Take Three: Anjelica Huston

Craig here with a new Take Three

Today: Anjelica Huston

Anjelica Huston's played so many memorable roles that I wish I'd called this series Take Ten.

The Witches and The Dead are essential Huston: key performances in two wildly differing films; both minor gems of their genres. As, respectively, the Grand High Witch and mournful Gretta Conroy she couldn’t have been more different, and in both she showed immense versatility. Essential, too, are Enemies: A Love Story and Prizzi’s Honor: an Oscar nod for the former; a win for the latter. (Nathaniel wrote about Mae Rose Prizzi previously - and the Grand High Witch, too.)

For Wes Anderson she played three independent women: two estranged wives in The Royal Tenenbaums and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, and a strange mother in The Darjeeling Limited. The Addams Family's Morticia parts are a double-bill of the joyfully macabre. The two uncredited blink-and-miss-them appearances in One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Frances are early career curiosities, and Daddy Day Care, Material Girls and Martian Child are all likely recent bill-paying gigs. There’s also solid supporting work in A Handful of Dust, Lonesome Dove, The Crossing Guard, Buffalo ’66 and Seraphim Falls - and more besides. (Either of these last two very nearly took Choke’s place.)

Take One: A mother’s ruin

In recent years, as with many actresses of a certain age - who Hollywood perhaps doesn’t know quite what to do with - Huston’s taken on that over-50’s female staple: the mother role. But unlike many of her contemporaries she’s not fallen foul of the usual pitfalls in playing mum. (See the Anderson triple.) Huston’s most recent atypical mother was for Clark Gregg in 2006’s Chuck Palahniuk adaptation, Choke.

The film's episodic plot is as ramshackle as the novel’s, and via this we get interwoven scenes of Huston as the wayfaring Ida J. Mancini, Victor’s (Sam Rockwell) irresponsible yet haphazardly complex mother. In present day she’s bed-ridden, losing her grip and her mind, being looked after in a nursing home. And as Victor ponders his ancestry throughout the film - between his choking cons and sex addiction - we get intermittent slices of his early life, where Ida constantly re-kidnaps him from various foster parents and traipses him from state to state - graffitiing maps, releasing lions from zoos - doling out her unique life lessons, and all the time hiding from him who his father was. Ida’s a combatant in life and a keeper of secrets until (very nearly) the end.

Huston as Ida J. Mancini in Choke

Ida’s a great part for Huston. It’s perhaps an easy part for her, but indicative of her leftfield role choices. (She can do this type of role in her sleep, but they’re no less fun or compulsive to watch.) She makes a resounding impact, especially as we get to see two sides, two distinct angles, to Ida: young and old, carefree and dependent, lively and stationary. The narrative intercutting adds emotional structure, but Huston adds a poignancy not always discernible in the book. She instills in the older Ida a sad believability; and gives younger Ida a bullshit-free spiritedness. (It’s often all too easy for a great many actors to succumb to the clichés of “acting old” or “doing zany” - Huston swerves them with aplomb).

On the road again: Huston and Jonah Bobo in Choke

We’re never explicitly told the reasons for Ida’s serial abandonment or the root of her problems, but Huston’s layered and thoughtful performance suggests a tantalising grab-bag of possibilities as to why Ida is the way she is. She finds the right tone for her somewhere between absurdity and dignity. It's a given that Huston makes Ida memorable from the moment she first appears on screen. She gave Choke an extra dimension of watchability. But then again, she’s had ample experience in imparting intricate and captivating characterisation over thirty-three years of exemplary acting.

Take Two: Murder, she wrote

I wanted to include one of Huston's roles for Woody Allen - either Crimes and Misdemeanors or Manhattan Murder Mystery (1993) - as in both she did some of her best character work. (She was Bafta-nominated in Supporting Actress for both - although won for neither.) In Crimes she’s Dolores Paley, Martin Landau's doomed mistress: she was excellent but her character was often sidelined (due to the story’s structural conceit); but in Mystery, as Marcia Fox, Larry Lipton’s (Allen) snooping co-conspirator and poker mate, she essayed a solid, bona-fide character part. Huston doesn’t have many scenes but makes the most of her screen time. Marcia was certainly the stronger character of the two for Woody, and more fun to watch. (And Marcia goes some way in proving that Woody’s gal pals are often more interesting than his wives.)

Betting on murder: Huston and Allen in Manhattan Murder Mystery

She’s a novelist client - was waitress, was film critic - of book editor Larry’s, someone his wife (Diane Keaton) thinks he has his bespectacled eye on. Marcia joins in on the couple’s amateur sleuthing - along with their friend, and Marcia’s suitor, Ted, (Alan Alda). She makes apt and accurate use of her profession by dreaming up the - actually plausible - murder scenarios for the group to comically mull over. It’s discernible, from how convincingly Huston inhabits such a slight role with an acute lived-in feel, that Marcia’s had an interesting life. Confident, flirtatious and direct with her body language (quintessential Huston traits), she comes on like a spiky, saucy Jessica Fletcher; solving ridiculous crimes (and misdemeanors), always dressed in black, and ushering in the plot’s denouement with a slapstick idea for the killer’s capture (“when I come back from the ladies’ room I’ll tell you how to trap him!”); then relaying in flashback how it all happened like a pro. Marcia needed a spin-off project all her own.

I agree with Alan Alda, when he says: “I like this woman - she’s lurid.”

Take Three: In it for the long haul

Dressed in sharp, anonymous suits - either blood-red or off-white to match her mood or masquerade - and with a tight peroxide perm that barely moves (whether or not it’s tethered by a matching headscarf), even when she’s trembling from adrenaline or nerves, Huston’s presence as long-time matriarch of con, Lilly Dillon, in Stephen Frears’ 1991 adaptation of Jim Thompson’s The Grifters is impossible to forget. As I watched the film again this week I was reminded just how magnetic, ferocious and daring Huston is in the role. It’s arguably her very best performance; but with Huston we’re spoilt for choice. Lilly's certainly the most complicated woman she’s played.

Movie characters in a tight fix wanting (or having) to alter their appearance as a kind of get-away-free procedure, usually do so toward the end of the film, after the shit has hit the fan. But, with an impersonal poise and rigid posture, Lilly enters The Grifters’ bruising, unforgiving world as a woman who’s been constantly evading detection her whole life; her appearance pre-altered before the events of its narrative unfold. (What was her life like before?) The cheap, yet still glamorous, get-up she wears is like a front for the crooks and a disguise for the cops.

Lilly’s a mother in name, but not in nature. Her feelings for and about her son Roy (John Cusack), maternal or, particularly, otherwise leave a lot to be desired, shall we say? The blame is hers. But all that’s just a consequence of a lifetime of wrong, another part of her tough-luck tale she doesn’t particularly need to retell. In the world of pulp-noir Lilly could be a direct descendant of Gloria Grahame’s Debby Marsh in The Big Heat: both got burned by the men in their lives; both got their revenge. But only Lilly’s left with a survivor’s internal scars - deeper and more searing than the reminder on her hand.

She gambles with others’ feelings to mask her own. But when it counts you can’t say she’s not protective or that she doesn’t care (but for what reason?). When she sees Roy, for the first time in a long time, he’s in hospital with near-fatal internal bleeding (like mother like son; Roy’s, too, is a life of con; his short, hers long). She wants him alive and lets the doctor know it in no uncertain terms: “You know who I work for. My son is going to be all right. If not, I'll have you killed.”

Watching Lilly Dillon ceaselessly stalk and fret her way from one chancy engagement to another - phone booth to hotel, racetrack to apartment - induces in us a nerve-shredding restlessness; her anxiety is infectious. But that’s the way Huston plays it; she motors the movie and takes us along for the ride, making us passengers, turning us into unwilling accomplices. She’s rootless too. There doesn’t seem to be a place where Lilly feels settled. She doesn’t really belong anywhere. Certainly not California; she doesn’t do California. Well, unless money or old ties draw her in - or when Pat Hingle (as the brilliantly named Bobo Justus) uses his own horribly persuasive brand of fruit- or cigar-based manipulation.

Huston successfully manages to transfer both Lilly’s subtle mannerisms (twitchy chain-smoking, deceptively vacant glare, her “Los Ang-Gleez”) and her grandest, fiercest altercations through a veil of life-eroding, nervy apprehension. She sizes up race odds with the same penetrating, hungry stare as she sizes up her marks and targets - including Roy and his squeeze, Myra Langtry (Annette Bening). Her eyes are directly fixed on the prize, unless she’s not getting what she wants; then they soften and we see a glimpse of Lilly as she likely was before she got ensnared in the long con - if there were indeed ever a time when she wasn’t grifting the odds, putting in a fix. It’s not a good idea to be caught up in Lilly Dillon’s world, but watching it unfurl from afar is a vicarious thrill. Huston’s tremendous performance ensures we’re right there anyway. She plays it as if it were a soul-stripping game of poker.

Further Reading?
Addendum - a few extra notes from Craig
Nathaniel on Anjelica Huston in The Witches (1990)
Prizzi's Honor 25th Anniversary (1985)
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25th Anniversary: Prizzi's Honor(s) and the 1985 Best Picture Race

Every once in a while (i.e. constantly) I'll pick up the classic Inside Oscar to double check an awards factoid. Sometimes I like to hold actual books in my hands rather than play search engines like a piano. So retro! I was looking at 1985 recently -- any '85 babies reading? Happy quarter-century mark -- for Kurosawa's section of that foreign film article. The Best Picture nominees for 85 were The Color Purple, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Out of Africa, Prizzi's Honor and Witness.

"What the hell, Charley, the calendar takes care of everything"

I'd venture to say that from that particular vintage John Huston's Prizzi's Honor is the least discussed now, so I thought I'd give it a spin to celebrate its anniversary on this very day.

Given the overall 1985 nomination field (the Picture nominees hogged 42 nominations all told) it's tough to imagine that any film came close to breaking up that party o' five. But it's always fun to conjecture about 6th place. Perhaps it was actually Kurosawa's Ran (four nominations, though foreign films rarely make that top competition) but maybe it was the surprise Oscar favorite Runaway Train (which showed up in three key categories). It certainly wasn't the critical pet of the year Brazil (too weird for AMPAS) or Woody Allen's miniature masterpiece The Purple Rose of Cairo, shamefully recognized only in Screenplay. It's possible that neither of those classics would have even made a ten wide Best Picture field though perhaps Back to the Future would've, since it was a big enough hit to break into the screenplay field despite being much sillier than Oscar allows.

But I digress.

Aside from the gay arthouse smash Spider Woman, Prizzi's Honor is the most atypical of the nominees. To start with it's a comedy, which automatically makes you the odd man out in any lineup.

"Do I ice her? Do I marry her? Which one of these?"

The film follows the confusion and misadventures of hitman Charley Partanna (Jack Nicholson, winning his 8th nomination) and the troubles that erupt from his dim trust in untrustworthy women: the thieving hitwoman Irene Walker (Kathleen Turner, the preeminent Shady 80s Lady) and his former girl Maerose (Anjelica Huston, Nicholson's real life partner at the time) who both have complicated histories with the Prizzi family that Charley serves. Since it's a comedy and quite eccentric at that, it's tough to imagine Oscar responding had it not come from such a legendary auteur (Huston was 80 by the time the ceremony rolled around and this would be his fourth Best Picture nominee).

I mean it's a strange movie, at once both expansive (multiple characters, multiple cities, and plentiful plot turns) and intimate (most of its spark comes from the nuances of its romances, both sexual and familial) and nearly always arrhythmic. Though the screenplay is whip smart and packed with clever flourishes and exchanges, it's also strangely dull and the pacing is just bizarre. Sometimes there are long passages where nothing is happening (the opening sequence at a mafia wedding goes on for quite some time offering up much less plot and characterization than the time would allow for) and then there'll be too much information all at once in short snappy scenes: Wait, who iced who? who's on whose payroll? What's a pieceman? Who stole whose money and they're hiding it how exactly? So the strangest among its plentiful Oscar nominations might actually be Directing and Editing.

That said, my single favorite beat in the movie is expertly timed, with the direction and editing (and star performers of course) coming together in quite a satisfying manner: I love the abrupt dissolve from the seemingly eternal static shot of Irene & Charley's foolhardy declarations of love (on their first date, mind) to the athletic perpetual motion shot of a marathon f*** in progress, scored with comic bombast. If you're thinking "but dissolves aren't abrupt," well, the beauty is that this one is.

Jack feigns stupidity with comic panache throughout the film and one recurring joke about his sexual shyness works superbly. Kathleen exudes confidence and sex (what else is new) but neither are 'best in show'. The movie is owned by the scandalous Prizzi daughter (Anjelica Huston) and her grandfather, the don (William Hickey) both of whom received Oscar nominations. Anjelica won giving her father the unique distinction of having directed both his father (Walter Huston, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre) and daughter to Oscar wins in his lifetime. Hickey and Huston are both doing heightened, funny, weirdly unnerving turns that mix well with the movie's ambitious comic tone. Still, in keeping with the slippery oddness of the whole enterprise, their one scene together doesn't really pop the way it probably ought to.

Prizzi's Weirdness.

"My gift to you is not only the pictures, but also what they mean."

Despite any reservations one may have about its honored place in the annals of 80s Oscar history, it's maddening that it got such a shabby DVD transfer. This is part of the filmography of one of cinema's most enduring directors. Show a little respect, studios. I'm wondering if there's a good DVD release that did the film justice and I just got the weak one? Anyone know?

Also: Have you seen all of the 1985 Best Picture nominees? Which one gets your vote?
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Streep Nom #9 and Act III: Funny Lady

Streep at 60: We've been looking at each Meryl Streep Oscar nod and its competition. Previously 78, 79, 81, 82 and 83, 85, 87 and 88

I believe that Meryl Streep's film career can be divided into five chapters or acts (thus far).

• Act I (Liberated Lady) 1977-1981
• Act II (Chamaeleonidae Erotica) 1981-1988
• Act III (Funny Lady) 1989-1992
• Act IV (???) 1993-2001
• Act V (The Great Entertainer) 2002-present

After the High Drama years it came as a shock to many when Meryl was suddenly making comedies. Some felt it was a career crisis and there was some backlash going on. This is possibly hard to comprehend for her new young fans but great success always leads to it and many people were sick of Streep's total dominance as the Eighties wound down. It was somewhat common wisdom at the time that her run at the top was ending, having turned 40 in 1989. Several younger stars were coming into their own and beginning to hog the attention: Meg Ryan (27) and Julia Roberts (22) were suddenly fighting for the America's Sweetheart crown, Michelle Pfeiffer (31) was beginning her short run as the dramatic actress, Winona Ryder (18) was inarguably in great demand; Melanie Griffith (32), Geena Davis (33) and Holly Hunter (31) were expected to soar in the Nineties; Ellen Barkin (35), Mimi Rogers (33), Madeleine Stowe (31), Mary Stuart Masterson (23) and Laura Dern (22) were question marks. The list goes on.

Though Meryl had often delivered funny beats in dramatic roles, She-Devil (1989) was her first purely comedic screen role. Some felt she was too broad and few liked the movie as a whole but that didn't slow Meryl on her new course. She followed it up with three more comedies: Postcards From the Edge, Defending Your Life and Death Becomes Her (1992). The fourth, very silly and quite entertaining (which I'll talk about next week), was her first substantial hit since Out of Africa (1985).

Off and onscreen mother & daughter duos at the Postcards From the
Edge premiere: Meryl, Debbie Reynolds, Shirley Maclaine & Carrie Fisher.
Photo via Simply Streep

The second, Postcards..., the best and most dramatic of the comedies, was a minor success financially and gave Meryl her ninth Oscar nomination. This historic event put her ahead of Geraldine Page (8 noms) and behind only Bette Davis (10 noms) and Katharine Hepburn (12 noms) as Oscar's all time favorite gal. For a great write up on Postcards I suggest Nick Davis's astute piece on Meryl as Entertainer. I also suggest reading the original book by Carrie Fisher which is much different than the movie but just as entertaining.

1990 the nominees were

• Kathy Bates, Misery
• Anjelica Huston, The Grifters
• Julia Roberts, Pretty Woman
• Meryl Streep, Postcards from the Edge
• Joanne Woodward, Mr & Mrs. Bridge
  

Other 1990 women for context: The snubbed Drama Globe nominees numbered two: Michelle Pfeiffer (Russia House) and Susan Sarandon (White Palace). The snubbed Comedy Globe nominees numbered three: Demi Moore (Ghost), Mia Farrow (Alice) and Andie MacDowell (Green Card). Other leading women that year were: Debra Winger (The Sheltering Sky), Sandra Bernhard (Without You I'm Nothing), Maria de Medeiros (Henry & June), Cher (Mermaids), Goldie Hawn (Bird on a Wire) and Tracey Ullman (I Love You To Death)

Nathaniel's list: I have still not caught up with Woodward's performance (?Why?) but otherwise my 1990 choices are the nominees Bates, Huston and Streep with the other spots going to two of these four: Mia Farrow, Laura Dern (Wild at Heart), Jessica Lange (Men Don't Leave) and Victorial Abril (Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down).

How do you feel about Meryl's first four screen stabs at comedy and who makes your Best Actress ballot for 1990?
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Fantastic Mr. Fox Sneak

It's a test screening exclusive. My pal "txt critic" strikes again. He managed to get into a test screening of Wes Anderson's animated film Fantastic Mr. Fox. It happened yesterday here in New York. Here's what he had to say about the movie which is based on the Roald Dahl book. Keep in mind that the movie is still a work in progress.

terrific! like a beautiful union of filmmaker and material. you could sense the love and reverence for the dahl story but he absolutely put his stylistic stamp as a filmmaker all over it, without one overwhelming the other. it FELT like what a wes anderson movie would be if animated. same title/caption font, hip soundtrack (though the only song i specifically remember is "i get around" by the beach boys), slo-mo dance sequence

very dry humor. i dont know if it's really for kids

only about 60-70% of the animation was completed, but i loved the look of it -- i'd describe it as akin to James and the Giant Peach meets a diorama

He also informs me that despite early reports and the information on the IMDB page, Cate Blanchett's voice is nowhere to be heard. It's Meryl Streep supplying the pipes for "Mrs. Fox". George Clooney, as you already know, voices the title character. My friend thought the voicework was excellent -- none of the dip in quality you sometimes get when filmmakers feel the need to have all celebrity voices [*cough* every studio but Pixar]. Sadly, Anjelica Huston has but a voice cameo (the other bit voice players are Brian Cox and Owen Wilson). Come on, Wes ... she's earned a front and center role by now. Next time, maybe?


txt critic ,who isn't even a quarter-century old, also tried to convince me that he was the oldest person there. Apparently the invites were asking for 18-32 and the crowd was heavily NYU students in Wes Anderson appropriate garb: tweet jackets, black rimmed glasses, pork pie hats, etc... "preaching to the choir so to speak" he says.

Fox Searchlight title cards are on the movie though previous reports have suggested it's a big Fox (as in 20th Century) releasing it. Whichever, it's FOX. Appropriate, no? The current release date is in November but if it's only 70% finished.... ???
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$100 Million. No Questions Asked.

Twitch asked a great question on Friday that has been dancing around in my head naked all day: which auteur would you like to see handed a huge pile of money ($100 mil') and complete freedom to make whatever the hell kind of picture they wanted to make with it? Our pal JA answered (always worth a read) and I should, too.

My five.

Jonathan Glazer. Birth and Sexy Beast are both so well directed and imagined with limited budgets. They're also the kind of features that scream 'this director will have trouble getting his films financed!' Imagine how pissed the cinephiles of 2050 are going to be if his feature career ends with Birth, only his second, a movie that will undoubtedly be revered by then.

Terry Gilliam. He makes every list like this... and that's out of more than pity. Even when he doesn't have a lot of money, the visuals are memorable. And an always fascinating if not always great filmography that includes Baron Munchausen, Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, Tideland, The Brothers Grimm, Brazil, The Fisher King ... he so deserves a major comeback.


Paul Thomas Anderson. Because, for such a contemporary auteur, he does period incredibly well (Boogie Nights & There Will Be Blood) and I love that its hard to predict what he'll come up with. That said he's never going to get $100 million to work with since he's never made a sizable hit. That's the audience's fault, not his. His films are so thrilling. Why isn't everyone lining up every opening weekend? He should be a household name by now.

Warren Beatty. Mostly because I want to see him work again one last time. He's getting up there in years (72) and he's only directed four pictures: Heaven Can Wait, Reds, Dick Tracy, Bulworth; none of them looked cheap so he'd need a lot of money to play with. No conditions but if there's another Reds in him, my god it needs to come out.

I'm cheating for the last picture with both conditions, cast and theme. I want a Women's Picture omnibus film. Each entry must be as obsessed with actresses as your average Almodóvar picture and Dianne Wiest must appear in all ten segments.

portraits from Portroids

Other suggested cast members: Kristin Scott Thomas, Julianne Moore, Jane Fonda, Kerry Washington, Samantha Morton, Emmanuelle Béart, Holly Hunter, Ari Graynor, Ludivine Sagnier and Catherine O'Hara. The following 10 directors gets $10 million and 10 minutes for their entry: Lynne Ramsay, Jonathan Demme, Claire Denis, Jane Campion, Richard Linklater, Wes Anderson (but only if it's completely about Angelica Huston), Patrice Chéreau, Brad Bird, Brian de Palma and Jodie Foster (provided her segment is an abbreviated version of Flora Plum. That's the only way we're ever seeing it)

I know that only 20 people would buy tickets but I love all 19 of you who'd join me in the theater.
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Kiss Her She's Irish

Happy St Patrick's Day


From three of the most successful Irish actresses (not a lot of Irish actresses seem to make a massive silver screen mark) to hit Hollywood: fascinating Anjelica Huston, endearing Maureen O'Hara and the goddess Greer Garson.


Contemporary actresses of varying degrees of Irishness that must be kissed today: Kathy Bates, Fiona Shaw, Rose McGowan, Jennifer Connelly, Allyson Hannigan (Willow), Kristen Bell (Veronica), Heather Graham and Janeane Garofalo. Did I forget anyone? Hollywood likes Irish men much more. Too many to list!

To read previous posts on any of these actresses, click the labels below
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Red Carpet Rendezvous

Checking in with a random sampling of stars @ events this past week or so, all of them sized to represent their actual heights. Because I'm anal like that. I like to keep you (and myself) guessing about who I might include.

individual images

Remember when Chlöe Sevigny was like the "it" fashion girl. What happened to that? And what happened to her acting --is it just me or has she been a little dull lately onscreen. I'm thinking of Zodiac and Manderlay? Angelica Huston still goes to things... but apparently only Wes Anderson remembers that's she's quite a great actress. I'm including Brooke Smith because now that she's been unceremoniously dumped from Grey's Anatomy... maybe filmmakers can remember that she's been all kinds of terrific in movies like Vanya on 42nd Street and Silence of the Lambs and Series 7: The Contenders and maybe without a television contract bogging her down, they ought to throw some interesting supporting roles her way. I'm just saying. Lukas Haas still looks like a little boy, albeit a 6' 1" 30 year-old boy. We'll always have Witness (1985). Pink! I know she's not a film person but so what... she's still a rock star (plus I love her so I must include). And finally Regina King. Remember how hard she worked her big moment in Ray? Remember how sweetly funny she was in The Year of the Dog? Apparently casting directors do not. What's wrong with them?
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Ethelink Tenenbaum

Self Styled Siren "Scenes From Cinematic Scorekeepers" on the reappraisals of Bergman and how all directors are subject to ebb and flow of critical love
By Ken Levine a fun perceptive review of The Bourne Ultimatum
<--- Coming Soon Angelica Huston is guest-starring on Medium for six episodes. In movies buzz I'm hearing that her role in The Darjeeling Limited is small in screentime but major in plot and impact. I'd love to see her back in the Oscar mix, wouldn't you? And it'd be sweet to see that happen by way of Wes Anderson who keeps casting her. Should I move her up the Supporting Actress Oscar chart?
popbytes Annie Lennox is back
IDLRZ has an interview w/ stage star and film actor Denis O'Hare (Rocket Science, A Mighty Heart)

Angelica Huston is Grand (High Witch)

Reader Request

The Witches (1990)
Roald Dahl's macabre children's books are classics but they're resistant to movie transitions. Their memorable grotesqueries get smoothed over or the films don't get made at all. He disowned the film version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The most successful recent adaptation is arguably James and the Giant Peach. Before that stop motion film arrived, Nicolas Roeg transferred The Witches to celluloid. The resulting film is a seldom discussed oddity that's primarily remembered for an overacheiving star turn from Angelica Huston. She plays the Grand High Witch, "the most evil woman in creation".

The Witches sets itself apart from other children's fantasy films straightaway. It begins with an grandmother/grandson conversation which is notable for its matter of fact harshness. This grandmother (Mai Zetterling) isn't at all concerned with giving her grandson Luke (Jasen Fisher) nightmares. She simply lays out all the ways in which you can spot witches and details how they do away with unsuspecting children. Adding to the frankess of her storytelling is the handheld camera work which is used in several scenes. It's hard to miss because you don't often see it in children's films, which are invariably slick. The camera choices contribute to the movies roughness which suits the material in tone but doesn't always add up in entertainment value. What's onscreen seems hampered by a limited budget: the sets don't have a lot of character, many scenes look flat, and some visual effects are too lo-fi. The entire budget seems to have been directed to the makeup effects which, to be fair, are very successful at being both creepily sick and sickly funny. Yet, given the over produced nature of many successful children's films; Lemony Snicket, Harry Potter, The Cat in the Hat, The Grinch and the rest tend to err on the side of overkill, this might be points in The Witches favor... depending on your point of view.

Divisive reactions to the storytelling and production values aside, there's one element that's a complete and total success: Angelica Huston.

Continue reading The Witches for more on its unique and award-winning star turn.

Actress + Performance: A to L

For no apparent reason I will now list my favorite performances by the top 17 actresses (in descending order) from the A to L poll last week.
* if a title is in all caps that means the performance would likely place somewhere in my all time lists for Best Lead Actress performance *

Nicole Kidman
1. Moulin Rouge! 2. Birth3. To Die For
Jodie Foster
1. Nell 2. Silence of the Lambs 3. Taxi Driver
Holly Hunter
1. THE PIANO 2. thirteen 3. Living Out Loud
Diane Keaton
1. ANNIE HALL 2. Looking for Mr. Goodbar 3. Reds
Glenn Close
1. DANGEROUS LIAISONS 2. Fatal Attraction 3. The World According to Garp
Joan Allen
1. The Upside of Anger 2. The Crucible 3. The Bourne Supremacy
Kathy Bates
1. Misery 2. Primary Colors 3. Titanic
Jessica Lange
1. Tootsie 2. Men Don't Leave 3. A Thousand Acres
Jane Fonda
1. KLUTE 2. 9 to 5 3. The Morning After
Judi Dench
1. Shakespeare in Love 2. Mrs. Brown 3. A Room with a View
Salma Hayek
1. Frida 2. TimeCode 3. Desperado
Judy Davis
1. Husbands and Wives 2. The Ref 3. A Passage to India
Julie Christie
1. McCabe & Mrs Miller 2. Afterglow 3. Shampoo
Sally Field
1. Norma Rae 2. Steel Magnolias 3. Places in the Heart
Madelin Kahn
1. Paper Moon 2. Young Frankenstein 3. Clue
Annette Bening
1. Being Julia 2. The Grifters 3. American Beauty
Angelica Huston
1. THE GRIFTERS 2. Prizzis Honor 3. The Witches