Casting Rumors Squeal #2

Daniel Day-Lewis, Benicio Del Toro, and Gael Garcia Bernal for Scorsese's Silence.

I've just finished my first GGB movie, Y Tu Mama Tambien (which was fucking incredible, btw. Dirty and explicit as I've heard, obviously, but also hysterically funny, awkward, sad, and surprisingly tender. There's something somewhat innocent about Julio and Tenoch's Superbad-like subservience to Luisa. They're initially terrified of her sexual advances. And the last scene is just *so* well acted) Anyhoo, I officially get all the fuss about him, and to see these three sensitive, scarily intelligent, lovely tornadoes of sexiness and talent act together in a movie would just be....weird. And epic.

Not sure about the chemistry between the three (I'm still always a bit wary of all-star-casts, because big names occasionally translates to me-me! acting. But I'm optimistic, especially with the inclusion of DDL. Something DDL doesn't get enough credit for is his ability to spark with other actors. When he's onscreen, all anyone wants to watch is him and his dynamic energy, of course, but he's equally brilliant at building an undeniable chemistry with his screen partners, whether it be Madeleine Stowe, Paul Dano, or Leonardo Dicaprio. Even if said screen partner is miserably less effective than DDL (cough last two names) at establishing their own significance with the audience.

So basically, DDL could dance with a hatrack and make it look good. Benicio Del Toro would probably be his usually freaked out, strangely entrancing self, and Gael Garcia Bernal might bring some sexy normalcy to the trio (can't comment on him as much as the other two, since I need to see more work of his.) So all in all, crossing fingers and hoping Scorsese goes for this much more interesting storyline than yet another goddamn Hollywood biopic.

Marion Cotillard as...Kay Corleone?

I simply cannot express how much I loved Marion Cotillard in Nine this year. This is what truly great actresses do, elevate underwritten characters that would have been insipid in the hands of a less capable actress.

Luisa Contini literally does *nothing* but complain throughout the entire goddamn movie, yet Cotillard transforms Luisa's whining into nothing short of angelic martyrdom. Her desperate devotion to a husband whom she alternately hates and worships; her exquisite anguish at being torn between supporting the Guido Show and finding her own self-assertion is continually expressed by little more than a glance or a embrace.

Well, what kind of a role does that sound like, really? Kay Corleone! A tool used by her doting/patronizing husband, an underwritten role which critics called a little more than useless. A role that, as gallantly as Diane Keaton tries to play her, is so annoying we couldn't care less what happened to her. What if Marion Cotillard, with her unmatched empathy and grace, had been there forty years earlier? *Sigh*. Of course, there's the problem of Marion being French, since I always thought the point of Kay being an all-American WASP was to show Michael's conflict between his inescapable Mafia roots and his (failed) attempts to assimilate into the "legitimate" American life.


Nevertheless! If I were any good at graphics I would try to Photoshop Marion Cotillard into a Godfather frame, but as it is, you'll just have to settle for this:



"Oh, Michael. Michael, you are blind. It wasn't a miscarriage. It was an abortion. An abortion, Michael. Just like our marriage is an abortion. Something that's unholy and evil. I didn't want your son, Michael! I wouldn't bring another one of your sons into this world! It was a son, Michael! A son! And I had it killed because this, must all end!"

Can't you TOTALLY see Marion doing that? I can. The look of pain in her large, miraculously expressive eyes, as Marion's hissy French accent trembles with barely contained anger and scorn, something similar, I imagine, to her electrifying interrogation scene in Public Enemies. My, I think that sounds perfect.