It's that time of year. Every Sunday the NY Times Style Magazine becomes a defacto Oscar FYC ad with luscious photoshoots of would be nominees --Last week Cate Blanchett was doin' her Dylan thing as a coverboygirl. This week's lucky ladies: Marion Cotillard talking about Edith Piaf for all who will listen (though that nomination is already a done deal methinks) and a stellar five page spread of Jennifer Jason Leigh hoping to emerge as a nominee for her abused sibling act in Margot at The Wedding.
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Ew, she shaved her hairline back and her eyebrows off? I know Bette did that to play Elisabeth, but I would've thought prosthetics/make-up had progressed in the last 50 years. Well, kudos to her anyway.
Hmm, maybe JJL has a chance after all. Then again, Bening got one of these big "presumptive nominee" stories last year and it went nowhere. The rest of Margot's reviews will need to be a lot better than the few out now, if JJL is going anywhere.
Is it just me, or are there an unusual number of surprise flops this year? Golden Age, Margot and I know there have been others. The Invasion and Next were both DOA but that was more expected. It just goes to show you that things that look great on paper usually aren't, sadly.
You mean (though that win is already a done deal methinks), right?
I don't see it not happening right now.
Adam K, I don't know what you've been reading or hearing about MATW but I've read aboout 40 reviews and about 15 are negative. MATW is simply a divisive movie and not a critically panned one even so the performances are being praised quite firmly, a critically divisive movie will have more people dscussing it than overly praised and panned movies IMO because what else is left to say. I know the RT rating is 29% and those are some of the negative reviews that I have read, there are about 13 great reviews from RT critics yet to post the reviews they've written and available online. Here are some of the reviews from critics, reviewers, bloggers, I wouldn't call it a flop by any means.
These RT critics have yet to add their reviews on RT and they are all good reviews, some are raves:
Entertainment Weekly's Lisa Schwarzbaum
filmcritic
Popmatters (Matt Mazur, Paramount Vantage will be using some of his quotes to promote MATW)
Onion/A.V Club (they have 2 reviews, both very good, on MATW)
Entertainment Insiders
Stephen Whitty (Star Ledger, NJ.com)
Ty Burr (Boston Globe)
Michael Phillips (Chicago Tribune)
Chris Vognar (WFAA.com)
Nathan Lee (Village Voice)
Patrick Z. McGavin (Stop Smiling, Chicago Tribune, Emanuel Levy)
The External reviews page on IMDB for more MATW reviews:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0757361/externalreviews
I have a question....nothing to do with this actress chat....however, you all appear to be experts, so: Did Al Gore win an Academy Award?....I say no, the producer did. But Al was not the won who officially won. Al did however, go up there, hold it, and thanked everyone & acted like it was his. There have been several rectent news stories in relation to the Nobel Perace Prize, in which they say he won an Oscar earlier this year. Not true, correct?
no Al Gore is NOT an Oscar winner. I personally love the guy so this is not me trying to kick him but he was the star of the movie. not the statue recipient
I DON'T KNOW EXACTLY WHY
BUT I JUST DON'T WANT TO SEE MARION COTILLARD NOMINATED AND GOD FORBID WINNING!!!
IT'S LIKE.... I DON'T KNOW...
I DIND'T WANT JAMIE FOXX NOMINATED EITHER FOR RAY BUT FOR COLLATERAL... WHATEVER!
no need to shout. you have a kindred spirit here. I'm sick to death of bio performances winning the Oscar. It's something like 16 of the last 40 winners playing real people. Not all of them are from biopics per se but come on: enough already.
let's hear it for actors who are imagining every single detail of their character
Right down to the makeup they wear and the dialogue they speak!
The difference between Cotillard and Foxx, however, is that Cotillard actually channels Piaf and says something new while Foxx just gave an okay imitation.
Sorry if this offends people, but she was damn brilliant in that movie...possibly the best biopic performance I've ever seen.
I didn't like La Vie en Rose or Cotillard's performance and I'll be disappointed if this becomes only the second foreign language performance by a woman to win best actress (and I'm with JD, I think she will at this stage strangely) but... oh well. Such is the heartbreak of being an Oscar lackie.
anon hardy har har. and touché. I hear you. but seriously now.
but i'm still waiting for someone to explain to why mimicry is the most noteworthy of all actor skills. I see nothing so remarkable about it that it deserves a huge portion of all acting awards. even comedians who are only mediocre actors can do impersonations.
james i don't think that's going to offend anyone. That's the consensus. But i just don't see it. There are a few scenes where she's moving (I liked the uninterrupted section in NYC when we got to see her as a young woman falling in love and losing her s***) but most of the time, to me at least, it seemed like one big cartoon. I realize Glenn and I are alone in this but at least we've got each other. Right Glenn.
Glenn?
GLENNNNNNNNNNNNN
Right there with ya Nathaniel and Glenn!!!! You're not alone... but maybe we're only 3.
It was just so... discombobulating is the word I come back to regularly when discussing La vie en rose. And when all it seems like Cotillard is doing is a) throwing on a new wig or b) pulling a new wacky face I wasn't able to enjoy the performance at all.
Marion Cotillard was so brilliant in "La Vie En Rose". God I hope she wins the Oscar.
Even though I can initially be impressed by it like everyone else, I tend to go cold on performances that focus too heavily on mimcry. It's why I'm no fan of Cate Blanchett as Hepburn in The Aviator. It was like watching Hepburn from one of her screwball comedies. It felt like an impersonation, not a real person. And while I was orginally impressed by Jamie Foxx in Ray (mainly because nobody expected that from Ugly Wanda), it's ultimately too much of an impersonation to hold up as a truly great performance. Same for Philip Seymour Hoffman in Capote.
To me, the best biopic performances were given by Denzel Washington in Malcolm X and Robert DeNiro in Raging Bull. Less reliance on mimicry, and more inhabiting their roles. Washington isn't a natural mimic, so his transformation from Detroit Red into Malcolm X is subtle and adroit. He adopts Malcolm X's physical mannerisms and staccato vocal delivery. Even the way Malcolm touches the side of his. head. But all that's secondary to presenting the emotional and intellectal core of the man. Watching Washington play Malcolm X feels authentic to the real man, but beyond mere mimicry.
DeNiro is Jake Lamotta is another case where the actor puts as much of himself into the role, as he does try to get into the character. Yes, DeNiro does the whole famous weight gain thing, but he's not doing a note perfect impersonation of the real Lamotta. He takes as much as he needs to create a credible portrait of the man, and fills in the blanks himself.
all of blanchetts perfs are for playing real people so how versatile is she really.
I think Cate will need to stop with this real people thing she has been doing and find something imaginary to sink her teeth into. Her performance in Notes was great but maybe it is just me but I didn't think she/it was all that. I am beginning to lean to the side that she is nothing more about a performer, I don't think or know that she can find the inside or mind of a character and deliver how it works. I would like to see less of her work as a "performance" actress, I wonder what she will be like taking a role that is philosophical or idea based where she is not asked to perform. Am I making sense? lol
Go watch "Little Fish". Then maybe all of these dumb "Cate Blanchett isn't capable of inhabiting anything except real-life roles well" will start to cease.
Cate Blanchett is absolutely amazing in HEAVEN, great in THE MAN WHO CRIED and THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY, very good in BANDITS and COFFEE AND CIGARETTES... I think she's really a great actress... but lately she seems like "LOOK AT ME I'M A GREAT ACTRESS CAPABLE OF DOING EVERY ROLE EVER WRITTEN" and ends up trying too hard for my taste... But I love her career before The Aviator.
I'm not one for biopics either, usually because the films themselves are so predictable. But I was impressed by Sam Riley in Control. Possibly because he wasn't a familiar face, I was less aware of it being an imitation. He really gives his all, a very committed performance.
anon 9:14 thanks for detailing that response. I appreciate it. I probably read as if i despise biopics but I guess that I'm actually fascinated by them because I have such strong reactions to their public reception and their strange uniformity. I find that the same things happen every time. the same conversations. the same "OMG HE/SHE IS TRANSCENDENT!" followed by the cooldown you describe.
and because the Blanchett thing continues to haunt i do want to remind that i loved her Aviator performance. I'm not ANTI mimicry. It just doesn't win automatic points with me.
Anon4.36, I have watched Little Fish, she was great in it but I haven't picked it up to watch it since that one time. It is still a performance. There is a certain "ease" that seems to be missing in her performances, I don't know what it is but it is missing. That is why I always seem to stop at saying "great" as an accolade and then just stop there.
That word "transcendent" bugs the hell out of me. It's almost as if people are surprised whenever an actor shows enough skill to mimic someone famous - "I can't believe how realistic he looked!"
Cate is an absolutely brilliant actress who can do both original and non-fictional roles to the utmost brilliance. I loved her in Little Fish, Heaven, Bandits and Thank God He Met Lizzie and all of those were "natural" non-"performance" type characters for me. Her face and voice can convey SO much more than most actors working today. She already is a legend. Deal with it.
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