list http://www.spout.com/ Recent community activity around Monster on Spout Copyright 2005-9 Spout, LLC Spout RSS http://www.spout.com/images/SpoutLogoRSS.jpg http://www.spout.com/ 136 30 http://www.spout.com/films/Monster/227862/default.aspx Title: Monster
Year: 2003
Director: Patty Jenkins
Plot: Model-turned-actress Charlize Theron leaves her glamorous image behind for this gritty drama, in which she plays a disturbed prostitute who becomes a serial killer. Aileen Wuornos (Theron) was a woman who survived a brutal and abusive childhood in Michigan to become a thick-skinned but emotionally damaged adult. Homeless most of her life, Wuornos subsisted by working as a street prostitute; later, when she was in Florida, down to her last five dollars and pondering suicide, she stopped into a bar for a beer. There, Aileen met Selby Wall (Christina Ricci), a woman in her early twenties who had been sent to live with relatives after her Christian parents became aware of her lesbian lifestyle. Selby is immediately attracted to Aileen, and while Aileen tells Selby she's never been in a lesbian relationship, she soon finds herself equally infatuated with her. Selby runs away from her family and moves into a cheap hotel with Aileen, who initially pays the bills by hooking. However, as their money runs low and Aileen finds herself unable to land a regular job, tensions mount between the two. One night, after a john attacks her, Aileen pulls a gun and kills the man. Although her first murder can be categorized as self-defense, Aileen's loathing for the men who pay her for sex becomes so extreme that she begins killing her customers regardless of their behavior. Meanwhile, Selby slowly becomes aware of the full extent of her lover's instability and the bloody consequences of her actions. Monster was inspired by the true story of Aileen Wuornos, whose life and death was chronicled in two documentaries by filmmaker Nick Broomfield, Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer, and Aileen: The Life and Death of a Serial Killer. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Times Tagged: 28
Number of Lists: 29
Number of blog posts: 4
Number of discussion threads: 6
SpoutRating: 3
]]>Thu, 18 Jun 2009 22:17:27 GMTMonster2003Patty JenkinsModel-turned-actress <a href="/players/P___216257/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Charlize Theron</a> leaves her glamorous image behind for this gritty drama, in which she plays a disturbed prostitute who becomes a serial killer. Aileen Wuornos (Theron) was a woman who survived a brutal and abusive childhood in Michigan to become a thick-skinned but emotionally damaged adult. Homeless most of her life, Wuornos subsisted by working as a street prostitute; later, when she was in Florida, down to her last five dollars and pondering suicide, she stopped into a bar for a beer. There, Aileen met Selby Wall (<a href="/players/P____59916/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Christina Ricci</a>), a woman in her early twenties who had been sent to live with relatives after her Christian parents became aware of her lesbian lifestyle. Selby is immediately attracted to Aileen, and while Aileen tells Selby she's never been in a lesbian relationship, she soon finds herself equally infatuated with her. Selby runs away from her family and moves into a cheap hotel with Aileen, who initially pays the bills by hooking. However, as their money runs low and Aileen finds herself unable to land a regular job, tensions mount between the two. One night, after a john attacks her, Aileen pulls a gun and kills the man. Although her first murder can be categorized as self-defense, Aileen's loathing for the men who pay her for sex becomes so extreme that she begins killing her customers regardless of their behavior. Meanwhile, Selby slowly becomes aware of the full extent of her lover's instability and the bloody consequences of her actions. Monster was inspired by the true story of Aileen Wuornos, whose life and death was chronicled in two documentaries by filmmaker <a href="/players/P____83168/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Nick Broomfield</a>, Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer, and Aileen: The Life and Death of a Serial Killer. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide28Tag Target (>10)29463http://www.spout.com/ProductImages/t52550n0vqf.jpghttp://www.spout.com/films/Monster/227862/default.aspxFilm http://www.spout.com/groups/Weekly_Theme/Re_Weekly_Theme_for_June_15_That_s_So_Gay/625/42689/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: mercurial
Post To: Weekly Theme
Post Date: 6/17/2009 2:13:33 PM
Body: Since I picked another winner of discussion this week, I guess it's up to me to try and add something more to this post. My last post focused more on the men, I'll focus on the ladies this time around. I haven't had a chance to see Bound yet but that remains the first movie that comes to mind when I think lesbians on film. Maybe that will change when I finally see it. I was completely unaware that it was a Wachowski brothers movies until a few years ago. Side note, now that one of the Wachowski's is making the transition to be a woman, I guess they are going to have to drop the brothers from their future movies. The Wachowski's also touched on lesbianism in V for Vendetta with the story of the lesbian couple that falls victim to the governments hypocrisy and is jailed for their love of each other. I liked the twisted lesbian relationship of Cameron Diaz and Catherine Keener in Being John Malkovich. Cameron inhabiting John's body to have sex with Catherine's character. Crazy. I love The Hours even though Meryl Streep and Allison Janney as the falling out of love couple was the weakest part of the film. Of course we can't forget Mulholland Dr. and the reason most people saw the film: Naomi Watts and Laura Harring. For those still not in the know, she was in fact a lesbian and most of the film was her masturbatorial fantasy. Thank you David Lynch! Charlize Theron got her Oscar for depicting a fugly serial killer lesbian attracted to the always adorable Christina Ricci in Monster. The rampant lesbianism in Desperate Living is something to be seen. Disturbing and traumatic, just as a John Waters film should be. Anna Faris played a seductive lesbian in the creepy May. I still can't look at Angela Bettis without seeing her with that creepy lazy eye. I'll always love Reese Witherspoon for played a jacked up Little Red Riding Hood in Freeway. The hilariously perverse pseudo sex scene with her and Brittany Murphy in priceless. Lastly, Kissing Jessica Stein was a really funny, adorable romantic comedy about lesbians, or rather a lesbian and a bisexual. Heartfelt and just a really simple, great movie.
]]>Wed, 17 Jun 2009 18:13:33 GMTmercurialWeekly Theme6/17/2009 2:13:33 PMSince I picked another winner of discussion this week, I guess it's up to me to try and add something more to this post. My last post focused more on the men, I'll focus on the ladies this time around. I haven't had a chance to see Bound yet but that remains the first movie that comes to mind when I think lesbians on film. Maybe that will change when I finally see it. I was completely unaware that it was a Wachowski brothers movies until a few years ago. Side note, now that one of the Wachowski's is making the transition to be a woman, I guess they are going to have to drop the brothers from their future movies. The Wachowski's also touched on lesbianism in V for Vendetta with the story of the lesbian couple that falls victim to the governments hypocrisy and is jailed for their love of each other. I liked the twisted lesbian relationship of Cameron Diaz and Catherine Keener in Being John Malkovich. Cameron inhabiting John's body to have sex with Catherine's character. Crazy. I love The Hours even though Meryl Streep and Allison Janney as the falling out of love couple was the weakest part of the film. Of course we can't forget Mulholland Dr. and the reason most people saw the film: Naomi Watts and Laura Harring. For those still not in the know, she was in fact a lesbian and most of the film was her masturbatorial fantasy. Thank you David Lynch! Charlize Theron got her Oscar for depicting a fugly serial killer lesbian attracted to the always adorable Christina Ricci in Monster. The rampant lesbianism in Desperate Living is something to be seen. Disturbing and traumatic, just as a John Waters film should be. Anna Faris played a seductive lesbian in the creepy May. I still can't look at Angela Bettis without seeing her with that creepy lazy eye. I'll always love Reese Witherspoon for played a jacked up Little Red Riding Hood in Freeway. The hilariously perverse pseudo sex scene with her and Brittany Murphy in priceless. Lastly, Kissing Jessica Stein was a really funny, adorable romantic comedy about lesbians, or rather a lesbian and a bisexual. Heartfelt and just a really simple, great movie. http://www.spout.com/blogs/pippin06/archive/2009/4/26/41758.aspx Post By: pippin06
Post To: Reel Thoughts
Post Date: 4/26/2009 4:40:12 PM
Body: What's an Oscar Flashback (tm)? Read here: Next on my Netflix queue was Monster, for which Charlize Theron won the Best Actress Oscar (film year, 2003; awarding year, 2004). The other nominees for Best Actress in this category were: 21 Grams - Naomi Watts In America - Samantha Morton Something's Gotta Give - Diane Keaton Whale Rider - Keisha Castle-Hughes This movie also represents the second of five LGBT-themed Oscar movies at the top of my Netflix queue (thanks to my stream of consciousness queuing). Just in case you were keeping track. Monster tells the true story of serial killer Aileen Wuornos (Theron), a hooker who had been abused as a child and resorted to prostitution when she ran away from home in Michigan and went to Florida at the age of 13. One night in the late 80s, when her car broke down (or she was stranded by her latest john, I wasn't quite clear on that point), she ends up in a local gay bar where she meets Selby (Christina Ricci), who is immediately attracted to "Lee." While Lee recoils at first, the two form a fast friendship that later evolves into a romantic and then physical relationship. Selby leaves the shelter of her father's friends, with whom she was staying to "clear her head" after her father found out she was gay, for a life of cheap hotel rooms and apartments and relative starvation with Lee. To pay the bills, Lee keeps hooking, but one night, when a potential john rapes her and tries to kill her, Lee manages to get free and kill him in self defense. The action is understandable and sympathetic, but the incident incites Lee's inner levee to break, and she begins to attack and kill other clients as if in vengeance for her lot in life and previous abuse. In so doing, she slowly loses her mind. All the while, Selby watches helplessly as her lover seems to lose all connection to reality and as law enforcement officials pick up on the trail of murders and bear down on Lee and Selby. Apparently, there were documentaries about Wuornos that partially informed this film version. Wuornos was ultimately sentenced to death, a sentence that was completed in 2002. The footnote to the film provides this fact, and it's not really a spoiler – information is widely available about this woman and her actions – but it's important to know when considering what the filmmakers might have been trying to say by making this film to begin with. All in all, I found this film to be another mixed bag of good points and bad points. To start with the good, much talk was had about how Theron might have won her Oscar because she was de-glamorized for the film to play this woman beaten down by life and poverty, but attributing this performance to make-up only is to do it an injustice. Theron clearly threw herself into the role so much that her facial expressions did not even seem to be hers anymore. Actually, at times, she kind of looked like Katherine Heigl, but that's a digression. My disbelief was completely suspended because Theron played this disturbed, traumatized woman so well, I actually forgot it was her by the end of the film. If she didn't deserve the award, I don't know who did. Of the five nominees, however, I've only seen Something's Gotta Give (and in that film, Diane Keaton was acting like, well, Diane Keaton). By the same token, I felt Christina Ricci was completely miscast. Maybe it's the fact that she still looks like a child, or maybe it was the fact that Selby was painted to be insecure and immature, but the whole performance felt off to me. Selby elicited some sympathy when her life became a nightmare in the wake of Lee's deteriorating sanity, and it's not Ricci's skill that left something to be desired; I think she did well. I just don't think she was right for the part. Maybe I don't know enough about Wuornos' real-life lover, but I couldn't suspend disbelief for Ricci as Selby, and it left me feeling extreme disjointedness and a sense of surreal about the entire film. It didn't help that the film actually devoted some focus to Selby's particular story. If the film was supposed to be an examination of Wuornos in an effort to challenge the viewer to sympathize (or at least understand) the motives of this particular serial killer, it didn't make sense to show Selby's familial and other struggles for acceptance of her sexuality. This lack of focus is probably why I had such a hard time buying Ricci in the part. The film had enough to deal with in trying to paint a picture of a troubled woman's descent into madness and violence without adding this other dynamic into the mix. This lack of focus also served to undermine any appreciation or enjoyment I might have had of the film. While the director of the film, Patty Jenkins, handled what could only be classified as controversial subject matter with deference and balance, the question still remains whether the film achieved what it was aiming to do. For the most part, I think it did, if the point was to dissect Wuornos' motivations and to give her an aspect of humanity in a situation for which she could easily, and possibly rightfully, be vilified without redemption. After all, her life and times were hard, and the first murder could at least be understandable even as all of the subsequent murders were neither understandable nor defensible. The problem is, the film was trying to divide its focus between Wuornos as a killer and Wuornos as a lover, and neither aspect was given a sufficient flush to correlate and to ultimately connect the viewer to her story. Also, by "connect," I don't mean "relate," but if the subject is important enough in this director's eye to film, then there is obviously a message or a stand to make here, and I think the film was trying to take too many stands at once. With focus on Wuornos' life, there should have been a bit more narrative to further explain her childhood, other than hints at the beginning and a hysterical monologue more than halfway through the film as the guilt of Lee's actions begins to overwhelm her. Plus, it was difficult to understand why Theron as Wuornos narrated the piece if some focus was going to be given to the Selby character too. All in all, the movie was just not filmed in a very tight or concentrated manner, and Theron's performance notwithstanding, lacked or at least undermined the emotional punch for which the film seemed so desperately to strive. As another small gripe, while I quite enjoy Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'," and maybe the lyrics fit some of the sentiments of the film, the use of the song for this film furthered its surreal quality, and surreal does not fit with a story that is supposed to be based on and in reality. Yes, the song was period (the late 80s), but the use of this song struck me as kind of hokey when the subject matter of this film was anything but. All in all, I did not really care for Monster the film, even if Theron's performance was, in fact, Oscar-caliber. The lack of narrative focus and other elements made Theron's contribution to the film that much more heroic even as the film itself lost me to its mire of related but under serviced themes and/or messages. After some consideration, I believe this film merits a 6.5 between cute/mediocre and shaky/entertaining, and it doesn't pass the test. This film undertook a monster of a topic but ultimately lost its teeth by its finish.
]]>Sun, 26 Apr 2009 20:40:12 GMTpippin06Reel Thoughts4/26/2009 4:40:12 PMWhat's an Oscar Flashback (tm)? Read here: Next on my Netflix queue was Monster, for which Charlize Theron won the Best Actress Oscar (film year, 2003; awarding year, 2004). The other nominees for Best Actress in this category were: 21 Grams - Naomi Watts In America - Samantha Morton Something's Gotta Give - Diane Keaton Whale Rider - Keisha Castle-Hughes This movie also represents the second of five LGBT-themed Oscar movies at the top of my Netflix queue (thanks to my stream of consciousness queuing). Just in case you were keeping track. Monster tells the true story of serial killer Aileen Wuornos (Theron), a hooker who had been abused as a child and resorted to prostitution when she ran away from home in Michigan and went to Florida at the age of 13. One night in the late 80s, when her car broke down (or she was stranded by her latest john, I wasn't quite clear on that point), she ends up in a local gay bar where she meets Selby (Christina Ricci), who is immediately attracted to "Lee." While Lee recoils at first, the two form a fast friendship that later evolves into a romantic and then physical relationship. Selby leaves the shelter of her father's friends, with whom she was staying to "clear her head" after her father found out she was gay, for a life of cheap hotel rooms and apartments and relative starvation with Lee. To pay the bills, Lee keeps hooking, but one night, when a potential john rapes her and tries to kill her, Lee manages to get free and kill him in self defense. The action is understandable and sympathetic, but the incident incites Lee's inner levee to break, and she begins to attack and kill other clients as if in vengeance for her lot in life and previous abuse. In so doing, she slowly loses her mind. All the while, Selby watches helplessly as her lover seems to lose all connection to reality and as law enforcement officials pick up on the trail of murders and bear down on Lee and Selby. Apparently, there were documentaries about Wuornos that partially informed this film version. Wuornos was ultimately sentenced to death, a sentence that was completed in 2002. The footnote to the film provides this fact, and it's not really a spoiler &ndash; information is widely available about this woman and her actions &ndash; but it's important to know when considering what the filmmakers might have been trying to say by making this film to begin with. All in all, I found this film to be another mixed bag of good points and bad points. To start with the good, much talk was had about how Theron might have won her Oscar because she was de-glamorized for the film to play this woman beaten down by life and poverty, but attributing this performance to make-up only is to do it an injustice. Theron clearly threw herself into the role so much that her facial expressions did not even seem to be hers anymore. Actually, at times, she kind of looked like Katherine Heigl, but that's a digression. My disbelief was completely suspended because Theron played this disturbed, traumatized woman so well, I actually forgot it was her by the end of the film. If she didn't deserve the award, I don't know who did. Of the five nominees, however, I've only seen Something's Gotta Give (and in that film, Diane Keaton was acting like, well, Diane Keaton). By the same token, I felt Christina Ricci was completely miscast. Maybe it's the fact that she still looks like a child, or maybe it was the fact that Selby was painted to be insecure and immature, but the whole performance felt off to me. Selby elicited some sympathy when her life became a nightmare in the wake of Lee's deteriorating sanity, and it's not Ricci's skill that left something to be desired; I think she did well. I just don't think she was right for the part. Maybe I don't know enough about Wuornos' real-life lover, but I couldn't suspend disbelief for Ricci as Selby, and it left me feeling extreme disjointedness and a sense of surreal about the entire film. It didn't help that the film actually devoted some focus to Selby's particular story. If the film was supposed to be an examination of Wuornos in an effort to challenge the viewer to sympathize (or at least understand) the motives of this particular serial killer, it didn't make sense to show Selby's familial and other struggles for acceptance of her sexuality. This lack of focus is probably why I had such a hard time buying Ricci in the part. The film had enough to deal with in trying to paint a picture of a troubled woman's descent into madness and violence without adding this other dynamic into the mix. This lack of focus also served to undermine any appreciation or enjoyment I might have had of the film. While the director of the film, Patty Jenkins, handled what could only be classified as controversial subject matter with deference and balance, the question still remains whether the film achieved what it was aiming to do. For the most part, I think it did, if the point was to dissect Wuornos' motivations and to give her an aspect of humanity in a situation for which she could easily, and possibly rightfully, be vilified without redemption. After all, her life and times were hard, and the first murder could at least be understandable even as all of the subsequent murders were neither understandable nor defensible. The problem is, the film was trying to divide its focus between Wuornos as a killer and Wuornos as a lover, and neither aspect was given a sufficient flush to correlate and to ultimately connect the viewer to her story. Also, by "connect," I don't mean "relate," but if the subject is important enough in this director's eye to film, then there is obviously a message or a stand to make here, and I think the film was trying to take too many stands at once. With focus on Wuornos' life, there should have been a bit more narrative to further explain her childhood, other than hints at the beginning and a hysterical monologue more than halfway through the film as the guilt of Lee's actions begins to overwhelm her. Plus, it was difficult to understand why Theron as Wuornos narrated the piece if some focus was going to be given to the Selby character too. All in all, the movie was just not filmed in a very tight or concentrated manner, and Theron's performance notwithstanding, lacked or at least undermined the emotional punch for which the film seemed so desperately to strive. As another small gripe, while I quite enjoy Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'," and maybe the lyrics fit some of the sentiments of the film, the use of the song for this film furthered its surreal quality, and surreal does not fit with a story that is supposed to be based on and in reality. Yes, the song was period (the late 80s), but the use of this song struck me as kind of hokey when the subject matter of this film was anything but. All in all, I did not really care for Monster the film, even if Theron's performance was, in fact, Oscar-caliber. The lack of narrative focus and other elements made Theron's contribution to the film that much more heroic even as the film itself lost me to its mire of related but under serviced themes and/or messages. After some consideration, I believe this film merits a 6.5 between cute/mediocre and shaky/entertaining, and it doesn't pass the test. This film undertook a monster of a topic but ultimately lost its teeth by its finish. http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2009/2/5/40271.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 2/5/2009 12:01:20 PM
Body: Are you one of the many sci-fi and comic book geeks who’d be more interested in Push were it not for Dakota Fanning? Sure, the precocious child star is now a teen actress (she’s about to turn 15), yet that probably makes you even more worried about her appearance in the movie. But what can you do? She’s literally everywhere this week – voicing the title character in the animated Coraline and starring in two new video releases, Hounddog and The Secret Life of Bees, both of which were released Tuesday. In the tradition of child actors continuing careers into adolescence, it’s only a matter of time before she ruins a movie that would have been better without her. We’ll have to wait until this weekend to see if that time is now, with Push, but in the meantime let’s take a look at some of the past offenders in this tradition. Most of the following former child actors (our definition: actors that began their career below the age of 13) have done great things in their adulthood, but each has done at least one film that could have been better without him or her. You may disagree with some of these picks, and you may think we’ve forgotten some (was Christian Bale really the worst part of The Dark Knight? did Mary-Kate Olsen’s disturbing kiss with Ben Kingsley take away from The Wackness?), so do share your own thoughts on former child stars below. We just ask that you keep your comments somewhat tasteful and law-abiding. BUtterfield 8 (1960) Elizabeth Taylor won her first Oscar for her performance in this film, and that’s basically the problem. Everyone knew then as they know now that she only won the award because she came down with a near-fatal illness weeks prior to the ceremony. Of course, she was nominated without such sympathy being the reason, so shouldn’t that mean the performance is still great? Well, that’s certainly debatable, but many critics today claim this to be one of the worst best actress wins of all time. So, if you go into BUtterfield 8 expecting an Oscar-worthy film, it’s going to be ruined for you. The Cat’s Meow (2001) Kirsten Dunst, who made her debut at age 7 in Woody Allen’s segment of New York Stories, got to work with another ‘70s cinema great, Peter Bogdanovich, in this comedic telling of an infamous Hollywood scandal. She portrays silent film actress Marion Davies, who becomes the catalyst in the scandal when her boyfriend, newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst (Edward Herrmann), discovers she’s having an affair with Charlie Chaplin (Eddie Izzard). The irony is that Dunst is so annoying in the role that it’s hard to believe any guys would fight over her. Many Dunst fans continually defend her performance in the film, but if it’s not her acting that ruins The Cat’s Meow, it’s at least her singing, which can be heard during the closing credits. Donnie Darko (2001) Drew Barrymore may be the most adorable thing to happen to romantic comedies since Jean Arthur, but occasionally she tries to make us believe she can do other roles. Unfortunately, she’s just not fit for most jobs, and English teacher is certainly one of them. Somehow in Donnie Darko her awkward speaking voice is even worse than usual, and she comes off sounding like she knows this and is attempting to enunciate as best she can in spite of the problem. Well, Drew, there’s a reason Spielberg hasn’t cast you in a sci-fi flick since E.T., you simply can’t pull off the dialogue. Garden State (2004) Natalie Portman didn’t make her film debut until she was 13 (in Leon, aka The Professional), but she did begin acting three years earlier, so we’re allowing her to make the list. How can we not? There isn’t a Garden State hater out there who doesn’t blame Portman and her obnoxious, flaky love interest character for ruining the film. Yet she was once the young girl that made tons of these cinephiles relate to a questionably friendly Timothy Hutton in Beautiful Girls. A year after Garden State, fellow former child starlet Kirsten Dunst (see above) played a similarly obnoxious and flaky love interest in the similarly plotted Elizabethtown. But at least Dunst had Orlando Bloom to make her seem talented by comparison. Portman is all alone in her ruination here. How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (1966) Ron Howard, child star-turned-Oscar-winning filmmaker, has a special circumstance that warrants his inclusion on this list. Unlike the other nine, he managed to ruin a movie he wasn’t even involved in. Notice both the title and the date above. Or click on the link. That’s the old animated adaptation of the Dr. Seuss holiday classic, which Howard ruined by directing his live-action version. You could also say that he ruined the book, and you could say that he ruined his own movie by making the latter so terribly horrendous. But it’s Chuck Jones’ earlier film that was most adversely affected by the release of 2000’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas (often listed simply as The Grinch), because how many children will now grow up with the ugly Jim Carrey-starring version instead of the wonderful Boris Karloff-narrated one? Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) Shia LaBeouf, like Natalie Portman, barely makes the child actor cutoff, but he needs to be included because we need to keep chastising him for ruining not only the latest Indiana Jones movie, but also the whole franchise. Maybe there were indeed other faults with Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Plenty of people credit the “nuke the fridge” scene as the downturn in both the film and the series, for instance. But most of us were forgiving up until Shia swung through the trees like Tarzan. So, he’s clearly to blame. It’s quite a shame, too, because he’s pretty much the only thing that really saves the Transformers movies. Inside Man (2006) Jodie Foster has often seemed out of place in movies. She doesn’t feel right in period romances, such as Sommersby and Anna and the King, but she’s a good enough actress that she’s forgiven for such casting faults. As for Inside Man, well, even her Oscar-winning talent couldn’t keep her from appearing ill fit for her role. Part of the problem is the character itself, that of a woman who comes off far less intelligent and tough than she should (the same kind of character ruined The Bourne Supremacy a year earlier). You want Foster, a smart and strong woman in real life and typically on screen, to be more and do more. But she hardly contributes to the film and if anything slows it and dumbs it down too much. Hopefully the rumors are correct that her character will not return in Inside Man 2. Monster (2003) Christina Ricci is not really a good actress to begin with, but if you cast her opposite a great performance she comes off as seeming a downright terrible actress. This is what happened with Monster, in which Charlize Theron does her Oscar-winning best at becoming unrecognizable. Next to that transformation, Ricci just looks like Ricci, and a really untalented Ricci at that. For the amount of screen time Ricci’s lesbian love-interest character is allotted, Patty Jenkins really should have gotten someone better. Because not only does the performance end up awful next to Theron’s, it ruins a film that is otherwise worth watching for the acting. Silver Screen Confidential (1996) Scott Schwartz actually won an award for this adult film, in which he gives a non-sex performance. It wasn’t his first porn nor was it his last, but because of the recognition he received for this one, it’s being used as the exemplary title. While creepy people out there tend to count down to the day that female child stars reach the age of 18, probably in the hopes that the girls will quickly appear in their first legal nude scene, it is unlikely that anyone was waiting for the day the kid from The Toy, A Christmas Story and Kidco would enter a career in porn. To be honest, we haven’t actually seen any of Schwartz’s adult titles, but we can imagine his appearance is quite distracting to anybody who recognizes him as “Flick” while otherwise trying to get off watching Jenna Jameson. Still, Schwartz does star in his very own title, Scotty’s X-Rated Adventure, so maybe he’s somehow a draw? X-Men (2000) Anna Paquin is the prime reason why the Academy needs to stop allowing child actors Oscar nominations. Yes, Paquin was terrific in The Piano, for which she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. But then look what happened: she grew up to be an irritating starlet who could ruin a film by Spike Lee, Cameron Crowe or Gus Van Sant with just a single whiny-voiced line while playing the same nymphet character over and over and over. So what if she can claim to have confirmed her talent with a recent Golden Globe win (for TV work)? That still doesn’t take back the fact that she stunk up the first X-Men, one of her rare deviations from her typecast Lolita roles, enough to make it a huge disappointment. Fortunately with the sequels, not even her lack of talent could depreciate X2, and she was far from the worst thing about X-Men: The Last Stand. Thankfully she won’t be in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, nor will she likely be given her own spin-off. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Thu, 05 Feb 2009 17:01:20 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com2/5/2009 12:01:20 PMAre you one of the many sci-fi and comic book geeks who’d be more interested in Push were it not for Dakota Fanning? Sure, the precocious child star is now a teen actress (she’s about to turn 15), yet that probably makes you even more worried about her appearance in the movie. But what can you do? She’s literally everywhere this week – voicing the title character in the animated Coraline and starring in two new video releases, Hounddog and The Secret Life of Bees, both of which were released Tuesday. In the tradition of child actors continuing careers into adolescence, it’s only a matter of time before she ruins a movie that would have been better without her. We’ll have to wait until this weekend to see if that time is now, with Push, but in the meantime let’s take a look at some of the past offenders in this tradition. Most of the following former child actors (our definition: actors that began their career below the age of 13) have done great things in their adulthood, but each has done at least one film that could have been better without him or her. You may disagree with some of these picks, and you may think we’ve forgotten some (was Christian Bale really the worst part of The Dark Knight? did Mary-Kate Olsen’s disturbing kiss with Ben Kingsley take away from The Wackness?), so do share your own thoughts on former child stars below. We just ask that you keep your comments somewhat tasteful and law-abiding. BUtterfield 8 (1960) Elizabeth Taylor won her first Oscar for her performance in this film, and that’s basically the problem. Everyone knew then as they know now that she only won the award because she came down with a near-fatal illness weeks prior to the ceremony. Of course, she was nominated without such sympathy being the reason, so shouldn’t that mean the performance is still great? Well, that’s certainly debatable, but many critics today claim this to be one of the worst best actress wins of all time. So, if you go into BUtterfield 8 expecting an Oscar-worthy film, it’s going to be ruined for you. The Cat’s Meow (2001) Kirsten Dunst, who made her debut at age 7 in Woody Allen’s segment of New York Stories, got to work with another ‘70s cinema great, Peter Bogdanovich, in this comedic telling of an infamous Hollywood scandal. She portrays silent film actress Marion Davies, who becomes the catalyst in the scandal when her boyfriend, newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst (Edward Herrmann), discovers she’s having an affair with Charlie Chaplin (Eddie Izzard). The irony is that Dunst is so annoying in the role that it’s hard to believe any guys would fight over her. Many Dunst fans continually defend her performance in the film, but if it’s not her acting that ruins The Cat’s Meow, it’s at least her singing, which can be heard during the closing credits. Donnie Darko (2001) Drew Barrymore may be the most adorable thing to happen to romantic comedies since Jean Arthur, but occasionally she tries to make us believe she can do other roles. Unfortunately, she’s just not fit for most jobs, and English teacher is certainly one of them. Somehow in Donnie Darko her awkward speaking voice is even worse than usual, and she comes off sounding like she knows this and is attempting to enunciate as best she can in spite of the problem. Well, Drew, there’s a reason Spielberg hasn’t cast you in a sci-fi flick since E.T., you simply can’t pull off the dialogue. Garden State (2004) Natalie Portman didn’t make her film debut until she was 13 (in Leon, aka The Professional), but she did begin acting three years earlier, so we’re allowing her to make the list. How can we not? There isn’t a Garden State hater out there who doesn’t blame Portman and her obnoxious, flaky love interest character for ruining the film. Yet she was once the young girl that made tons of these cinephiles relate to a questionably friendly Timothy Hutton in Beautiful Girls. A year after Garden State, fellow former child starlet Kirsten Dunst (see above) played a similarly obnoxious and flaky love interest in the similarly plotted Elizabethtown. But at least Dunst had Orlando Bloom to make her seem talented by comparison. Portman is all alone in her ruination here. How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (1966) Ron Howard, child star-turned-Oscar-winning filmmaker, has a special circumstance that warrants his inclusion on this list. Unlike the other nine, he managed to ruin a movie he wasn’t even involved in. Notice both the title and the date above. Or click on the link. That’s the old animated adaptation of the Dr. Seuss holiday classic, which Howard ruined by directing his live-action version. You could also say that he ruined the book, and you could say that he ruined his own movie by making the latter so terribly horrendous. But it’s Chuck Jones’ earlier film that was most adversely affected by the release of 2000’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas (often listed simply as The Grinch), because how many children will now grow up with the ugly Jim Carrey-starring version instead of the wonderful Boris Karloff-narrated one? Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) Shia LaBeouf, like Natalie Portman, barely makes the child actor cutoff, but he needs to be included because we need to keep chastising him for ruining not only the latest Indiana Jones movie, but also the whole franchise. Maybe there were indeed other faults with Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Plenty of people credit the “nuke the fridge” scene as the downturn in both the film and the series, for instance. But most of us were forgiving up until Shia swung through the trees like Tarzan. So, he’s clearly to blame. It’s quite a shame, too, because he’s pretty much the only thing that really saves the Transformers movies. Inside Man (2006) Jodie Foster has often seemed out of place in movies. She doesn’t feel right in period romances, such as Sommersby and Anna and the King, but she’s a good enough actress that she’s forgiven for such casting faults. As for Inside Man, well, even her Oscar-winning talent couldn’t keep her from appearing ill fit for her role. Part of the problem is the character itself, that of a woman who comes off far less intelligent and tough than she should (the same kind of character ruined The Bourne Supremacy a year earlier). You want Foster, a smart and strong woman in real life and typically on screen, to be more and do more. But she hardly contributes to the film and if anything slows it and dumbs it down too much. Hopefully the rumors are correct that her character will not return in Inside Man 2. Monster (2003) Christina Ricci is not really a good actress to begin with, but if you cast her opposite a great performance she comes off as seeming a downright terrible actress. This is what happened with Monster, in which Charlize Theron does her Oscar-winning best at becoming unrecognizable. Next to that transformation, Ricci just looks like Ricci, and a really untalented Ricci at that. For the amount of screen time Ricci’s lesbian love-interest character is allotted, Patty Jenkins really should have gotten someone better. Because not only does the performance end up awful next to Theron’s, it ruins a film that is otherwise worth watching for the acting. Silver Screen Confidential (1996) Scott Schwartz actually won an award for this adult film, in which he gives a non-sex performance. It wasn’t his first porn nor was it his last, but because of the recognition he received for this one, it’s being used as the exemplary title. While creepy people out there tend to count down to the day that female child stars reach the age of 18, probably in the hopes that the girls will quickly appear in their first legal nude scene, it is unlikely that anyone was waiting for the day the kid from The Toy, A Christmas Story and Kidco would enter a career in porn. To be honest, we haven’t actually seen any of Schwartz’s adult titles, but we can imagine his appearance is quite distracting to anybody who recognizes him as “Flick” while otherwise trying to get off watching Jenna Jameson. Still, Schwartz does star in his very own title, Scotty’s X-Rated Adventure, so maybe he’s somehow a draw? X-Men (2000) Anna Paquin is the prime reason why the Academy needs to stop allowing child actors Oscar nominations. Yes, Paquin was terrific in The Piano, for which she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. But then look what happened: she grew up to be an irritating starlet who could ruin a film by Spike Lee, Cameron Crowe or Gus Van Sant with just a single whiny-voiced line while playing the same nymphet character over and over and over. So what if she can claim to have confirmed her talent with a recent Golden Globe win (for TV work)? That still doesn’t take back the fact that she stunk up the first X-Men, one of her rare deviations from her typecast Lolita roles, enough to make it a huge disappointment. Fortunately with the sequels, not even her lack of talent could depreciate X2, and she was far from the worst thing about X-Men: The Last Stand. Thankfully she won’t be in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, nor will she likely be given her own spin-off. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/groups/Filmgaming/Re_Cast_BATMAN_3/563/33381/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: LadyKaede
Post To: Filmgaming
Post Date: 8/1/2008 10:22:33 AM
Body: There are several directions the story might take. If the mob as represented in the last two movies morphs into big business, either The Kingpin or a re-imagined Penguin (so called because he is a dandy and wears a tux, perhaps?) might be logical villains. But I think the one thing we can be sure of is that Batman will enter the next movie depressed and bereft. With the demise of Rachel and the disenchantment of Lucius, he’s got nobody left on the Bruce side of his life except Alfred, who can only do so much (and is too easily taken for granted). Bruce is reviled as a wasted twit, and Batman is hated as a cop-killer. I think it’s time to revive the thread from 1992’s Batman Returns in which Batman falls in love with the alter ego of his nemesis, and yes, that means Catwoman. Handling the origins of the character briefly and believably will be the most difficult technical problem, but Chris, Jonathan and David certainly seem up to the task. Early talk on the ’Net of Angelina Jolie for this role is misguided. Unless you put her in full body armor and mask her voice like Darth Vader, no audience will buy it that Batman doesn’t recognize her when she’s on the prowl. What’s required for the role: Someone with a ‘look’ as malleable as Christian Bale’s or Gary Oldman’s. Someone who is age appropriate, but can handle the stuntwork credibly. Someone who can play the line between sanity and madness, perhaps between madness and genius. I give you Charlize Theron, and submit as evidence her work as Aileen Wuornos in 2003’s Monster, and her work as the title character in 2005’s Aeon Flux. I guarantee she would stand up perfectly against Bale whichever masks the two are wearing, and wipe the vision of Halle Barry from our collective memories.
]]>Fri, 01 Aug 2008 14:22:33 GMTLadyKaedeFilmgaming8/1/2008 10:22:33 AMThere are several directions the story might take. If the mob as represented in the last two movies morphs into big business, either The Kingpin or a re-imagined Penguin (so called because he is a dandy and wears a tux, perhaps?) might be logical villains. But I think the one thing we can be sure of is that Batman will enter the next movie depressed and bereft. With the demise of Rachel and the disenchantment of Lucius, he&rsquo;s got nobody left on the Bruce side of his life except Alfred, who can only do so much (and is too easily taken for granted). Bruce is reviled as a wasted twit, and Batman is hated as a cop-killer. I think it&rsquo;s time to revive the thread from 1992&rsquo;s Batman Returns in which Batman falls in love with the alter ego of his nemesis, and yes, that means Catwoman. Handling the origins of the character briefly and believably will be the most difficult technical problem, but Chris, Jonathan and David certainly seem up to the task. Early talk on the &rsquo;Net of Angelina Jolie for this role is misguided. Unless you put her in full body armor and mask her voice like Darth Vader, no audience will buy it that Batman doesn&rsquo;t recognize her when she&rsquo;s on the prowl. What&rsquo;s required for the role: Someone with a &lsquo;look&rsquo; as malleable as Christian Bale&rsquo;s or Gary Oldman&rsquo;s. Someone who is age appropriate, but can handle the stuntwork credibly. Someone who can play the line between sanity and madness, perhaps between madness and genius. I give you Charlize Theron, and submit as evidence her work as Aileen Wuornos in 2003&rsquo;s Monster, and her work as the title character in 2005&rsquo;s Aeon Flux. I guarantee she would stand up perfectly against Bale whichever masks the two are wearing, and wipe the vision of Halle Barry from our collective memories. http://www.spout.com/blogs/cinemarian/archive/2008/5/13/28844.aspx Post By: CinemaRian
Post To: CinemaRian Blog
Post Date: 5/13/2008 4:22:48 AM
Body: I think I would have liked Monster more if I didn't know that it was based on actual events. I liked the film's ideas but somehow never totally connected with the material on an emotional level. I think that the reason is that I saw the pictures of Aileen Wuornos on death row, and read reviews of a documentary that Nick Broomfield had made about her. I think that I might have been more receptive to Jenkin's message if the protagonist of her film was a totally fictional character, and was thus had nothing to compare it to. The movie's thesis is that Aileen Wuornos, a serial killer who was executed in Florida a year before the film was released, was doomed from the day she was born. Despite her crimes, she is essentially a good person, but she is uneducated and was never given anything approaching a fair chance or lucky break. Born in Michigan, her father was a serial child molester who commited suicide in prison, her mother abandonded her and she was raised by her grandparents, who she claimed were abusive. She gave birth at age 14, giving her son up for adoption. The child's father was probably a john she picked up prostuting. This is an unbelivably tragic story. And the odd thing is that the film doesn't tell us much of this- the above paragraph is a summery of what I read on Wikipedia. Jenkins' strangely picks up the story after Wuornos has hitchhiked to Flordia. This deletion is a critical mistake- we see that Wournos is wounded, but we don't totally understand why. Later on, when the director wants us to sympathize with her, this backstory would have made it much easier. To summerize Jenkins' film: On a day she plays on commiting suicide, Wuornos meets Selby (Christina Ricci) a young lesbian from a evangelic household. The two strike up a romance and Aileen becomes truly devoted to and borderline obcessed with Selby- like an adolecent crush. While prostituting to get money for a date, Aileen picks up a sadist who rapes and plans to murder her. She manages to kill him in self defense. After she convinces Selby to run off with her, she tries to get a job, but can't- she has no skills and has never worked legitamentally in her life. In order to get money to live on, she poses as a prostitue and kills the johns, taking their money and their car. She is eventually caught, and is executed, bitter to the end. What I liked best about the movie was its demonstration about the plieght of people in the lower depths of our society. The film's version of Aileen is an essentially good person who never given anythign she would need to be a productive member of society. Yet that society expects her to be self-sustaing individual and gives her no help, only abuse and exploitation. Where the movie fails in its portrayal of the love story (or whatever it is) between Aileen and Selby. Charlize Theron won an Oscar for her portrayal, but Ricci comes off as fake and unbeleivably naive. I was not surprised to learn that Selby is a fictional composite of several characters. As I said earlier, the movie would have been easier to beleive and get into if I knew that it was fiction, that Jenkins could make her argument without the audince worrying about the truth of the story she frames that argument with. By leaving out much of the tragedity of the backstory, we don't get the total motivation that left Aileen this way, so we never feel anything on the gut level. Instead of getting involved in her pleight, we think "I wonder if that actually happend." I should probably say as I close that a lot of people liked this more than I did (my oft-quoted fave critic Ebert named it was the best film of 2003). I don't think its quiet that good, but I can understand why some people feel it is. But I can't help but think that what we needed was a more realistic approach, perhaps in the vien of De Sica, instead of the Hollywood classisim we get here. However, the tragedity of the film's version of Ailieen is haunting- what loss to society, with such a good heart going to total waste. Monster (2003)
]]>Tue, 13 May 2008 08:22:48 GMTCinemaRianCinemaRian Blog5/13/2008 4:22:48 AMI think I would have liked Monster more if I didn't know that it was based on actual events. I liked the film's ideas but somehow never totally connected with the material on an emotional level. I think that the reason is that I saw the pictures of Aileen Wuornos on death row, and read reviews of a documentary that Nick Broomfield had made about her. I think that I might have been more receptive to Jenkin's message if the protagonist of her film was a totally fictional character, and was thus had nothing to compare it to. The movie's thesis is that Aileen Wuornos, a serial killer who was executed in Florida a year before the film was released, was doomed from the day she was born. Despite her crimes, she is essentially a good person, but she is uneducated and was never given anything approaching a fair chance or lucky break. Born in Michigan, her father was a serial child molester who commited suicide in prison, her mother abandonded her and she was raised by her grandparents, who she claimed were abusive. She gave birth at age 14, giving her son up for adoption. The child's father was probably a john she picked up prostuting. This is an unbelivably tragic story. And the odd thing is that the film doesn't tell us much of this- the above paragraph is a summery of what I read on Wikipedia. Jenkins' strangely picks up the story after Wuornos has hitchhiked to Flordia. This deletion is a critical mistake- we see that Wournos is wounded, but we don't totally understand why. Later on, when the director wants us to sympathize with her, this backstory would have made it much easier. To summerize Jenkins' film: On a day she plays on commiting suicide, Wuornos meets Selby (Christina Ricci) a young lesbian from a evangelic household. The two strike up a romance and Aileen becomes truly devoted to and borderline obcessed with Selby- like an adolecent crush. While prostituting to get money for a date, Aileen picks up a sadist who rapes and plans to murder her. She manages to kill him in self defense. After she convinces Selby to run off with her, she tries to get a job, but can't- she has no skills and has never worked legitamentally in her life. In order to get money to live on, she poses as a prostitue and kills the johns, taking their money and their car. She is eventually caught, and is executed, bitter to the end. What I liked best about the movie was its demonstration about the plieght of people in the lower depths of our society. The film's version of Aileen is an essentially good person who never given anythign she would need to be a productive member of society. Yet that society expects her to be self-sustaing individual and gives her no help, only abuse and exploitation. Where the movie fails in its portrayal of the love story (or whatever it is) between Aileen and Selby. Charlize Theron won an Oscar for her portrayal, but Ricci comes off as fake and unbeleivably naive. I was not surprised to learn that Selby is a fictional composite of several characters. As I said earlier, the movie would have been easier to beleive and get into if I knew that it was fiction, that Jenkins could make her argument without the audince worrying about the truth of the story she frames that argument with. By leaving out much of the tragedity of the backstory, we don't get the total motivation that left Aileen this way, so we never feel anything on the gut level. Instead of getting involved in her pleight, we think "I wonder if that actually happend." I should probably say as I close that a lot of people liked this more than I did (my oft-quoted fave critic Ebert named it was the best film of 2003). I don't think its quiet that good, but I can understand why some people feel it is. But I can't help but think that what we needed was a more realistic approach, perhaps in the vien of De Sica, instead of the Hollywood classisim we get here. However, the tragedity of the film's version of Ailieen is haunting- what loss to society, with such a good heart going to total waste. Monster (2003) http://www.spout.com/groups/HORROR_MOVIES_101/Re_H_H_Holmes_and_serial_killers/222/25848/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: divinemsjunebug
Post To: HORROR MOVIES 101
Post Date: 3/4/2008 12:02:49 PM
Body: I have seen the documentary about her on A&E, I'm not sure what show it was. Hearing her story it makes you feel kind of sad for her and you can see why she is so screwed up. But there are a LOT of screwed up people out there that DON'T go on a killing spree. [quote user="Risselada"] I just remembered Aileen Wuornos.I haven't seen any of the documentaries about her, but I have seen Monster and it was pretty good.[/quote]
]]>Tue, 04 Mar 2008 17:02:49 GMTdivinemsjunebugHORROR MOVIES 1013/4/2008 12:02:49 PMI have seen the documentary about her on A&amp;E, I&#39;m not sure what show it was. Hearing her story it makes you feel kind of sad for her and you can see why she is so screwed up. But there are a LOT of screwed up people out there that DON&#39;T go on a killing spree. [quote user="Risselada"] I just remembered Aileen Wuornos.I haven&#39;t seen any of the documentaries about her, but I have seen Monster and it was pretty good.[/quote] http://www.spout.com/groups/HORROR_MOVIES_101/Re_H_H_Holmes_and_serial_killers/222/25811/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: HORROR MOVIES 101
Post Date: 3/3/2008 1:43:04 PM
Body: I just remembered Aileen Wuornos.I haven't seen any of the documentaries about her, but I have seen Monster and it was pretty good.
]]>Mon, 03 Mar 2008 18:43:04 GMTRisseladaHORROR MOVIES 1013/3/2008 1:43:04 PMI just remembered Aileen Wuornos.I haven&#39;t seen any of the documentaries about her, but I have seen Monster and it was pretty good. http://www.spout.com/blogs/moviebabe/archive/2007/7/3/13017.aspx Post By: MovieBabe
Post To: MovieBabe Blog
Post Date: 7/3/2007 7:52:00 PM
Body: By Tricia Olszewski There's a lot of ugliness in Monster, and despite the publicity about extra pounds and prosthetics, it's not all courtesy of Charlize Theron. Theron is indeed unrecognizable in her lead role as Aileen Wuornos, the prostitute-turned-serial-killer who was convicted of the late-'80s murders of six johns and executed in a Florida prison in 2002. But this unsettling biopic, the debut of writer-director Patty Jenkins, manages to transcend the usually distracting beauty-goes-beast trick and keep the focus on a life gone south. Jenkins swaddles Wuornos' crimes in a love story that's as cringe-inducing as it is tender. Monster begins on the night Aileen, soaked from the rain and looking half past dead, ambles into a Daytona Beach gay bar under the ruse that her truck broke down. She catches the eye of a desperately lonely young woman named Selby (Christina Ricci). Selby is an Ohio transplant, sent to Florida by her father in the hope that her hyper-religious aunt and uncle will "cure" her of lesbianism. Many pitchers and shots later, Selby invites the obviously homeless Aileen to platonically spend the night with her, and their wrecked trains are irrevocably hitched. From Aileen's opening voice-over about how she "always wanted to be in the movies" and was a "real romantic" to her passionate insistence that she can take care of Selby, Jenkins attempts to humanize the murderer without making excuses: Aileen's abusive upbringing doesn't get revealed until film's end, and for every violent episode that seems justified (Aileen's first victim brutally raped her), there are others that are clearly the reaction of someone who's at least paranoid, perhaps psychotic. Aileen, though often well-intentioned in her desire to straighten up and settle down, is shown to occasionally lose touch with reality, promising to buy Selby beach houses with $40 she earned with a couple of blowjobs, musing that her next job might be as a veterinarian. Though Aileen's guilt is a foregone conclusion, audience sympathy vacillates with every scene. The murders, in Aileen's mind, are purely a matter of circumstance: After she unsuccessfully tries to begin a new career, she reasons that killing men for their money and cars is the only way she and Selby can survive. A fender bender with a victim's car and Selby's disillusionment with the relationship lead to Aileen's eventual capture. Ricci and Theron both succeed in making their characters mesmerizingly repugnant. Ricci's bug-eyed neediness—a carryover from her role in Woody Allen's Anything Else—as the pitiable, mulleted Selby suggests none of her trademark brattiness. And Theron's physicality is a marvel: She throws her extra 30 pounds into a perfect redneck swagger, carrying herself with a head-cocking stiffness that discloses both arrogance and insecurity. Her freckled, jowly, nearly eyebrowless face does take a few minutes to get used to, and at times her tweakiness—Theron's head is always moving—seems a touch overboard. But Theron generally tempers the bodily bravado, leaving only deep loathsomeness. Even Monster's minor characters are unlikable, from Selby's harping, narrow-minded aunt (a highly effective Annie Corley) to Aileen's women-hating johns. The only laugh in the movie is unintentional—Aileen and Selby's first kiss, in a roller-skating rink, is choreographed to the increasing tempo of Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'." Unjustified belief, both Selby's in Aileen and Aileen's in herself, is in fact the only hint of light in this dour affair, but it's just enough to cast upon Monster a captivating shadow of doubt.
]]>Tue, 03 Jul 2007 23:52:00 GMTMovieBabeMovieBabe Blog7/3/2007 7:52:00 PM By Tricia Olszewski There's a lot of ugliness in Monster, and despite the publicity about extra pounds and prosthetics, it's not all courtesy of Charlize Theron. Theron is indeed unrecognizable in her lead role as Aileen Wuornos, the prostitute-turned-serial-killer who was convicted of the late-'80s murders of six johns and executed in a Florida prison in 2002. But this unsettling biopic, the debut of writer-director Patty Jenkins, manages to transcend the usually distracting beauty-goes-beast trick and keep the focus on a life gone south. Jenkins swaddles Wuornos' crimes in a love story that's as cringe-inducing as it is tender. Monster begins on the night Aileen, soaked from the rain and looking half past dead, ambles into a Daytona Beach gay bar under the ruse that her truck broke down. She catches the eye of a desperately lonely young woman named Selby (Christina Ricci). Selby is an Ohio transplant, sent to Florida by her father in the hope that her hyper-religious aunt and uncle will "cure" her of lesbianism. Many pitchers and shots later, Selby invites the obviously homeless Aileen to platonically spend the night with her, and their wrecked trains are irrevocably hitched. From Aileen's opening voice-over about how she "always wanted to be in the movies" and was a "real romantic" to her passionate insistence that she can take care of Selby, Jenkins attempts to humanize the murderer without making excuses: Aileen's abusive upbringing doesn't get revealed until film's end, and for every violent episode that seems justified (Aileen's first victim brutally raped her), there are others that are clearly the reaction of someone who's at least paranoid, perhaps psychotic. Aileen, though often well-intentioned in her desire to straighten up and settle down, is shown to occasionally lose touch with reality, promising to buy Selby beach houses with $40 she earned with a couple of blowjobs, musing that her next job might be as a veterinarian. Though Aileen's guilt is a foregone conclusion, audience sympathy vacillates with every scene. The murders, in Aileen's mind, are purely a matter of circumstance: After she unsuccessfully tries to begin a new career, she reasons that killing men for their money and cars is the only way she and Selby can survive. A fender bender with a victim's car and Selby's disillusionment with the relationship lead to Aileen's eventual capture. Ricci and Theron both succeed in making their characters mesmerizingly repugnant. Ricci's bug-eyed neediness&mdash;a carryover from her role in Woody Allen's Anything Else&mdash;as the pitiable, mulleted Selby suggests none of her trademark brattiness. And Theron's physicality is a marvel: She throws her extra 30 pounds into a perfect redneck swagger, carrying herself with a head-cocking stiffness that discloses both arrogance and insecurity. Her freckled, jowly, nearly eyebrowless face does take a few minutes to get used to, and at times her tweakiness&mdash;Theron's head is always moving&mdash;seems a touch overboard. But Theron generally tempers the bodily bravado, leaving only deep loathsomeness. Even Monster's minor characters are unlikable, from Selby's harping, narrow-minded aunt (a highly effective Annie Corley) to Aileen's women-hating johns. The only laugh in the movie is unintentional&mdash;Aileen and Selby's first kiss, in a roller-skating rink, is choreographed to the increasing tempo of Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'." Unjustified belief, both Selby's in Aileen and Aileen's in herself, is in fact the only hint of light in this dour affair, but it's just enough to cast upon Monster a captivating shadow of doubt. http://www.spout.com/groups/movie_maniacs/real_life_characters_in_film_how_far_real/248/7406/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: forrest_gump
Post To: movie_maniacs
Post Date: 4/22/2007 10:56:02 AM
Body: i just finished seeing domino...its ok..seems better approach toward something cinematic more than real..! i can still recall monster ..a very honest adaptation of real life..but are they always true to the story that much?
]]>Sun, 22 Apr 2007 14:56:02 GMTforrest_gumpmovie_maniacs4/22/2007 10:56:02 AMi just finished seeing domino...its ok..seems better approach toward something cinematic more than real..! i can still recall monster ..a very honest adaptation of real life..but are they always true to the story that much? http://www.spout.com/groups/Top_5/Re_Toughest_Dame_around_Noir_Neo_Noir_or_any/190/4118/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Rock
Post To: Top 5
Post Date: 12/8/2006 1:43:43 PM
Body: The real Domino Harvey Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor Charlize Theron as Aileen Wuornos in Monster Sexy and a Killer in one -> Bridget Fonda in Point of No Return
]]>Fri, 08 Dec 2006 18:43:43 GMTRockTop 512/8/2006 1:43:43 PMThe real Domino Harvey Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor Charlize Theron as Aileen Wuornos in Monster Sexy and a Killer in one -&gt; Bridget Fonda in Point of No Return http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/murder/MemberTagFilms.aspxmurder
Number of films tagged: 8748

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]]>Fri, 04 Dec 2009 02:57:25 GMT8748157830Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/sex/MemberTagFilms.aspxsex
Number of films tagged: 2414

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]]>Fri, 04 Dec 2009 00:50:42 GMT2414126548Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/disturbing/MemberTagFilms.aspxdisturbing
Number of films tagged: 283

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]]>Wed, 04 Nov 2009 21:55:54 GMT283119394Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/lesbian/MemberTagFilms.aspxlesbian
Number of films tagged: 58

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Number of times used: 70

]]>Wed, 18 Nov 2009 11:01:03 GMT583570Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/serialkiller/MemberTagFilms.aspxserialkiller
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]]>Wed, 07 Oct 2009 18:01:31 GMT502352Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/serial-killer/MemberTagFilms.aspxserial-killer
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]]>Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:25:45 GMT642376Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/prostitute/MemberTagFilms.aspxprostitute
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]]>Wed, 07 Oct 2009 18:01:31 GMT372144Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/painful/MemberTagFilms.aspxpainful
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]]>Mon, 02 Nov 2009 02:44:12 GMT261934Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/woman/MemberTagFilms.aspxwoman
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]]>Tue, 30 Jun 2009 13:07:18 GMT20151941Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/incredible/MemberTagFilms.aspxincredible
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]]>Thu, 18 Jun 2009 22:18:24 GMT161718Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/lesbianism/MemberTagFilms.aspxlesbianism
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]]>Mon, 13 Jul 2009 13:04:22 GMT5861221Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/Best-Actress/MemberTagFilms.aspxBest-Actress
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Number of times used: 99

]]>Fri, 19 Jun 2009 05:09:54 GMT821199Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/raw/MemberTagFilms.aspxraw
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]]>Sat, 22 Aug 2009 15:08:33 GMT111115Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/true-story/MemberTagFilms.aspxtrue-story
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Number of people who tagged: 9

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]]>Wed, 25 Nov 2009 02:12:04 GMT19922Tag