Regional friendo: “I finally got around to watching CODA. Maybe I missed something?  It plays like a randy after-school special with fart jokes and broad sitcom sex jokes.  The rising above one’s station in life is nothing new.  It’s all played very safe.  More cloying than moving.  I’m probably in the minority. It’s one of those films that is nearly critic-proof. If you knock it, then you probably hate kittens, puppies, Santa, and kids. It reeks of ‘TV movie’. Nothing worse than calculated sentimentality and cheap emotional scenes. I’d rather spend more time with the Guccis than this crowd.”

HE comment: I was irked by the beginning of the Berklee School of Music audition scene, when it initially appears as if Emilia Jones‘ character is choking (i.e., lack of confidence). This is a cheap device that some directors resort to — the big moment arrives and our lead protagonist has to deliver or die, and it seems as if he/she is going to drop the ball but then…recovery! Mimi Leder‘s On The Basis of Sex pulled the same crap when Ruth Bader Ginsburg (Felicity Jones) is about to deliver a big argument before the Court of Appeals, and seems to hesitate and stammer before getting it together.