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| Customer Reviews: | | Average Customer Review: ( 4 customer reviews )
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9 of 11 found the following review helpful:
 Condescending whiner Jan 09, 2006
By chris
I love the globe Trekker series in general, but Justine Shapiro gets on my nerves. In most shows she only gives a couple of condescding smirks or comments during the program, usually beind the back of someone she just spoke with, but in this particular program, she seems to be irritated the whole time. It's as if she was forced to take this assignment and would rather be somewhere else....anywhere else! She was very condescending toward almost everyone, and just a pain in the ass for most of the show.
The worst part was when she stayed in a hostel in New Mexico. It looked like a nice place. It had dormitory rooms. It was $15 a night. She was so irate that she had to do a chore in the morning. She complained and whined and went on and on to the manager of the hostal. It was embarrassing. I find it hard to believe she doesn't realize that maid service in the united states is not cheap and if they did have to hire maids, the price of the hostal would have to greatly increase. That is why all the hostals i have been to in the US required me to do a chore in the morning. It's called "budget travel". She should have gone and stayed at the hilton, or even a Motel 6 so she wouldn't have been so bothered. Is Ms Shapiro ignorant or just hard headed?
she whined or made her silly condescending smirks throughout the program and didnt seem to connect with any of the people she was interviewing. Then, at the end of the show, she gives a little speech about what a great time she had and how wonderful the people were......yadayadayada......-I didnt buy it.
I give this program a 2.5 stars because it had some good photography, but Ms Shapiro really brought this one down. I think if it were any of the other GT hosts, this would have been a 4 or 5 star show.
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
 Complaining, missing the point, wasting our time Apr 25, 2009
By ThomasH
I second the opinion expressed in the other review: Ms. Justine Shapiro made probably an attempt to show how to "travel on an extreme bargain" I suppose, and reduced her reporting to complaining about her personal experiences in places so cheap that, well, one cannot get much for the price paid. She could not resist to film long scenes with her complaining in front of the camera. I do not want to repeat the "10min tragedy in a dorm with morning chores," described by the other reviewer. Equally long was her attention paid to the episode, in which she put a wrong key in her cheap bought on the road car, and broke it. What in heavens has a broken key to do with Southwest? And so in lieu of learning about Southwest, we learned rather about her selected "tragic" experiences.
In other cases she was judgmental about entire cities and places and skipped them all together. For example, to my astonishment she skipped Santa Fe completely, what is one of most charming towns in the vicinity, because of... her claim that the town is a reconstructed fake, she would not lose her time in it. We saw barely anything from treasuries of Albuquerque. What about Zuni and Navaho, the people, relics, and contemporary art? Where are the even older historic places, like Chaco Canyon, Acoma Pueblo, Anasazi Ruins? Of Sedona we saw barely a few seconds of the landscape. She did not explored the town with its historic lodges and haciendas, neither did she ventured into the maze of red rocks. Instead she sold us a long scene with a bizarre esoteric lady with a copper pipe hat, or whatever was it actually?
To make the things even worse, the authors of this video chose to part time shake camera and show images in strange surreal over saturated colors, probably as an artistic expression. Hm... Maybe this is attractive to some: If you love to see random snippets of landscape with image shaking and jerking left and right, in which colors resemble a comic book, this is your type of a video. If you would like to inform yourself about the landscape and actually see it in genuine, correct colors and learn about the places, do not lose your money on this bizarre misproduction.
 Worth Every Penny Dec 05, 2010
By Buyer
If you want hours of boring footage of empty fields, mountains, and buildings, then Globe Trekker is not for you.
If you want to go off road to locations that only locals know about and don't like spending hundreds of dollars for one night at a hotel, then this was made for you!
The burning man footage lasts for around 10 minutes and they never zoom on inappropriate body parts. There's nothing sexual about the segment, only glances of nudity. Teenagers have already seen this much nudity on sex ed at school.
The hostel that require Justice to do chores was actually one tiny room with 4 beds. She had to share the room and bathroom with other guests. This for $15 when you can get a hotel room at a casino in Las Vegas and Laughlin for $20!
I could relate to Justine completely. The extra features include tips and information for travelling in the Southwest, including best forms of transportation, description of the local cuisine, festivals and more.
Globe Trekker is my favorite source of travel information. It grabs your attention with outgoing hosts and keep you entertained while you learn! It's widely used in classrooms to teach culture.
Not Suitable for Children May 17, 2009
By Holly
"Holly"
I was looking to supplement my daughter's homeschooling unit on the United States with some of the Globe Trekker DVDs. Thank goodness I decided to preview this entire video! Though Justine's complaining is a bit much, most of the video is still entertaining. However, at the very end, Justine drives to the Burning Man festival, and most of footage from there is completely inappropriate - lots of gratuitous, pointless nudity. Several shots focus in on a giant inflatable penis - certainly they could have moved the camera to the left and shown the festival without zooming in on something so tasteless.
I also don't really understand why a festival that takes place in Northern Nevada is included in a travel documentary on the south west anyway.
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