Daniel Day-Links
Tuesday, June 20, 2017 at 11:40PM • Vanity Fair the interrupted erupted into crazed outrage early today over fake news regarding Gal Gadot's Wonder Woman payday. Katey clears up the confusion
• Time has a gorgeously written profile of Sofia Coppola by Stephanie Zacharek as The Beguiled heads to theaters.
• Meanwhile, though, not everyone is happy with the film. Our own Murtada thinks the film lacks tension and should've switched its setting away from the Civil War. Slate details the whitewashing of the source novel that happened in both the 1971 movie and to an even larger degree in the current film. I think a couple of the Slate article complaints are overdoing it particularly when it comes to the dialogue addressing the absence of slaves -- that feels absolutely authentic as to how that particular character (Nicole Kidman's stone-faced self-serving Miss Martha) would dismiss the topic but there are enough valid ones that now I'd love to see a third version that is actually more faithful to the book because it sounds, at least in this article, like its more fascinating than either movie version. I guess we should read it.
• THR Young Han Solo loses/fires (?) its hot directors Phil Lord & Christopher Miller under the typical "creative visions" disagreements. The worrying part is that they're already several months into production. Deadline follows up with the bad news that they want Ron Howard to finish the film
• GQ Joel Schumacher looks back on the reviled camp of Batman & Robin. Has no regret about the Bat Nipples.
• Village Voice Transformers: The Last Knight wrecks Bilge Ebiri. Perfect. This review is perfect.
• And you have probably heard that Daniel Day-Lewis is retiring...
The Wrap reminds us that he's announced his retirement before but Variety goes with the sensational misleading "Shocker!" headline even though Daniel Day-Lewis hardly ever works by his own choice and thus it was only a matter of time before he did this. Letters of Note shares a cool story about how hard he fought for his breakout role in My Beautiful Laundrette. I personally think it's fine that he's retiring. He's clearly not a "hungry" actor anymore and actors are better when they really want it (just as people in all professions are). Also Lucy Prebble, Clarisse Loughrey, and Teo Bugbee had amusing notes to comfort us on this topic on twitter.
Naturally this means that Phantom Thread, his next Paul Thomas Anderson picture opening in December, would theoretically be his last. Cynics will tell you -- and have already told you online surely -- that this means he's a lock for the Oscar yet again. But let's not get carried away. People will have to at least really like the movie and Oscar voters will have to really want him to tie Katharine Hepburn's record for that to happen. Will they? We'll see.
Reader Comments (34)
I'm gonna be devastated if he wins over Joaquin again.
I can totally see him going back to acting if there is a juicy great role that could win him another Oscar.
I really hope Phantom Thread can be an Oscar winner for PTA, but not DDL again. It's Joaquin's time!
LOL tho at Clarisse. I actually like Daniel as Guido, but yeah that movie has actually put me to sleep, only to wake up again during Nicole's "Unusual Way" cause of course!!
That piece on Sofia is beautiful. She is already among the best out there.
That review on the new Transformers is awesome.
I mentioned over Twitter actually. It's a trend that Coppola has done in the past over her films, and I'm glad the criticisms are being brought up. I've yet to see the film, but the black characters are important in the novel, and they provide a lot of context for the voices of women in that particular scenario (why else set it in that era anyways).
While Coppola's reasons may be genuine or pure, it *is* erasure and it is textbook definition of white feminism. Perhaps Coppola tried to avoid controversy or felt unprepared to handle the matter or race but the dismissal of it is quite problematic and a part of the original story. If Coppola didn't feel like the right voice to tell the black characters stories then she wasn't the right voice to tell this particular story.
I'm still looking forward to the film I will add, but the criticisms are valid. And calling out white feminism, especially one that can be as "innocent" but harmful as Coppola is important and valid.
Not cynical about Day-Lewis' retirement announcement. Who knows what goes on in his personal life to compel him to make certain decisions?
Coppola has a preoccupation with whiteness. Her physical whiteness is ethnic. But the blonde, pale, non-ethnic whiteness of her screen muses is where her universe is centered aesthetically. She is no ally to the cause of diversity in film. Continue making your upper crust white bred exercises in naval gazing.
Add me to the cynics. I mean he's practically retired anyway due to his infrequency of work, so there's really no need for an announcement.
Sofia Coppola was damned if she did and damned if she didn't. She's accused of erasure for writing out the sole black character in the film and therefore minimizing the terrifying culture of slavery, or she includes the sole black character in the book and is yet again criticized for perpetuating black stereotypes and adding to the long list of grievances and complaints by black actors and actresses that Hollywood fails to see them outside the character tropes of maids and slaves.
Ultimately, however controversial, I think she made the right decision...even though the criticism of her is entirely justified. Sofia Coppola attempting to dissect and analyze the culture of slavery and black oppression in the antebellum South - all within the narrative confinements of a revenge thriller starring white women - would be all kinds of disastrous.
Internet Update: Daniel Day-Lewis is God, Sofia Coppola is too white and we're not supposed to comment Carrie's autopsy.
I so hope this means that this shines a massive beacon on the criminally undervalued Lesley Manville in the Phantom Thread and gives her finally the rightful title of 'Oscar nominated actress'. I have seen her twice on stage in Mike Leigh's Grief and her Olivier winning turn in Ghosts, and she was absolutely mesmerising in both.
How are some people so convinced that Joaquin Phoenix's film will get to the Oscars and that his performance will be a frontrunner for the award, especially when Cannes Best Actor winners don't usually get nominated and when it seems the time to give Gary Oldman his 1st Oscar/ Daniel Day Lewis his 4th/ Tom Hanks his 3rd ?
Oldman's politics will undo him. Hanks getting nominated would be the win. Day-Lewis won't default for the win.
Yeah, whether or not the DDL retirement sticks (I recall everyone from Kristin Scott Thomas to Anthony Hopkins to Leonardo DiCaprio seemingly "retiring" just to come back to the movies, so I have my doubts until he's gone as long as a Sean Connery or Gene Hackman), the Best Actor race still feels like Oldman v. Jackman.
No, he will lose to the next generation's DDL, Timothee Chalamet. Fire away...
Sofia is obsessed with aryanism/Nordic/Germanic aesthetics. She is obsessed with Scandinavian looking blue eyed white-blonde haired women. She can't see anything beyond that. Brunettes don't exist in her world. Mediterraneans and Southern Europeans and Jews don't exist in her world. Being an Italian American with dark hair, dark eyes and a typically Mediterranean-southern European nose, this is all very strange and questionable.
When Italians first arrived in the US, they weren't even considered white. She cast an Asian American in The Bling Ring because she had to, this, along with casting a brown haired and brown eyed Emma Watson was a star far as she ever went from her aryan- Scandinavian mythology obsessed aesthetics. She just can't see women who look one shade darker than Kirsten Dunst.
Plus, has she kept the songle black female, she would have to, at some degree, acknowledge that white women were complicit with, took part on, and benefited from the slavement, abuse and exploitation of black women. If she did that, her characters would no longer be the "depressed melancholic victimized over sensitive blue eyed white haired angel staring out the window". She would allow her characters to go to such dark places and she wouldn't ackowledge political complications such as this one because she just doesn't have the depth to do so.
oH, and while she did keep the asian leader of the ring, she erased an illegal mexican immigrant who was also a member.
"that white women were complicit with, took part on, and benefited from the slavement, abuse and exploitation of black women." BINGO. And that's why the criticisms are so valid too. The erasure doesn't just seem to come from a 'I was uncomfortable with the subject" but "I was uncomfortable with the subject because it points out my own entitlement as a white woman."
The film might end up being a cool exploration of power dynamics for women, but Coppola's decision to leave out the black characters isn't to be take lightly.
@Aaron You know she wouldn't have been damned? Not do the movie at all. It's actually very quite simple not to tell a story that's not yours to tell. Because you don't have the skills to tell it, it's not your place or you don't have the proper knowledge to. It's an easier thing to move on and take on other projects.
@Amanda It's also worth pointing that while she did keep the Asian leader in The Bling Ring, the actress was only a quarter Asian, while the real girl she's based upon is fully Asian.
I'm annoyed that people think the best solution to difficult portrayals of race is to just erase them. It's the laziest way out. That is what "Doctor Strange" did and apparently what Sofia Coppola is doing in "The Beguiled." How about making an effort to develop these characters beyond "slave" or "wise old Asian man." How about treating these characters like people as opposed to viewing them as problems to avoid?
Timothee Chalame ill be lucky to be even nominated hepwa. It's extremely difficult for actors under 30 to get nominated and impossible to win.
The Beguiled: one of the fascinating things about the novel is that the different characters narrate each chapter. That is, everyone except McBurney (the character played by Eastwood/Farrell). This not only allows us to observe the interactions and betrayals among the women in the house, but also to witness the blatant way in which McBurney is manipulating all of them.
Daniel Day Lewis: I am very skeptical about this announcedment. He vowed he was retiring from acting before, some 10 or 15 years ago. He was going to concentrate on his favorite trade: making shoes. Well, he then changed his mind. So, what gives?
He's a total Diva.
In perusing the comments, it seems that criticisms of Coppola now have to include a dissection of her looks? Sexism is so tired.
The Beguiled is her worst movie. SPOILERS
I just don't get why she cut the most interesting aspects of the original. Even the amputation scene. The incest, the rivalry among the girls, the sense of danger!
Coppola is perfect for her niche, but she can't create tension like Siegel. And I adore the actors here, but they are never close to reaching the originals.
Kidman is a sensational actress, but I missed Geraldine Page all the time.
I don't get the direction prize at Cannes. The movie is dull!
Day-Lewis is not hungry anymore but his best work comes from these non-hungry years (forget Nine).
And just the other day on an interview she said she would love to work with a diversa cast one day. Would she? Because if thats the case, so far in her career- which did not start yesterday- simply chose not to.
Had she wanted to work with a diverse cast, she would have done so. She is just not interested. She is only interested in the lives of wealthy (nordic germanic non-ethnic) white women. Which means, she is only interested in herself.
I love Lesley Manville, but I seriously doubt Paul Thomas Anderson has any interest in creating complex, awards-worthy roles for women anymore. Everyone thought Reese Witherspoon might have a shot a nod for his last movie, and it turned out her character was just filler. The film will likely be the DDL show.
Tyler, how the Hell is it sexist to point out how weird Sofia's obsession with white, blue eyed, blonde female characters is when she's an ethnic looking white woman with brown hair and eyes?
@Tyler
Her looks were brought up in relation to her fixation on whiteness as an aesthetic.
And for someone who is thaught of as "fowarding and advancing women in film", she has shown no interest in working with or no signs that she would ever cast actresses such as Penelope Cruz, Tina Fey, Julia Louis Dreyfuss, Anne Hathaway, Salma Hayek, Lena Dunham, Carey Mulligan, Lea Michelle, Winona Ryder, Sally Hawkins, Natalie Portman, Paz Vega, Elena Anaya, Cecilia Roth, Catherine Zeta Jones Linda Cardellini,Hailey Atwell, Judy Davis, Holly Hunter, Mariska Hargitay, Hillary Swank, Halle Steinfeld, Keira Knightley, America Ferrera and Wonder Woman herself Gal Gadot because they dont fit her White Supremacist/ Arianist/Swedish wet dream aesthetics.
Not to mention, Viola Davis, Cicely Tyson, Audra McDonald, Angela Basset, Halle Berry, Regina King, Octavia Spencer, Kerry Washington, Alfre Woodard, Lupita, Whoopi, Oprah, Phylicia Rashad, Tracey Ellis Ross and so many others.
Let alone all the italian GODDESSES who probably look a lot more like the women on her own bloodline than KIdman or Dunst or Johansson ever did or ever will.
Amanda, just briefly glancing through your list...she actually did cast Judy Davis in Marie Antoinette, and she was terrific. Also in that film were Rose Byrne, Shirley Henderson, and Molly Shannon, if I remember correctly. And the Italian beauty Asia Argento, who was also great in the film.
Judy Davis was in Marie Antoinette. Sofia directed a series of short films starring Natalie Portman for Dior.
A really interesting comment thread, gotta say. The Slate article, as well as the Daily Beast article, fascinate.
Ok, so I was wrong. She did cast some non-Scandinavian looking women in non-lead parts. I didn't remember Judy Davis in MA. I vaguely remember Asia Argento.
Still, Judy Davis is not Scandinavian looking, but is still a WASP, and it was, again, not a lead role.
And that does not deny that hers is a very limited aesthetic and that, had she and interest in working with non-blondes, whites other than nordics, and even minorities, she would have done so.