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Actors and actresses who are just terrible in everything

Started by Phil_A, April 06, 2017, 11:50:37 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

Paaaaul

Quote from: Sal Vicuso on April 06, 2017, 01:15:50 PM
In fairness to him, he does take on some interesting and challenging roles which is more than you could say for your Butlers or Worthingtons
Wouldn't you rather that good actors got those interesting roles rather than a lousy actor who guarantees some bums on seats?

Bhazor

Quote from: Paaaaul on April 06, 2017, 07:26:29 PM
Have you seen Under The Skin?

Thats what I mean. She's a block of wood who just keeps on appearing in great films where she plays a robot or whatever and people go "Oh shes so wooden and alien its genius".

Quote from: Bhazor on April 06, 2017, 08:34:26 PM
Thats what I mean. She's a block of wood who just keeps on appearing in great films where she plays a robot or whatever and people go "Oh shes so wooden and alien its genius".

But there's a great precedent for this kind of performing in cinema, which kind of amounts to 'being able to take direction really well'. Great screen performers like Alain Delon, Greta Garbo and Catherine Deneuve suggest multitudes by virtue of doing very little, being positioned correctly and having features that are inherently compelling and can be made to be suggestive of myriad emotions or thoughts. To give oneself over to a director's vision in that way takes no lack of skill and dedication, so I think Johansson deserves plaudits for her intelligence and her sympathetic understanding of how to fit perfectly into the larger authorial conception of a film.

Sal Vicuso

Quote from: Paaaaul on April 06, 2017, 07:28:24 PM
Wouldn't you rather that good actors got those interesting roles rather than a lousy actor who guarantees some bums on seats?

I guess it shows he's trying to improve, push his boundaries. He could just coast through silly romantic comedies for the rest of his career. Plus the flipside of your argument is that the films and plays he's doing, some of which are fairly niche, have the potential to reach a much wider audience

Serge

Jenna Coleman. Well, I assume she's as bad in anything else she's ever been in as she was in 'Doctor Who', I'm not going to waste my time finding out. But she was so bad in DW, so unutterably fucking dreadful, only Catherine Zeta Jones has come anywhere close to sucking the life out of every scene she's ever been in.

mothman

Edward Woodward. Much as I love Breaker Morant, there's no doubt he couldn't act for toffee. His din has also inherited his lack of ability.

Chuck Norris. Even though the actual B-grade cheesefests that he appears in can be fun (Invasion USA and not a lot else) the man himself could not act his way from under a paper towel. His grizzly demeanour might be suited to firing an uzi, but it can't cover up his lack of screen presence, charisma or sex appeal.

Phil_A

Quote from: mothman on April 07, 2017, 10:39:49 AM
Edward Woodward. Much as I love Breaker Morant, there's no doubt he couldn't act for toffee. His din has also inherited his lack of ability.

Nonsense! He was a fine character actor. I agree about Peter Woodward, though. He's rubbish.

Brundle-Fly

Quote from: Bhazor on April 06, 2017, 08:34:26 PM
Thats what I mean. She's a block of wood who just keeps on appearing in great films where she plays a robot or whatever and people go "Oh shes so wooden and alien its genius".

She is asked to play all these robots and aliens because she does the glacial automaton thing extremely well and sells tickets. That is what is required of her sometimes. If she turned up on the first day on the set of Ghost In The Shell (2017) announcing to the director that she was going to try a different approach with the role and will play Major in the style of a pissed Beryl Reid, the producers would tell her to do one.

She is great in Ghost World (2001)

Dead Soon

Quote from: Brundle-Fly on April 07, 2017, 12:49:04 PMShe is great in Ghost World (2001)

Sorry, pissed my pants at how lifeless she was in that film. Telling Thora Birch to fuck out of her life was delivered with the same emotion as if she was remarking that the milk in her coffee was not that fresh.

Brundle-Fly

Quote from: Dead Soon on April 07, 2017, 01:23:55 PM
Sorry, pissed my pants at how lifeless she was in that film. Telling Thora Birch to fuck out of her life was delivered with the same emotion as if she was remarking that the milk in her coffee was not that fresh.

Which was kind of the point. It is Daniel Clowes. Both characters were emotionally stunted.

pigamus

Quote from: Monsieur Verdoux on April 06, 2017, 01:52:37 PM
Yeah, but....   

nevermind.

Exactly. Same for Scarlett Johansson, Karen Gillan, Jenna Coleman... My brain is unable to do anything with women that beautiful other than register that I would cheerfully drink their piss. Critical faculties? Forget it.

Avril Lavigne

Quote from: Brundle-Fly on April 07, 2017, 12:49:04 PM
She is asked to play all these robots and aliens because she does the glacial automaton thing extremely well and sells tickets. That is what is required of her sometimes. If she turned up on the first day on the set of Ghost In The Shell (2017) announcing to the director that she was going to try a different approach with the role and will play Major in the style of a pissed Beryl Reid, the producers would tell her to do one.

She is great in Ghost World (2001)

She's also great in Her doing much more emotionally varied & nuanced acting just as a disembodied voice. It's probably my favourite thing she's done.

Camp Tramp

Quote from: mothman on April 07, 2017, 10:39:49 AM
Edward Woodward. Much as I love Breaker Morant, there's no doubt he couldn't act for toffee. His din has also inherited his lack of ability.

You can't have seen him in Callan?

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: Serge on April 06, 2017, 10:20:51 PM
Jenna Coleman. Well, I assume she's as bad in anything else she's ever been in as she was in 'Doctor Who', I'm not going to waste my time finding out. But she was so bad in DW, so unutterably fucking dreadful, only Catherine Zeta Jones has come anywhere close to sucking the life out of every scene she's ever been in.

Nah, she's great, I mean her portrayal of an incredibly smug and ridiculously unlikeable teacher in Doctor Who was spot on!

mobias

Quote from: Absorb the anus burn on April 06, 2017, 01:11:33 PM
Jennifer Connelly.


Jennifer Connolly was excellent in Labyrinth. She was one of my first silver screen crushes, she was total eighties teen crush material of the highest order.  Can't say I've ever seen her in anything since, though i know she's been in quite a lot. 

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: mobias on April 07, 2017, 07:17:36 PM
Jennifer Connolly was excellent in Labyrinth. She was one of my first silver screen crushes, she was total eighties teen crush material of the highest order.  Can't say I've ever seen her in anything since, though i know she's been in quite a lot.

She's great in The Hot Spot and Rocketeer as well, but at some point in the nineties it seems she went a bit shit.

remedial_gash

Quote from: Absorb the anus burn on April 06, 2017, 01:11:33 PM
Jennifer Connelly.

She's head and shoulders above everyone else in the school in 'Phenomena' - okay, she is the only one speaking English natively, but it's a semi see-through nightie. You are wrong sir. You are wrong!

Dropshadow

Quote from: Gulftastic on April 06, 2017, 03:28:51 PM
(Re, Vin Diesel) I thought he was quite good in 'Boiler Room'.

I was going to say that.

Quote from: Paaaaul on April 06, 2017, 01:08:17 PM
Martin Freeman is good in The Office, OK in Fargo, but has been poor in every film I've seen him in.

I think he was poor in "Fargo" too.

Quote from: Puce Moment on April 06, 2017, 06:20:04 PM
Mark Wahlberg

"Mr. Mumbles" as I call him. I have great difficulty in hearing what he's saying.

Sydward Lartle

There's a very amusing snippet in Adrian Edmondson's book How to be a Complete Bastard which has a list of 'Totally Bastardish Things to do to Yourself' - and high on the list is 'watch Delta Force on video'.

A couple of years ago (after finding a copy of the aforementioned book in a charity shop for a princely fifty pence), I decided to buy a DVD copy of Delta Force from Ebay and see for myself why that would be such a bastardish thing to do to yourself. I know it's a Cannon film, and that company were not exactly synonymous with quality / restraint / good taste / understatement, but I have enjoyed quite a few of Golan and Globus's productions in the past, and the knowledge that they gave Delta Force a huge Hollywood-style premiere tickled me no end.

Basically, it's a retelling of Raid on Entebbe with a ton of wish-fulfillment thrown in and a heavy dose of brainless slam-bang action thriller pyrotechnics. The first hour isn't bad, in a cheesy, overstated, TV movie on steroids way, and the scenes on the hijacked plane are appropriately tense and claustrophobic. Dear old Lee Marvin is always watchable, as are most of the other character actors and faded stars who turned up to pocket a quick cheque before moving on. Sadly, however, the film detaches itself from reality around the halfway mark and quickly becomes nigh-on unwatchable with the arrival of Chuck Norris and his motorcycle equipped with rocket launchers.

The sad thing is, Delta Force - along with Code of Silence - is actually one of Norris's better films, and if you've seen how utterly boring, uncharismatic and wooden he is in Code of Silence, you'll know that's not really saying a lot, but Christ, both those films are absolute masterpieces compared to the monotonously violent likes of Good Guys Wear Black and A Force of One, not to mention the utterly ridiculous Invasion USA.

Dr Rock

Quote from: mothman on April 07, 2017, 10:39:49 AM
Edward Woodward. Much as I love Breaker Morant, there's no doubt he couldn't act for toffee. His din has also inherited his lack of ability.

Not sure why nobody has said this, but you think he is shit in Wicker Man? Nobody could say 'Jesus Christ!' in the same way he does at the end.

Sydward Lartle

Presenting... the Edward Woodward Album from 1976.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNUmwyvI2_E

It's actually pretty great in a Richard Harris / MacArthur Park kind of way.

Mr_Simnock


maett

The absurdly gorgeous Elaine Tan is really dreadful  in everything I've see her in, and I do try to see everything she's in.
She was particularly appalling in Eastenders as a character called Li Chong, she got that role after stinking up Hollyoaks. The small screen could never contain that amount of suckiness so she's moved into the movies and Hollywood. Last time I saw her was in Inherent Vice, it's clearly not her acting that's landed her roles in Hollywood.

Bronzy

Quote from: Monsieur Verdoux on April 06, 2017, 09:05:15 PM
But there's a great precedent for this kind of performing in cinema, which kind of amounts to 'being able to take direction really well'. Great screen performers like Alain Delon, Greta Garbo and Catherine Deneuve suggest multitudes by virtue of doing very little, being positioned correctly and having features that are inherently compelling and can be made to be suggestive of myriad emotions or thoughts. To give oneself over to a director's vision in that way takes no lack of skill and dedication, so I think Johansson deserves plaudits for her intelligence and her sympathetic understanding of how to fit perfectly into the larger authorial conception of a film.

She's also hot as fuck, which helps.

Super Ape

#55
Quote from: Bhazor on April 06, 2017, 08:34:26 PM
Thats what I mean. She's a block of wood who just keeps on appearing in great films where she plays a robot or whatever and people go "Oh shes so wooden and alien its genius".

This reminded me of something I've always wanted to say about Cumberbatch.

The critic Kenneth Tynan once claimed John Gielgud was Britain's finest actor "from the neck up," and, in a similar vein, whenever I watch Cumberbatch I see a man who's very capable of acting with every part of his body except his eyes. There's a kind of vacancy there, which makes him seem like he's not quite engaging with the camera, the action, or any the other actors. Being mostly known for playing socially incompetent or Aspergic intellectual prodigies, roles where a lack of engaging eye movement would be unsurprising and expected, this weakness obviously works in his favour and means nobody really notices it as a negative thing. But I can't help but notice it as such when he's playing a character who doesn't strictly fall on the spectrum, like Doctor Strange (who's arrogant, highly intelligent, and generally a pain in the ass but there's nothing which suggests his character is meant to have Aspergic or autistic traits).

olliebean

Quote from: Small Man Big Horse on April 06, 2017, 01:27:58 PM
Have you seen Swiss Army Man, Kane? I'd not a huge amount of time for Radcliffe before then but he really impressed me in it.

He plays a corpse in it, doesn't he? In which case it could be argued that the role is a perfect match for his acting talent.

Has anyone mentioned Posehn yet?

Dr Syntax Head

That football cunt. Was in Snatch. Can't remember his stupid name

EDIT Vinnie Jones. Why won't he just fuck off to his Surrey mansion and leave us alone?

Bogbrainedmurphy

Quote from: Sydward Lartle on April 08, 2017, 10:26:35 PM
There's a very amusing snippet in Adrian Edmondson's book How to be a Complete Bastard which has a list of 'Totally Bastardish Things to do to Yourself' - and high on the list is 'watch Delta Force on video'.

A couple of years ago (after finding a copy of the aforementioned book in a charity shop for a princely fifty pence), I decided to buy a DVD copy of Delta Force from Ebay and see for myself why that would be such a bastardish thing to do to yourself. I know it's a Cannon film, and that company were not exactly synonymous with quality / restraint / good taste / understatement, but I have enjoyed quite a few of Golan and Globus's productions in the past, and the knowledge that they gave Delta Force a huge Hollywood-style premiere tickled me no end.

Basically, it's a retelling of Raid on Entebbe with a ton of wish-fulfillment thrown in and a heavy dose of brainless slam-bang action thriller pyrotechnics. The first hour isn't bad, in a cheesy, overstated, TV movie on steroids way, and the scenes on the hijacked plane are appropriately tense and claustrophobic. Dear old Lee Marvin is always watchable, as are most of the other character actors and faded stars who turned up to pocket a quick cheque before moving on. Sadly, however, the film detaches itself from reality around the halfway mark and quickly becomes nigh-on unwatchable with the arrival of Chuck Norris and his motorcycle equipped with rocket launchers.

The sad thing is, Delta Force - along with Code of Silence - is actually one of Norris's better films, and if you've seen how utterly boring, uncharismatic and wooden he is in Code of Silence, you'll know that's not really saying a lot, but Christ, both those films are absolute masterpieces compared to the monotonously violent likes of Good Guys Wear Black and A Force of One, not to mention the utterly ridiculous Invasion USA.

"Sleep tight, sucker"

pigamus

Despite being universally loved, I've always found Julie Walters a bit hammy.