Little Children

I watched this movie on DVD a few months ago and didn't blog about it, though I wanted to. If you don't remember it, it was a somewhat acclaimed but not widely popular film starring Kate Winslet (who needs no introduction) and Patrick Wilson (Phantom of the Opera, GAP commercial, Broadway star), with Jennifer Connelly in a supporting role. It's a dystopic all-white suburbia tale, the dark and quietly incisive take rather than the Desperate Housewives take.

I actually don't know what possessed me to rent it at this late date -- or actually I do; I decided I should read and watch a few more things with 'modern' settings, since I like period work so much for fun. Those pieces, of course, reflect our concerns just as much, but it's interesting to see a straight take on ourselves. Stay-at-home mums, neighborhood watch, prom kings gone to seed -- it's all here. Wilson and Winslet play stay-at-home parents, bored and desperately self-loathing for giving up on their careers, who fall into an affair that gives them some semblance of hope and excitement. Little do they know that everyone else in the town is just as desperate as they are, just not so superior about it.

It just drew me in more and more as the plot unfolded (can't bear to spoil it here; you know I always avoid that if I can). I do recommend it, but be warned that it is, as I said, dark. Beautifully shot; interesting score, light and melancholy. Great acting from all, though Connelly was a bit bland (you could argue that that was a deliberate choice). Winslet got her fifth Oscar nomination for this role. She'll win someday, no doubt. You would think that her courage in being so resolutely homely in this movie would have scored her some points, but she ran into the unstoppable force that was Helen Mirren.

A Man for all Seasons

Just a quick break from work to pay tribute to the great actor Paul Scofield, who died yesterday. The first thing I think I saw him in was Franco Zeffirelli's (better known as Mel Gibson's) Hamlet, in which he played a very touching but rather fast-spoken Ghost. But it was his performance as the father in Robert Redford's overlooked masterpiece Quiz Show, starring Ralph Fiennes, that made me sit up and take notice. He was absolutely devastating as the proud, loving, and ultimately anguished father who makes his grown son realize the extent of his, well, old-fashioned dishonoring of the family name.

No greater a performance but certainly a more iconic one is his famous Oscar-winning turn as Thomas More in A Man for all Seasons, a better movie than play (I think). That craggy face and hollow voice were ideal for the intellectual, principled More as a contrast for live-out-loud Henry VIII. The line that sticks with me is when More, on trial, sees that his protege has turned on him for the sake of promotion. He stops him and says, "It profits a man nothing if he gain the whole world and lose his soul thereby. But Richard -- for Wales?" Written down, it looks like a punchline of one of those UK Wales-bashing jokes, but in the film it was nothing but melancholy.

A great, great actor.

I should also pay quick tribute to director Anthony Minghella, who sadly and unexpectedly died this week as well. If he had just one more scene in him like the "creepy" one in The Talented Mr. Ripley or the church-by-candlelight-and-swing one in English Patient... well, the loss is great in any case.

The Dubber's Curse

This is a very belated Oscar thought, but it just occurred to me that Marion Cotillard's win for Best Actress ended the long curse of actresses whose singing is dubbed in their films. Deborah Kerr in The King and I, for example, though I seem to recall hearing that the singer who dubbed her was practically threatened with blacklisting if she told anyone. That was because Audrey Hepburn was similarly disappointed for My Fair Lady. Funnily enough, both were dubbed by the same woman, Marni Nixon, who played one of the nuns in The Sound of Music.

Also funnily enough, a reporter asked Cotillard to sing a few bars of an Edith Piaf song in her post-Oscar press conference. Why? Just to see whether she could sing or not? Or because he was spilling over with that much love for her?

If you know of anyone else who's won in spite of dubbing, leave a comment. Wins for musical actors have died off, of course, but Catherine Zeta-Jones certainly did her own singing.

Karma's a stitch

That's right. Not for Eliot Spitzer (though that too), but for all those snooty New Yorkers who have always enjoyed laughing at NJ, and never more than when our ex-straight ex-governor stepped down. Yes. Stepped down. Promptly, no beating around the bush. And yes, wife by his side. Honestly, what a ridiculous, sad situation. Big picture: possibly -1 superdelegate for Hillary.

Lindbergh against Winchell

More treadmill reading to report: I finally finished Philip Roth's The Plot Against America, which was a big hit when it came out a few years ago. In short, the novel envisions what might have happened if Charles Lindbergh, aviation hero, had defeated FDR and put an insidious set of anti-Semitic politics to work. It's told from the point of view of a little boy named... Philip Roth, which I can only assume was meant to punch up the novel with a realistic urgency but doesn't do much.

I actually liked the novel reasonably well. It's not very tightly written, but the premise itself keeps you intrigued. Roth does a great job of depicting real diversity among even a tightly knit Jewish family and community, with completely conflicting politics and attitudes towards Lucky Lindy. He drags a bit when trying to describe political machinations, which I think is the function of the narrator's restricted p.o.v. And I think that the ending was a bit of a cop-out, but I won't spoil it.

It almost makes me want to go reread Portnoy's Complaint, which I tried to read when I was far too young, probably. I remember thinking it was a pile of filth. (Which is something, because I read D.H. Lawrence without batting an eyelash.)

Chocoholic

Well, it's not a terribly newsworthy endorsement as they go, but did anyone else catch Robert Reich on Stephen Colbert last night? Colbert kept pressing Reich (former Labor secretary for Bill Clinton) for an endorsement, and he kept saying how great they both were, and how he had decided not to endorse. Colbert, in typical mock-overbearing fashion, kept pressing him: would he choose ebony or ivory? Ladyfingers or black forest cake? You get the idea. I thought they would just keep up the ridiculous banter right until the last exchange:

Colbert: What would you want in your Easter basket, chocolate bunny or marshmallow chick?
Reich: Just between us?
Colbert: Yeah?
Reich: Chocolate bunny.
Crowd: [GASP! Scattered applause.]

I may have gasped just a tiny bit too, mostly in surprise that he gave any answer at all. Rather cagey, but a bit of an endorsement for Obama. At least an amusing one this time!

Elizabeth: The Golden Age

This movie begged for all kinds of awful punning blog post titles, like Elizabeth: The Stone Age or Elizabeth: What Golden Age? There's nothing I love better than a good costume drama. Even a bad costume drama--and this definitely was, with its melodramatic plot, lighting, sets, and editing--offers some weird enjoyment. Gorgeous costumes. Awful film.

Here is a vague rundown of my thought processes during the watching of the film:

15 min. in: Hey, this movie isn't that bad. What were people talking about?

+5 min: Oh no.

Wow, Clive Owen is yummy. Hey, where's he been lately? He was the It Guy for a while.

Poor Cate Blanchett. She's doing her best.

Maybe she's doing too much.

Now I can't even remember what I thought was good about the original Elizabeth.

What is the point in cutting back to Spain for thirty seconds at a time? Did Shekhar Kapur decide he didn't like character development any more?

Yes, I too surround myself with a hundred candles in a circle when I decide to stare at myself naked in a mirror while the guy I'm crushing on is gettin' it on with my lady-in-waiting. Good god. Restraint, people.

This beacon scene reminds me of Return of the King.

This ship scene reminds me of Pirates of the Caribbean.

What a sad waste of potential.