Actress Spotlight: Natalie Portman

Plus: RIP to the great James Caan

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Jul 08, 2022

It doesn’t seem like Natalie Portman should be nearing a 30-year acting career. She’s too young for that, right? And at the same time, Portman has always been mature beyond her years, going back to her impressive mid-90s child performances in Leon: The Professional and Heat. Back on our screens this weekend as one of the stars of Thor: Love and Thunder, Portman has given us many great roles before she even turned 40. We wrote about a couple of them today.

Also, RIP James Caan, who passed away on Wednesday. We did quick recommendations for two of our favorite Caan movies below. Enjoy, and have an awesome weekend!

Billy recommends…

Jackie

Here is why Annihilation is the best sci-fi movie of the 21st… wait, I already wrote about Annihilation? Alright, fine… Here is why Jackie is the best biopic of the 21st century. Natalie Portman has had an absolutely fascinating career. A consistent presence in Hollywood that is at times seemingly wooden and uninterested. Or that is what I thought until I saw her SNL appearances for the first time. Her commitment to silly and off-the-wall content proves her range, so when we see her swing for the fences it is exhilarating. Jackie was one of the most anticipated movies of that year and the results speak for themselves. She completely transforms into the caricature of Jackie Kennedy.

Director Pablo Larrain creates a lambasting of Jackie’s myth while being empathetic to one of the most recognizable American figures. By lambasting, I mean it strips away our perception of these Kennedy figures. A calculated bunch that became our first “celebrity” President-First Lady combo. Young, good looking, and at the center of one of America’s most shocking moments. That is where Larrain sets this story. Within days of JFK’s assassination and Jackie’s life living through that. All centered on an interview about a week after the horrific event. Portman’s commitment to Jackie’s voice can be a bit distracting at the start, but as you get into the story it mixes in with the background. Everything about this woman is so recognizable it would have been disingenuous to not let Portman recreate this character.

I do not know if Larrain is using our wooden typecast actresses (Kristen Stewart in Spencer being the other) in his biopics on purpose, but it is a fascinating experience to prove to the world what they can do. Portman is one of our best living actresses and is not often given (or chooses) the projects that let her play. It is fitting that she played Jackie Kennedy because everything in her life felt calculated to an annoying degree. That is part of the myth. Where did the real Jackie start and the curated one end? Portman has the opportunity to make that question even more confusing while seemingly bringing clarity into her own career. Jackie has its massive supporters like me, but is often thought of as just a vehicle for Portman to get an Oscar. It’s so much more.

Available to rent on digital platforms

Drew recommends…

Black Swan

After seeing the final cut of Black Swan for the first time, Natalie Portman said she was “completely surprised.” She had thought they were shooting something “documentary-style,” not a melodramatic thriller. To Portman, this was a reminder that film is a director’s medium. While filmmaker Darren Aronofsky certainly imprinted his intense personal vision on Black Swan, it’s Portman as Nina Sayers that most react to first when recalling the movie. Her performance is so stunning in part because she isn’t trying to play Nina in a feverish psychosexual drama; she’s simply embodying the human behind the character.

Portman has always had a knack for finding the real in most of her characters. Sometimes that means she’s relatable or down-to-earth, but often it just means she uncovers the emotional truth, no matter what type of movie she’s in. In Black Swan, Nina is a tightly wound ballerina in the New York City Ballet company who lands the lead in Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake. Terrified that she isn’t “perfect” enough to play the part, Nina begins to break down physically, emotionally, and psychologically – no thanks to the arrogant company director Thomas (a never-better Vincent Cassel) and frenemy ballerina Lily (a perfectly cast Mila Kunis). There could be many different ways to play Nina’s unraveling, but Portman opts for an authentic, almost low-key portrayal amidst the hysterics of the film’s heightened score and hallucinatory cinematography. If she had tried to match these elements with an over-the-top performance of her own, everything gets thrown out of whack. In this case, it helped that the star thought they were making a different movie than the director.

Training for six months to learn how to be a realistic ballet dancer, Portman was clearly up to the demanding challenge that Aronofsky had designed. It’s this abundant commitment on screen that earned her Best Actress at the Oscars that year, a crowning achievement in a sterling career thus far. The psychological horror of Black Swan is not the kind of film that typically wins Best Actress, but Portman so fully embodied the tortured artist Nina that Academy members couldn’t look away.

Streaming on Hulu and Amazon Prime

From the DYLA Archive

Annihilation

RIP James Caan

The great James Caan passed away this week at 82. Best known for playing Sonny Corleone in The Godfather, Caan had a long and surprisingly versatile career. As a tribute, we wrote about two of his best performances. RIP.

Billy: Thief

Michael Mann’s first theatrical release is a masterclass in tension-building. It is fitting that our lead is played by James Caan. The man oozes tension by just being himself. Calm and collected until he doesn’t need to be. Then a ferocious figure that is terrifying. Thief is a grimy smoke-filled experience that is obsessed with the details of a heist. All of those minute components aren’t lost in translation because of the amazing filmmaking by Mann and the reliable James Caan leading us along the way.

Drew: The Gambler

A couple years after The Godfather, Caan starred in an underrated character study about a man with a crippling gambling addiction. The Gambler is a very 70s film, in that its dark and downbeat tone doesn’t try to uplift or sugarcoat a damn thing, which makes Caan the ideal lead in a movie like this. He plays Axel Freed, who can’t feel alive unless everything is on the line, leading to all sorts of trouble for a guy that can’t get out of his own way.

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