Elle Fanning
SXSW Review: Hulu’s The Girl From Plainville Is an Introspective Drama Uninterested in Excuses
The Pitch: Series co-creators Liz Hannah and Patrick Macmanus keep the true-crime story wave going with The Girl From Plainville, an eight-part limited series based on the “texting suicide case.” In 2014, Conrad Roy III died by suicide in Mattapoisett, Massachussets — this tragedy eventually garnered national attention as investigators learned of the role that the teen’s girlfriend, Michelle Carter, played in his death. Roy’s and Carter’s motivations were previously explored in Erin Lee Carr’s 2019 documentary, I Love You, Now Die: The Commonwealth v. Michelle Carter – and, of course, in all the preceding media coverage of the groundbreaking case. But The Girl From Plainville uses artistic license to venture deeper into the minds of these adolescents, and track how a chance meeting in Flor...
Hulu’s The Great Never Lives Up to Its Name: Review
The Pitch: In 18th century Russia, a penniless Prussian noble named Catherine (executive producer Elle Fanning) is betrothed to Emperor Peter (Nicholas Hoult). Catherine, who makes up for what her family lacks in finance with the kind of sick optimism preserved for golden-haired, porcelain-perfect teenage girls in these types of fairy tales, travels across Europe and Asia with wide-eyed hopes of marital bliss, a progressive Russia, and maybe even some pull in court. Of course, as these things go, Catherine’s husband is loutish, childish, and more concerned with drinking himself into a stupor than just about anything else. Catherine is forced to grow up, fast. Their marriage quickly devolves into a battleground. A mere six months in and with all of her dreams shattered in pieces at her feet...
