I did not care for it at all.
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Well, that’s disappointing. I had high hopes for this. Interesting comment on Carey Mulligan’s performance. Based on other performances of hers, blankness seems to be her default, going beyond subtlety to non existent. It makes me think of your recent Joan Fontaine post because she is another actress that is so subtle and soft in her performance but you can see the steel underneath. Would Mulligan also blossom under different directors that are willing to put in the time to draw the performance out, such as Fontaine did?
Honestly, I don’t think there’s much there to begin with. I liked her in Inside Llewyn Davis, but it didn’t require much from her. She has worked with great directors and has had phenomenal opportunities in Gatsby and Shame –
but I just don’t think she has it. Good comparison with Fontaine – who was really able to dive into the frailty of her characters, their fragility – you really worry about those women.
Mulligan shouting “Liar!” in Suffragette with basically nothing on her face is just … I don’t know … inexcusable? She does a lot of weeping and stuff like that in the film, but I didn’t care.
I was disappointed too. It was such an interesting time-period, such a radical movement. I mean, yes, we see women blowing shit up – but there was way too much Maud for my taste.
I liked her character in Never Let Me Go, but blankness played into the strange and otherworldly nature of the children. You knew they were mysterious for some reason. This was a case where it played well into the story/the character, not because her acting brought something to the role.
You have to be very very talented to play “blankness” (I just talked about it in my Catherine Deneuve post – her “blank” performance in Repulsion is one of my favorite performances of all time).
With Mulligan, the blankness seems flat. Shallow. Like nothing’s going on. Nothing is activated inside her, beneath the blank surface.
Like: how can you scream “Liar!” at the top of your voice and have nothing going on?
If it’s not there, no amount of chiseling or polishing will make a piece of quartz into a diamond.