STARDUST MEMORIES (WOODY ALLEN, 1980) & CELEBRITY (WOODY ALLEN, 1998)

Stardust Memories, USA, 1980
Dir: Woody Allen
Cast: Woody Allen, Charlotte Rampling, Jessica Harper

Celebrity, USA, 1998
Dir: Woody Allen
Cast: Kenneth Branagh, Judy Davis, Joe Mantegna
 

"You can learn a lot about society by who we choose to celebrate."

During a recent self-imposed Woody Allen bender, it struck me that the four films I watched were all connected with each other.

The first two, Stardust Memories from 1980, and Celebrity from 1998, represent the most underappreciated period in Mr. Allen’s career. Both films were shot in black and white, which, for contemporary films is highly irregular. Both films are also about the film industry, and pay homage to the classic European filmmakers who inspired Mr. Allen, like Federico Fellini and Ingmar Bergman.

Mr. Allen has long had an obsession with paying tribute to his movie heroes. In 1972’s Play it Again, Sam, the film not only attributes its title to Casablanca, but it even incorporates the ghost of Humphrey Bogart as a character. His 1978 drama Interiors was inspired by several of Mr. Bergman’s films. After winning Best Director and Best Picture at the Academy Awards for Annie Hall, Mr. Allen turned to more serious fare, including Interiors and the bleak romantic dramedy, Manhattan. Criticized for abandoning his earlier, slapstick comedies for more adult-oriented films, Woody made Stardust Memories not only as a response to the critics, but also to pay homage to Fellini’s classic 8 ½, about a film director in turmoil.

 

Stardust Memories was also the mark of a new chapter in Mr. Allen’s career. His relationship and collaboration with Diane Keaton had concluded, and a year later, he would being to date Mia Farrow, who would star in many of Mr. Allen’s most notable works from this period including Hannah and Her Sisters and The Purple Rose of Cairo. 1980 was also the year United Artists tanked due to the immense failure of Michael Cimino’s Heaven's Gate, thus leaving Woody without the studio he routinely worked with. 

Nearly two decades later, Allen revisited the black and white world of the movie business with Celebrity. In one of the rare instances in which he did not act, Mr. Allen instead chose to cast British import Kenneth Branagh in the “Woody Allen” role, this time as a neurotic journalist who hangs out with the rich and famous. The film also stars Judy Davis as his ex-wife who embarks on a career in television. Both Stardust Memories and Celebrity examine the lives of movie stars and the privileged few who get to make a living off of it. 

In Stardust Memories, it was Charlotte Rampling and Jessica Harper that headlined the cast. Celebrity featured a more spread out array of young stars including Winona Ryder, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Charlize Theron. Both films end up being tone poems to the dark side of filmmaking that Mr. Allen allegedly despises and finds his own criticisms by voicing them in his work.

Mr. Allen thrives on intellectual comedy, that which provides  him the opportunity to prove how much smarter he is than everyone else, and how he rationalizes every situation so that it becomes logical and sensical. Mr. Allen has the most uncanny talent at showing his disdain for human civilization, simultaneously commenting on moral values, society, love, sex, money and beauty. His view of the celebrity world is bleak, lacking any warmth or color; perhaps that is why he chose to film both stories in black & white.

While Stardust Memories was made in response to the critics of Mr. Allen's more serious films, Celebrity was a response to the intense media coverage surrounding his affair with the 20 year old adopted daughter of his girlfriend, Mia Farrow in 1992. Since then, Mr. Allen has stayed away both from the limelight of the media, as well as from making films that satirize the world they inhabit. In 2012, Mr. Allen won his fourth Academy Award for Midnight in Paris. He is currently shooting his 43rd film, an as-of-yet untitled romantic comedy set in San Fransisco and New York.

DIAL M FOR MURDER (ALFRED HITCHCOCK, 1954)

Dial M for Murder, USA, 1954

Dir: Alfred Hitchcock

Cast: Ray Milland, Grace Kelly, Robert Cummings 

What more could be said about Alfred Hitchcock? He is the godfather of classic cinema. Honestly, was there anyone more talented and popular than Hitchcock from the 1940s through the 1960s? He directed over a dozen masterful thrillers including Shadow of a Doubt, Lifeboat, Notorious, Rope, Strangers on a Train, North by Northwest, Psycho and The Birds. In 1954, while anticipating the release of Rear Window, one of Hitchcock’s trademark films, Hitch directed Dial M for Murder, an adaptation of the stage play by Frederick Knott, starring one of Hitchcock’s favorite blonde bombshells, Grace Kelly.

Hitchcock and Grace made three films together from 1954-1955. In addition to Dial M, she also starred across Jimmy Stewart in Rear Window, and Cary Grant in the crime caper, To Catch a Thief. Ms. Kelly retired from acting a year later, after marrying Rainier III, Prince of Monaco. She died, tragically, in a car accident in 1982, at the age of 52.

Dial M for Murder is a very shrewdly written film. It deals with a former tennis champion who blackmails an old college friend into murdering his adulterous wife. The friend reluctantly agrees and goes ahead with the clever scheme planned by the husband, but it goes terribly wrong and the husband is forced to concoct a plan B. Hitchcock does an expertly job in creating the most tension and thrills out of a very claustrophobic setting. The studio decided to release the film in 3-D hoping to grab audiences by their throats, literally. The bet paid off and the movie was a large success for Hitch and co. Although the 3-D fad of the 50s wore off, the film remained one of Hitchcock’s best thrillers, overshadowed possibly, by the overwhelming reaction to Rear Window, released in theaters just a few months after Dial M for Murder.

Also in the film is Ray Milland, the Oscar winner from Billy Wilder’s The Lost Weekend, and Robert Cummings as Grace’s lover. Dial M for Murder was a welcome return to England for Alfred Hitchcock. Ever since coming to Hollywood in 1940, Mr. Hitchcock had become accustomed to making films in America, primarily working with American actors like James Stewart, Gregory Peck, Joan Fontaine, and Joseph Cotton.

Mr. Hitchcock employs some of his best camera techniques to set up unforeseen twists and turns, and for a film that is nearly six decades old, it still holds up pretty well. That is the sign of a true master filmmaker, and Hitchcock deserves no less than such recognition. His ability to scare the audience is derivative of his ability to manipulate audiences, to convince them that the story will go in one certain direction only to turn the tables and go down a completely altered yet still satisfying path. 

After the dual success of Dial M for Murder and Rear Window in 1954, Hitchcock continued to scare audiences until the mid-1970s when health problems took Hitch away from movie sets. When presented with the AFI lifetime achievement award in 1979, he singled out four people he wanted to thank—a film editor, a scriptwriter, his daughter’s mother, and his favorite cook—all four were his wife, Alma Reville. Hitchcock passed away in 1980 at the age of 80.

DAYS OF HEAVEN (TERRENCE MALICK, 1978)

Days of Heaven, USA, 1978
Dir: Terrence Malick
Cast: Richard Gere, Brooke Adams, Linda Ganz

There is something to be said about Days of Heaven. Even though the film has become one of the most acclaimed movies of the 1970s, directed by one of cinema's most reclusive filmmakers, there is something poetic about it. Days of Heaven is a film with a very long history. Shot in 1976, editing took two years for Terrence Malick to complete. The production was so tumultuous that as soon as he completed it, Malick left the States and moved to Paris in a self imposed creative exile. It would be a full 20 years before Malick directed The Thin Red Line, a war film starring a host of well-known actors including Sean Penn and Nick Nolte.  

Malick first broke out in 1973 with Badlands about a young couple on the run. Think Bonnie and Clyde but with narration and classical music. It put Malick on the map, and made his next project highly touted by emerging actors like Richard Gere and John Travolta. Gere was eventually cast as the lead in Days of Heaven, Bill, his first movie role. Also cast was Brooke Adams as his lover Abby, and Linda Ganz as his younger sister. The plot follows the trio as they try to successfully cheat a dying landowner out of his wealth. The characters are not bad. They've just never been given a fair chance. 

The film, set in Texas in 1916, is slow, like a painting, and takes time to warm up to. It was originally panned by critics but has since been recognized for its brilliant cinematography. It was actually shot by two very distinct cameramen. Nestor Almendros, frequent collaborator of Francois Truffaut, was hired but had to leave once the production ran late. Acclaimed cinematographer Haskell Wexler took over the duties. Days of Heaven ended up winning the Oscar for Cinematography, but only Almendros was awarded a trophy. 

It was a very meticulous production. Mr. Malick insisted on shooting primarily during a time in the day which became known as “magic hour,” that short period when the sun is rising in the morning, and setting in the evening. According to Almendros, this limited the cast and crew to less than an hour of shooting a day. Malick then spent two years editing the picture, struggling to find the voice he wanted the film to have. The spark for the finished film came when he experimented with narration by the films young star, Linda Ganz, like he did with his previous films star, Sissy Spacek. All of Malick’s subsequent films also features some form of narration.  

If Badlands was Terrence Malick’s introduction to movies, then Days of Heaven was his mature second effort that simultaneously propelled him to cinema’s top and drove him away from it. The film also starred Sam Shepard as the farmer who is fooled into marrying Abby. Most viewers will single out the visual greatness of Malick’s work, but there is a very strong story involved in this film as well. In fact Malick borrowed parts of the plot from a back-story in The Three Musketeers.

Today, Malick is 68 years old and has found new life in his movie career after the success of 2011’s The Tree of Life. The film won the Palme D’or at the Cannes Film Festival and helped Malick secure the director’s role on three new projects in the works. He remains one of cinema's most talked-about, but least seen and least interviewed filmmakers. But that just adds to the mystique of his life and movie career which can be characterized as a quiet and unnerving body of work. Days of Heaven, depending on your perspective, might be his finest work.

REALITY BITES (BEN STILLER, 1994)

Reality Bites, USA, 1994
Dir: Ben Stiller
Cast: Winona Ryder, Ethan Hawke, Ben Stiller

Reality Bites follows Lelaina, played by Winona Ryder, a recent college grad who works as a TV production assistant. Her best friends are Vickie, played by Janeane Garofalo, Sammie, played by Steve Zahn, and Troy, the wannabe artist in love with Lelaina, played by Ethan Hawke. Reality Bites is a movie about its time. And because the 1990s were considered the Generation-X, Reality Bites came to be the defining film of Gen-X. Like The Graduate did for the peace and love generation, Saturday Night Fever did for the disco era, and The Breakfast Club did for the 80s, Reality Bites explains what its like to be a young adult living in the 90s. The film was directed by one of its stars, Ben Stiller. At the time, he was most famous for being comedian Jerry Stiller’s son and for creating The Ben Stiller Show, which became defunct after two years on MTV.

A lot of the narrative is told through video interviews as part of Lelaina’s attempt at a documentary on her friends and contemporary culture.  She expresses her distaste for consumerism, and yuppy-culture. She dates Michael, played by Stiller, a young executive who lacks the charm and bravado of the outspoken musician Troy. Stiller does a convincing job as an actor, and does better as a director, perfectly capturing that period in time when Michael Bay music videos and Big Gulps were the most prominent features of pop culture. Independent film was riding huge waves after the success of small-scale filmmakers like Robert Rodriguez and Kevin Smith. Studios were more open to young, first time filmmakers, eager for fresh material. Jersey Films, the production company of actor Danny DeVito, produced Reality Bites. The company came to prominence in the 90s producing successful films like Pulp Fiction, and Out of Sight.

Reality Bites also had a hip soundtrack featuring the music of Squeeze, The Knack, Peter Frampton and Lisa Loeb. Ryder was the quintessential it-girl of the 90s. Her breakout role was in the high school dark comedy Heathers, chronicling life as a teenager. She also worked with top directors like Tim Burton, Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, and Woody Allen. Hawke used his turn in Reality Bites as the cynical and artistic rebel to propel himself to the A-list. He went on to star in indie hits like Before Sunrise, and Gattaca, as well as more commercially successful fare like Training Day, which got Hawke an Oscar Nomination. 

Films about contemporary youth culture stretches back to 1955 when James Dean  and Natalie Wood starred in Rebel Without a Cause. 1955 was also the year Dean perished in a head-on collision with another car while driving down Route 41 in California. 39 years later, Reality Bites made its debut at the Sundance Film Festival. People immediately identified with its themes of confusion and alienation following graduation from college. The film, however, hasn’t aged well. Times have changed, and today, more than 18 years later, our culture is worried less about HIV exams and VHS tapes and more about their Facebook accounts and the latest iPhone app.

What, then, is the defining film of our generation? Is there one defining movie that we can say truly captures the reality of culture today? Perhaps its difficult to find the right script or the right actors whose collective voice can define a generation. But in 1994, brought together by that magic potion whose ingredients are kept secret by the movie gods, a group of characters came together to produce a charming and funny look at people trying to break out into the new world. Looking back today, the film is still relevant to all of us who are in similar positions, the only difference being it’s 2012, and not 1994. The same could be said about other culture-defining films, like the aforementioned The Graduate or Midnight Cowboy or anything by John Hughes. The problems are the same, but the clothes are different.

TWINS (IVAN REITMAN, 1988)

Twins, 1988, USA  

Dir: Ivan Reitman  

Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Danny DeVito, Chloe Webb

Now I'm going to talk about a movie that most people would not consider to be a  masterpiece but it's one of my favorite films from my childhood and honestly, its  a comedy with a lot of charm and appeal. I’m talking about Ivan Reitman’s 1988 comedy, Twins. The film stars Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito, improbably, but intentionally, as two brothers separated at birth. Their life began as a scientific experiment involving the creation of the perfect specimen, the 6’2, muscular and brilliant Julius, played by Schwarzenegger. Through a medical miracle, a second embryo turned out the “scraps” of the genes, the 5’1, stocky, and smug Vincent, played by DeVito.

At the time of the release, DeVito was just coming off the success of the popular TV show, Taxi. Schwarzenegger was already on his way to being America’s number one movie star, having played Conan the Barbarian in two films, and the Terminator, to international success. He also played in blockbusters like The Running Man and Predator. 1988 brought Arnold to the world of comedy. Reitman, fresh off the success of Ghostbusters was slated to direct, and its stars were a (mis)match made in heaven. The two played brilliantly together, as one was the obnoxious, con-artist type, while the other was the charming, intelligent brother. The ying and the yang. 

Twins is about 80s consumerism. When supermarkets and microwaves were becoming popular. A time when owning a Cadillac meant you were wealthy and prosperous. This is when Arnold was the most charismatic and capable actor in Hollywood, and DeVito was its smarmiest. Schwarzenegger and DeVito spend the majority of the film bonding and tracking down their mother who was told her child died during the experiment. Twins also stars David Caruso, in one of his earliest roles, and Kelly Preston, the future Mrs. John Travolta, who played Schwarzenegger’s love interest in the film. 

Twins was a film released during the latter part of the 80s, that era of synthesizers and montages set to cheesy music. Twins is a simple movie, really. It doesn’t have flashy effects, or Woody Allen-type writing. It doesn’t feature extensive set design or staging. But it’s a happy film, with great characters, that will make you laugh and enjoy yourself. Schwarzenegger really proved it to himself and to audiences that he could pull off lighter fare, that he didn’t need to be the macho, tough guy action hero in every movie. He was able to show a different, warmer side of himself, and it paid off tremendously.

The film was a financial success, and allowed Schwarzenegger to reach a different stratosphere of movie stardom. He continued to be the world’s biggest actor for several more years. He starred in the sci-fi classic Total Recall in 1990, and a year later, reprised his role as the Terminator in Terminator 2: Judgement Day, the biggest hit of his career. In 2003, Schwarzenegger became the 38^th Governer of the state of California.

He has produced the greatest underdog story in movie history—his own life. Hailing from Austria, he came to international attention as a bodybuilder and star of the documentary Pumping Iron in 1977. He later became a huge movie star in Hollywood, married a Kennedy, and became the leader of the most populated state in America. His pairing with DeVito in Twins would not be their last one together. In 1994, they starred in the less-successful comedy Junior.

Twins is a film I first saw as a child, because the only channels I had on my television were the standard six channels that came with TV’s in the early-1990s. And since Twins was a new release for the television market, it would be on TV quiet often. So it became one of those guilty pleasures from the past that all of us have. If we were children of the 1950s, it might be It’s a Wonderful Life. If we were children of the 1980s, it might be Star Wars. For me, it was Twins. 

PROFILE OF FILMMAKER RIDLEY SCOTT

Ridley Scott’s 20^th feature film, the sci-fi blockbuster Prometheus, to be released this week, is one of the summer’s most highly anticipated films. It marks a full circle for Mr. Scott, who, a few generations ago directed two of the all time great science fiction films, Alien and Blade Runner, in the late 70s, and early 80s. The fact that Scott is still around making big budget films is a testament to his talent as a filmmaker. He started out shooting short films with his brother, Tony, who has also gone on to become a renowned filmmaker, in England, where they grew up. Ridley Scott began working in advertising in the 1960s and eventually started directing commercials, working his way up to his feature debut, The Duellists with Harvey Keitel, in 1977. Ridley had just turned 40. 

Two years later came his international breakthrough. Alien, starring a then unknown Sigourney Weaver, centered on a space crew that encounters a deadly creature. The film’s heroine, Ellen Ripley, was a landmark for women actors. The film was a box office success, and Scott had his first hit. Three years later, Scott directed Harrison Ford, straight out of Indiana Jones, and Star Wars, in the extremely ambitious, visually stunning Blade Runner. The film took place in a futuristic Los Angeles, and set the standard for sci-fi pictures that followed. Although not a success initially, Blade Runner has since gone on to become a huge cult hit. In 1985, Scott directed a dark fantasy film called Legend, with a young Tom Cruise in the lead. Scott continued to direct smaller fare like Someone to Watch Over Me in 1987, and Black Rain, with Michael Douglas, in 1989.

Ridley got a big break in 1991, when he directed Thelma & Louise, another female-oriented film, this time headlined by Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis. The movie won a lot of acclaim and an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. Scott followed it up with 1492: Conquest of Paradise, the story of Christopher Columbus, in time for the 500^th anniversary of his “discovery” of America. The film flopped at the box office, and Scott retreated once more, away from the film business. He came back four years later with White Squall, starring Jeff Bridges, but the film failed to garner any notice. A year later, Scott directed the controversial G.I. Jane, starring Demi Moore as a woman who enrolls into the Navy SEALS.

Around this time, while Scott’s star was fading, his younger brother Tony was making a name for himself with films like Top Gun, one of the most iconic films of the 80s, True Romance, written by a pre-Pulp Fiction Quentin Tarantino, and Crimson Tide, which started his working relationship with Denzel Washington. The two have since gone on to make four more movies together. The Scott brothers also started a production company called Scott Free Productions, which produces television fare like Numb3rs and The Good Wife, as well as all of Ridley’s films. 

After the failure of G.I. Jane, Ridley Scott did not make another film for three years, but when he did make his big screen return, it would be the biggest success of Scott’s career. Russell Crowe had already made a name for himself in his native Australia, so it was only logical that he would be granted an opportunity to make it in America. After starring in acclaimed films like L.A. Confidential and The Insider for filmmakers Curtis Hanson and Michael Mann, Crowe was cast as the lead in Scott’s Roman-coliseum-epic Gladiator. In the spring of 2000, the film was released to great acclaim. The movie ended up grossing over $450 million worldwide, and was nominated for 12 Academy Awards, including one for Scott as Best Director, and Crowe as Best Actor. The film won 5 Oscars, including one for Crowe. Scott lost out to Steven Soderbergh and Traffic in the Best Director race, but Gladiator won the top prize of the night, the Best Picture Oscar. Scott then went on a directing purge over the course of the next decade, and re-emerged as one of the premiere filmmakers of his time.

He directed the much-buzzed about sequel to The Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal, in 2001, with Anthony Hopkins returning as his most famous character, the eponymous Hannibal Lecter. That same year, Scott visited Somalia in Black Hawk Down, a true story of U.S. Soldiers on a mission to fight renegade warlords. The film won two Oscars. In 2003, Scott directed Nicolas Cage in Matchstick Men, where Cage played a con man with OCD, who learns he has a 14-year old daughter he never knew he fathered. 

In 2005, Scott returned to the battlefield with Kingdom of Heaven, an epic action-adventure film about the crusades in 12^th Century Jerusalem. The film received mixed reviews but still packs a punch with an all-star cast. The following year, Scott directed A Good Year, a romantic drama starring Russell Crowe and Marion Cotillard. Scott would continue to work with Crowe on three more films, 2007’s American Gangster, with Denzel Washington, 2008’s Body of Lies, with Leonardo DiCaprio and 2010’s dark fable Robin Hood, with Cate Blanchett as Lady Marion. In all, Scott completed nine films in ten years from 2000-2010. When word got out that Scott was working on a quasi-prequel to one of his biggest hits, fans of the Alien franchise became excited and now that excitement will reach its peak when Prometheus is finally released on June 8^th. Now, the 74-year old filmmaker says he will re-visit futuristic worlds and dangerous replicants again with a sequel to Blade Runner. 

Mr. Scott has been married three times, most recently to the actress Giannina Facio. He has two sons, Jake, and Luke, and a daughter, Jordan, all of whom are filmmakers and work in Scott’s production company. In 2011, Scott received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Over the course of four decades of working in the business, Scott has cemented his position as a marvelous director with a flair for the visuals. Aside from filmmaking, Scott also directed the infamous Apple Macintosh commercial during the 1984 Superbowl, influenced by George Orwell’s classic nightmarish novel 1984.

Prometheus arrives during a time where 3D blockbusters reign over the box office, both domestically, and more significantly, internationally. The film’s cast includes Charlize Theron, Michael Fassbender, and Noomi Rapace, from The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (the Swedish version). Scott is also working on a film for 2013 called The Counselor, with Brad Pitt and Michael Fassbender. Whatever legacy Scott leaves behind, when his filmmaking days are over, his place as one of the greatest filmmakers of all time has already been etched in stone. 

His body of work has varied from gladiators to road flicks, to space operas, to intimate dramas, and now has completed the full circle from British ad man, to American horror storyteller, along the way picking up three Academy Award Nominations for Best Director, and comprising one of the most unique film resumes in history. Whatever Ridley Scott does next, you can be sure that it will be one of the most talked about movies of the year.

MENTAL MASTURBATION PART VIII

My old college newspaper editor used to tell me that making lists was an exercise in mental masturbation. Although I agree with him to an extent, I also believe its very fun and interesting to make lists of films that others might not be aware of are out there. These are some great movies, and if I had the time, I'd pen a 1000 word review for each of them.

If a film has a * symbol next to it, it means that the selected choice is an exceptional stand out. Rarely will I assign this symbol, but I feel that certain films deserve the extra shout-out.


 

Häxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages (Benjamin Christensen, 1922)
What Price Hollywood? (George Cukor, 1932)
Black Narcissus (Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger, 1947)
Limelight (Charles Chaplin, 1952)
Shoot the Piano Player (François Truffaut, 1960) *
Tom Jones (Tony Richardson, 1963)
Kwaidan (Masaki Kobayashi, 1964)
In Cold Blood (Richard Brooks, 1967)
Petulia (Richard Lester, 1968)
Hour of the Wolf (Ingmar Bergman, 1968)
The Panic in Needle Park (Jerry Schatzberg, 1971)
Images (Robert Altman, 1972)
Cinderella Liberty (Mark Rydell, 1973)
Girlfriends (Claudia Weill, 1978)
Gallipoli (Peter Weir, 1981)
Koyaanisqatsi (Godfrey Reggio, 1982)
The Twilight Zone: The Movie (Joe Dante, John Landis, George Miller, Steven Spielberg, 1983)
After Hours (Martin Scorsese, 1985)
The Quiet Earth (Geoff Murphy, 1985)
Mask (Peter Bogdanovich, 1985)
Salvador (Oliver Stone, 1986)
City on Fire (Ringo Lam, 1987)
Scrooged (Richard Donner, 1988)
Ju Dou (Yimou Zhang, 1990)
The Crying Game (Neil Jordan, 1992)
The Sandlot (David M. Evans, 1993)
Pusher (Nicolas Winding Refn, 1996)
Eye of God (Tim Blake Nelson, 1997)
Boiler Room (Ben Younger, 2000)
Insomnia (Christopher Nolan, 2002)
The Good Shepherd (Robert De Niro, 2006)
Sleeping Beauty (Julia Leigh, 2011)
Tyrannosaur (Paddy Considine, 2011)
Pina (Wim Wenders, 2011)
Robot and Frank (Jake Schreier, 2012)

GREAT FEMALE PERFORMANCES

What does it mean to give a memorable performance? Is it the one that gets people talking at the water cooler on Monday morning? Is it the one that wins the Academy Award every year? Or does it mean that the actor was good at making us laugh and cry and feel all sorts of emotions that we didn’t even know we had? Some actresses have spent their careers playing women of all types; strong and weak, bitter and happy, old and young, rich and poor, ones that prospered and ones that failed. Each performance has moved us, changed us, made us re-evaluate our ideals, and our beliefs in ourselves and the ones around us. Acting isn’t what it used to be. For better or for worse, Hollywood has glamorized and deglamorized the female persona to the point where great performances are a thing of the past. Sure, there’s still Meryl Streep, with her three Oscars in tow now, but she is not the contemporary answer to the queens of the silver screen of an era gone by too quickly and too suddenly. Here are a few ladies that you might have heard of, or, if you’re lucky, are only discovering for the first time.

Maria Falconetti – The Passion of Joan of Arc - 1928

Maria Falconetti’s performance is the only one on this list that comes from a silent movie. It was her face that did all the talking necessary. The pain and misery found in her facial expressions throughout The Passion of Joan of Arc is palpable and heart wrenching. Carl Theodore Dreyer did a magnificent job of directing Falconetti, who never starred in another film again. The complete version of The Passion of Joan of Arc remained lost until 1981, when a copy of the original negative was found in the closet of a mental institution in Norway. Even due to age and the invention of sound, her performance continues to resonate to this day. Her performance is timeless and superb. Falconetti died in 1946, at the age of 54. 

Vivien Leigh – A Streetcar Named Desire - 1951

Vivien Leigh was another reclusive actress who starred in very few films in her career. After her iconic turn in Gone With the Wind in 1939, she married Laurence Olivier and moved to England as he pursued his artistic career. When Olivier got a job working on an American production in the early part of the 1950s, Leigh decided to reprise a role she originally played on stage in London, the fading Southern belle, Blanche DuBois, in Tennessee Williams’ landmark play, A Streetcar Named Desire. Starring alongside Marlon Brando in his screen debut, Leigh performed her way to her second Oscar win, and left behind a torn and shattered character that began in the mind of one our greatest playwrights, and continued to breath through the direction of Elia Kazan who directed the original Broadway play, and finally found its life and being through the words and emotions of Vivien Leigh, one of Hollywood’s most famous and infamous characters that ever was. She starred in just three more films after this one, and passed away in 1967 at the age of 53.

Elizabeth Taylor - Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? - 1966

By the mid-1960s, Elizabeth Taylor has already endured a lifetime of trauma. Married five times, and widowed once, she experienced a lot of turmoil over her personal life, much of which came when she began a torrid affair with co-star Richard Burton on the set of the infamous Cleopatra, which was finally released in 1963. The two married, and divorced, then got married again, then got divorced again. In between, they co-starred together in Mike Nichols’ debut as a film director, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? based on the acclaimed play by Edward Albee. The film gained a lot of attention, bringing home five Academy Awards, including one for Taylor for Best Actress. In order to play the alcoholic, 50-ish character, the 33-year-old Taylor gained 30 pounds for the role. It paid off, with the second Oscar statuette of her career.

And a few of the other most memorable performances...

Gloria Swanson - Sunset Blvd. - 1950

Swanson’s infamous turn as Norma Desmond mirrored her own downfall from silent-era fame. She immortalized the troubled, and deprived actress with the famous last words of the film, “I’m ready for my close-up Mr. Demille!”

Faye Dunaway - Network – 1976

Playing a cold hearted, but ambitious TV executive, Faye Dunaway won an Academy Award as part of the most impressive cast in movie history.

Jane Fonda – Coming Home - 1978

Fonda’s heartfelt performance as a soldier’s wife who falls in love with an injured veteran gave Fonda the second Oscar of her career. An underrated war film that was overshadowed by the release of another post-Vietnam epic, The Deer Hunter.

Rena Owen – Once Were Warriors - 1994

Owen was strong and fearless as a wife and mother involved in an abusive relationship with a member of the Maori tribe in New Zealend. An absolutely brutal depiction of life down under.

SWINGERS (DOUG LIMAN, 1996)

Swingers, 1996, USA

Dir: Doug Liman

Cast: Jon Favreau, Vince Vaughn, Ron Livingston

Swingers was made back in 1996, when the Sundance Film Festival was the elite breeding ground for tomorrow’s filmmakers. Set in Los Angeles, three struggling actors from New York spend their days hanging out in diners and jazz clubs while trying to pick up women. Their careers are going nowhere, so they soak up life with Vegas-road trips and hopping from party to party. 

The film is centered on Mike, played by Jon Favreau, who wrote the script. Mike is a transplant from Queens and just made the move to L.A. to pursue an acting career. Being so far from home, he deals with the effects of a bad break-up in the midst of his big move. We then follow him for the rest of the film as he tries to put the memory of his ex behind him, while trying to meet someone new with the help of his eccentric friends, played by Favreau's real-life friends, Vince Vaughn and Ron Livingston, among others.

What made Swingers great was that it was original and honest, and yet it was very stylized and referential. Favreau and the gang did an exceptional job at mixing truth with style, which is always hard for filmmakers and artists to do. It takes a special group of people to make a memorable film, particularly one that is very low budget. There must be a gimmick for the audience to grab a hold of. For example, in the 2007 release, Paranormal Activity, a movie shot for less than $50,000, the majority of the footage was shot by the protagonists themselves, so that the movie looked like it was made on home video, lending to its authenticity, which in the end was proven to be just a ploy. But the film was well received, and grossed nearly $200 million worldwide, and has spawned three sequels to date. 

Swingers was one of those tiny, independent films that came out of L.A. in the mid-90s. The impressive cast and crew included Vince Vaughn, who has become one of America’s leading funnymen, Ron Livingston, who enjoyed a stint on Sex and The City, and cult movie fame from Office Space, and Heather Graham who starred in the highly acclaimed PT Anderson film Boogie Nights, and recently starred in The Hangover, a global box office success. Jon Favreau eventually became a director, and helmed the first two Iron Man movies, which, together, grossed over a billion dollars worldwide during their releases. The man who directed Swingers is Doug Liman. You may know him as the guy behind the first Bourne film, The Bourne Identity. He also directed Mr. and Mrs. Smith starring Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. 

Made for only $200,000, Swingers became a cult movie hit, and spawned the careers of many of today’s leading men and women in Hollywood. It was distributed by none other than Miramax, headed by Harvey Weinstein. It seemed like every great independent film in the 90s was in some way connected to Weinstein and Miramax. The company released many memorable films that decade including Pulp Fiction, Good Will Hunting, and Shakespeare in Love. 

Swingers features an eclectic but brilliant soundtrack with the tunes of Dean Martin, The Commodores, and Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, the latter of which performed in the film during a memorable swing dance performance at the movie's climax. It’s one of my favorite comedies, a film that mixes emotion and heart with some of the coolest lines of dialogue in recent movie history. If you’ve ever heard the expression “You’re Money!” this is the film that originated it.

BELLE DE JOUR (LUIS BUNUEL, 1967)

Belle de Jour, France, 1967
Dir: Luis Bunuel
Cast: Catharine Deneuve, Jean Sorel, Michel Piccoli

Belle de Jour was Luis Buñuel’s 29th film as writer and director. Buñuel began his career as an artist in the 1920s, working alongside other surrealists like Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp and Salvador Dali. It his relationship with the latter that formed the genesis of Bunuel’s first project, a short film called Un Chien Andalou (An Andalusian Dog). Dali and Bunuel are credited as co-directors, and released the film in 1929. The movie quickly gained infamy for portraying graphic images, particularly one of an eye being slit open with a razor (they actually used an eye from a deceased cow for the scene).

The two friends and collaborators would go on to direct their first feature film together as well, L'Age d'Or (The Golden Age) in 1930. The film, like its predecessor, was criticized around its native France and other countries for being blasphemous and subversive. Dali and Bunuel went through creative differences while making the film and the two never worked together again. Bunuel, so outraged at the negative response to his work quit filmmaking and left France, not to return again for over three decades.

Bunuel directed some short documentaries throughout the 30s, but spent most of his time living and working in New York at the Museum of Modern Art. He returned to narrative filmmaking in the late 1940s, and would go on to direct several masterpieces in Mexico, including Los Olvidados, The Exterminating Angel, and Simon of the Desert. In the late 1960s, however, he began making films in France again and directed some of his best work there including Belle de Jour, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, and That Obscure Object of Desire.

Catherine Deneuve was a blonde bombshell in the 1960s. After starring in Roman Polanski’s brilliant psychological thriller Repulsion two years earlier, Bunuel cast her as Severine, a naïve young housewife who fantasizes about being sexually deprived by other men. Unbeknownst to her oblivious husband, Severine decides to join a small brothel and renames herself “Belle de Jour” –- beauty of the day. Deneuve’s portrayal as a destitute and bored housewife growing up in the swinging 60s is cold and distant, perfect for Bunuel’s style of fantasy and satire.

Belle de Jour remains one of France’s most iconic films. It’s the typical subversive and counter-cultural film that only the French in the 60s could produce. Bunuel was already 67 years old when this film was released, and he would be 77 by the time he directed his last picture in 1977. Bunuel grew up in an era when the 19th Century was being forgotten and the 20th Century was making its mark. The 1920s saw a rush of great artists and writers flock to Paris, like Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

The year this film was released, 1967, was a very pivotal year in movies. Bonnie & Clyde, The Graduate and In the Heat of the Night were all released that year. It was the beginning of the end of the studio system and the dawn of the age when directors had creative control over their work. Bunuel would make four more films after Belle de Jour. He passed away in 1983 at the age of 83.