"Fur" and Nicole
Word around the campfire is that Nicole Kidman's performance as celebrated art-gallery photographer Diane Arbus is the best thing about Fur. As for the film itself, some are using the A word, as in "arty." Or as in, "It turned out a little artier than what some in the loop were expecting."
In some circles "arty" means index-finger-up-the-butt precious, but shouldn't an Arbus biopic, of all biopics, have a kind of art-gallery feeling? An aura of artified apartness? If I'd directed this puppy I would have shot it in 35mm black-and-white.
The director is Steven Shainberg (Secrretary), who worked from a script by Erin Cressida Wilson and a book by Patricia Bosworth. Picturehouse is releasing Fur sometime in November, following what I'm told will be a debut at the Toronto Film Festival.
Arbus commited suicide in 1971 at age 48. Why is it that the final acts in the lives of so many gifted 20th Century artists (Arbus, Harry Nilsson, Sylvia Plath, Jean-MIchel Basqiat) end on a black note? Suicide obviously lends a quasi-tragic dimension and also gives the biographer or screenwriter an "ending", but there are few cliches as groaningly tiresome as that of the self-destructive genius.
Posted by Jeffrey Wells on August 4, 2006 at 2:20 PM
comment #1
Anonymous says ...
Genius' self-destruct because they are finely attuned to the fact that life is meaningless and that it ends in decay. They don't want to stick around to see the obvious. That there is no God, no point and no hope.
Puke.
Posted by Anonymous at August 4, 2006 3:03 PM
comment #2
Amy says ...
Jeff, FUR is an imaginary portrait, it is not a biopic by any stretch of the imagination according to Shainberg (in Premiere) and the film concentrates on just 3 months of Arbus' life before she became (the) DIANE ARBUS. The movie is not about an artist who committed suicide, it is about the woman who became (the) Diane Arbus.
And I hope it is arty, I hope it pisses people off. I am so looking forward to this!
Posted by Amy at August 4, 2006 3:19 PM
comment #3
graig says ...
I'm skeptical of Shainberg. His first film, Hit Me, had a great cast and a good script and very poor direction. Secretary is a good movie with at least one great performance, but it could have been a lot better if handled with a more rigorous hand.
And a Diane Arbus movie should be in B&W or not made at all.
Posted by graig at August 4, 2006 3:45 PM
comment #4
Amy says ...
Parts of Fur are in Black and White, I believe and wouldn't that be so cliched for everything about the movie to be Arbus-like, I think even Arbus would have been alittle disappointed if no risk is taken and the filmmakers stick to the script.
Posted by Amy at August 4, 2006 3:49 PM
comment #5
Anonymous says ...
Did you hear about Kidman's performance on PerezHilton.com?
Posted by Anonymous at August 4, 2006 4:59 PM
comment #6
Anonymous says ...
Nicole looks so much better without the giant forehead hairdo
Posted by Anonymous at August 4, 2006 5:24 PM
comment #7
c fontana says ...
Kidman's face is so stretched and botoxed I can't even look at her anymore...Go watch 'Dead Calm' and then try to watch anything she's done in the past five or six years...she looks like a completely different human being. I mean, if she was on an album cover walking barefoot holding a cigarette in her right hand, people would swear she's been replaced by a bad look-alike.
Posted by c fontana at August 4, 2006 5:24 PM
comment #8
Alice says ...
Yawn, c fontana "another botox peddler" comes along. She looks fine, to say her face is stretched and botoxed is so silly. How stretched is her face, how botoxed is it? she is supposed to look like she did when she was 19 or 20 when she did Dead Calm? get real, what are you talking about. Go look in the mirror, you look the same to some 20 years ago? She looks fine.
In the past 5 or 6 years, she has played roles where her dialogue is quite little, it is her face that has done all the work for her. You think a botoxed or stretched face could have made:
Grace in The Others (2001) and Dogville work (2003/4),
Anna in Birth (2004, the opera scene alone is so masterfully done, wow),
Joanna in TSW(2004) where she was being fired and you can see the dementia simply all over her face or
even Sylvia (2005) whose deception seeps through her skin and face?
all these performances happened in the last 5-6 years and these performances and characters simply blow your botox jab out of the water because they are all characters with little to say with their mouth but alot to say with the face.
I love how the botox jab comes out and nothing is there to show for it, is it supposed to ridicule her. Her face is stretched? from where to where? when she starts looking like Jessica Lange then I will start wondering, for now, the face works fine. My God, what she can do with that face! If this is what botox allows her to do then by jove! Nicole keep it coming! botox all the way!
The botox comment is so boring now, I will continue to pretend to laugh.
And yes, this is coming from a fan of almost 2 decades and if she looked like she did in Dead Calm, I'd be very worried.
Posted by Alice at August 4, 2006 5:52 PM
comment #9
c fontana says ...
Alice, the joke wasn't the botox, it was the 'Abbey Road' reference...but I digress...
As we age our skin changes, sure, but most people don't gain *smoother* skin and narrower eyes.
DAMNING proof in these photos:
http://www.awfulplasticsurgery.com/archives/005432.html
I don't care one way or another what Kidman has done to her face, it's just an observation.
Posted by c fontana at August 4, 2006 6:11 PM
comment #10
Cartier-Bresson says ...
She looks about the same, only older. DAMNING. Heh.
Arbus arty? You mean America wanted a big, mainstream Arbus picture instead?
Posted by Cartier-Bresson at August 5, 2006 12:43 AM
comment #11
Linden says ...
With the right roles, she's a very talented actress. But I agree that the botox is hurting her. She looks more and more unnatural and it hinders her acting.
Posted by Linden at August 5, 2006 1:11 AM
comment #12
Dixon Steele says ...
Hey, Alice.
The last time I saw SYLVIA, Gwyneth Paltrow was in it, not Nicole Kidman.
Oooops.
Posted by Dixon Steele at August 5, 2006 9:43 AM
comment #13
Richard Avedon says ...
Hilarious, Cartier-Bresson! An arty subject is an arty subject, no way around it, that's for sure. As for Nicole's botox, well of course she gets botox, it's plain to see. But so does every actor in Hollywood now, regardless of their age. It's far more disgusting to me that 20-somethings get botox now, than it does for a nearly-40 year old woman like Nicole Kidman to get it.
Posted by Richard Avedon at August 6, 2006 11:37 PM
comment #14
Anonymous says ...
UNBELIEVABLE!
instead of speak about the film or the kidman's performance, you're discussing about if she uses or not the botox!!!
when it is spoken about nicole, there is always of means the botox.
personally i'm tired about this story.
you don't now with certainty (that you do not know of person nicole kidman, and she was in person to tell you) so please, STOP IT!!
Posted by Anonymous at August 7, 2006 12:11 PM