Natasha Lyonne

You'll Go Gaga for Rian Johnson's 'Poker Face,' Boasting a Lead Every Bit as Memorable as Benoit Blanc in 'Knives Out'

Just check out this list of shows: “Kojak,” “Cannon,” “Ironside,” “Baretta,” “Harry O,” “McCloud,” “The Rockford Files,” “Hart to Hart,” “Starsky and Hutch,” “Ellery Queen” – and these were just the U.S. That’s a fun idea, but what truly elevates “Poker Face” above your average self-contained “murder mystery of the week” is Lyonne herself. I’m far too much of a conformist, it turns out, so I watched the first six in the order in which they were presented. The upside is seeing how Charlie Cale figures in each storyline. Lest we feel too smug about the formulaic simplicity of it all, it is worth remembering some recent examples that show this practice is still alive and well: “Will Trent,” “Clarice,” “Reacher,” “Bosch” and, with a slight twist, But there’s nothing wrong with that. Nowadays, though, many are more likely to associate cops with another fictional California creation from 1971: Clint Eastwood’s “Dirty” Harry Callahan. (In case you haven’t seen those fictional retellings, you will not be shocked to hear that De Niro does not make a very convincing Jewish financier, and Dreyfuss’ addiction to ingesting scenery has long required intervention.) The new year may have arrived, but I still seem to be playing catch-up with movies from 2022 (more on some of those next week). There’s something bizarrely timeless yet dated about the show, which serves as a welcome reminder that U.S. That show is coming to Israel in mid-February, so I won’t beat myself up too much about that. The “Columbo” connection comes not from this being a detective show but it being a, ahem, “howcatchem” – the flip side of the coin to the whodunit where the viewer sees who the killer(s) is and then watches on as the sleuth ingeniously unravels the mystery.