Women & Hollywood

I spent both Saturday and Sunday morning fixated on watching the English series The Commander (which was recommended by the Flickfilosopher several months ago.) The series totally rocks. The show debuted on ITV in Britain in 2003 starring Amanda Burton as Commander Clare Blake. Super awesome crime writer Lynda La Plante (who specializes in writing about women and also wrote the Prime Suspect series with Helen Mirren) gives us a strong female leader competing against the boys and holding her own. She just a tough and conniving as the guys and does quite a few shady and compromising things to keep her job. Some of her decisions are more than questionable -- like falling in love with a man she put in jail ten years before for murdering his girlfriend, or sleeping with the boyfriend of a woman who works for her-- but that's typical of La Plante's women.

Amanda Burton is fantastic. I also loved her in Silent Witness (a forensic CSI like show that ran on BBCA.) I guess I am a bit obsessed with British crime dramas that star women. They just seem to be so much better than ours.

If you have some downtown over the holidays and are looking for some good TV, check out The Commander. I got it on netflix. I can't wait until they release the next series here in the US.