Underplayed Gems
The whole movie catalogue

Films and series, searchable by what they are

← Back to the shop

Big Love (2006)

Big Love poster
Genre
drama television series
Country
United States
Length
5 seasons, 53 episodes
Rated
TV-MA
Rating
6.9 of 10 from 150 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb

How it feels

A man in suburban Utah lives with his three wives and their children. The series follows the family as they navigate daily life and try to keep their polygamous lifestyle hidden from the outside world. It also shows their connections to a nearby fundamentalist compound.

family-driventensedramaticslow-burnemotionally complexclaustrophobicsoapyserious

What happens

Big Love is an American drama television series created by Mark V. Olsen and Will Scheffer that aired on HBO from 2006 to 2011. It stars Bill Paxton as the patriarch of a fundamentalist Mormon family in contemporary Utah that practices polygamy, with Jeanne Tripplehorn, Chloë Sevigny, and Ginnifer Goodwin portraying his wives. The series charts the family's life in and out of the public sphere in their Salt Lake City suburb, as well as their associations with a fundamentalist compound in the area. It features key supporting performances from Amanda Seyfried, Grace Zabriskie, Daveigh Chase, Matt Ross, Mary Kay Place, Aaron Paul, Bruce Dern, Melora Walters, and Harry Dean Stanton. The series premiered in the United States on March 12, 2006, following the sixth-season premiere of the HBO series The Sopranos. Big Love was a success for HBO, running for five seasons before concluding its run on March 20, 2011. Big Love received widespread critical acclaim, and earned several major awards and nominations throughout its run. The third season was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series, and the first three were nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series - Drama. For acting, Chloë Sevigny won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress in the series' third season, and Bill Paxton was nominated three times for his leading role. At the Emmys, Ellen Burstyn, Bruce Dern, Mary Kay Place, and Sissy Spacek were all nominated for their recurring roles, while series' creators Olsen and Scheffer won the Writers Guild of America Award for Television: Episodic Drama. The series has been the subject of articles in academic journals, including the Columbia Law Review, Law and Contemporary Problems, and Michigan Journal of Gender & Law. Several publications listed the series's first three seasons as among the best television of the decade 2000–09, and its final season ranked among the best-reviewed scripted series of 2011. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

More like this

This page is from Underplayed Gems. Not quite it? Tell the Catbot what you feel like watching and it picks from the whole catalogue, or browse by genre, country and year.

Lists: Korean thrillers worth the evening · Anime films beyond Studio Ghibli · Slow films for a rainy night · Horror that unsettles instead of startling · Series you can finish in a weekend · Nordic crime worth the subtitles · Good films that end in under 90 minutes · Documentaries that play like thrillers

Loading movies…

What should I watch?