Re: Inception (Christopher Nolan, Leonardo DiCaprio) Grading & Discuss
Interesting. I thought Ellen Page stood out as fantastic, actually, surprisingly able to hold her own, and even shine, among the likes of DiCaprio, Caine, Watanabe, and Murphy. She's turning out to be a very good actor, I'm happy to say, able to do hip teenage comedy as well as realistic drama. She didn't have a big role, but her character had a resonance with me, and given how few lines the person had, that's a testament to Ellen Page's subtle acting.
In a way, I feel Nolan finally got the casting of his female right. In Prestige, everything was great, except Scarlett Johansen (sp?) was like a black hole, unable to do anything with the underwritten role. In Batman Begins, Katie Holmes was unconvincing. But now, Page shows how one can make a relatively small role work very well.
One-dimensional? Not at all. I believed completely that she was, all at once, brilliant, naive, inexperienced, insecure, confident, good with people, frightened, in over her head, the smartest person in the room...there were many levels, often contradictory, just like in a real person. it was a very subtle, and very complex, character to play interestingly, and she managed it, and made it look easy.
You talk of her "blank" expression - but have you ever really looked at people when they talk? Most people don't make any expression when they speak. It's all in the eyes, and the voice, and the body language. The face actually does very, very little. If you want to see a really mediocre actor, look for someone with a lot of different facial expressions.
Interesting. I thought Ellen Page stood out as fantastic, actually, surprisingly able to hold her own, and even shine, among the likes of DiCaprio, Caine, Watanabe, and Murphy. She's turning out to be a very good actor, I'm happy to say, able to do hip teenage comedy as well as realistic drama. She didn't have a big role, but her character had a resonance with me, and given how few lines the person had, that's a testament to Ellen Page's subtle acting.
In a way, I feel Nolan finally got the casting of his female right. In Prestige, everything was great, except Scarlett Johansen (sp?) was like a black hole, unable to do anything with the underwritten role. In Batman Begins, Katie Holmes was unconvincing. But now, Page shows how one can make a relatively small role work very well.
One-dimensional? Not at all. I believed completely that she was, all at once, brilliant, naive, inexperienced, insecure, confident, good with people, frightened, in over her head, the smartest person in the room...there were many levels, often contradictory, just like in a real person. it was a very subtle, and very complex, character to play interestingly, and she managed it, and made it look easy.
You talk of her "blank" expression - but have you ever really looked at people when they talk? Most people don't make any expression when they speak. It's all in the eyes, and the voice, and the body language. The face actually does very, very little. If you want to see a really mediocre actor, look for someone with a lot of different facial expressions.
shows how bungled the script structure really was. What should have plainly been a climactic moment just became a stepping stone on DiCaprio's journey to victory or defeat. I suppose DiCaprio fans find that rewarding, though I didn't care enough for Dom Cobb to be so enthralled.
) And it has the additional merit of counterposing an opposing viewpoint to the climax of the Murphy arc. Two opposing viewpoints expressed by the movie would be true ambiguity. If both Murphy and DiCaprio prefer dreams/movies to reality, there is in fact less ambiguity. I would suppose people would notice this, but there are some dreadfully foolish "ideas" about ambiguity being deep floating around.