I’m sorry to say it, because she is generally a fairly attractive woman, but I am not sure what happened in this movie. She did not look remotely pretty AT ALL. Herearesomepictures of Cate Blanchett.
Here is what she looked like in Robin Hood. She looks beaten down and worn out.
You’ll remember what she looked like in Lord of the Rings. (I don’t know why it’s spliced with a picture of Crowe.)
It’s telling to me that I cannot find many pictures of her as Maid Marion. She looked almost forty years old and while I have nothing against forty-year old women - hell I’m not all that far away from 40 - it didn’t fit my image of Maid Marion at all. I mean, MAID, right? Doesn’t that mean an unmarried young woman? Somebody is probably going to say “But it’s accurate” (is it?) and my answer to that is you can make it accurate and still make her attractive. In contrast Russell Crowe did not look nearly as old. Also, this is my shallow thread for the month and as such I am being shallow.
The movie wasn’t great to begin with - mainly due to editing, I feel. Scenes were cut in weird places and it got a little jarring. But nothing disappointed me more than Cate Blanchett’s lackluster appearance. WHAT DID THEY DO TO HER???
I actually thought is was really refreshing to see a woman as part of the story that wasn’t so beautiful that she looked out of place in the movie. I thought she was pretty but understated and looked like someone who spends her time tilling soil and preparing food for her father in law. Personally I thought the movie was not great but I liked Blanchett as Marion.
Geez, you couldn’t have posted this in the OTHER stupid Robin Hood thread? I liked this version a lot, but I wasn’t going to defend it anywhere, but this criticism is pretty outragrously strange. I really like you, but, damn, ragging on a woman who shows her age in a movie that finally shows Marion as something other than a pretty princess-type?
I think there’s been some murmuring in crappy tabloids that she’s lost a touch too much weight and is looking “sunken”. I don’t think it’s an “age” thing as much as “bag-of-antlers thing”. Ladies we love you when you’re voluptuous!
That said, from the stills I’ve seen, she looks appropriate for the movie.
:: ahem :: Should clarify “bag of antlers” is how I’ve read it described in snarkier forums, like Fark, and is not how I would describe Blanchett.
And BTW I believe the weight loss make her looks “sunken” is specifically for a role in which she’s supposed to play Marisa Acocella Marchetto, a cancer survivor. She got quite thin (before and after pic).
One unflattering “behind the scenes” photo isn’t going to convince me she looks “like crap.” She looks fine in the clips I’ve seen - earthy, but fine. Why would we expect her to look like she did in “The Lord of the Rings,” in which she was essentially meant to be a heavenly being?
I am a little put off by the use of the name “Maid Marion” for a woman whose maidenhood is past. I think it would have been fun (and a bit daring) if they would have justified it as her being an “old maid,” but she’s described as a widow so that doesn’t apply. But I haven’t seen the movie, so maybe they make it work somehow.
Well since she is a fictional character, accuracy is in the eye of the beholder ;).
In the Errol Flynn movie she was a royal ward, i.e. an orphaned, propertied nobleman’s daughter who would be auctioned off ( with her property ) in marriage in exchange for a fat bride price relative to the value of her inherited estates ( this was a normal and accepted part of royal income ). In such circumstances, she’d invariably be young. The then 22-year old Olivia De Havilland would probably considered a bit long in the tooth for the role, but close enough for government work.
In Robin and Marian she was played by the 47-year old Audrey Hepburn opposite a 46-year old Sean Connery. In that case it was “accurate” and well done IMO, because serious timeline issues aside, they were cast as age equivalent middle-aged people, reconnecting in life after twenty years apart. And Hepburn’s middle-aged Marian had become a nun, the normal vocation for unmarried women of presumably gentle birth.
In this one ( which I haven’t seen yet ) she apparently plays the widow of a noble Crowe is impersonating. Which is reasonable enough. I guess. At seemingly a bit of a stretch, but again I haven’t seen the film. Crowe is 5 years older than Blanchett, so no serious discrepancy there.
‘Maid’ comes from ‘maiden’ and equates with virgin. Fine for royal ward Olivia De Havilland and okay for former maiden Hepburn turned nun, not at all applicable to the married Blanchett.
I don’t think there is anything wrong with preferring a young, pretty, genuine maiden in the De Havilland mode for Maid Marian. It’s pretty much the default image. But merits of the film aside, I don’t necessarily object to re-imaginings. I rather like Hepburn’s Marian ( and have a real soft spot for that particular film ).
I think she looks almost exactly the same. She’s never struck me as the beautiful type, anyways. Sure, she’d be pretty for real life, but not for Hollywood.
She looked appropriate for the role she was cast in, I thought. Her husbands been away for 10 years, times are tough in the manor, she’s working hard, and not getting enough to eat.
She is 41 with 3 kids after all.
This reminds me of the criticism I saw for Ashley Judd in the movie Bug, a great, but harsh movie inwhich she looked like the woman she was playing.
BTW, here’s one of my favorite Blanchett photos
She’s never been beautiful, nor even especially pretty in the conventional sense. Her acting is what carries her, just as it does for Glenn Close, Streep, Toni Colette and Francis McDormand.
I think she makes no effort to choose roles that make her look good and think she is more attractive than the roles she plays. I have bumped into her twice, in real life, and she is stunningly attractive. I didn’t realize who she was at first either time (once she was pushing a pram at Town Hall station in Sydney). I just spotted her and thought, “wow!” During my ogling I realized who it was that I was perving on.
I should point out if it hasn’t been mentioned, that at 46, Crowe is about the same age as Connery was when he played over the hill middle-aged Robin Hood in Robin and Marian. A bit old for an origin story.
Oh, come on. I know I was being shallow. Don’t I have a right to be shallow once in a while? Everyone is.
I think Ms. Blanchett is a perfectly lovely actress. But no, it did not fit my image of Maid Marion at all. I always imagined a much sweeter face, maybe with a widow’s peak.
And I don’t really go to movies to see plain people. I’m surrounded by plain people. I’m somewhat plain myself! I go to the movies to see beautiful people and big explosions.
All that being said, there was a lot more wrong with the movie than just Cate. I was just being…superficial.
I just thought that it was great to see a woman who did an excellent job of looking the part that she played. I have seen several period films that have had characters that were so beautiful it took me out of the film for a moment while I adjusted. This happens to me just about any time Leonardo DiCaprio is in a movie, actually. He is usually just too attractive for me to see the character he is trying to portray. Leelee Sobieski in the TV version of Joan of Arc had the same effect. Gweneth Paltrow in Shakespeare in Love did too, though not to the same extent. Keira Knightley does some period stuff really well and fits in the physical role but her in the version of King Arthur with Clive Owen was jarring.
I totally get going to the movies wanting crazy, beautiful, exciting stuff that doesn’t tend to happen in my day to day life. For that kind of thing I will go see the movie Kick-Ass or whatever romantic comedy is in theaters. For period pieces I like to see things with at least a little bit of realism. In Robin Hood I could have done with a bit less shooting people in the neck as well, but maybe that is just me.
I honestly had no idea it was her. Afterwards, I asked the SO “Who do you think played the woman?” I refused to believe it was Cate Blanchett. I think it’s the long, thin hair that makes her look so old. And possibly some weight loss. Gotta fill out the wrinkles as ages comes on! Obviously her performance was incredible - that much I knew from the movie - but I had no clue it was her.
Another who didn’t look good recently is Scarlett Johanssen in Iron Man 2. Weird hair again.
Everyone is.
