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carrobin

Posted: Thu Feb 03, 2011 12:58 pm

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 7795 Location: NYC

Bart--haven't you seen "The Professional"? That's the first time I saw Portman, and she was pretty impressive. It's a lot like "Gloria," with the genders reversed.

bartist

Posted: Thu Feb 03, 2011 1:10 pm

Joined: 27 Apr 2010 Posts: 6961 Location: Black Hills

Sadly, that is one I've missed (it was Knox posting his portmania on the previous page, BTW) (though I, too, am a portmaniac, and would endorse her perfs in all those films he listed...). The Fifth Element and La Femme Nikita are the only Luc Besson films I've seen. It's possible I confused it for Paper Moon with automatic weapons or something, and just wasn't really paying attention. Will look for it.

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He was wise beyond his years, but only by a few days.

carrobin

Posted: Thu Feb 03, 2011 1:18 pm

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 7795 Location: NYC

Sorry, Bart, I think I was confused because your pup's photo was above Knox's post. But 'The Professional" is terrific. Jean Reno as the hit man, Gary Oldman as the crooked cop, Portman as the very precocious survivor.

gromit

Posted: Thu Feb 03, 2011 1:21 pm

Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 9016 Location: Shanghai

I liked the first half -- the setup -- of Leon the Professional. It goes off the rails in the second half with some ridiculous stuff and Oldman is rather cartoonish.

Last edited by gromit on Thu Feb 03, 2011 1:27 pm; edited 1 time in total
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carrobin

Posted: Thu Feb 03, 2011 1:23 pm

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 7795 Location: NYC

It's just called "The Professional" in the US. And I rather enjoyed it when it went off the rails. Nice ending, too.

billyweeds

Posted: Thu Feb 03, 2011 1:43 pm

Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City

carrobin wrote:

Bart--haven't you seen "The Professional"? That's the first time I saw Portman, and she was pretty impressive. It's a lot like "Gloria," with the genders reversed.

Leon aka The Professional is one of the very very few movies I have ever walked out on in a theater, mainly because of Portman's annoyingly amateurish presence. She was not remotely ready for prime time at that point in her career. She peaked early and magnificently a couple of years later in Beautiful Girls, in which she completely stole the show from a bunch of stars. Since then she's maintained a competent but uninspired level. Her performance in Black Swan is perfectly okay though hardly award-worthy. But Hollywood is Hollywood and she'll probably win.

gromit

Posted: Thu Feb 03, 2011 2:23 pm

Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 9016 Location: Shanghai

billyweeds wrote:

Leon aka The Professional is ....

Leon: The Professional === International (English title) / USA (longer version)

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Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number.

marantzo

Posted: Thu Feb 03, 2011 2:38 pm

Guest

I have fond memories of Rancho Notorious. I saw it in Paris with my girl fiend at the time. She was from New Jersey. One fond memory was that I found the movie rather unusual and liked it a lot. The other fond memory was when there was a scene at the dinner table and my gf shouted out, "That's Superman!" (George Reeves) I'm sure no one in the audience knew what she was talking about. I wish she had prefaced it with, "It's a bird. It's a plane. No it's........"

I can't remember what the movie was about though.

jeremy

Posted: Thu Feb 03, 2011 2:49 pm

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 6794 Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)

Leon was great fun, if a little too long; Luc Besson at his ridiculous best. It was interesting to see the level cuts made for the American release by a studio who were worried that the American public might, for some reason, be discomfited by scenes hinting that the relationship between Reno, a mature man, and Portman, a 12 year old girl, might not be entirely paternal.

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My irritability keeps me alive and kicking.
I know the meaning of life, it doesn't help me a bit.
I know beauty and I know a good thing when I see it.

jeremy

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2011 12:12 am

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 6794 Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)

There was a lot to admire in True Grit. Partially, because the plot and scenes were so similar to those in the first film, I assumed that both versions of the film were fairly faithful to the book. However, there were a number of aspects the made the current version more watchable. The satisfyingly brutal violence and gritty verisimilitude one was something that would have been less palatable in a John Wayne movie in 1969. I don’t know how much of it was due to the Coen’s trademark love of language and to what extent it was drawn from the source material, but regardless, I loved the almost baroque use of English, the dry wit and the slow, deliberate delivery of an unapologetic Southerm drawl, belying the modern prejudice that accompanies such rural accents. They should be placed on a Unesco list. True Grit also makes a lie of the inferiority complex that some Americans hold with respect to British character acting. The film’s pitch perfect performances by a parade of the crusty, craggy and crunchy was pure cinematic comfort food. It could be said that at times this bordered on caricature, but I’m sure nobody ever told Dickens to tone it down to make his characters more believable.

Hailee Steinfield, was excellent as the fourteen year Mattie Ross bent on avenging her father. Preposterous though her precocity may have been, at no time did we lose sight of her vulnerability or fail to sense the fear and uncertainty behind her resolve. With her steely façade held in place by moral certitude and her determination driven by a desire for justice; Mattie Ross was the ram-rod straight, tightly-laced backbone of the film. Whether redeeming angel, moral cloak or agent of latent feelings of parenthood or desire, she fired Reuben J Coburn in much the same way she did her dead father’s oversize colt. She gave him a precious gift, worth.

If I have any quibbles with the acting, it may have been that the otherwise excellent Jeff Bridge’s overdid Rooster Coburn’s hard-to-follow mumbling and that Matt Damon, as Laboeuf , may have been slightly miscast. I usually enjoy Matt Damon’s acting, but I felt he didn’t quite manage to portray the fragility behind his pride or the desire for sex, love, a home that Mattie stirred in the bluff, would be Texas Ranger.

Finally, in places, I found it a little slow. I don’t mind unevenly paced films with quiet passages to explore character or subtext, but felt that True Grit missed a trick or two in not using them to their full extent.
There would be worse travesties if True Grit was to walk away with the Oscar for best picture. I think I enjoyed it more than the Coen’s previous winner, No Country For Old Men. However, I think it falls slightly behind King’s Speech and Social Network in my personal 2010 Pantheon.

marantzo

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2011 11:14 am

Guest

I just learned something very interesting on the radio this morning about The King's Speech. Listening to the CBC this morning on my computer they mentioned a fib in the film. George VI first speech after his speech impediment was dealt with was not made in England, but get this, in Winnipeg. Many thousands watched his speech and about 15,000 Americans came up to the city to see it. They played the recordings they had from the radio broadcasts and it was impressive but they didn't have the recording of the speech. This took place in the spring of 1939. The King's speech was a great success and apparently he didn't have a stutter.

Here is a short piece on the event:

http://www2.macleans.ca/2011/01/26/the-kings-winnipeg-speech/

Syd

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2011 11:35 am

Site Admin Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 12929 Location: Norman, Oklahoma

Actually George started seeing Lionel Logue shortly after his speech at Wembley in 1925 and gave some successful speeches as early as 1927. However, he also had speeches where he stammered, and there's a big difference between giving a speech to a few hundred people in Australia and one to a billion people around the world, especially one as important as the one in the movie.

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Shane

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2011 12:36 pm

Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 1168 Location: Chicago

billyweeds wrote:

carrobin wrote:

Bart--haven't you seen "The Professional"? That's the first time I saw Portman, and she was pretty impressive. It's a lot like "Gloria," with the genders reversed.

I can't believe I am in such agreement with you Billy, I thought Black Swan was so taken with itself I wanted to walk out and let it get on with it..however I'll always have a copy of Leon in my collection just for the over the top work of ALL the cast. Miss Portman was splendid in her role as far as I could see and it took little effort on her part to convince me of her genuine talent. Which I consider now being wasted time and film after time.

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I'd like to continue the argument we were having before. What was it about?

marantzo

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2011 12:38 pm

Guest

Australia? Who said anything about Australia?

The broadcast of the speech in Winnipeg was broadcast around the British Empire with an audience of 100's of millions. The BBC carried it of course.

The King wasn't the King in those early speeches. It was 1937 when he became King, wasn't it?

jeremy

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2011 12:57 pm

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 6794 Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)

Australia, Canada, it;s all much of a muchness, just another dominion where they speak funny,

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