Skip to main content

Mad Men: Back in the Days When Men were Men

Period drama. The 60s. Cigarettes and booze. Mad Men is all about that and more. The brainchild of Matthew Weiner, this American TV series just ended its third season with a coming fourth season slated for a July airing date. And this when I'm only starting on Season 1. Ugh. But better late than never right?

Mad Men follows the comings and goings of the men and women of the fictional ad agency, Sterling Cooper. Mostly, the series is centered around one man Sterling Cooper's creative director, Don Draper, played to enigmatic perfection by Jon Hammer, his dealings with the ad agency's clients, which include hard sells like Lucky Strike and Richard Nixon, his superficially perfect family life with wife Betty (January Jones) and his many women on the side. Don Draper seems to be the embodiment of that period: on the surface, a successful and dapper man, but go deeper and you'll finds all kinds of emotional and psychological trauma and maybe remnants of the physical excesses indulged in back in the day.

This is what I'm talking about. TV! About characters and a period setting that is integral to the story and not just there to tell audiences how different it was back then. Of course, it was different. That's what made it so interesting. Now, give us a show about people living in that time. And voila, Mad Men.

The characters are rich and dynamic. They have both charm and flaws, which can make you either hate them or love them on principle but nothing per se. Kind of like how you feel about real strangers in your life.

I love the visuals. The suits are gorgeous. The dresses, too. The hairdo -- oiled and nicely slicked back for the men, neatly coiffured for the women. And even cigarettes, which everybody seems to do on the show, both men and women alike, looks good. I don't smoke and I don't understand the habit but even I can appreciate its appeal when it's being shown this way.

This show is about a time when corporate America is on a boom, when moral compasses of CEOs and junior executives all seem to be missing a needle, when sexual harassment is rampant and commonplace in the office,  when nothing is done about the environment and cigarette smoke causing cancer is dismissed as a myth, it's the Bonfire of Vanities except we're not dealing with stockbrokers but ad guys. Yet, there is not a single wagging finger. All of this happened, see, and rather than moralizing us about the mistakes of that time, we're just seeing them as facts and history.

I'm not finished watching the first season yet but so far so good. I haven't found any major thing that I disliked about Mad Men. Well, I don't like Pete (Vincent Kartheiser) but that just goes to show how effective his character is.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Moview Review: The Lady Shogun and Her Men

I've heard about this story for sometime now. The Japanese title is Ooku , which refers to the chamber in the shogun's castle where all the women of the shogun's harem are kept. However, Yoshinaga Fumi's manga, on which this movie is adapted, adds a twist: the shogun is a woman and beautiful men fill her harem. THE STORY In the year 1716 Japan, most of the men have died from a deadly disease that only affects men, resulting in their population dwindling to as much as 1/4 of the total population of women. Consequently, women fill in the traditional roles of men, performing hard labor, managing businesses and running government while men are pampered, protected and allowed only to indulge in light entertainment. In this nonexistent Japan lives Mizuno Yunoshin (Kazunari Ninomiya), a teenager from an impoverished samurai class family. He likes fencing and his childhood friend, O-Nobu (Horikita Maki), but because of his family's financial status (O-Nobu is a daugh...
3 comments
Read more

I have loved the stars too truly to be fearful of the night

THE OLD ASTRONOMER. - Sarah Williams R EACH me down my Tycho Brahé,—I would know him when we meet, When I share my later science, sitting humbly at his feet; He may know the law of all things, yet be ignorant of how We are working to completion, working on from then till now. Pray, remember, that I leave you all my theory complete, Lacking only certain data, for your adding, as is meet; And remember, men will scorn it, 'tis original and true, And the obloquy of newness may fall bitterly on you. But, my pupil, as my pupil you have learnt the worth of scorn; You have laughed with me at pity, we have joyed to be forlorn; What, for us, are all distractions of men's fellowship and smiles? What, for us, the goddess Pleasure, with her meretricious wiles? You may tell that German college that their honour comes too late. But they must not waste repentance on the grizzly savant's fate; Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light; I have loved the s...
Post a Comment
Read more

TV Review: The Queen's Classroom

Imagine a person with the emotional range of a terminator, the aura of Darth Vader and the Machiavellian mindset of Hitler. Now put her in a classroom. What you get is an unusual Japanese drama series that debunks the "heroic" teacher stereotype, presents searing commentaries about the state of the public school system, and gives you a character so evil and negative that the makers of the series had to show a clip at the ending transforming her back into just an actress. The show is called The Queen's Classroom and not for no reason. THE STORY Sixth grader Kanda Kazumi ( Shida Mirai ) is looking forward to spending her last year in grade school having fun and creating lasting memories with her friends. But problems arise when a strict new teacher, Akutsu Maya ( Amami Yuki ) is assigned as their homeroom adviser. Maya ranks her class strictly according to merit, punishing harshly those with the lowest grades while lavishly awarding those with the highest marks. So...
1 comment
Read more