Word: campion
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...never been accused of anything more serious than criminal gorgeousness. Her vertiginous pastimes, such as rock climbing, are the ways a game gal spends a Sunday with her jock husband. So Kidman is not Suzanne Maretto; and the actress, now on location in Italy starring in the Jane Campion film of Henry James' Portrait of a Lady, will heatedly explain why. "Everyone says, 'Oh, you are Suzanne, that's how you played the role so well.' Well, no! I'm an actor, and I created that role. My dream was to be in the theater and be a great actress...
That is all changing. The swift success of both Campion's protofeminist film and Nyman's lush, haunting score (more than 1.5 million CDs sold to date) has meant far fewer puffy noses and sour faces. Previously, Nyman was best known for the music he wrote for the idiosyncratic director Peter Greenaway (The Cook The Thief His Wife & Her Lover) and for his own superb 1987 opera, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, based on Oliver Sacks' best-selling book about neurological disorders. On a recent tour of North America with his 10- piece chamber orchestra...
...wrote last year's most memorable and original movie score -- for Jane Campion's The Piano -- was not even nominated for an Academy Award. That says a lot about the Oscars, but it also says something about Michael Nyman, a composer who has never quite received his due. Whether writing for films or turning out concertos, string quartets, ballets and chamber operas, the English critic turned composer is a cult figure on both sides of the Atlantic who yearns for wider acceptance. "I've had to contend with a certain amount of envy and puffy-nosed disapproval," he says...
...these things would be useless if the film did not contain performances to match. Campion's direction is perhaps her greatest achievement in "The Piano." A nearly unrecognizable Holly Hunter is simply amazing as Ada. Despite the fact that she does not utter a word during the movie, Hunter manages to provide a full-bodied portrait of Ada, so that the audience knows what she is thinking and feeling without her having to articulate it. Ada marks Hunter's best work on screen thus far. Keeping up with Hunter is Anna Paquin as Ada's daughter Flora. Paquin brings...
...comet bursting forth in a year in which cinematic greatness has been rare. It showcases a sensual and poetic sensibility which has for the most part been absent in the history of film. In order to do this, the movie takes many risks, and brings them off spectacularly. Jane Campion has fashioned a masterpiece, one woman's private symphony. Let yourself be seduced by the wondrous music of the peerless "Piano...