mystery who-done-its. That is, they artificially feed that audience just
enough to maintain interest, and ambiguity enough so that they cannot
guess who did it.

To me these kinds of movies are useless waste of time fake-entertainment,
and this was no exception.

Another thing these courtroom dramas do is to take huge liberties with
court protocol.

One thing about American television is that they could teach Americans
about their legal system, both the good and bad or it, having some productive
reason to exist, but mostly the legal dramas as a fake as the movies that
are based on a true story. What they do not say is that basing a movie
on a true story is about the same as completely changing the facts and
characters to manipulate the audience to sell soap and popcorn.

The most unbelievable aspect of this finale to me was that in the courtroom
the cold, calculating African-American defense attorney was not prepared
for all outcomes, and instead went practically apoplectic right in court. Putting
the wife on the stand was also something she would not have done if she
was who they spent the entire series making her out to be. Changing characters
at the last minute is another flaw in so many of these dramas.

Rather than go into all the spoilers here, I'll just air my opinion that this
is a rather blah, commonplace thriller/courtroom drama that is not really
worth the watch ... unless maybe you are stuck quarantined at home or
somewhere and there is not much else to do.

[–] mobocracy (894) 4 years ago

IMHO, they failed in terms of entertainment. The whole thing was one giant tease and misdirection, and not even that great at that -- Hugh Grant never really redeemed himself as being potentially innocent, so its not like him being actually guilty felt like much of a surprise outcome.

I agree with the courtroom aspect, too. The amount of glaring procedural shit makes me crazy, especially the witnesses basically ignoring questions and giving irrelevant answers (or none at all) and getting away with it by both the attorney and the judge.

I cut the defense attorney a bit of slack on Grace's testimony at the end, Grace pressured her into it and she'd already let Hugh Grant testify. I think she felt like they were losing and that Grace's testimony could have been potentially beneficial given her professional credibility as a character witness. Without the inside information passed to the DA, her testimony would have been hard to impeach and could have been compelling to the jury.

[–] brux (14731) 4 years ago

I differentiate what the character of the defense attorney did in court from her previously established character. You can cut her some slack, but essentially you are cutting a fake another character the slack, because he character was built up to be cold and calculating. A mistrial would be in order once the discovery was reviewed.

There are smart, very controlled characters, and the one thing they all know is do not lose your cool in public - let along a courtroom.

Another mitigating factor would have been the fact that the dead girl attacked the husband with the mallet first.

But, I don't think in the series they even bothered to tell the audience what the actual charger was? Murder? What degree?

[–] mobocracy (894) 4 years ago

I think they went with first degree under the guise that he knew her and had an existing romantic relationship, thus granting him wide possible premeditation.

I wonder how this would have turned out if Hugh Grant's character had smashed himself with the mallet (maybe enough to break a bone or at least provide a wound of some kind) *and* if he had only hit Elena in the head once hard enough to kill her.

He *might* have gotten away with it outright as self-defense or at worst a low level manslaughter charge -- she hit me, I managed to dodge the next swing, we fought for the mallet, I took it away and she swung something else at me and I just lashed out in self defense and managed to hit her hard enough to kill her.

It might be a tough sell, but if he had a serious documented injury attributable to that hammer it might be salable.

[–] Batty67 (358) 4 years ago

Interesting. I thought about that too, briefly. But it was in the heat of the moment. And we he rapidly hit her 8-9 more times...after confirming she was dead, that was that.

It is meaningful that he lost his extremely lucrative job (probably 500k+ year) because he was not discrete in his romance with Elena, and hid it from Grace. So, clearly, he was also infatuated with her and for a long time. A compulsive liar weaving lie after lie until it fell apart.

[–] mobocracy (894) 4 years ago

They never showed any real context for his affair with Elena when he was her child's oncologist. I kind of get the feeling that she was obsessed and might have been the one that was indiscreet.

[–] Batty67 (358) 4 years ago

True. But that part of the show was well done, successfully hiding he lost his job over her. As for Grant's character, and as I've said elsewhere, once he was established to be a liar, anything that came out of his mouth was (rightfully) highly suspect.

[–] exatera (3959) 4 years ago

Completely omitted isn't the same thing as well done.

[–] Esterhowse (468) 4 years ago

The most impressive thing about this show was the cast and who made it. David E Kelley is a huge name in the TV world, though I have never understood why really. Kiddman, Sutherland and Grant and A lister names that don't come cheap.

I guess the spent all the money on the stars and costumes and not on the writers.

Holy shit was this show terrible. It started with a bang and set up some interesting story points and then just got dumber and dumber the longer it went on.

Yes all the court room stuff was just so insultingly stupid, but the problems really started with how the show handled the cops. How the cops were slowly releasing information to Grace, for reasons, just made no sense.

It was day time Soap Opera level story telling.

[–] brux (14731) 4 years ago

I hate to say this because it is going to sound sexist, but to me the only compelling thing that got me to watch this for more than one episode was the beautiful girl naked. It was just not good in any way. Sutherland is an old fogey, Grant is pretty good. Kidman also is a good actress by past her sell by date for the most part. At least it was free to me. I'd give it a 2/5, only because to me 1/5 means completely unwatchable.

[–] Esterhowse (468) 4 years ago

Agreed on all points.

[–] Trev (947) 4 years ago

Kidman looks like she's had a ton of work done on her face, and there were certain scenes in this show where you could just see right through it and she looked 94 years old

[–] brux (14731) 4 years ago

I didn't see that, any work on her face, and I don't care. Actors are just placeholders for the writers and directors to tell a story. She certainly didn't look anywhere close to 94 ... what are you 8?

[–] Trev (947) 4 years ago

You must be 8 because you've never heard of exaggeration

[–] brux (14731) 4 years ago

Heard of it, know when to use it.

[–] [deleted] 4 years ago

The part that simply stuck to high heaven was the defense attorney thinking for a second that they even needed to put the wife on the stand. There was already more reasonable doubt that what was used to get the not guilty verdict for OJ Simpson, yet here the attorney decides to put the wife on the stand? Where the fuck did that decision even come from... it simply made no sense. And as you pointed out no attorney ever puts a witness on the stand unless they already know everything the might be asked and every answer the witness would have. You don't spend the weeks prepping for a case without going over your witnesses with every possible question the other side might throw out there.

[–] Heisenberg (6730) 4 years ago

I agree on lots of your points, but I have to admit I was hooked.

SPOILER
To me, the biggest problems where:
her testimony about the opinion of his estranged mother would never be that relevant.
Kidman still declared that she believed he was innocent and good and incapable of violence.
The DA proved that she was in contrast with her mother in law's opinion.
So what???
Is his mother the absolute truth?
She was not even in court to say this, it's hearsay.
Of a bitter woman who never got her 14yo son any medical help after such a tragedy.
Instead, she blamed him. Mother of the year.
And she lost contact for 35 years. Again, speaks about her as much as about him.
The jury should have changed nothing after this.

Another problem: he killed her. His lawyer is sure she can plea bargain manslaughter.
He straight refuses because he pretends he's innocent, even if his case is quite dangerous.
Why???

Don't get me started on murdering her that day, that way, after fucking, after she got him fired, etc.

[–] brux (14731) 4 years ago

The have to skew a little bit of every part, what happened before the movie, what the people were doing or thought, and how it got transmitted and to whom throughout the movie. It was just an unpleasant movie, with an unpleasant story ( except for the beautiful girl who was fun to look at ) and and unpleasant ending. I wouldn't say I was exactly hooked, but because of he pandemic I was pretty much of a captive audience. Hell, I watched all the episodes of "The Ranch" with Ashton Kutcher and Danny Masterson who I detest because I am so bored! ;-) Just my opinions and taste.

[–] maximmm (3344) 4 years ago

[–] brux (14731) 4 years ago

I was about to agree with your until I realized you were feeding back my own words to me! ;-)

You are right that a lot of detective and other TV shows and some books work like that. And I guess if you do not think too hard about it I guess one can be happy with that. But this series was really manipulative to the point it was annoying. Of course you can maintain the reader's/viewer's suspense to only showing them part of what is going on, or by showing how you lied to them in earlier episodes or chapters. I think that is cheap.

I like stuff that is new and at least clever and not so obvious about it. One series I would point to is the 3rd season of True Detective that had the very clever device of having the main investigator have Alzheimer's and going back in time to re-open a case looking for closure. Now, that was the best of that genre I had seen in a long time. Another one was the Icelandic series Fortitude, or Trapped, both excellent, and avoid given the viewer the feeling of being cynically manipulated.

If you liked Undoing, great, but for me at the end I wished I had not wasted the time.

[–] maximmm (3344) 4 years ago

I haven't seen undoing - I was merely commenting on the first few sentences of your comment which seemed odd to me, given that you've described most mystery/detective novels in a nutshell and then called them a waste of time, which I disagree with since even real-life detective work is based on slow collection of evidence which later help to reveal who did what. I'm sure you've clarified your point in the latter paragraphs, but I didn't read those - lol.

[–] brux (14731) 4 years ago

I write for the reading disabled too.

[–] maximmm (3344) 4 years ago

lol