But, he's the same character in AH as he was in Goodfellas and Casino. That's not range. That's a reprise.DeNiro has sullied himself by taking too many shit roles [mainly in bad comedies] but when you see him at his most powerfull [as he is in his brief but utterly compelling appearence in American Hustle
Did we already do this?
Moderators: sgt.null, dANdeLION
- Vraith
- The Gap Into Spam
- Posts: 10623
- Joined: Fri Nov 21, 2008 8:03 pm
- Location: everywhere, all the time
- Been thanked: 3 times
You may have to consider it sometimes...because sometimes it is true.qfufs wrote: In this light you have to consider that there is not so much a thing as great actors as actors who have been fortunate enough to be directed greatly.
but then on consideration, to play such an extreme charachter really makes little demand on a skilled and trained actors talents. There's so much scope for 'hamming' it and getting away with it, that it's not really a challange.
But there are great actors. And just "do what the director tells you?"
Seriously?
Then why isn't everyone a rockstar, moviestar, olympic champ, CEO, billionaire investor, experimental and theoretical physicist, NFL quarterback, etc. etc?
Because it doesn't matter at all how great the instructions/vision are if you don't have the talent/skill.
A great performance can absolutely be purely individual.
A great film, however, usually requires high-level work by everyone [or at least most everyone]]
[[Sure, there are great films that work more like paintings in motion, where it's mostly the directors design. And a few films that would be crappy films except for someone's performance]]
On the second...those extreme characters are quite difficult to portray convincingly, and incredibly easy to ruin...
almost anyone can ham it up...
But no one wants to pay any money to watch most of them do it.
Thousands of them a year---at least---go direct to video.
Some of them are this new art-form called "reality TV."...Ham, no wry...[[because people DO love a train wreck and seeing people at their worst...they just don't want to pay 10+ bucks a person [not including transport and snacks] to see it]]
[spoiler]Sig-man, Libtard, Stupid piece of shit. change your text color to brown. Mr. Reliable, bullshit-slinging liarFucker-user.[/spoiler]
the difference between evidence and sources: whether they come from the horse's mouth or a horse's ass.
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
the hyperbole is a beauty...for we are then allowed to say a little more than the truth...and language is more efficient when it goes beyond reality than when it stops short of it.
the difference between evidence and sources: whether they come from the horse's mouth or a horse's ass.
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
the hyperbole is a beauty...for we are then allowed to say a little more than the truth...and language is more efficient when it goes beyond reality than when it stops short of it.
- Obi-Wan Nihilo
- Pathetic
- Posts: 6503
- Joined: Thu Feb 04, 2010 3:37 pm
- Has thanked: 6 times
- Been thanked: 4 times
He played a killer with ice in his veins in Goodfellas and a neurotic controlling pussy in Casino.dlbpharmd wrote:But, he's the same character in AH as he was in Goodfellas and Casino. That's not range. That's a reprise.DeNiro has sullied himself by taking too many shit roles [mainly in bad comedies] but when you see him at his most powerfull [as he is in his brief but utterly compelling appearence in American Hustle

The catholic church is the largest pro-pedophillia group in the world, and every member of it is guilty of supporting the rape of children, the ensuing protection of the rapists, and the continuing suffering of the victims.
- peter
- The Gap Into Spam
- Posts: 12210
- Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:08 am
- Location: Another time. Another place.
- Has thanked: 1 time
- Been thanked: 10 times
Going back to V.'s post - I'm not sure a film 'performance' actually qualifies as a performance as such does it? In the making it's so random, so disjointed that the actor never really gets to perform in the same manner as a stage set production. Here is where an actors metal is tested and true greatness can be achieved (which reminds me - Spacey) and is why all practitioners of the art hanker to get back on to the boards to cement their genius. The performance feel of film is like all the rest of it - illusion.
President of Peace? You fucking idiots!
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard
- peter
- The Gap Into Spam
- Posts: 12210
- Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:08 am
- Location: Another time. Another place.
- Has thanked: 1 time
- Been thanked: 10 times
Like the guests in Macbeth, they stood not upon the order of their going but went at once! 

President of Peace? You fucking idiots!
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard
His villain in Machete was a completely different role for him, thoughdlbpharmd wrote:But, he's the same character in AH as he was in Goodfellas and Casino. That's not range. That's a reprise.DeNiro has sullied himself by taking too many shit roles [mainly in bad comedies] but when you see him at his most powerfull [as he is in his brief but utterly compelling appearence in American Hustle

"You make me think Hell is run like a corporation."
"It's the other way around, but yes."
Obaki, Too Much Information
"It's the other way around, but yes."
Obaki, Too Much Information
Of course, there's also Emma Thompson. I don't think I've ever seen a movie where I didn't appreciate her performance.
(Brought to my mind by revisiting Stranger than Fiction, where she's incredibly quirky and eccentric in a not-overdone way)
(Brought to my mind by revisiting Stranger than Fiction, where she's incredibly quirky and eccentric in a not-overdone way)
"You make me think Hell is run like a corporation."
"It's the other way around, but yes."
Obaki, Too Much Information
"It's the other way around, but yes."
Obaki, Too Much Information
We just re-watched Dead Again a few months ago. She's great.Rigel wrote:Of course, there's also Emma Thompson. I don't think I've ever seen a movie where I didn't appreciate her performance.
(Brought to my mind by revisiting Stranger than Fiction, where she's incredibly quirky and eccentric in a not-overdone way)
"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." - PJ O'Rourke
_____________
"Men and women range themselves into three classes or orders of intelligence; you can tell the lowest class by their habit of always talking about persons; the next by the fact that their habit is always to converse about things; the highest by their preference for the discussion of ideas." - Charles Stewart
_____________
"I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." - James Madison
_____________
_____________
"Men and women range themselves into three classes or orders of intelligence; you can tell the lowest class by their habit of always talking about persons; the next by the fact that their habit is always to converse about things; the highest by their preference for the discussion of ideas." - Charles Stewart
_____________
"I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." - James Madison
_____________
- peter
- The Gap Into Spam
- Posts: 12210
- Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:08 am
- Location: Another time. Another place.
- Has thanked: 1 time
- Been thanked: 10 times
Much AdoAbout Nothing!
President of Peace? You fucking idiots!
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard
- Hashi Lebwohl
- The Gap Into Spam
- Posts: 19576
- Joined: Mon Jul 06, 2009 7:38 pm
The Senator was really more of a pawn of Booth and Torrez.Rigel wrote: His villain in Machete was a completely different role for him, though
Movie trivia time: Trejo's character Machete taking down Segal's character Torrez was payback for Segal stuffing a rag into Trejo's mouth before throwing him into the trunk of a car way back in the opening scene from Marked for Death (1990).
The Tank is gone and now so am I.
-
- The Gap Into Spam
- Posts: 1058
- Joined: Mon Dec 22, 2014 8:41 pm
- Location: 24i v o ot
Surprised noone has mentioned Jeff Bridges.
He's starred in lots of my favourite movies, from, The Last Picture Show, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, The Fisher King, King Kong, The Big Lebowski, Tron and Tron: Legacy, True Grit ...
... which reminds me! I noticed that Crazy Heart, his only Oscar Win for Best Actor, was on the DVD shelf earlier this week where I work. Fingers crossed it will still be there tomorrow.
He's starred in lots of my favourite movies, from, The Last Picture Show, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, The Fisher King, King Kong, The Big Lebowski, Tron and Tron: Legacy, True Grit ...
... which reminds me! I noticed that Crazy Heart, his only Oscar Win for Best Actor, was on the DVD shelf earlier this week where I work. Fingers crossed it will still be there tomorrow.

- peter
- The Gap Into Spam
- Posts: 12210
- Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:08 am
- Location: Another time. Another place.
- Has thanked: 1 time
- Been thanked: 10 times
Agreed - he has earned a place on any list worth its salt!
President of Peace? You fucking idiots!
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard
- peter
- The Gap Into Spam
- Posts: 12210
- Joined: Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:08 am
- Location: Another time. Another place.
- Has thanked: 1 time
- Been thanked: 10 times
How could I have forgotten - Eli Wallach! Tuco is possibly one of the greatest film charachters of all time. He provides the 'human' foil to Eastwood and Van Cleef's cold efficiency. He fails, rises and fails again always seeming to have the dice roll against him, He's a bastard but you can't help rooting for him. I don't know if Wallach did anything else of the same note - but even if not, that one performance seals his place amongst the greats.
President of Peace? You fucking idiots!
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard
"I know what America is. America is a thing that you can move very easily. Move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way." (Benjamin Netenyahu 2001.)
....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'
We are the Bloodguard