*Which is sort of redundant... a half-full/half-empty kind of statement. And of course it goes without saying that you don’t need, nor did you ask for, my permission to do either (or both).
5.) Natalie Portman I made this pick based on two roles: M
athilda in The Professional* (aka Leon aka The Cleaner) and Alice in Closer, the second strongest acting performance (eclipsed only by Clive Owen’s) in what is in my opinion the most well-acted** movie of the past decade. Her career as a whole, however, has been spotty at best, stained by her performances in the Star Wars prequels, though this was not entirely her fault (more on the Lucas-factor later) and Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium, one of the worst-reviewed movies of 2007. Thus her position at the end of the list.****At the risk of showing my bias here, I fell just skull over ankles in love with her because of this movie. And no, it’s not gross—I was thirteen at the time, and she’s three months older than I am.
**Yeah, “most well-acted” may be the most awkward, clunky phrase ever to dirty up the English language. One of those clichés borne out of no better way to say a thing.
***Or beginning, as it were. Though the beginning’s really the end in this case. I think countdowns (as opposed to countups) have more dramatic effect.
4.) Kate Winslet One of the
most underrated actresses out there. She has overcome the Titanic stigma by posting outstanding performances in film after film, with four in particular coming to mind: Quills, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Finding Neverland and Little Children. She has one of the rarest qualities you can find in an actor—range—and I expect more good things from her in the years to come.3.) Gwyneth Paltrow Again, some bias slipping in here. I’m a card-carrying, meeting-attending Gwynaholic. Have been since the mid-‘90s when she hit it big with Se7en, (actually caught my first
glimpse in ’91—I distinctly recall thinking the young Wendy in Hook was the prettiest girl I’d ever seen in my life (I was ten)). She won an Oscar for Shakespeare in Love, but that doesn’t represent her best work. Gwyneth moved out of the ‘crush’ category and into the ‘amazing actresses I happen to find gorgeous’ category with Proof, for which she was nominated for a Golden Globe but snubbed by the Academy.*Subcategory: Projected Names of Gwyneth's Next 5 Children:
1.) Avocado
2.) Possum
3.) Broofus
4.) Methuselah
5.) Helmet
*In favor of a handful of actresses whose films I didn’t see (and so won’t disparage them unjustly), Hillary Swank (Million Dollar Baby, for which she won—deservingly,** I think, though I can’t be sure, I guess, not having seen the others, as stated above) and my #4, Kate Winslet (for Eternal Sunshine).
**Stephen: I’ve been shopping at Lolly’s, as you can tell. And you were right, happiness did wash over me.
2.) Dame Judi Dench I feel sort of poser-ish putting her at number two—it implies a much deeper patronage/kn
owledge of her career than I possess. According to the always reliable, Michael Scott-approved Wikipedia, she received her formal training onstage in London as a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. But I first got to know her as ‘M,’ James Bond’s boss, saw her again in Shakespeare in Love and then again in The Shipping News, which was the film that won me over. Like her male counterpart and fellow knight, Sir Anthony Hopkins, she’s one of those actors you don’t want to look away from when they’re onscreen—not even for a second—for fear of missing something special.1.) Cate Blanchett Yeah, I know. Such a conventional cho
ice. But sometimes the reason a convention becomes a convention is because it’s true. While there was some preliminary shifting around of #’s 2-5, I never doubted my #1 spot: Ms. Blanchett held it from the beginning. Elizabeth,* Lord of the Rings, The Shipping News (a minor part, but a good point of reference with respect to her range), The Aviator, Babel, Notes on a Scandal, I’m Not There (one of the strangest, most compelling performances I’ve seen to date), et cetera.** More than any other actor I can think of, male or female, she seems to approach each subsequent project as a challenge to reinvent herself. But unlike the majority of those who attempt this, she has the talent to pull it off.*Don’t be fooled into thinking it’s a chick flick just because it involves a love story. For one, Geoffrey Rush is in it, and he kills people.
**So yeah, Kingdom of the Crystal Skull fits somewhere in here (spoilers ahead: don’t read on if you haven’t seen it yet and want to go in fresh), which brings me to the Lucas-factor, the ability of this modern filmmaking icon, draped in Millennium Falcon-adorned laurels, to draw more talent to his recent projects than he knows what to do with. And I mean that in a literal sense.
Not only is the new Indy movie the worst film George Lucas has ever made (and that’s saying a lot in light of The Phantom Menace), it’s the worst movie Harrison Ford has ever made as well (and that’s saying a whole hell of a lot in light of Hollywood Homicide). An insultingly predictable and lazily-constructed plot, one-dimensional and often incoherent character development, a slew of missed opportunities (not the least of which are underutilized actors—LaBeouf’s natural charm is wasted on a tough-guy greaser caricature while Blanchett is constricted to a sword-wielding stick-figure Communist whose motivations are never really articulated), almost no charm whatsoever (not entirely Ford’s fault, by the way—no one could’ve delivered those lines with any semblance of charisma (but his acting is also pretty bad)), too absurd and over-the-top even for an Indiana Jones film (yeah, I’m thinking of LaBeouf’s vine-swinging and the nuclear blast/fridge scene at the beginning with those cute little gophers a la Caddyshack—for a second it felt like I was watching a Pixar flick). Ultimately, it played more like the reunion episode of a sitcom than a feature film, a movie high on its own nostalgia, much to the detriment of the end product. This guy sums it up pretty well, I think.
And it would be a mistake to blame the director, because this is not a Spielberg movie—I refuse to believe the guy who made Munich could turn out something like this. Even his lower-tier efforts (Lost World, War of the Worlds, etc.) are pretty solid, respectable films, overall. No, George called the shots on this one. Spielberg, artistically crippled by Lucas’s close involvement with the project (and hesitant to give honest script notes that might have saved the film (but tested their friendship)), just worked the camera, kept his mouth shut, and now he’s stuck with it.
It’s like the guy whose wife gives him a wool sweater for his birthday. All the seams are crooked, the arms are too short and it’s a bright fluorescent orange. But even though it’s ugly as sin he wears it with pride, never saying a word, because he loves her, bless her heart, and he knows it took her five months to knit it.
Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is the orange sweater Lucas knitted for Spielberg. The real tragedy is that he used to be pretty handy with a needle.
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