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Showing posts with label Kate Winslet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kate Winslet. Show all posts
Sunday, 10 July 2011
I’ve already covered Revolutionary Road in Scene On A Sunday when I looked at the final argument between April and Frank. But, this is Sunday Openings, so I guess I’m allowed to revisit. There’s a pervading sense of claustrophobia through the entire film, our main couple are trapped in suburbia; so it makes sense that the opening is cosmopolitan and liberated.
The location established we move inside, and the first person we spot is April. That, right there, is my favourite shot of the scene above. I’ve already spoken about how much I love Kate’s smoking in this film and she looks so glamorous. For such an eclectic actress, I wish that Kate would do a film where she really allows herself to let go and be as glamorous as she could. What makes those potentially maudlin dreams of April work is that we can imagine a life where Kate could be the glamorous actress April had hoped she’d become. This makes her failed dreams so much more devastating.
Frank (OS: “So, what do you do?”
April: “I’m studying to be an actress. You?”
Frank: “I’m a longshoreman.”
April: “No, I mean really.”
Frank: “I mean really, too. Although, starting next Monday. I’ll be doing something a little more glamorous.”
April: “What’s that?”
Frank: “Night cashier at a cafeteria”
April: “I don’t mean how you make money. I mean, what are you interested in.”
Frank: “Honey, if I had the answer to that one I bet I’d bore us both to death in half an hour.
Mendes and Justin Hayte (the writer) seem to milking the Titanic romance here. I'd imagine that dissenters would be unmoved by the overly romantic opening, even as it segues into that romantic dance sequence.
And the final shot of vignette switches to a tense Frank in the present.
I love to go in for over-analysis and for me, I find that Revolutionary Road is saturated with layers upon layers. It’s not clear whether what we just saw is a memory or real. The thing about memories is that they always seem better in retrospect and taking into context what we come to know about April – and Frank, especially – they’re the type of people who dream big. The glossiness of that flashback that opens the seem is the sort of clichéd meet-cutes that real people only dream which makes us wonder if it was as lovely in reality. Surely, if April was really as glamorous as she seems at the opening she’d have been a successful actress? But, we don’t know any of this yet. We’ve got an opening that hooks us, and then we get the eyes of a hardened Frank lost in thought.
A shot of a play that seems to have underwhelmed its audience...
And we get a shot of April, acting, but from all evidence unsuccessfully.
As far as hooking the audience goes Mendes and co. accomplish it in under 3 minutes because immediately we’re wondering – what went wrong? And, for me, the rest of Revolutionary Road makes good on that promise giving us a play by play of what did.
What do you think of the film's opening?
Wednesday, 6 April 2011
Heavenly Creatures is an especially succinct film (especially for a quasi-biopic) clocking in at just about 100 minutes. What makes it so special, though, is how saturated with different themes it is and for me it’s the power and implicit danger to be found in imagination that always me thinking when the credits role. I was one of those children who grew up allowed to watch even the goriest of films, so I was Heavenly Creatures well before I was into my teens. The ever looming figure of Diello was a constant source of terror for me the first time I saw it and while re-watching it this week, Diello remains as the most visceral source of terror in the film and Jackson’s decisions to mark the alternate universe with clay figures instead of actors always makes me ruminate.
The first shot of Diello is so incidental as the bedridden Juliet makes him in the hospital. It’s all about perspective, and there’s little terror to be found in something so small and unanimated. Even that close-up of the “toy” is hardly appalling....and yet...
And it’s such a marked difference from Diello’s next appearance, less than ten minutes later when the priest arrives to “deliver” Juliet. His image is obscured by the priest, and yet it’s terrifying.
Even though that baleful image of Diello is Juliet’s projection, but it never fails to shock me – even now that I’m all grown up, sort of. It underscores the whole issue of perspective, really, which is something the film touches on effectively. It’s one thing for us to create imaginary worlds, children are so constantly playing “house” with their toys – pretending they’re real, even some in their teens but we take comfort in the fact that these things can’t really happen which is why my favourite shot of the film always haunts me.
It goes to show that my favourite shot of the film is also the one I find most horrific, and there really is little that’s expressly horrific about the shot of the clay figures in the throes of passion, but never before has lovemaking seemed so menacing. Which makes me return to my question: why clay? Had Jackson realised the imaginary world as if it were real this shot would have none of its profundity but it marks – for me – the film’s strongest theme. As much as we try to immerse ourselves, there’s something significantly grotesque about forcing imaginary things to be real. It’s a bit of a stretch, but it makes me think of the Tennyson poem “The Lady of Shallot” – when the woman in the tower, indicative of the artist in the imaginary world, goes down into the real world she’s destroyed – the two can’t mix. And it’s the same with the clay figures. The act of sex seems almost like an explicitly human which only underscores the unnaturalness of the image, before they were strange....but now they just seem particularly disturbing. There’s something distinctly awry in the images which their realisation in clay emphasises. It’s a brilliant decision on Jackson’s part, he’s always been a visual director and the decision here is not just aesthetically based it highlights one of the film’s more profound themes – the dichotomy between illusion and reality.
This is a part of Nathaniel's series Hit Me With Your Best Shot.
Friday, 1 April 2011
I haven’t linked in sometime, which is because I haven’t been reading in some time. I’m SO busy, and I keep adding new things to my schedule. On top of that I still haven’t seen any 2010 film – I feel like such a failure!!!! But, I digress on with the links, despite all the ramblings amidst the links - these links do come in peace...
It's been some time since Paolo posted this, but I have to single this post out because Sense & Sensibility is amazing. The end. (Image courtesy of Paolo, too.)
I don't love Alicia Silverstone, but I do like her. Like so many actors she just hasn't been able to keep up that momentum that she started with. Nicholas takes a look at her trajectory.
Weird confession, I was interested in seeing Sucker Punch after seeing Bright Star five times last months (no lie) and I felt like seeing Abbie in something new. I knew I was barking up the wrong tree, I knew it wasn't going to be Campionesque, but the reviews have been abysmal. But of the ashes of Sucker Punch comes this great article from Univarn.
I always think of actors and their types. Sure, I think Kate is the greatest actor who ever lived, but she does have a type, which makes me often think of the word "typecast". Castor takes a look at 10 typecast actors...but I often wonder about the great actors, think of the other Kate. She's Little Children, Revolutionary Road, Mildred Pierce, The Reader - three of them mothers, each of them women with secrets to hide, some big some small, almost stifled by their deep emotions and misunderstood by their peers. Typecasted?
Isn't it nice to see that one of Luke's three favourite films is Beauty & the Beast? It's such a timeless piece of cinema, and definitely one of the strongest films from Disney, hell it's one of the strongest films in animation (the strongest if you ask me).
This is an interesting list from Candice featuring comedic actors who've done excellent dramatic work. I don't agree with all her choices (I'll never love a certain performance from 2004) but it's a fine list featuring some brilliant choices - especially Joel Barrish. Now, I want a list of dramatic actors who do brilliant comedic work.
I love Ryan's TV report, especially his words on The Good Wife because Archie Panjabi is AWESOME! The end. I've only recently caught up on the entire season, but GAH I love her, still don't really care for Julianna Marguiles, though but more on that tomorrow.
Thursday, 31 March 2011
I don’t pay the closest attentions to the mini-series and movie events that often occur on cable television. It’s hard enough finding time to get through the mire of films released a year without the addition of more. Still, the option of not seeing Todd Hayne’s adaptation of the novel Mildred Pierce was not even an option. The Joan Crawford one appears in my top 100 films, but all for richer adaptations of novel which is what makes the television format such a perfect home to novels of significant size.
It’s odd, but the first name in the credits that stood out for me was Ann Roth as the costume designer. Roth’s name doesn’t emerge as often as Sandy Powell or Colleen Atwood, or even Jenny Beavan but she is an Oscar winning designer and I couldn’t help but notice over the span of the first two episodes how costumes emerge as a significant part of characterisation.
I love, for example this first dress we see Melissa Leo in. The garishness of its brightness in an odd way seems to augment the simplicity and practicality of it; clothes are more than important for taking us from period to period it’s almost as if that costume transforms Melissa Leo who’s so excellent here. And Leo is quite good here. Her Lucy overflows with a sincerity which makes even her occasional lack of finesse (in light of her staunch level-headedness) strangely appealing. She is an actor with control over voice, but it’s her fluidity of expressions which wins me over here – consistently more sincere than her work in The Fighter.
That sense of sincerity is evident throughout the entire two hours, Haynes is a slow director – not in a negative sense, but he lets everything ruminate before he leaves it. He loves to have his camera travel – almost sensuously, at times – over the surroundings. And the cohesiveness if excellent.
Here again, the costumes jump out at me. It’s the style of Mildred juxtaposed with the normalcy of the waitress that emerges first, but the choice of brownness by Roth makes her seem so pallid, almost unobtrusive. Admittedly, in Part Two there are those odd moments of excess where the movement seems especially dawdling – but I can’t ever say of Haynes that he doesn’t have a purpose to his technique.
And good grief – this thing is brilliantly casted.
Kate Winslet: A (highlight in Episode 1)
Melissa Leo: B+ (highlight in Episode 1)
Mare Winngingham: B+ (highlight in Episode 2)
Morgan Turner: B/B+ (highlight in Episode 2)
Brian F. O’Byrne: B/B+ (highlight in Episode 2)
James LeGros: B (highlight in Episode 2)
Quinn McLoglan: B (highlight in Episode 2)
Guy Pearce: B
Have you been following the mini-series?
Tuesday, 22 March 2011
Wednesday, 9 March 2011
My favourite post of this week is one that amuses me to no end, which is not to say that Nicholas isn't completely earnest in his proclamations. I'll always have his best interests at heart because he's as big a fan of Titanic as I (more so, even) and he returns to a decade long (and more) quest to Give Kate Winslet Back her Oscar (his words not mine).Jose's finally getting down to his year-end awards and his list of Supporting Men and Supporting Women are both fine. As is expected, the list of full of some interesting surprises. Love his #1 on both counts, so I can't complain.
Tom gives an especially rousing look at The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, tying it to current (American) times. It's a particularly good read.
Univarn loves to feign madness, but he's always ready to point out some astute things. Case in point this VERY pertinent entry on film criticism.
I couldn't help but notice two reviews of The Sting around hereabouts recently, one by the aforementioned Nicholas (here) and one by Paolo (here). Am I the only who loves this film without reservations?
Addendum
Hmmm, apparently I can't count...seven links. Whatever.
Friday, 12 November 2010
I was up early in the morning a few days ago and The Reader was on, I tuned in at that specific scene where Hana and Michael are in the bedroom. Though, in all honesty they do spend half their time there, but I digress. It’s Michael’s birthday and he’s annoyed that Hana doesn’t even seem interested. “You looking for a fight kid?” No, I didn’t get some massive epiphany about how this scene was some sort of metaphor for the general reaction to The Reader back in 2008, and its eventual Oscar glory. It’s even less a summation of the gravity of the film, but watching it – yes, I did end up watching the entire thing from there – I wondered why The Reader is called a pretentious Holocaust flick. Your guess is as good as mine to whether or not it’s pretentious, but Holocaust? That seems like a stretch. I saw The Reader for the first time back in 2008 the same day that I saw Revolutionary Road which culminated in a one-two punch of complete depression. I liked them both, and I’ve seen the latter countless times even if it’s not the easiest film to sit through but for some reason I haven’t seen The Reader since. It’s odd, I bought the DVD – I still have it, but I’ve never watched it. It’s not meant to be a slight to the film, because it still is as good as I thought it was – better even, but I’m not sure what it was that stopped me from seeing it again.
What struck me most upon rewatching it was how quickly the first act goes. It’s the most generic portion of the film, but it also seems in many ways to be the strongest. I’m a big fan of Ralph Fiennes but he’s not as essential to the film’s plot as the poster would have you believe and even Kate who appears in the past and present is not as irreplaceable to the narrative. Sure, she gives the strongest performance but it’s up to David Kross as young Michael to ensure that first half (and more) of The Reader. I’ve gleaned from IMDB that he has a number of upcoming projects and his performance here ranks among my favourites of 08 even if he was virtually ignored. What I appreciate most about the narrative is its slowness to cast judgement on either Hana or Michael. Depending on who you speak to, both of them are being morally reprehensible – and I’m not talking about the court case in the middle of the film. The thing is, I could care less about the legality of their affair and Daldry and Hare manage to make it work, romantic even. It’s an odd partnership but it really is brilliant watching Kross and Winslet together.
It seems unfair that somewhere along the line The Reader is given the moniker of “holocaust film”, anyone who leaves the film with the trial in the middle as the most significant plot point doesn’t seem like someone who paid keen attention to it. True, the trial is an important arc and that potential dissonance that occurs when considering whether or not Hana should be guilty so many years after the fact is probably the point – but the point of the film is more than just that. Calling it a character study isn’t a copout – that’s the bare essentials of what it’s about really. Stephen Daldry is lucky to have such a successful streak, Oscar-wise, but he’s even more lucky to have directed three successful films each of which is starkly different from the others. True, The Reader doesn’t resonate as much as The Hours or Billy Elliot but I still say it’s one well worth watching.
Where do you stand on The Reader?
Sunday, 17 October 2010
Kate Winset has a very distinctive face. It’s not a shallow thing, she is beautiful, but she’s adept at expressing her feelings with her face, and the camera loves her. I’m a fan of her work in Revolutionary Road (evidence), as I am of DiCaprio’s (evidence) and even though it just might be one of the most harrowing portrayals of a marriage gone wrong it’s still fascinating to watch. My favourite scene in the film occurs towards the end, when everything has already begun to self-destruct. Frank and April’s impractical dreams of living as bohemians are given up – April’s pregnant and Frank is not as enthused about the move as he pretends to be. After John Givings turns up to put in some last minute lacerations in the already tenuous relationship it all comes to a close.
I love that shot of Kate there. She’s been sitting with cigarette in her hand for the majority of John’s tirade which has just ended. It’s almost painful to watch her expression, and it’s one of the beauty of watching Kate. She’s so good at emoting. But I love the next shot even more.
She moves from vulnerable to stoic in a matter of seconds, April may not be a good actress – but she’s an actress nonetheless.
Frank: “Okay, okay. Don’t tell me. Let me guess, I made a disgusting spectacle of myself, right?”
April: “Right.”
Frank: “Everything that made said is true, right? Is that what you were gonna say?”
April: “Apparently I don’t have to. You’re saying it for me.”
Frank: “Well, you’re wrong, April.”
April: “Really? Why am I wrong?”
The Wheeler couple are like a box of explosives. The slightest motivation and they start shooting sparks at each other. In the argument of consistency Kate outweighs DiCaprio but they’re both doing work that’s close to their best and they’re evenly matched throughout.
Frank: “Because the man is insane, he’s fucking insane. Do you know what the definition of insanity is? ”
April: “No! Do you?”
That immediate reaction of laughter from April is one of the scariest moments in the film. Though I wouldn’t call her crazy, she does a good job of pretending to be.Frank: “Yes, it’s the inability to relate to another human being. It’s the inability to love.”
I love how Kate plays it: it’s not so much real amusement as it is hysteria, and Frank is just there confused.
Frank: “April, April. April! APRIL!”
April: “The ina – the inability, oh, oh. Oh, Frank: you really are a wonderful talker.”
And then her about face from superficial delight to the harsh coldness...
April: “If black could be made into white by talking, you’d be the man for the job! So, now I’m crazy because I don’t love you. Right, is that the point?”
The thing is, though Kate is getting the bulk of the lines here DiCaprio’s reactions are just as important. It’s one of the brilliance of Mendes direction. Whenever a quasi-monologue comes up he’s careful to gauge the other’s reaction.
Frank: “No, you’re wrong. You’re not crazy, and you do love me. That’s the point, April.”
Honestly, I’d never see DiCaprio as the kind of guy who could talk a bird off a tree but he manages to make himself believable as a potential seducer and as a pathetic man.
April: “But, I don’t. I hate you.”
There goes Kate again with that preciseness that’s not too technical. These few lines are more important for seeing Frank’s reaction, though it’s anyone’s guess if April really means them.
April: “You were just some boy who made me laugh at a part once, and now I loathe the sight of you.”
The emotions that he goes through there works, Frank might be weak and potentially despicable but April knows where to hit him the hardest. He really does love his family.
April: “In fact, if you come any closer; if you touch me or anything, I think I’ll scream.”
What a pair of lungs, you can’t hear...but it’s loud.
I know it’s wrong to find this amusing, but that mutinous look of satisfaction April gives when it’s over is scary and funny at the same time woman on the verge...
And then, Frank’s reaction to it...
And off they go, round 2 (or 200)
Frank: “FUCK YOU, APRIL. Fuck you, and all your hateful...”
April: “What are you gonna do now? Are you gonna hit me, to show me how much you love me?”
Frank: “Don’t worry, I can’t be bothered. You’re not worth the trouble it would take to hit you, you’re not worth the powder it would take to blow you up. You are an empty, empty, hollow shell of a woman.”
And now Frank has the floor and April’s reactions become important, a sort of a blance...of we can call it that. This particular of shot of DiCaprio is my favourite of his in the scene.
Frank is the sort of emotionally man who has trouble with his emotions. That makes this portion of the film so poignant.
Frank: “I mean: what the hell are you doing in my house if you hate me so much? Why the hell were you married to me? What the hell are you doing carrying my child? I mean, why didn’t you just get rid of it when you first had the chance? Because, listen to me – listen to me, I got news for you. I wish to God that you had!”
But in the end we must return to Kate’s face, just like at the beginning...
April’s so good at putting her defences up, those moments of vulnerability are a treasure.
And then she begins thinking, we can see the wheels moving in her head...
She’s got her plan right there. Why doesn’t she get rid of the baby? It's the expressions like that that make me remember April the most...just brilliant.
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