Paul Dano in There Will Be Blood. Just awful. I heard he only had a week to prepare because the first choice dropped out late, but still.
.
Same with “That Thing You Do”. It has to be one of the best cast movies, even the minor parts were spot on, except for her. Part of the problem was that her “traveling with the band” role didn’t make sense in the story. Her big scene at the end was cringe-worthy.
All this hate for Dr. Christmas Jones - I can name at least five Bond movies with worse actresses in the leading lady role. Does nobody remember Tanya Roberts?
I kinda felt Battlefield Earth might have been watchable had John Travolta not been in it.
Of course, had he not been in it, it would never have been made.
John Lithgow as Roberta in The World According To Garp. Yechh…
Except he never said it, and that wasn’t the movie. Debbie Reynolds did in an interview making fun of him. He says "Yonder in the valley of the sun is my father’s castle.”
Now I can’t speak for the accent but apparently there are scenes from the movie (which is actually the 1952 movie The Son of Ali Baba) on youtube. (I tried to check your link but it doesn’t work anymore. Neither did the one I tried. My info is from here.)
“Bend of the River” (1952) is justly acclaimed as one of the greatest westerns ever, one of the five films that James Stewart and Anthony Mann did. But unfortunately it has some scenes with Stepin Fetchit.
Jessica Lange early in her career was especially terrible. See “King Kong” (if you must) or “All That Jazz”.
I agree with both of you, and yet …
I always got a kick out of watching her in this film. She took the movie somewhere where it was never expected to go and I found myself wondering if Kubrick might have used her in this way on purpose.
For me, it really enhanced the bizarre and macabre nature of the film.
It was a crazy film and she was the craziest of all.
I appreciated her performance and found myself wondering whether she was in on the joke or not.
If she was not in on the joke, then I have to elevate Kubrick to an even higher spot on my idea of the greatest directors of all time.
Many of his film were just the most outstanding of all and I have read that he intentionally screwed around with the actors to get the kind of performance he wanted. I sure wish he would have lived for many more years.
IMO, Kubrick died far too young and if he had lived, he would have given us many more wonderful films.
Screw the actors!
What was that film where someone asked something about actors and someone else asked, “Have you ever eaten with one?” It was a hilarious moment in film.
Oh yes! It was from The Producers.
Zero Mostel is another one who died far too soon. He would have given us many more wonderful performances if only he lived another 20 years or so.
This is hilarious if you pretend it’s about Four Weddings and a Funeral.
I think there are a number of actresses who could handle such a role well. We’re looking for sexy/funny/smart/spunky. Reese Witherspoon, Drew Barrymore, Parker Posey, Tina Fey, Jennifer Anniston .. and a lot of others whose names I don’t remember. It’s a long damn list.
And Gwyneth Paltrow does NOT belong on it. She stank up Sky Captain big time.
One of the first websites I ever saw (in the 1990s sometime) was devoted to hatred of Andie McDowell.
Onto the main topic of the thread - John Larroquette, a fine actor, is the weakest part of “Stripes” - everyone else is a plausible exaggerated “type,” which is just right for this type of movie, but Larroquette’s character is just over-the-top ridiculous.