Frost/Nixon and Redbelt
I realized tonight that if I don't write about these movies, they will just fall by the wayside, and I really don't that to happen-they're both too good.
Frost/Nixon is getting a lot of buzz for Frank Langella's portrayal of Nixon, which, for me, was not the best part of the movie. He seems awkward playing Nixon (who was himself an awkward man) but the awkwardness seems forced and actorish-I was never not aware that he was an actor playing a part-when I catch myself thinking the actor is doing a good job, it's a sure sign that it's NOT that great a job. On the other hand, Michael Sheen (an actor I think who has not gotten the kudos he deserves) does an excellent job. He's completely caught up in the circus surrounding the interviews and he revels in it.
I liked the interview portions the best-and Ron Howard does a nice job of setting the stage-Nixon, the wily politician who pyschs out the younger man before each interview-until Frost does the same thing to him before the last interview, dealing with Watergate. But did Frost mean to do it-mention the call that Nixon made to him the night before? It seemed me that he did it to be polite, not for the reason Nixon had-in order to throw him off his game. Regardless, it had the same effect-Nixon was thrown off and Frost was able to finally ask tough questions that threw Nixon out of his comfort zone. Would he have said "If the President does it, it's not illegal" if he hadn't been off his game? Maybe not, but I don't know the truth of the background story anyway-the only truth is in the interviews themselves. The supporting actors were all good-Sam Rockwell seems to get better and better-but I'm still not sure what Rebecca Hall was doing there other than to be the girl in an almost all-male production.
Unlike in Redbelt, where Chewitel Odjezorfor's (yes, I misspelled. sorry) wife plays a major part. He's a mixed-martial arts teacher who feels competing in the sport would demean him and his sport. The art is in teaching and doing it well-there's no need to compete. Unfortunately (as this was written by David Mamet), he's poor and his wife wants some money. And she's the daughter of a man Chewie reveres and the sister of a man who puts on mixed-martial competitions. This can't end well for anyone. The wife sets him to compete (by machinations too elaborate to go into) in order to erase a huge debt-until he finds out the (shock!) the match is rigged-he'll win and then lose and win next time. (I'm pretty sure that's the way it's supposed to go but I could be wrong). A man of honor is not happy at finding about both the rigging and his wife-and he walks away. But when he meets up with his brother-in-law (and mixed-martial arts expert himself) in the entrance way to the arena, the real fight (so to speak) begins. At least he knows it's not rigged and if he winds, he's won purely by skill. The whole thing requires a suspension of belief-the set-up is extremely elaborate-but it's not hard to believe his wife set him up from the start, especially as she bitches at him about money throughout almost the whole thing. But Chewie makes you believe the whole thing. This guy is a great actor, from The Operative in Serenity (where I spent the movie, saying "who IS that guy?"), to the transvestite of Kinky Boots, the brother of the American Gangster to a hardened soldier brought to his knees in Children of Men-he has been uniformly excellent in everything. I can't wait to see what he does next.
And it's a pretty good movie.
Frost/Nixon is getting a lot of buzz for Frank Langella's portrayal of Nixon, which, for me, was not the best part of the movie. He seems awkward playing Nixon (who was himself an awkward man) but the awkwardness seems forced and actorish-I was never not aware that he was an actor playing a part-when I catch myself thinking the actor is doing a good job, it's a sure sign that it's NOT that great a job. On the other hand, Michael Sheen (an actor I think who has not gotten the kudos he deserves) does an excellent job. He's completely caught up in the circus surrounding the interviews and he revels in it.
I liked the interview portions the best-and Ron Howard does a nice job of setting the stage-Nixon, the wily politician who pyschs out the younger man before each interview-until Frost does the same thing to him before the last interview, dealing with Watergate. But did Frost mean to do it-mention the call that Nixon made to him the night before? It seemed me that he did it to be polite, not for the reason Nixon had-in order to throw him off his game. Regardless, it had the same effect-Nixon was thrown off and Frost was able to finally ask tough questions that threw Nixon out of his comfort zone. Would he have said "If the President does it, it's not illegal" if he hadn't been off his game? Maybe not, but I don't know the truth of the background story anyway-the only truth is in the interviews themselves. The supporting actors were all good-Sam Rockwell seems to get better and better-but I'm still not sure what Rebecca Hall was doing there other than to be the girl in an almost all-male production.
Unlike in Redbelt, where Chewitel Odjezorfor's (yes, I misspelled. sorry) wife plays a major part. He's a mixed-martial arts teacher who feels competing in the sport would demean him and his sport. The art is in teaching and doing it well-there's no need to compete. Unfortunately (as this was written by David Mamet), he's poor and his wife wants some money. And she's the daughter of a man Chewie reveres and the sister of a man who puts on mixed-martial competitions. This can't end well for anyone. The wife sets him to compete (by machinations too elaborate to go into) in order to erase a huge debt-until he finds out the (shock!) the match is rigged-he'll win and then lose and win next time. (I'm pretty sure that's the way it's supposed to go but I could be wrong). A man of honor is not happy at finding about both the rigging and his wife-and he walks away. But when he meets up with his brother-in-law (and mixed-martial arts expert himself) in the entrance way to the arena, the real fight (so to speak) begins. At least he knows it's not rigged and if he winds, he's won purely by skill. The whole thing requires a suspension of belief-the set-up is extremely elaborate-but it's not hard to believe his wife set him up from the start, especially as she bitches at him about money throughout almost the whole thing. But Chewie makes you believe the whole thing. This guy is a great actor, from The Operative in Serenity (where I spent the movie, saying "who IS that guy?"), to the transvestite of Kinky Boots, the brother of the American Gangster to a hardened soldier brought to his knees in Children of Men-he has been uniformly excellent in everything. I can't wait to see what he does next.
And it's a pretty good movie.
posted by SHbookworm at 6:23 PM
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