In Contention

Tag: Bugsy

  • ‘Silence’ smack-down

    (from left) Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster in The Silence of the LambsI stumbled onto Noah Forrest’s ribbing of Jonathan Demme’s “The Silence of the Lambs” over at Movie City News today toward the end of this piece, and frankly, I found little I could argue with.

    Here’s the key graph:

    I think seeing Bill Hader’s brilliant impression of Jame Gumb on a recent SNL made me question a lot of things about The Silence of the Lambs. First off, Jodie Foster is plain old not good in that film. Her accent is awful and she over-emotes constantly. Secondly, Ted Levine’s performance as Jame Gumb has turned out to be the most memorable thing about that film (“Is she a great big fat person?”). Thirdly, that film is really not that great and it pains me to say that because I always held it in high esteem. In fact, it plays better as an unintentional comedy than as a thriller.

    Ever since the film was released back in February of 1991, I’ve found myself scratching my head at its somewhat over-elevated status as a modern classic.  I fully agree with Forrest’s assessment of Jodie Foster’s Oscar-winning performance, for starters, and beyond the sheer thrill-factor of the film (it can’t be said that it’s not a solid genre entry), I never…ever…understood the awards train it dominated in the fall of that year.

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  • Mr. Beatty, direct another film please?

    Interviewing Warren Beatty a few years ago in Toronto, I was struck at once by his intellect, which is laser sharp. The man misses nothing. He speaks slowly, taking long pauses before he speaks, and avoids personal questions, which I dislike and refuse to ask anyway.

    He was with Annette Bening at the time, supporting her efforts in “Being Julia.” But all I wanted to discuss was “Reds,” Beatty’s masterful film about John Reed and the Russian Revolution which won him the Academy Award for Best Director and was ousted for Best Pic by the vastly inferior “Chariots of Fire.”

    I had heard he could be a nightmare in interviews, but he seemed genuinely interested in discussing the film. He remembers sitting there at the ceremony, and when the other film won Best Costume Design, he said he knew it was over.

    Beatty was recently honored by the American Film Institute, which led me to go back and watch many of his films. I’ve come to the conclusion that, not only is he among the more under-appreciated actors and directors working in film today, but he has been for at least 40 years.

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