Word: babel
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Rinko Kikuchi's breakthrough performance as Chieko, a deaf-mute teenager in Alejandro González Iñárritu's Babel, was so convincing that co-star Cate Blanchett at first assumed the 26-year-old Japanese actress really couldn't speak. It's the kind of talent that has propelled Kikuchi from obscurity to an Oscar nomination-the first for a Japanese actress in 49 years. Kikuchi talks to Time's Michiko Toyama about Babel, isolation and her newfound fame...
...Babel features the first nude scene of your career. How did you cope with it? The scene is one where Chieko is seeking something fundamental. It's not that she is looking for sex, but that sex is the only means she has to keep the guy, and she can't help doing it. Chieko had no other way of communication, and I felt her despair. I knew from the beginning that there was going to be such a scene, but the nudity was handled so beautifully that I wasn't concerned and tried to be professional...
...think you'll win? I don't know. I'm just having a ball. It's like it was with my audition [for Babel]. Whatever the outcome, the process itself never fails to amaze me. It's amazing that I'm even nominated and I'm very grateful. Here I am, an unknown Japanese actress who arrives in Hollywood and is warmly accepted and celebrated...
Bienvenido! Willkommen! Irashaimase! No, that’s not some lame kabuki version of “Cabaret,” and it’s not the opening lines to “Babel 2,” either. It’s a trio of exclamations from the languages of some of the best movies at the 79th annual Academy Awards, a motley group of international films that have largely blown the English-language competition out of the water. Why the Spanish? “Pan’s Labyrinth,” Guillermo del Toro?...
...TIME: What made you audition for Babel and how did you win the role out of 1,000 other aspirants...