No, you haven't escaped my posts on Premiere's 100 Greatest Performances list - muahahahaha! I stopped doing them for a while because I couldn't get hold of a copy of #85, among other things. But now I've seen it, so back to the list I go!
86. Robert Walker as Bruno Anthony Strangers on a Train (1951) ( Collapse )
85. Jessica Lange as Frances Farmer Frances (1982) ( Collapse )
87. John Wayne as Ethan Edwards The Searchers (1956)
One of the greatest Westerns ever made - possibly THE greatest. It's difficult not to like John Wayne, but his antihero Ethan takes some effort to feel affection for. He spends years looking for his niece Lucy. Eventually the drive to find Lucy becomes, for Ethan, a desire to find her and kill her - because she has been assimilated into the culture of the Indians that Ethan despises so deeply. This is a really meaty character that gave Wayne a chance to show that he was much more than a walk and a talk.
This film shows its age in the area of racial sensitivity, but in all other respects it is a masterpiece. A true piece of art that explores the gray areas of Western "heroes" - no small feat for a movie of its time.
Still chipping away at the Premiere list, and YAY! One I had seen before starting this project!
88. Christopher Walken as Nick Chevotarevich The Deer Hunter (1978)
This is the kind of movie that could only have been made in the 1970s. Incredibly raw and unafraid to demand our attention for as long as it needs to. The first 30 minutes or so are very atypical for the opening of a movie. That section of the movie is entirely devoted to establishing characters and their relationships with one another, and it almost all takes place at a wedding. We need that - we need those introductions to set us up for what these characters go through for the rest of the film.
Robert De Niro plays the main character Michael. He represents us - our eyes and ears, and the voice of hard-earned experience through a war that no one understood. But Walken's character, Nick, is the real heart of the film. At the time the film was made, Walken was a gorgeous man, something that certainly didn't hurt him in portraying the epitome of innocence lost. When he and his fellow soldiers are being forced to play Russian Roulette early in the film, it breaks him. You can see the torture all over his face. Then later, when we see him for the last time - again playing Russian Roulette, but this time by choice - the change is breathtaking. He doesn't even recognize his best friend who has come back to Vietnam to take him home and even spits in his face. When he puts the gun to his head and pulls the trigger, he barely blinks. His face is hollow, his big, beautiful eyes are blank, and he couldn't care less what happens to him - because, in every way that matters, he's already dead.
An incredible performance in an incredible movie - but perhaps one that you can't watch that often. This is a movie that hurts to watch.
It's been ages, but I'm finally going back to my posts on Premiere magazine's 100 Greatest Performances list.
89. Gong Li as Juxian Farewell My Concubine (1993)
Yeah, so this is where I suddenly become an uncultured boob, because I just didn't get this movie. I mean, yes it's very tragic and epic - and it looks absolutely gorgeous. But ... I didn't feel for the characters as much as I probably should have. And the culture barrier was a bit too much for me with this movie. I didn't understand the historical context very well, and that is a huge part of what motivates the characters and pushes the story forward.
Gong Li plays Juxian, a former prostitute who comes between two men that star together in the Peking Opera and have been friends since childhood. She struck me as the most sympathetic character in the story, and she is certainly not your average "other woman." She accepts that her husband is loved deeply by another man, and she is understanding almost to a fault. Her greatest moment is the last time we see her face, after she concedes (as it appeared to me, at least) defeat to Douzi.
I probably would have enjoyed it much more if I were more familiar with Chinese history and culture, but I didn't connect with this film at all, except for in fleeting moments.
Looking forward to a new episode of House tonight, but especially the season finale of Veronica Mars. Who was really behind the bus crash???? I'm dying to know!
On to another notch on the Premiere performance list...
96. Judy Holliday as Billie Dawn Born Yesterday (1950)
Like many movies that have standout performances, Born Yesterday is kind of "meh" as a film. It's kind of straddling the line between classic and contemporary. But Judy Holliday is just marvelous - and, to own the truth, quite relatable. There were lots of times during the movie when I would cringe with empathy for her. I've been her loads of times in my life.
What's interesting about her is that she's not dumb - she's actually quite bright. She's just never been exposed to books and newspapers and the other things that educate the people of the world. No one has cared to show her or teach her anything, because a woman like her (in the opinion of some) doesn't really need to know things like that.
It's extremely fun to watch her discover things and think for herself. And, though I'm not fond of soapboxes, I think this movie was an appropriate place to express the notion that ignorance is a dangerous thing.
Gandhi who? Seriously, this is about as 180-degree different from Kingsley's most lauded role as it is possible to be. Sexy Beast is about a retired gangster who is doing his best to say "no" to a request from his old crime buddy Don (Kingsley) to un-retire and do another job.
Don is psychotic. What is so scary about him is his unpredictability. He can be incredibly violent as well as incredibly still. And he interchanges the violence and stillness with an alarming ease. Loads of other cinema "bad boys" have made an impression with their stillness or calmness. Marlon Brando stroking that cat in The Godfather, Anthony Hopkins just standing behind that plexiglass in Silence of the Lambs, etc. But Kingsley's stillness seems much more sinister because we see so much of his brutality. His Don Logan seems as if he would just as soon beat you to death with a chair as look at you. That is scary.
As is his relentless pursuit of ex-gangster Gal. He reminds me of a killer in a slasher movie. He can't be stopped, he can't be reasoned with, and he will not take no for an answer. He's frightening when he's beating somebody down, but he's even more chilling when he's not, because underneath all that composure you can positively feel the anger simmering beneath his skin, ready to explode at any moment.
Back to the Premiere list. The first of probably 2 of these today.
98. Barbara Stanwyck as Phyllis Dietrichson Double Indemnity (1944)
Before there was Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct, there was Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity. This isn't my favorite - by far - of Billy Wilder's movies. It's the film that pretty much established the clichés of film noir, but Wilder's writing is so tongue-in-cheek that you have to love it. Stanwyck's part in it, though, is something particular.
Stanwyck was never a "beauty" along the lines of Lana Turner or Greta Garbo or many other screen sirens. But she can work the heck out of what she's got, and you totally buy that she's someone men would fall all over themselves for. She was either wearing a wig or had her hair dyed blonde for this movie (my money's on "wig"), and it doesn't really suit her at all. But she still finds a way to exude confidence and sexiness. Her first conversation with Fred MacMurray's smooth-talking, somewhat condescending (let's count the number of lines he has that are capped off with "baby", shall we?) insurance salesman is a thing of beauty. And - you know, I'm just going to quote it here, because it's art.
This is not even really my favorite performance of Stanwyck's (that would be The Lady Eve, if you were wondering), but it's so iconic that you can't really talk about Stanwyck without talking about her deliciously evil turn as Phyllis Dietrichson.
back in the saddle