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Post by pacinoyes on Nov 20, 2020 20:21:33 GMT
Morfydd Clark and Jennifer Ehle - Saint Maud (2019/2020)Clark is a flat out revelation here simultaneously sensitive and dangerous to herself and to others.......one of the few modern performances that actually feels like a tightrope walk to watch yet consistent in manner and nuance. I mentioned in my review she has an incredible small scene in a bar where she attempts to join a conversation of which she is not part that is heartbreaking sad in its loneliness.........and she has no dialog in this scene whatsoever. Ehle, in support - lashes out with dialog coming from a very dark and uncomfortable place and has a great scene of her own where she tells Maud not to walk away from her. Both performances have a sexual undercurrent to them .......which makes them both into something of deceptive and dark live wires.
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Post by pacinoyes on Nov 22, 2020 1:54:54 GMT
Helen Shaver & Peter Falk - "Rest in Peace Mrs. Columbo" The "Nicole Wallace-like" episode of Columbo with Shaver extremely memorable as someone 3 fries short of a happy meal with a personal score to settle.....she has a scene set to "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" that's pitch perfect ........and as for Falk well when he says he likes Gary Cooper, Louis Armstrong and Mark Twain that's pitch perfect too. One of the best later episodes .....
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Post by JangoB on Nov 23, 2020 0:55:48 GMT
With all the meme obsession going on these days it's easy to forget that Nicolas Cage is not just a craziness generator but is actually a wonderful actor who can bring unique colors and attributes to his characters which otherwise might've been portrayed in a more generic way. Matchstick Men was to me a terrific reminder of that quality that makes Cage so special. Here is a character full of various tics and fits and twitches and such, and it is of course up to Cage to make him believable, relatable and human. Which he does magnificently while maintaning the hilarity and the absurdity of it all. This is a great Cage turn, full of heart, vigor and comedy.
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Post by michael128 on Nov 23, 2020 14:19:05 GMT
Tess Harper in 'Crimes of the Heart'
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Post by Mattsby on Nov 23, 2020 18:28:57 GMT
James Earl Jones - The Greatest Thing That Almost Happened (1977) TVM - Not a recommendable movie itself, like a heavier Cornbread Earl & Me but instead of injustice, it's cancer. Jones as the father of an athlete/ill son is staggering - supporting perfs don't get much better. There's very interesting tension in him, like in the first few scenes how and why he avoids eye contact with others. He plays this man as so restricted and walled, making his later open-hearted scenes hit even deeper emotionally. It's a great, beautifully done perf. I'd recommend fans just check out his scenes. Angela Bassett and Danny Glover - Boesman and Lena (2000) John Berry directed this at 82 and died shortly before its release. Long concerned with characters in the undertow of poverty, disenfranchised (he himself was blacklisted and restarted life in France). He began under Welles and was the stage manager of Native Son in '41, did a few eps of East Side/West Side, Claudine in '74, and he also produced/directed this South African play off-Broadway in 1970 with James Earl Jones & Ruby Dee. Some liken the play to Godot and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. Bassett gives a career-best perf in a huge role of deranged winding, charisma, gloom. Glover gives a mean, down-angled perf - he does thrive in darker roles (see his very best To Sleep with Anger). Its on-location Cape Town is made to feel like theater - it's at times startlingly well done, Underrated.
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Post by pacinoyes on Nov 23, 2020 20:27:47 GMT
Karen Viard - Perfect Nanny (2019) 13 time César Awards nominee (this was her 13th nod) - 3 time winner Viard is superb in a film that doesn't deserve her or quite know what to do with her. A too cool, luridly dour film that removes all thriller elements in a way that seems counter-intuitive - she creates a whole character and fills her in where the script doesn't. One of the best performances in a so-so movie (or less than that) I've seen in a long time.....Viard's work isn't one people will agree on or that is even clear - she plays this as a catatonic-mania mishmash that you'd want to avoid from the start irl (but don't).......... it's amazing it works so well when nothing else really does. Polarizing........ in the best sense.....
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Post by pacinoyes on Nov 24, 2020 20:05:45 GMT
Nick Nolte - Life Lessons - New York StoriesRichard Price wrote 3 great dialog driven scripts for some heavy duty actors : Newman in Color of Money, Pacino in Sea of Love and this one - probably the best overall script he ever did. Nolte is flat out great here as an artist whose work and love life splatter him on a canvas - and this was the era where a lot of people were calling him the best working American actor at that time - he wasn't but with this and Affliction he almost justified the hype.
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Post by pacinoyes on Nov 25, 2020 17:52:52 GMT
Lee Grant - Ransom For A Dead Man - Columbo (1971)Marvelous turn, classic original run episode - she's smart, funny, determined, her greed is great fun and Grant is having so much fun here it should be a crime .....which it sort of is....... ..........one of the best written and etched Columbo adversaries.
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Post by Mattsby on Nov 26, 2020 18:56:31 GMT
Whole cast of Roots: The Next Generations (1979)
Went thru this over the last week, not flawless but floored me by the end and there's so many very good, moving perfs in it. Stan Shaw ("Hear me all the way"), Debbie Allen, Al Freeman Jr's unblinking Malcolm X ("We know how to laugh"), Ossie Davis' warm and aware train porter in Ep3, Paul Winfield's smart, hiding doctor in Ep5 who says “When I sing a cappella, I tend to stray from the key" - it's a small but clever perf, only two scenes but they're great, and he sings. Later, Brando sings too (evilly) in Ep7.... as the neo-nazi head, there's classic-Brando distracted behavior, spinning and spraying things, but it fits the odd, frightening indifference of the character. James Earl Jones anchor-legs the series in a gaining perf of work and emotion.
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Post by Viced on Nov 28, 2020 0:40:17 GMT
Paul Bettany in Uncle FrankI feel like Alan Ball wrote a TV season's worth of material into this character/95 minute movie, but Bettany somehow makes it work. I liked the intellectual charisma he brought at first, but as the film goes on he really delivers in some heavy moments. Very believable raw emotion. One of 2020's best performances. shoutout to Margo Martindale and Steve Zahn in minor roles here as well...
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Post by pacinoyes on Nov 28, 2020 19:11:15 GMT
James Woods & John Lithgow - The Boys (aka The Guys) - TV movie (1991)I sometimes on here have talked about how Woods to me is both overrated AND underrated.......here's one I'd use as evidence that he's a bit more versatile than I generally claim him to be. A sort of disease of the week black comedy where Woods and John Lithgow are far better than this script - in fact - they find things in their interplay that are not even on the page at all.
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Post by Mattsby on Nov 30, 2020 21:52:49 GMT
Haley Bennett - Swallow (2020) - Chaplin's shoes, Elf's cotton, Charlie's sunscreen - eating food things has been a source of comedy but I don't think ever looked at as psycho-trophically as here. This is a potentially laughable script that's flawed but pretty much saved by the very delicate simmer of the Bennett perf, in a daring role, deeply sad, very unexpectedly played. Like the therapist scenes, how does an actress make such sudden, flat dialogue work? She does. Within every scene, maybe every shot? and across strange humor, notes of shame, compulsion, feeling crushed, shut... it's somehow still an appealing, risible perf without being "silly" and quite a physical perf too in a subtle way and obvious way, it's like seeing someone slowly implode, except Bennett doesn't turn it into a sour affair either, there's heart there. Jeon Jong-seo - The Call (2020) - Maybe the freshest, most beguiling young actress out of South Korea, after her debut Burning, and now this, a devilish, fun, very unabashed perf that is probably among the best of the year, like Bennett. As the Burning director said, "she carries this sense of duality, as if something much bigger was on the other side of that innocence." She has an oblique, sexy, punk quality and a scariness to her too, like that cackle, and how the actress herself feels escaped and at large.
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Post by mikediastavrone96 on Dec 1, 2020 0:45:10 GMT
Steve Martin - All of Me (1984)The most inspired win in the history of NSFC? How about NYFCC? Steve Martin, reunited once again with his greatest collaborator Carl Reiner, puts on a display of comic creativity that needs to be seen to be believed. As an upstart lawyer whose body he unexpectedly has to share with Lily Tomlin's newly deceased socialite Edwina, Martin's physical humor goes to war with itself in a way that wouldn't be close to approximated until Jim Carrey's battle with a red blue pen in Liar Liar. But of course Martin brings heart to go with the humor and there, in the conversations he has with himself or a mirror, is where his work in developing a full character really shine. To anyone with HBO Max, definitely check this one out.
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Post by JangoB on Dec 2, 2020 19:41:20 GMT
Dustin Hoffman in Death of a Salesman - quite a tour-de-force. I miss him in movies these days.
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Post by Mattsby on Dec 4, 2020 19:24:42 GMT
Riz Ahmed - Sound of Metal (2020) Amazon Prime. Fascinating, trapped, raw nerve perf... the movie embeds itself into the character, it hands him the whole movie, and he gives it an emotional immediacy and a constant sort of glassy tension. We buy the annoyed boiling in him, and we get some beautiful moments - the slide scene, for example. Career best perf and among the best lead perfs of the year. Anyone else think he could get a SAG or BAFTA nom and then place at the Oscars? Might round up a lot of support...
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Post by pacinoyes on Dec 4, 2020 20:17:35 GMT
Riz Ahmed - Sound of Metal (2020) Amazon Prime. Fascinating, trapped, raw nerve perf... the movie embeds itself into the character, it hands him the whole movie, and he gives it an emotional immediacy and a constant sort of glassy tension. We buy the annoyed boiling in him, and we get some beautiful moments - the slide scene, for example. Career best perf and among the best lead perfs of the year. Anyone else think he could get a SAG or BAFTA nom and then place at the Oscars? Might round up a lot of support...If there's any justice he will......personally I haven't seen a more charged and smart performance combined (sometimes you get 1 of those but rarely both) so far in an American film in 2020 ......I can't imagine anyone who wouldn't be impressed by this turn if they see it......
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Post by mhynson27 on Dec 5, 2020 5:53:07 GMT
Count me in on the Ahmed bandwagon. Brilliant stuff.
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Post by pacinoyes on Dec 5, 2020 11:35:17 GMT
Gary Oldman - MankHe's actually better than the praise he's getting that I've seen - this is one of his very best later career turns. Handling tough, smart dialog expertly but never making it seem like a stunt or false, he also gives a terrific physical performance of an alcoholic that can rival the best UK acerbic (and artistic!) portrayals of a drunk (Finney/O'Toole). In addition he's quite funny even when not speaking - with marvelous wry and mocking reaction acting - there's a totality of effect in this way .......he may be one of our great comic actors too. This is a star turn, in a character actors guise and he's always thinking while playing it including getting the timing just right while setting a believable character arc too........you never feel like he's just spewing witty one liners. There might be better performances in 2020 but I am hard-pressed to think of another actor who wouldn't get lost playing in this movie, in this role. He deserves a nod.....
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Post by Viced on Dec 6, 2020 17:14:54 GMT
Michael Pitt in Boardwalk EmpireHe... or at least his character... deserved better. Jimmy was a much more compelling character than Nucky... and through two seasons, Pitt was much more convincing in the realm of the show than Buscemi. Convincing as a PTSD war veteran, a tough sunnuvabitch, a man of ambition, and in season 2 -- a man in way over his head. Would've been interesting to see where the character and performance went in future seasons... but at the same time, the mentor/protégé thing has been done on enough crime shows already so I guess it was wise to end it early with a shock. To the lost indeed.
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Post by pacinoyes on Dec 7, 2020 0:50:00 GMT
Vicky Knight - Dirty God (2019) - Raw, live-wire performance by Knight in her debut - she's a real life burn victim playing a victim of an acidic burn and she is haunted and empathetic here. In some ways this reminds me of Crissy Rock in Ladybird, Ladybird .......not on that amazing a level, but still quite impressive (and she's doing it in a downbeat, very tough movie to watch which her performance justifies almost by itself.
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Post by cinemagirl16 on Dec 8, 2020 6:23:03 GMT
Emma Corrin, The Crown (Season 4) - I think this is one of the strongest breakthrough performances I've seen in recent memory, movie or television. Corrin's near perfect rendering of Diana's mannerisms and voice doesn't ever feel like she's priming a caricature, but rather implementing nuanced tools through which she so gracefully taps into the complexity of a young woman who was as abundantly vulnerable as she was vibrant.
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Post by pacinoyes on Dec 8, 2020 23:36:29 GMT
Mads Mikkelsen- Another Round (2020)He's in terrific form in at times penetrating, at times manipulative and playing it a bit safe drama that has some of the keenest insights into why men drink, and why it gets incrementally worse. This is a marvelous performance not only playing a drunk but playing a drunk while seemingly sober and having to cover it daily - this has a clear distinction between other screen drunks because his Martin is distinct from his friends and almost in some ways cut off from himself by the specifics of his "comfortable"/suffocating life. He is operating on a darker plain than the movie too.....no matter where the movie goes....
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Post by pacinoyes on Dec 9, 2020 11:59:45 GMT
Nina Hoss - My Little Sister (2020)This is the 2nd great performance the remarkable Nina Hoss has given this year ( Audition is the other).....in movies that are far under what she's bringing to them. She's brilliant here again and complexly rounded - sharp, sad, strong, grounded and funny, believable and deftly avoiding movie of the week cliches which are like a minefield in this material. Once you get beyond Huppert and Streep - who occupy a sort of sacred different level of DePac (or greater than them even) anyway - there may not be a single better actress - period - in the world right now than Nina Hoss and I always advocate for Blanchett and Haenel - and Hoss falls right in the middle of them for age......she's 45 now and at her peak.
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Post by Viced on Dec 11, 2020 23:33:17 GMT
Bobby Cannavale in Boardwalk EmpireAbsolutely ridiculous character... seemed like Terence Winter wanted to combine Richie Aprile and Ralph Cifaretto and out-crazy the both of them combined... but Bobby somehow made it work... and gave this show a shot of adrenaline that it badly needed. He had so many big, insane moments that he always kept believable. And he dominated the screen no matter who he shared it with... which always seemed strangely right. My only complaint is that he only had an Italian accent around 15% of the time.
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Post by stephen on Dec 11, 2020 23:36:16 GMT
Bobby Cannavale in Boardwalk EmpireAbsolutely ridiculous character... seemed like Terence Winter wanted to combine Richie Aprile and Ralph Cifaretto and out-crazy the both of them combined... but Bobby somehow made it work... and gave this show a shot of adrenaline that it badly needed. He had so many big, insane moments that he always kept believable. And he dominated the screen no matter who he shared it with... which always seemed strangely right. My only complaint is that he only had an Italian accent around 15% of the time. I appreciate what Cannavale did on an individual level, but I just don't think he works in the confines of the season. I think I once likened his performance to introducing a De Palma character into a Scorsese/Coppola project; he's operating on such a different wavelength that I can't really buy him in that world. But I will say, the motherfucker has his moments, especially when he's acting against Ivo Nandi (who is so so so underrated as Joe "the Boss" Masseria).
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