2012 Muriels: Other Stuff We Loved, Pt. 2 (Actresses)

"“Acting is reacting” is one of those annoying movie clichés. I prefer its opposite -- reacting is acting -- and as the seemingly passive, unmoored Margot in Take This Waltz, Michelle Williams gives a master class in reactive acting. Take the scene in which Luke Kirby’s Daniel, who’s been pursuing her with a low-key sort of persistence, tells her exactly what he would do to her, given the chance. It’s a scene that teeters between eroticism and ridicule, and we look to Margot’s face for cues, scanning it for signs just like he does. She’s surprised, on the verge of giggling, but also turned on. The scene is filmed in standard shot-reverse shot, but even when the camera is on Daniel, we observe the back of her head, trying to deduce what she is thinking. “I want to find out how you work”, he says at one point, and so do we - though admittedly in a less pervy way.

Margot could easily have been a cypher, a moodily indecisive stand-in for female ennui filmed from a gauzy distance. What’s most surprising about Williams’ performance is how open it is: every single emotion, no matter how fleeting, is reflected on her face. She’s a mystery not because we don’t know what she feels but because we don’t know which emotion will prevail. Take the first “Video Killed the Radio Star” scene, which ended at number 12 on our list of cinematic moments. Within the space of a song, Margot goes from elated to romantic to sad, then defiantly back to happy again, at least until the song ends and she’s abruptly brought back to the real world. Because Williams’ performance is so open, so lucid and transparent, I went along with every beat." - Hedwig Van Driel



"The role Ann Dowd plays in Compliance - at least, to someone who only minored in theatre in college (long, long story) - sounds, on paper, to be a ridiculous challenge. She has to convincingly portray a manager of a fast food restaurant that would not only believe there's a police officer on the telephone telling her that an employee of hers (Dreama Walker) has been stealing but that the very same employee needs to be sexually humiliated. Walker has to just sit there with her perky implants and look petrified; Dowd has to be the Gestapo. And in this visual recreation of what can only be described as a real-life Stanley Milgram experiment (come on, you remember Psych 101), Dowd's character is the embodiment of blind obedience.

What Dowd does with the role is, in short, spell-binding (and mind-boggling): every word from the fake cop is gospel to her, even to the point where she willingly leaves her fiancée alone in the same room with the naked girl (this ends ... disastrously). Early scenes reveal her character to be insecure and an oddball, thus framing her later reactions; when others express their disbelief with regard to the situation, she remains unthinking, unbending and utterly subservient to the Voice on the Phone. It's a fine line between the pathetic and the dutiful and it's ever so important to recall that this really is based on a true story -- when the manager of a McDonald's in Kentucky, a certain Ms. Donna Summers, claimed she was a victim, she was (... in a way): she was a victim of ignorance. And so was the girl she victimized, a Ms. Louise Ogborn.

You'd think someone who is so clearly gifted at her craft would have a more substantial cinematic resume, but it appears Ms. Dowd's career has been littered with mostly bit parts on television and in the movies. Sporting an M.F.A. from the notorious DePaul University (which, at one point in time, had a cut system that 'weeded' out what they considered 'lesser talent'), she's done strong work on the stage, but here in her late 50's, she finally and unquestionably has a landmark screen role (Dowd's husband, coincidentally, also works in the theatre). Full credit is due to director Craig Zobel for casting her for this tricky, complicated role, and with a little luck it will afford her more cinematic roles to utilize her formidable skill-set. In a line from the aforementioned Dr. Milgram's landmark experiment, "You have no other choice, you must go on." - Matthew Lotti



"One of the purest joys that movies can offer is the exhilaration of seeing an artist express his/her sheer joy of creation onscreen for all of us in the audience to share. That is a major reason why a musical like, say, Singin’ in the Rain is still so highly regarded today: Regardless of the details of its setting or plot, we all still remember, for instance, the soul-filling explosion of happiness that Gene Kelly expresses when he prances around town with his umbrella during the title number.

Last year brought an extraordinarily sustained piece of cinematic euphoria in the form of Jacob Krupnick’s Girl Walk // All Day, a 77-minute music video set to the entirety of All Day, the latest album from Gregg Gillis, the DJ known as Girl Talk. But Girl Walk // All Day arguably would not have been half as effective if it had not been for Anne Marsen, the volcanic bundle of energy at its heart. The film itself can be described in many ways: an ode to New York City, an expression of unifying optimism in the face of a certain big-city jadedness, a street ballet celebrating sheer freedom of movement. With her consistently awe-inspiring gyrations and irrepressibly mirthful spirit, Marsen gloriously embodies all of these facets. Let it not be said, however, that she merely plays that one joyful note throughout the whole film. From yearning despair to unabashed elation, this particular girl experiences it all in the course of a day, and Marsen, without uttering a line of dialogue, conveys it all through facial expressions and body movement with a thrilling emotional transparency. Maybe there is another way to describe Girl Walk // All Day after all: as a monument to one performer’s seemingly boundless exuberance and the ways people around her react to it. But though not all New Yorkers take as kindly to her spirit than others, we in the audience are free to bask in it as long as possible -- or at least, until the party ends to the strains of John Lennon’s Imagine in Central Park in the dark." - Kenji Fujishima



"I don’t think I’ve ever had a more difficult time assembling five decent candidates for the Best Lead Performance (Female) category, for the Muriels or for any of my own lists, than I did this year. Only two of my own nominees came completely without hesitation -- Rachel Weisz for The Deep Blue Sea and Eva Green in the sadly underseen Perfect Sense. I hadn’t even seen four or the five nominated women in the running for the Best Actress Academy Award by ballot time, and what Quvenzhané Wallis does in Beasts of the Southern Wild, as utterly disarming as her presence might be, feels more like the latest manifestation of the Ponette Syndrome rather than actual acting.

My only slightly facetious solution to this dilemma: the eternally wide-eyed, super-sized (with cupcake bra to match) pop personality that is the front and center attraction of last summer’s 3D documentary Katy Perry: Part of Me. Mind, on the scale of significant music movies KP: POM hardly ranks as either a pop culture jamboree on the order of A Hard Day’s Night or a brutal generational dissection a la Gimme Shelter. The worst thing that happens during a Katy Perry concert probably occurs during the exuberant performance of “Peacock,” KP’s gonzo saber rattle at the doors of propriety -- a lascivious limerick of sympathy for a devil ragin’ full-on (“I wanna see your peacock-cock-cock/Your peacock”), probably amounting to little more than the occasional shocked soccer mom fainting into her popcorn over the ribald transparency of what barely qualifies as sexual innuendo.

But if the movie isn’t exactly a landmark, then fortunately neither is it a pretentious meditation on the ego-fueled angst and impatience underlying what makes Katy Katy, a Truth or Dare for the “Fireworks” set. No, what makes the movie fun, and what makes me think Katy Perry is a good candidate in the Best Lead Performance (Female) category, is not just the peek behind the elaborate construct that Perry presents to adoring fans but also the consideration of the daunting energy and craft put into the image itself and its constant, cheerful, remarkably anti-cynical perpetuation.

“I don’t think anyone can ever be too cartoony!” the singer gleefully exclaims while putting herself together for the first performance of her first worldwide tour. It’s a moment that makes you want to stand up and salute, a sentiment that distills Perry’s perfectly calibrated self-awareness and places her mix of shiny, candy-colored pop extravagance and (unthreatening) Vargas-girl sexuality well within the tradition of beloved animated icons Sweet Polly Purebred and Jessica Rabbit, both of whose appeal Perry seems to aspire towards. The movie pays only lip service to the greater weight of crafting such an image, but even if KP: POM is meticulously manipulated to present exactly the picture Katy Perry wants disseminated, it’s still a fascinating appraisal of what such a heightened level of pinup performance art might still mean to the audience. I don’t recall ever seeing a movie about a pop singer whose artifice is so up front which is then also so relatively unafraid of presenting the star at her most vulnerable, whether she’s crawling out of bed after a exhausting leg of the tour or laying immobile on a massage table, crippled with grief over her crumbling marriage.

And Perry’s walking the fine line between exuberant amateur and slick professional is itself cheerfully, endearingly enjoyable too. To paraphrase Lennon and McCartney, she may be a singer (with more #1 hits off a single album than even the Beatles), but she ain’t no dancer. Yet her indefatigable desire to connect with the fans is quite something to behold -- you’ll never catch her glad-handing a mom and dad and their goggle-eyed kids backstage, then turning to make a gagging gesture behind their backs. And the tunes, even though they are only largely sampled here, remain seductively catchy, playfully hedonistic, occasionally transgressive, supremely empathetic paeans to the optimistic energy of pop, much like Perry herself. (No wonder she made the Children’s Television Workshop nervous.) Katy Perry: Part of Me ultimately remains true to its title -- this is only a glossy reflection of a carefully selected portion of the star’s reality. But it’s one in which the effort and art of creating her persona is as much in focus as her relentless appeal, documenting the moments when the acting put into being Katy Perry, Pop Princess, merges seamlessly with the joy she takes, and the toll taken from her, as that princess commands the stage." - Dennis Cozzalio



"What happens when the somnambulist starts to wake?

Early on in the viciously funny Killer Joe, Juno Temple has a monologue about her mother attempting to kill her in her infancy. In content and delivery, the piece sums up her character of Dottie in her entirety -- the childishly wordy, matter-of-fact tone of voice gives off a surface naivete that purposefully distracts from the words she says, full of off-the-cuff insults and blunt, perfect understanding. Sharla, her trashy stepmother, claims to her father, "She don't put two and two together like you, me and Chris." Which is true, in that she's the only one in the film able to put things together bang-on and sans bullshit. Is the little-girl guilelessness a pose or a genuine way of thinking, of coping with her alienating surroundings? The answer could swing either way, which makes for a difficult juggling act. It's to Temple's credit that she manages to play both sides of this with effortless aplomb. Using expressive body language and crack timing on the delivery of her dialogue (check how, in the first scene between her and McConaughey's oily Joe, she waits a perfect comedic beat before saying three simple, chipper words -- "Was he alright?" -- that demolishes his carefully-composed worldly cool), she crafts an enigma out of a character whose emotions and thoughts are always right on the surface.

Furthermore, she believably embodies another of Dottie's central contradictions: the accidental sexuality that can inspire a cold logical beast like Joe to attempt a grotesque parody of domesticity and her walking-disaster brother Chris into incestuously protective frenzies. While the intelligence can be either purposeful or inadvertent, the sexuality has to be the latter -- the character wouldn't work if there was even a whiff of femme-fatale manipulation. In other words, the innocence has to maintain even through the obvious hormonal impact. Another tricky balance, and another aspect that Temple has zero problem with; Dottie's indifference to her body and its effects is cemented from her introduction wandering around in a nightgown in the rain, and on that front Temple tips her hand not once. She's not a schemer or a terror like the rest of the irredeemable cast. She's the one glimmer of hope in the black void, the rose in the cesspool, and despite the title, Killer Joe is her story, her progress towards the assumption of her own will. Dottie may not be a genius, may still be a youthful 18 years of age, but in every scene she's in -- even those with the titular character -- she's the smartest person in the room. The magic of Temple's performance is letting us see the intelligence behind those sleeping eyes." - Steve Carlson

2012 Muriels: Best Director

Any one of these three guys could have won and I'd have been happy with it. Good crop this year, I'd say.

Third place:



Wes Anderson, Moonrise Kingdom [107 points / 17 votes]

Second place:



Paul Thomas Anderson, The Master [131 points / 21 votes]

And your winner...

2012 Muriels: Other Stuff We Loved, Pt. 1 (Actors)

As you, dear reader, may or may not know, every year we try to go beyond the winners and highlight some interesting performers and technicians who, while without enough support to take a prize, nonetheless popped up on enough ballots that we feel they're worth noting. Here's some of this year's crop:



"Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image. This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible. This image's head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay. (Daniel 2:31-33)

As metaphors go, Nebuchadnezzar’s dream is a fairly obvious allusion to the flaws found in us all; the fragile foundations upon which we build our beliefs and bona-fides. In Spike Lee’s Red Hook Summer, Clarke Peters delivers a performance in which he becomes an all-too-human embodiment of Nebuchadnezzar’s vision; a man divine in countenance, shown teetering (thanks to a third act, right-hook revelation) on feet crumbling to dust as we gaze on with a mixture of fascination, fear and, ultimately, empathy.

When Da Good Bishop Enoch Rouse is preachin’ - standing beneath a fluorescent cross, the summer sweat streaming down his face as he rails against the secular and spiritual evils that plague his parish - we are caught up in the passion that pours from his heart and we feel the pull of the Word in his calls to come to Jesus. His audience is rapt, entranced by the golden glow of his countenance, and even his grandson Flik Royale, devout atheist that he is, is seen smiling in appreciation at the power of Bishop Enoch’s words.

Outside of the church, Grandpa Enoch is a firm, yet fair, man of sterling character and iron-clad resolve. He is trying to save his grandson not only from the fires of hell, but the slow-burning disillusionment of living in a world that, for all appearances, cares little for his participation or presence. Peters work here is undemonstrative - subtle, never showy - reflective of a true man of God fighting for his kith and kin with a mixture of humility and methodical tenacity.

Then comes the moment when Lee and writer James McBride open a brutally literal Book of Revelation...

Suddenly, Peters’ character goes from a nuanced, if one-dimensional, totem of religious authority, to something so compelling, so perfectly human, that when this revelation comes, it hits not only with a shocking force but also a soul-stirring sense of pity. This idol of a man - this ideal of a man - has been revealed to be just as damaged and fragile as Nebuchadnezzar’s monolith. That this doesn’t completely derail what has been, until now, been a fairly straightforward coming-of-age tale, is a testament to Peters’ skill not only as an actor, but as a man of profound humanity. In lesser hands, Da Good Bishop would collapse under the weight of this newfound revelation, becoming a hollow farce of the figure we knew before. But Peters reaches deeper, and brings forth a quiet strength that shows there is still a little iron left in his foundations; a strength that may just be enough to carry the weight of the cross he’s been asked to bear. You may not be able to forgive Bishop Enoch for his sins, but thanks to Peters exceptional work, you can certainly see the integrity of his suffering, and hope that maybe someday this great image of a man my find his way back to a state of pure and solid grace. " - Donald Carder



"Leonardo DiCaprio's career is singular in its varied trajectory over the last two decades, beginning with his naturalistic performance as Johnny Depp's mentally challenged little brother in What's Eating Gilbert Grape, for which he received his first Academy Award nomination. Soon after that, his back-to-back leading roles in blockbuster hits Romeo + Juliet and Titanic catapulted him to mega-stardom and off-the-charts teen heartthrob status, which he wisely eschewed by collaborating with Martin Scorsese on several films and taking on equally serious roles in weighty dramas such as Revolutionary Road and J. Edgar. And here, DiCaprio shifts gears yet again; his role as 'Monsieur' Calvin Candie, a flamboyant and sadistic Mississippi plantation owner, in Quentin Tarantino's wildly anachronistic treatment of slavery in the Old South Django Unchained begins what will hopefully be another new phase in his career.

As Candie, DiCaprio oscillates seamlessly between sociopathy and Southern gentility, all while adopting a flawlessly laidback Mississippi drawl. We see many chilling layers to his character early on from his first appearance in the private room of the Cleopatra Club, as he sips daintily on a Polynesian Pearl Diver ("Do not spare the rum!") following a gruesome spectacle where he mercilessly urges two of his slaves to fight each other to the death for his entertainment. Shortly thereafter, he orders another slave to be chewed alive by dogs, the horror of which is contrasted by the incestuous tenderness and doting he displays towards his widowed sister, Lara-Lee. We are as charmed and amused by his verbal sparring with his house servant Stephen (played by Samuel L. Jackson) as we are terrified and menaced by the lesson on phrenology that he recites over the skull of Old Ben.

What makes this a particularly exciting development in DiCaprio's career is not so much that it marks the first time he has played a villain but that he does so with refreshing doses of humor and self-parody that we have not seen him portray in his other films to date. He has great fun with this role, and his enthusiasm is infectious. The theatricality of his acting style lends itself well to the rich characters and colorful dialogue of Tarantino, a director who, among other things, is known for helping already gifted actors reach even greater heights." - Kevin Dufresne



"One of the most common praises of Amour is that it completely avoids sentimentalizing its subject, the life of an elderly couple as the woman’s health rapidly deteriorates. This achievement, which makes the movie feel so much realer and rawer than the phony tearjerker alternative, has most often been credited to filmmaker Michael Haneke’s screenplay, which is undoubtedly where it originated. But the lead performances by screen legends Emmanuelle Riva and Jean-Louis Trintignant are equally responsible for the successful delivery of such unfettered storytelling; they make the viewer feel for the characters without actively soliciting empathy, which makes the material come across as that much more honest and resonant.

Trintignant’s role is less showy than Riva’s in that he remains able-bodied throughout while she suffers from myriad ailments following a series of strokes, but one could argue that it was more of a challenge for this very reason. That Haneke’s script allows the actor not a single conventional opportunity to superficially gain the audience’s sympathy (for instance, his Georges doesn’t dramatically freak out when his wife has her first stroke at the breakfast table, instead almost leisurely strolling to the bedroom to get dressed so he can take her to the doctor) makes the work even more difficult. The only way for Trintignant to earn said sympathy is to create a fully-formed human being -- someone we could believe as our own father or grandfather, thereby forging a connection -- and does he ever. Each choice the actor makes feels authentically human; especially in quiet moments, it’s remarkable what he can do with his relatively stoic face. Further, Trintignant is able to retain his core humanity even in the film’s most symbolic scenes, including a nightmare straight out of a horror movie and a particularly heartbreaking moment with a bird.

There’s a highly significant layer beneath the surface of Georges that only fully comes out at the end of the picture, but looking back afterwards, it’s astounding how much Trintignant integrates this layer into his characterization throughout. It has a subconscious effect on the audience, as we’re aware that this man has dimensions with which we are not acquainted -- an early scene sees Riva’s Anne tells him “You’re a monster sometimes” in a passive yet foreboding way -- but we don’t know how they’ll manifest themselves. It’s impossible to go into detail without spoilers, but I will say: if you want to understand how masterful this performance is, think about how delicately Trintignant builds to what happens in the end. He crafts an arc for Georges that is as meaningful as the overarching one that Haneke does for the film. This may very well be the 82-year-old’s final performance, and boy, is it a great one to go out on." - Danny Baldwin



"The point of a performance, the saying goes, is to bring the truth. But how do you perform in a movie that’s all about a lack of truth? Bernie presents a very simple story in a not-so-simple way. Richard Linklater’s film both documents and narrativizes the story of Bernie Tiede, the nicest man in Carthage, Texas. So why did Bernie end up killing an old woman? Numerous people, both fictional and real, offer answers to this question, but none of them are truly satisfactory. What becomes apparent is that explaining this action -- simplifying it into an x or y statement -- is nigh-impossible.

Jack Black’s wondrously complex performance reflects this strange ambivalence the film builds. Charming, precise in language and bustling with energy, Black creates Bernie as an instantly likable character with a magnetic force that extends over him even as he lovingly explains how to embalm a corpse in an early scene. But if Black simply jumped around with a skip to his feet, the film would be shallow. Instead, Black hints at insights in the way his voice will occasionally quiver, the way his eyes can shift from delight to concern, the way his gestures can feel overcorrected. These choices create a totality of a character sans easy explanation, and Black thus forms his performance into a rounded human being, one with many facets and masks yet unable himself to understand his own actions. Most actors know their character; Black never shows himself knowing who Bernie Tiede is, choosing instead to highlight the tension within a man struggling to know himself. And that perhaps, is the boldest action an actor can do when performing a real life person." - Peter Labuza



"My favorite performance of 2012 comes from a baker. I don't mean an actor who prepped for a role as a baker by spending months methodically learning to bake. I mean a baker who now acts on the side. As Hushpuppy's father Wink in Beasts of the Southern Wild, Dwight Henry could have been just another protagonist's troubled patriarch, another one-note obstacle impeding our hero's ability to prosper. Instead, we get a relationship achingly complicated and beautifully specific-- it's the most moving depiction of a father and his daughter I've witnessed in decades. When we reach film's end, we see the basis of Wink's fight, we feel the weight of his journey, and we understand the gravity of his sacrifice. Every outburst is cloaked in love. We never feel Henry posturing like we sometimes do in overwrought dramas. Cliches are utterly absent from the proceedings, and the artifice that emerges after years of desperate training is replaced with pure raw emotion.

Don't mistake the phrase "raw" for "uncontrolled," however; every moment is expertly played, every line read brilliantly twisted, every emotional beat authentically hit with precision. Bakers appearing in indie films don't understand potential awards season ramifications; they merely pursue reality relentlessly. As Shakespeare once said, "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them." In Dwight Henry's case, he might be all three. How a man stepping in front of a camera for the first time was able to move me greater than any other experienced actor, male or female, is nothing short of miraculous. It deserves to be celebrated. Perhaps by small children with fireworks." - Russell Hainline

2012 Muriels: Best Lead Performance (Female)

Last year, this category led to one of the closest races we've ever had. This year... well, I won't say it's a landslide, but the winner here certainly enjoyed a (much-deserved in my opinion) comfortable margin of error.

Third place:



Jennifer Lawrence, Silver Linings Playbook [122 points / 21 votes]

Second place:



Jessica Chastain, Zero Dark Thirty [138 points / 22 votes]

And your winner...

2012 Muriels: Best Lead Performance (Male)

Down to the last big four! (By the way, check the totals of our top three vote-getters. Then take a look at the tally for #4.)

Third place:



Daniel Day-Lewis, Lincoln [186 points / 29 votes]

Second place:



Joaquin Phoenix, The Master [229 points / 33 votes]

And your winner...

2012 Muriels: Best Cinematic Moment

I know every year I talk about how this is my favorite category, but it really is. The variety of responses never fails to fascinate me - something about this category allows our voters to loosen up and throw a little love at films that they otherwise have no reason to vote for. I don't just mean expected stuff, either; there were solo votes for scenes from That's My Boy and Dredd in this category. I almost voted for one of the two cited scenes from the latter myself - this one:

(SPOILERS for Dredd on this, by the way. Though this doesn't exactly have the kind of story that can be spoiled.)



Anyway, the point is that any kind of impulse that encourages this inclusiveness is fine by me. Here's some other slices of cinema that made our members happy this year:



The Cabin in the Woods - System purge



Magic Mike - "Pony"

This Is Not a Film - describing a film/"If we could tell a film..." (click through, turn on subtitles, let it run to 30:58)



This Must Be the Place - David Byrne performs the title track



sk10 from Daniel Gemko on Vimeo.

Skyfall - Shanghai skyscraper battle



Take This Waltz - "Video Killed the Radio Star"



Beyond the Black Rainbow - 1966 flashback



The Deep Blue Sea - "Molly Malone"



The Avengers - Hulk meets Loki

Also, for my usual Why Didn't All Y'all Vote for This Goddammit Scene, I still can't believe that only myself and one other voter singled out this, which makes me want to hide under the couch every damn time I see it:

It's Such a Beautiful Day - "The pipe is leaking..." (click through to view)

All this video goodness, and we still haven't gotten to the top three! So, without further ado...

Third place:



Prometheus - emergency C-section [142.5 points / 15 votes]

Second place:



The Master - Freddie's first processing [215 points / 19 votes]

And your winner...

2012 Muriels: Best Screenplay

This one's up later than I wanted it to be - got unexpectedly tied up today. But I think it's worth the wait.

Third place:



Rian Johnson, Looper [110 points / 18 votes]

Second place:



Tony Kushner, Lincoln (based on the book Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin) [137 points / 21 votes]

And your winner...