I've long loved learning about old Hollywood, but admittedly haven't watched many films from the time in full. But now im amending that and these 2 are just so darn charming it's crazy! Because they starred in movies of the 30s 40s etc their characters can really be such awful fucking guys, (and ones the audience is still supposed to root for somehow) and yet! Everytime I'll still find myself enjoying their performances! I like how rhythm, timing and gesture are so fundamental to their style of acting. It's incredibly fun to watch them use their bodies so purposefully. Such obvious attention to detail/the musicality of movement is completely absent from our naturalism-obsessed age.
(s/o to Willem Defoe for going against this grain! Also to any actors who aren't waspy, and tho also following naturalism, still gesticulate like most people actually do irl lol)
Itâs rare for men to have je ne sais quoi, and I am obsessive about the ones who I think do. The depraved, roguish charm of Serge Gainsbourg has fascinated me for as long as I can remember, and so has Rod Serlingâs ability to careen between sinister and comforting. I already regret saying this in a public forum, but when I interviewed Larry Gagosian, I detected a lot of that nameless quality in himâprobably from his ability to self-efface freely with a fox-in-the-henhouse twinkle in his eye. Most recently, Iâve become completely enraptured by Gene Wilderâs peculiar energy, which ping-pongs irrationally between mellow yellow to tempestuous. The âPuttinâ On The Ritzâ scene in Young Frankenstein makes my heart swellâimagine that man, with those watery, cornflower blue eyes, describing you as âWhat was once an inarticulate mass of lifeless tissues, [who is now] a cultured, sophisticated, man about townâ...?
ok to be honest he is in a lot of bad movies including like literal war propaganda but this guyâs vibe always brings me immense joy often to the point of tears. and anything in technicolor is worth watching imo. best movies of his are An American in Paris and Singin in the Rain. oh and The Young Girls of Rochefort heâs just like a cameo but itâs a great one