I think Natalie Portman was a tremendously interesting actress at 12 or 14, but her adult performances haven't lived up to The Professional or Beautiful Girls yet.
I really liked her in Closer and Garden State. They weren't mind-blowing performances, but she inhabited her characters in a very natural, relaxed way. (And played them differently enough that I don't assume I know anything about how she acts in real life.)
Her performance in SW is an anomaly, which is why it's so irritating. (Also irritating is the rumour that
Lucas cut out a subplot where Padme forms the beginnings of the Rebel Alliance. Way to give your female lead zero agency, George!
)
Wow, that mysterious whitefonted subplot would have been great.
People born in 1990 are like sophmores in HS! It's fucked up!
I have yet to see something involving Natalie Portman that impresses me much, in part because she still looks like a child, to me. It's harder to take her seriously as an adult consciousness with all of her childlike gestures. (I feel the same way about what little I've seen of Keira Knightley, although in her case it's a vaguer feeling.)
Which is not to say Portman doesn't have something; certainly, there's more there behind her eyes than, say, Orlando Bloom's. But, like green bananas.
that mysterious whitefonted subplot would have been great.
Indeed, and provided us with some internal consistency. Hmmph.
that mysterious whitefonted subplot would have been great.
Why do I have this horrible feeling that if he HAD gone that way, it would have meant more JarJar.
Gack! What? No!
I know! AND no-one cards me anymore. WTF?
I really liked her in Closer and Garden State. They weren't mind-blowing performances, but she inhabited her characters in a very natural, relaxed way.
I agree that she was good in Garden State. But I thought that, while she was clearly trying hard, her performance was the weakest in Closer -- she was visibly Acting at times, instead of existing as the character. Then again, the character probably *should* be visibly Acting at times.
I couldn't be that critical of NP in
Closer
since I thought JR was pointlessly blank. She was ranking below OB on the emotimeter.
