Nigel Barnes

It was just OK. At the end I was left with a feeling of it could have been so much more. There are far better true life documentaries/docudramas on Netflix than this. There was no character exploration at all. It was just a random, weird guy, who killed women.

This review is following watching season 3. The majority of reviews here, which give it a high rating, are predominantly based on the first and maybe the 2nd season. If I had made a review after just the 1st season I would have been singing its praises. However. Season 3 is a bizarre, over the top, ridiculous, mess! Did the same people script this garbage? Fortunately there were only 3 episodes. All I'll say, so there are no specific spoilers, is that if you are the kind of person who always watches every season of a programme without fail, don't even start watching it. You will be disappointed and feel the 1st series was an eternity ago, made in a different universe. You have been warned.

I'll keep this short, (there's plenty of wannabee critics here already). Watched first episode. Bored. Actually typing this at the end of it. Oh, there's 8 minutes left. Can't be bothered. Off!

Just didn't do it for me. It was one of those films that when it ended I just didn't care. So I won't leave a long detailed, film critique, plenty of others have done that. Just don't expect too much. Maybe then you'd enjoy it more than I did.

Good movie ... then the last 20 mins is ridiculous! Compare it to the Dallas, wakes up in a shower type of ending. Totally ruined the film and made it worthless. 2 stars!

This is a repeat of many reviews, but I feel it should be repeated; if you have read the book DO NOT bother with this film adaptation. It is soulless, lifeless, emotionless, compared to the book and I'm sure you would be very disappointed. Those who give it a good review are most likely those who did not read the book first. My daughter, who is a teacher, said she was going to let her class watch it as an end of term treat (she had read the book). I advised her to watch it first and see what she then thought. She agreed with her dad. It was terrible! I was quite sad actually when I finished watching the film; only because I couldn't understand how they turned something so wonderful (the book) into something so poor in comparison (the movie).

OK at best. Those with gushing reviews I can't help but feel haven't watched much else in this genre over the years. IF the ending was better I'd have given it another star, but felt totally let down and underwhelmed by the ending.

Ignore all those trying to be intellectual in their reviews. This is a dull movie where not much happens. How the perpetrator just gave up everything and believed what he was being fed by undercover cops was ridiculous. Poor movie.

Wow. So many people doing their best to be intellectual and write clever reviews, and put down the poor reviewers, assuming we have no intellect and just want mundane movies. I'm afraid I gave up after 30 minutes. I found it a mess, annoying, not funny and certainly not intellectualy challenging. Just because critics and other reviews are fawning all over it, don't be fooled. Don't follow the crowd and think you have to be wowed by this movie too, otherwise you'll be seen as not clever enough to understand it. It's not clever, it's a jumbled up, incoherent mess. But each to their own eh.

I feel cheated. After reading about this film and seeing the trailers it looked like it was going to be my kind of thing. I love films and documentaries about all genres of music and musicians. And if the story and acting is well done then even better. But. I can't help but feel a lot of the hype, gushing and people/critics falling over themselves is more down to the terrible loss of Chadwick Boseman. For me the main performances are over the top; though I think this may be tied to the fact this is a screen version of a play and you can see this in the movie - where the performers are really trying to project to the audience. Full disclosure; I'd had enough after 50 minutes. Nothing happens! This isn't a story about Ma Rainey; there isn't any story. It focuses, through Ma Rainey and Levee's over the top speeches , the injustices black people faced. If you like over the top performance, love theatre and watch movies more for the performance then I'm sure this is for you. If you want to be entertained, watch a story about Ma Rainey and feel those Chicago Blues being played through the screen, then perhaps, like me, you'll be very disappointed. I decided to read about Ma Rainey after watching 50 minutes of this film and I couldn't help but feel there could have been a great film to be made about Ma Rainey.