The Brave One

Mister Tee
Tenured Laureate
Posts: 8637
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2003 2:57 pm
Location: NYC
Contact:

Post by Mister Tee »

Damien wrote:Tee, I saw the play Piaf on Broadway with Jane Lapotaire, but about the only thing I can remember about it is her peeing on stage.
That's precisely what my wife said when I mentioned the play last night.

To be fair, Lapotaire was dynamic -- which is what the part demands, and why it's such catnip for actresses.

I agree, Christie would seem to be a prime candidate for some if not most of the critics' awards -- again, dependent on whether something truly extraordinary emerges by December.
Penelope
Site Admin
Posts: 5663
Joined: Sat Jan 31, 2004 11:47 am
Location: Tampa, FL, USA

Post by Penelope »

Really? Away From Her lasted less than a month here, whereas, like I say, La Vie en Rose has been playing for nearly 3 months. (Consider that other, more high-profile films opened at the same time--Spider-Man 3, Pirates 3, etc., and they're already gone).
"...it is the weak who are cruel, and...gentleness is only to be expected from the strong." - Leo Reston

"Cruelty might be very human, and it might be cultural, but it's not acceptable." - Jodie Foster
Damien
Laureate
Posts: 6331
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2003 8:43 pm
Location: New York, New York
Contact:

Post by Damien »

I think Away From Her was at least a [/I] success d'estime [/I] whereas La Vie en Rose may have twice the box-office, but the reviews (other than for Cotillard) were middling.

I think we also have to remember that Christie is a beloved icon, and I would be shocked if she didn't win at least some of the more important critics awards. I haven't seen La Vie en Rose but Christie is sensational in Away From Her. Also, that not a lot of people have seen the picture is not necessarily a bad thing, at least in terms of the Oscars -- it's the kind of small film that will play very well on DVD.

Tee, I saw the play Piaf on Broadway with Jane Lapotaire, but about the only thing I can remember about it is her peeing on stage.
"Y'know, that's one of the things I like about Mitt Romney. He's been consistent since he changed his mind." -- Christine O'Donnell
Mister Tee
Tenured Laureate
Posts: 8637
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2003 2:57 pm
Location: NYC
Contact:

Post by Mister Tee »

Is Away from Her viewed as a flop, really? I thought, for a movie about Alzheimer's -- a known audience-magnet -- $5 million or so is considered okay, and, given Christie's exceptional personal reviews, enough to buttress a best actress nod (didn't Being Julia, a far more audience-friendly piece, top out around the same?).

I haven't seen either Christie or Cotillard, but the latter, it seems to me, has the advantage of a surefire part (cf. the Tony to Jane "Who?" Lapotaire) matched to the disadvantage of subtitles, who makes her success largely dependent on the depth of the emerging field. In '05 she would surely have made the cut; last year, not so much.

As for The Brave One...I said in the Round 3 thread I wondered if this were a serious work or Death Wish in a skirt, and this review leaves the question still open. Does he mean Foster's work makes a standard genre piece a bit more interesting than it might have been (like Panic Room), or that her performance genuinely goes somewhere unexpected and interesting (a la, at peak, Fonda in Klute)? I'll need to see more reviews to get a handle on this.
Penelope
Site Admin
Posts: 5663
Joined: Sat Jan 31, 2004 11:47 am
Location: Tampa, FL, USA

Post by Penelope »

I'd say Marion Cotillard is a stronger bet than Julie Christie; the former gives those over-the-top Oscar-bait performances the Academy loves and the film was an art-house smash (still playing here in Chicago, I believe), whereas Christie gives a very subtle, understated performance in a film that flopped even at the art-house.

As for Foster, the movie looks like Death Wish with a gender switch; it's also one of 3 vigilante movies being released this year (the other two being Death Sentence with Kevin Bacon and Reservation Road with Joaquin Phoenix).
"...it is the weak who are cruel, and...gentleness is only to be expected from the strong." - Leo Reston

"Cruelty might be very human, and it might be cultural, but it's not acceptable." - Jodie Foster
User avatar
OscarGuy
Site Admin
Posts: 13668
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2003 12:22 am
Location: Springfield, MO
Contact:

Post by OscarGuy »

But some might say that Marion Cotillard and to a lesser extent Angelina Jolie are pretty solid nominees...

I've got my first updated predictions since May ready to post. They'll probably go up Thursday to pre-view the coming September-October-November-December bum rush of films. September being the "we think we might, but probably won't" month.

Some day, if I have time, I'm going to analyze release dates and film nominations in the different categories to see if there's a correlation between month of release and oscar nominations... other than January/February Never-Gonna-Happen months...
Wesley Lovell
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." - Benjamin Franklin
Big Magilla
Site Admin
Posts: 19318
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2003 3:22 pm
Location: Jersey Shore

Post by Big Magilla »

Yes, we could see Jodie in and Oscar race again, and Terrence Howard and Neil Jordan as well if the film is a big enough hit.

This could be the sleeper of the year or just another genre flick that is quickly forgotten. We'll have to see how the momentum builds over the next couple of weeks. With Julie Christie the only sure bet Oscar nominee in the first eight months of the year, it's more than time we had another one.
User avatar
OscarGuy
Site Admin
Posts: 13668
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2003 12:22 am
Location: Springfield, MO
Contact:

Post by OscarGuy »

Could we see Foster in the Oscar race again?

The Brave One
By JUSTIN CHANG
Jodie Foster plays an assault victim who fights back in Neil Jordan's 'The Brave One.'

Hell hath no fury like a woman with a grudge, and in “The Brave One,” Jodie Foster unleashes her rage on the mean streets of New York with the same mesmeric intensity and steely resolve that have characterized her very best performances. Foster’s pistol-packing turn as an avenging dark angel nearly sustains director Neil Jordan’s grim vigilante drama through a string of implausibilities and occasionally trite psychological framing devices, with deft support from Terrence Howard as a sympathetic cop. Top talent involved should draw decent midrange B.O. for the Warner Bros. release, despite its tough subject matter.
While Jordan typically works from his own scripts, “The Brave One” (written by Roderick Taylor, Bruce A. Taylor and Cynthia Mort), with its distaff twist on the vigilante picture, feels appropriate coming from a helmer who, in films like “The Crying Game” and “Breakfast on Pluto,” has handled issues of gender subversion with subtlety and dramatic flair.

Here, he gets a performance out of his lead actress that takes on extra-textual dimensions thanks to Foster’s previous performances as a woman in trouble, whether as a battered prostitute in “Taxi Driver,” a rape victim in “The Accused” or a green FBI agent in “The Silence of the Lambs.”

A radio host who tells stories about life in “the safest big city in the world,” Erica Bain (Foster) finds her world irretrievably altered one night when she and her fiance, David (“Lost’s” Naveen Andrews), are attacked and savagely beaten by a trio of thugs during a stroll through Central Park. The assault leaves David dead and Erica with more lasting psychological than physical scars, and it’s not long afterward that she impulsively buys a gun.

Erica no longer feels safe -- a fact made clear enough by Foster’s clenched, tight-set features, yet also excessively underlined by a nervously swerving camera and ominously subjective tracking shots through a dark corridor. But Erica’s fear and grief are ultimately subsumed by her anger, and when she kills for the first time -- in self-defense -- it leaves her with a vague appetite for more.

Justice or revenge? Hero or villain? All the usual questions arise, some of them pondered by callers-in to Erica’s show, who are alarmed by the vigilante in their midst. They’re pondered, too, by Sean Mercer (a superbly world-weary Howard), a cynical detective whom Erica interviews for a segment, and who also happens to be investigating Erica’s handiwork.

While the relationship between these two unexpectedly kindred spirits takes on a queasy intimacy that results in some of the film’s strongest scenes, it also points up the script’s reliance on tidy coincidences: Even viewers who buy Erica as both cold-blooded murderess and respected media personality may raise an eyebrow at the fact that Mercer and his partner (Nicky Katt) appear to be the only homicide detectives in the entire city. Similarly, that Erica finds herself readily imperiled almost every time she goes out at night -- even when she starts looking for trouble -- seems awfully convenient, even as it promises to feed audiences’ worst stereotypes about Gotham crime rates.

But “The Brave One” convinces where it most counts, as Foster delivers a performance of astonishing physical and psychological credibility. Lowering her already deep voice to a husky rasp (speaking mainly in a disturbingly cool voiceover that bleeds into her sessions on the air), her eyes glazed over one moment but flickering with murderous excitement the next, the actress all but physicalizes the idea of a woman boldly inhabiting a man’s skin -- an inner transformation that Erica seems to observe from the outside.

At the same time, Jordan films the actress to accentuate her petite stature, her lithe frame, her thin arms constantly bared from the shoulders. When Erica walks the streets at night or strides purposefully onto a subway platform, she seems to be descending, wraith-like, into the abyss; yet her ferocity can also give way, without warning, to vulnerability and panic, especially when events begin to spiral out of her control.

Even at her most ruthless, Foster never cedes her grip on the viewer’s concern -- but then, neither did Charles Bronson in “Death Wish.” Jordan neither subverts the pleasures of seeing lone-ranger justice onscreen, as David Cronenberg did in “A History of Violence,” nor panders overtly to the audience’s baser instincts; instead, “The Brave One” attempts to tap into post-9/11 anxieties and comment on the very American idea of righteous payback.

But it’s hard not to feel that this moribund genre has simply exhausted its ability to say anything new, and even the film’s too-twisty denouement -- which brings new meaning to the term “cop-out” -- feels softer than the provocation it’s meant to be.

Pic has its grungy, dark-night-of-the-soul ambience down cold, thanks to expert New York location shooting and Philippe Rousselot’s moody, desaturated lensing. All other tech contributions are pro.
Wesley Lovell
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." - Benjamin Franklin
Post Reply

Return to “2000 - 2007”