Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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Kim Kardashian Karries on Her new reality series deals with — what else? — the breakup TV by DEAN ROBBINS I got caught up in the excitement of Kim Kardashian's whirlwind romance with basketball player Kris Humphries, which played out on Keeping Up With the Kardashians. True, Kim and Kris had known each other only for a few months, but come on — his name started with a K, the same as all the Kardashian sisters. With that kind of foundation, surely this love would be 4-ever. I shared tears with the Kardashian family during the two-part wedding specials last month, and after much prayer and meditation, I concluded that Kim had in fact picked out the right wedding dress from the hundreds she tried on. So imagine my surprise when, only three weeks after the wedding special, Kim filed for divorce, citing irreconcilable differences. Can any differences qualify as "irreconcilable" after such a short time? One begins to think that Kim didn't even try. Worse, one begins to think she manufactured the whole romance so she'd have a plot point for the reality series. I refuse to watch any more Kardashian produc- tions, which have proven that they will use any trickery to get us involved in the sisters' lives. To be honest, though, I'm going to begin my strike after Kourtney & Kim Take New York (Sunday, 10 p.m., E!). Word is that the new season will deal with the breakup, and I can't miss that, now, can I? Mitch Albom's Have a Little Faith Sunday, 8 pm (ABC) It's another TV movie based on an inspirational Mitch Albom book, in which the self-dramatizing sportswriter fancies himself asking big questions about God and faith. An oh-so-wise rabbi who speaks in aphorisms (Martin Landau) asks Albom if he would prepare a eulogy for him in anticipation of his death. This sends Albom (Bradley Whitford) into a paroxysm of aphorisms himself, not to mention parables. He narrates the parallel story of an African-American man (Laurence Fishburne) who gains the world but loses his soul. The movie has so little feel for black culture that this subplot seems like a minstrel show, with exaggerated ghetto dialect, clothes and behavior. The idea of a white guy using black stereo- types to teach us all a lesson is — well, the most gener- ous way to put it would be "old-fashioned." Whitford delivers his dialogue with a dazed expres- sion, as if he still can't believe his agent made him take this job. "There is a fine tradition of men running away from God," he says in a typically Sunday School moment. There's also a fine tradition of men running away from godawful TV movies. Top Gear Top 40 Monday, 8 pm (BBC America) U.S. reality shows about driving fast vehicles tend to feature boneheads like Jesse James, who act stupid and make us feel stupid in the process. Not so with the British driving series Top Gear, which is Masterpiece Theatre compared to our versions. The drivers are witty, and they pull off droll stunts like racing a sleek Porsche against a pathetic Volkswagen Beetle that's dropped a mile from a helicopter. A new eight-episode run counts down the fans' favorite moments. Host Andy Wilman is acutely aware of how silly it all is, at least from the perspective of a cultured British audience. "There will be much catching of fire, much shouting of 'Power!'" he says with heavy irony, "and I guarantee you will feel your IQ physi- cally falling when you watch some of our finer moments." From the American perspective, I can report that I felt my IQ physically rising. WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM NOVEMBER 23-29, 2011 UCW 19