Sunday, April 11, 2010

Best Actress 1988: Glenn Close in Dangerous Liaisons



Glenn Close received her fourth nomination for playing Marquise Isabelle de Merteuil in Dangerous Liaisons. Her character seems like a nice person, but is actually incredibly evil and incredible and doesn't really care about anything or anyone. She conspires with her former lover (John Malkovich) to take advantage of and destroy the people around them. At first, this all goes well, but it ends up becoming much more then they bargained for. What I love about this performance is that Glenn never overplays or underplays it. Like Meryl in The Devil Wears Prada, Close takes a subtle approach to a performance that could have been way over the top. It's an incredibly chilling,brilliantly layered performance. Close's evilness is so delicious and it's so much fun to watch! She and Malkovich have great chemistry, and their final scene together is fantastic. Close shades Marquise so well, making us see her vulnerability and her eventual sadness. Her last scene is an incredible moment that's perfectly executed. So, a great, fascinating performance which is a marvel to watch which gets

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Eh...I'll save my opinion until I do this year, but I'll go ahead and say I'm not a fan.

joe burns said...

I know you said it was too calculated for you, but she just really impressed me! What did you think of Pfeiffer?

Anonymous said...

I'll have to save my opinion on her too, but not a fan either :]

joe burns said...

I didn't like her much either, but she got a little better with me the second time. My guess is that you didn't like the film as a whole. I thought it was a little boring, but still well made and well written.

Malcolm said...

Yahoo! Loves for Close!

She was once my pick as Best Actress that year. But it was a very stiff year for actress, don't you think? Or is it otherwise?

Brandon said...

This is one of those movies that I should see, but will probably put off for awhile, haha.

I've heard mixed reactions, but I'll eventually get around to it.

joe burns said...

Malcom: I've only seen three of them, so I can't say it was a really stiff year. But it does look like one!

Twister: I thought you had seen it! Since you did a 1988 ranking and Pfeiffer was nominated.

Zephyr said...

Very good film. Fantastic performance.

Nigel Maruva Chikukwa said...

I haven't seen this but I am a huge fan of her creation in "101 Dalmations."

She was perfectly suited to donne Cruella De Ville's hysteria and all the derangements that make her character fun to watch

joe burns said...

I remember that she was very good in that, but you should see this!