The wonderful symbiotic relationship between film writers and the movies they cover is thrown into bold relief come January and early February. Forced to toggle between think pieces about Oscar nominees they may or may not agree are worthy and obligatory reviews of the shlock Hollywood dumps into wide release immediately after qualifying season, these critics begin to show the strain.
Witness the Globe's Wesley Morris, posting on so-called paycheck acting:
January is a pitiful month for movies. We all know that. But less
commented on is what a wonderful time it is to observe an actor doing
what he can to make ends meet. In "
Taken,"
Liam Neeson is a vision of hustle. With every kicked groin or threat to
destroy the Eiffel Tower, I saw another paid bill. Wham! There's the
cable!
Pow! The babysitter! Kablooey! The contractor....
[David Strathairn]'s participation is understandable insofar as times for everyone are
tough, and one never knows when the next job might come. So here he is,
looking lost and confused (if extremely fit, tan, and handsome), even
while he makes love to Elizabeth Banks atop an office desk. With each
befuddled stare, you can see him having a
"Price Is Right" moment. Bob: "Rod, tell our contestant what he's playing for." Rod: "Well, Bob. [Dramatic pause] A new car!"
Or the Guardian's Danny Leigh, examining how [and why] David Fincher goes to the Gump well in Benjamin Button:
Of course, much of the irony lies in the recycling of Gumpisms in
what's being sold as a high-flown, semi-arthouse enterprise – and in a
David Fincher film to boot. Because as pointedly various as his movies
have been, there's still something of a drag act about the heavy
sentiment of Gump being associated with a director known for his
stylistic machismo, that he-man shtick now buried under the misty
uplift of the
real Benjamin Button trailer,
a riot of by-the-book lip-trembling that prompted a friend of mine to
turn to me in a cinema last week and whisper: "Not if you fucking paid
me."
Or Slate's Dana Stevens, devoting her considerable smarts to analyzing the carefully crafted public persona of Anne Hathaway:
What does all this image-management savvy have to do with Hathaway's skill as an actress? That's the thing: Hathaway
is so smart about choosing roles, promoting them, and winning our
sympathy off-screen that it's sort of hard to tell how gifted an actor
she really is. Rachel Getting Married is certainly the
furthest she's stretched yet, and she's very winning in a role that
could easily have been overplayed. But I'd argue that the movie's power
derives mainly from its ensemble cast and Jonathan Demme's nimble,
roving hand-held camera. Next year, Hathaway will play an ambivalent
bride-to-be in The Fiance (sounds like a princessy A role) and the White Queen in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland. (With
that director, it's bound to be an elaborately costumed B.) I'd love to
see her take on something, anything, completely outside the Hathaway
canon: a schlumpily dressed, unprincesslike, unfeisty schmo. (Wait, she
could play me!)
Hell, even public television, the Times, and the New Yorker are not exempt. Charlie Rose recently devoted almost 40 minutes to grilling A.O. Scott and David Denby on the Oscar nominees.
The cinetrix can only say courage, critics--February 22nd is right around the corner. And thanks for the laffs.
