Word: dopey
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Sarandon's Adele August is running away from nothing very much--a boring small-town life and boyfriend--and she's not running toward much either--a dopey dream that life in Beverly Hills is bound to be more exciting. She is one of those irritating people who cover wrongheadedness with eccentric excess. This is supposed to be charming, but it is merely tiresome. Portman pouts prettily at Adele's all too predictable capers--naturally she forgets to pay the utility bills, misreads her daughter's dreams and that handsome orthodontist's intentions. But you can feel these beats coming...
After a decade of warm-weather box offices defined by mammoth action films, Hollywood is partying in 1999. This is the season of silly--the goofy summer. Also dopey, because the humor is so often about bodily functions. And happy, for the studio bosses pleased not to be sweating out each weekend's take for a Titanic-priced epic that may do Postman-like business...
...computer whizzes had generated something fresh, but it's pretty much shape-shifting and meteorological anomalies as usual. These batter into senselessness the wan efforts, led by Brendan Fraser as the chief tomb robber, to impart a sort of cheeky, Indiana Jonesish air to this hopelessly overwrought and deeply dopey movie...
...thewindow? Fine. Want to direct a period piece likean Aerosmith video? Okay. But must you givetalented lead Cate Blanchett such an atrociousscreenplay to work from? Must you so steadfastlyrefuse to permit your title character theslightest bit of development until the last reel?Kapur's film may have conned enough dopey Academymembers to secure it a nomination, but inevitablecomparisons to Shakespeare in Love ("thatother Elizabethan film") will destroy Elizabeth'sOscar prospects--and rightly...
...dramatic performance. As in thedirecting category, Benigi's portrayal of therelentlessly mirthful Guido is for the film but bythe same token is necessarily unextraordinary.Bengini is an actor of great comic talent, butthat can only take him so far. The whole point ofLife is Beautiful is that Guido must keephis dopey, funny face on from start to finish inorder to combat the horrors of Nazism. As such,the role ends up being fundamentallyuncomplicated. There is no way that Benigni'sperformance here can compete with the nuanced andcomplex star turns of the other nominees. We mustnote, though, that he did inexplicably take...