SuspendedLikeaMoFo.
09-22-2001, 11:39 PM
Those who haven't seen it probably won't find that funny. Those that have may burst out laughing like I did. Here is an excerpt from Roger Ebert's film review on Meet Joe Black:
"He does not recognize Susan. That's odd. Isn't Death an emissary from God? Shouldn't he know these things? He's been around a long time (one imagines him breaking the bad news to amoebas). This Death doesn't even know what peanut butter tastes like, or how to kiss. A job like that, you want a more experienced man.
No matter. We accept the premise. We're distracted, anyway, by the way Brad Pitt plays the role. As both the young man in the coffee shop and as ``Joe Black'' (the name given him by Parrish), he is intensely aware of himself--too aware. Pitt is a fine actor, but this performance is a miscalculation. Meryl Streep once said that an experienced actor knows that the words ``I love you'' are really a question. Pitt plays them as a compliment to himself. There is no chemistry between Joe Black and Susan because both parties are focused on him.
That at least leads to the novelty of a rare movie love scene where the camera is focused on the man's face, not the woman's. Actresses have become skilled over the years at faking orgasms on camera, usually with copious cries of delight and sobs of passion. (As they're buffeted by their competent male lovers, I am sometimes reminded of a teenager making the cheerleader team, crossed with a new war widow.) A male actor would have to be very brave to reveal such loss of control, and Pitt's does not cry out. His orgasm plays in slow motion across his face like a person who is thinking, this is way better than peanut butter."
=)
"He does not recognize Susan. That's odd. Isn't Death an emissary from God? Shouldn't he know these things? He's been around a long time (one imagines him breaking the bad news to amoebas). This Death doesn't even know what peanut butter tastes like, or how to kiss. A job like that, you want a more experienced man.
No matter. We accept the premise. We're distracted, anyway, by the way Brad Pitt plays the role. As both the young man in the coffee shop and as ``Joe Black'' (the name given him by Parrish), he is intensely aware of himself--too aware. Pitt is a fine actor, but this performance is a miscalculation. Meryl Streep once said that an experienced actor knows that the words ``I love you'' are really a question. Pitt plays them as a compliment to himself. There is no chemistry between Joe Black and Susan because both parties are focused on him.
That at least leads to the novelty of a rare movie love scene where the camera is focused on the man's face, not the woman's. Actresses have become skilled over the years at faking orgasms on camera, usually with copious cries of delight and sobs of passion. (As they're buffeted by their competent male lovers, I am sometimes reminded of a teenager making the cheerleader team, crossed with a new war widow.) A male actor would have to be very brave to reveal such loss of control, and Pitt's does not cry out. His orgasm plays in slow motion across his face like a person who is thinking, this is way better than peanut butter."
=)