Sunday, June 20, 2010

Beauty Break: Nicole Kidman

I've never been one to collect memorabilia, stills or autographs. But if I did I'd surely have a stash to represent my Kidmania. So happy 43rd to the Oscar winner.


In addition to that Trespass picture which sounds like a disaster, Kidman will soon be doing an HBO picture called Hemingway & Gellhorn. I smell Emmy nomination.

Here are arguably my six favorite pictures of Nicole from the past six years. Arguably because I argue with myself, don't you? Argue with yourself, not me, I mean.

random photo shoot, 2007

promoting Margot at the Wedding with Jennifer Jason Leigh in 2007

With Baz, her best iconographer, in 2008

random photo shoots from 2005 & 2007

<--- a 2006 photoshoot. I wish I knew the photographer's name.

Fansites like the great Nicole's Magic are a godsend. Visit them! I wish all actresses had fansites this devoted. It's easy to find similarly strong sites for other mega-stars like Pfeiffer or Streep. But sadly many of the great actresses have almost nothing online or scattershot, out of date sites. I've found that the name actresses from 70s through the early 90s are the biggest problem area. Once you hit the mid 90s, the internet had begun to take over and the stars from the 1950s and earlier will always have the "classic hollywood/nostalgia" factors going for them in terms of archiving. But inbetween those eras it's tough going if you want to see great photoshoots and whatnot.

Just about my only gripe with the best fansites of moviestars is that they tend to not list the photographers when they're sharing photoshoots from the years. Usually if you're scanning from a magazine the photographers name is right there and they definitely deserve the credit.

In chronological order, my six favorite Kidman performances: To Die For (1995), Moulin Rouge! (2001), The Others (2001), Birth (2004), Dogville (2004) and Margot at the Wedding (2007) with apologies to a handful of others. Here's hoping Rabbit Hole (2010) disrupts this list. Not that that will be easy to do because that list feels pretty untouchable. I didn't even have room for her 'violent jolt' in The Hours (2002).
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26 comments:

jbaker475 said...

That picture of her lying on her back in the long dress is stunning. May she continue to act and be awesome for many years to come, and here's hoping that "Rabbit Hole" finally (let's hope deservingly) lands her back in Oscar's radar.

JD said...

My all time favourite actress turns 43 today!! :)

City_Of_Lights said...

Happy Birthday to Nicole!

Nathaniel, the photographer of that beautiful photo is James White. The shot appeared in Red Magazine (UK) in their Sept 2006 issue as part of an interview titled "New Beginnings".

Hayden said...

I love looking at how IMDb orders their featured birthdays. It's always a weird struggle between of-the-moment relevance and cinematic importance. Yesterday Zoe Saldana was deemed "more important" than Kathleen Turner and Gena Rowlands (on her 80th birthday!).

NATHANIEL R said...

Hayden --i almost did a post on that because Nick and I had a conversation the day of i think it was Barba Stanwyck's birthday . Anyway whoever the classic star was she fell underneath several people who couldn't possibly be considered more important than her in the grand scheme of the movies... but they were of the now.

sad.

Amy said...

Happy Birthday Nicole Kidman, here is to another 43 years! :)

And here's hoping that Rabbit Hole makes our day!

I don't know why but I am actually looking forward to Trespass, just because she has not done a thriller in some time and she is usually fantastic in thrillers especially if it is claustraphobic-like. I guess we'll see.

/3rtfu11 said...

These sites don’t sight the photographers because many don’t know who the photographers are. They’ve just found or scanned these pictures for their site.

Personal favorite Kidman performances -- Eyes, Fur, Birth (Best Ending Ever), Margot (Best Bitch Ever).

cinephile said...

C'mon, the fansite is not that good. Streep's is much better. The Kidman fansite doesn't even have a video of Kidman's Oscar win in its media section. No Golden Globe wins etc either.
Anyway, it's said that Kidman's Oscar win diminishes my appreciation for her. Why did they have to give it to her for The Hours while there were much more deserving nominees? Why not for one of the performance listed here, for example.

cal roth said...

By this time we all agree that if we really had to choose her best performance, we'd pick Birth, right?

Maria said...

Most fansites don't use the photographer's name since the photos they're posting are not legally licensed and to use the name only makes it easier for the photograher/agency to find out.

Philip said...

My favorite performance of hers will always be Moulin Rouge, but The Others is really good. A lot of it probably has to do with the fact that Moulin Rouge is my favorite movie ever, though. Oh well. She was really good.

Nathaniel, when are you going to start up your Oscar predictions, or start predicting, or whatever? Just wondering. I'm anxious. :P

Anonymous said...

Birth! birth! birth!

Aimée said...

Nathaniel,

One more time you act like you're surprised by Kidman's choice of projects.

But she isn't doing anything new when it comes to her career : it was the same a decade ago, and it was the same in the 90's.

She's not the type of actor who will play in 3 films of the same genre back to back, never has been never will be. And I think that's why her fans like her : she's unpredictable.

I love Blanchett or Winslet for example but I'm never surprise by their choice.

I like the WFT aspect of Kidman's career.

Isabel Archer said...

'I like the WFT aspect of Kidman's career.'
Lol... me too.

But my all time favourte movie of her or anybody us The Hours, so deep and moving. Then Moulin Rouge! so passionate and spectacular.

@cinephile: You have to go to the forum and you will find a world inside of it.

So...
Happy birthday to Nic!

badmotherfucker said...

I can't recall how many times I've felt down and all I had to do to make myself feel better was play scenes from Moulin Rouge! in my head. That makes it my favorite Kidman performance by default, I guess.

Still... she kicked all kinds of ass in Birth.

Henry said...

She really is still one of my favorite actresses but it's still a little peturbing to me that she hasn't had a good performance in a film since The Interpreter in 2005. Dogville didn't work for me and Australia wasn't really working for me either.

Anonymous said...

Hehe, just saw you paid tribute to her, too.
I made a Top 10 Kidman Movies list on my blog, 'Birth' being my favorite...

Glenn said...

Amazing actress, she is. An all timer.

Birth, To Die For, Dogville, Moulin Rouge!, The Others, Margot at the Wedding, The Hours and the one-two punch of Vietnam & Bangkok Hilton being her best work.

Anonymous said...

Amazing, stunning, incredible actress. People should have more respect and show more love for one of the greates and finest actress of our history.
Happy b-day Nicole!

Y Kant Goran Rite said...

... So sterile.. So artificial.. Even just as an object to be gazed at, I'm afraid I'll never get Nicole. Satine would surely be the most sexless, anorexic dancer at the Moulin Rouge. Or was it all just the bronchitis?

As an actress, my opinion of her isn't all that much higher, but she can be solid, sometimes even very very good -

Hang on, I'm sure I write this same comment here roughly ever six months. So I'll shut up now. By all means, bask in the Kidman worship. I'll come back tomorrow and write something positive about someone, I promise.

Macy said...

I agree with you on fansites. Streep has a good one and Julia Roberts has a really good one (aboutjulia.com). The Julia Roberts' site video vault is pretty insane (and they probably feel extra special because Julia gave them a shout out one time during a press conference for Duplicity).

Back to Nicole, Happy Birthday to a phenomenal actress. My favorite performance of hers is Birth, but To Die For runs a very close second, and I'm one of the few that thoroughly enjoyed her performance in The Hours.

Here's hoping Rabbit Hole is everything that it should be

NATHANIEL R said...

Macy -- the Pfeiffer fansites are terrific too. Basically it takes an actress who makes people obsessive. Or rather, it takes an actress who makes people of a certain age obsessive. :)

i still feel bad that some of the great 80s and 70s stars have like NOTHING online. Good luck finding any of Kathleen Turner's amazing magazine photoshoots from back in the day.

Vikter said...

Nicole Kidman doesn't have a remote likeness to Gellhorn. There had to be other people to choose from than her. But HBO's films are routinely great, and they'll throw much money it it for promotion, costuming, and makeup. Any new Clive news makes me happy of course.

Magicub said...

the photoshoot with JJL is great

sar said...

nicole kidman she is an amazing actress
her best performance was in moulin Rouge

i loved her in that movie
actually i loved everything about moulin Rouge
the music, the costumes, the whole cast, the love story
its my all time favorite musical.

1m also agree we dont have great fan sites about great actresses
im a big sharon stone´s fan
i been lookig for a good fan site but i havent find it.
her imdb message board looks like a hatters message board

Anonymous said...

"As an actress, my opinion of her isn't all that much higher
Fortunately it's your opinion..

I mean, Nic's great talent should be indisputable like it happens with meryl streep or even with winslet or blanchett, I wonder why people still have doubts about her abilities