Oscars 2012: Best Dressed.

It was the safest year we've ever had on the red carpet. This means that:
a) There's little to make fun of and even less to give us nightmares (something that very well describes the utter forgettability of the whole event)
b) There is just one look that will go down on the fashion books (guess which one...)
c) Meryl Streep is featured among the best dressed for the second time! You'll be in shock when you see how high she ranked!

10) Natalie Portman
Since last year she denied us moments of amazing fashion (damn you baby bump!) she tried hard to make up for it this year in a series of looks that highlight her loveliness. This vintage Dior gown features polka dots, yes polka dots, and even if you would've assumed they only worked in relaxed episodes of Mad Men, Portman made the look acquire a certain je ne sai quoi. The hair is a bit of a letdown, but she looks so jovial and fresh...

9. Michelle Williams

It was about time MiWi wore something that made it seem she was having fun and enjoying herself. The girlieness in this Louis Vuitton is undeniable and the way she accessorized it (the little bow!) is absolutely adorable. This is the first time I've ever been in love with one of her looks.

8. Emma Stone

Yes, we all know this Giambattista Valli is essentially Nicole Kidman's Balenciaga froma  few years ago. The difference is in the style of the woman who wears it. With Nicole, the dress made a statement; it seemed to be saying "I am a gift to humanity" and neither of us could prove it wrong, which is why the dress gained a certain arrogance (very much like Jolie and her leg this year). 

As worn by Emma, the giant bow expresses her exciting youthfulness and her eager desire to be liked. The flow of the gown is remarkable and Emma's grin brings it something that Nicole's icy demeanor never achieved.

7. Rose Byrne

She's sexy and she knows it, that's why she went for a simple Vivienne Westwodd sequined sheath that screamed disco queen meets dominatrix. 

6. Stacy Kiebler
She may not be a celebrity but boy was she perfect on the red carpet. This Marchesa is one of the most beautiful I've ever seen. The structure is perfect, the color is bold and demands everyone's attention. Clooney lost Best Actor but he sure had his own little golden statue to take home.

5. Penélope Cruz

Everyone seems to have a strong opinion on Pé's new hairstyle. I think the length is perfect and even if it gives her a slight severity it still brings out the Grace Kelly-ness in her. Something highlighted even more by this gorgeous sky-blue Armani Privé which follows Pé's own kind of red carpet trend but feels utterly refreshing in spite of its classic-ness.

4. Jessics Chastain

Do you remember when Beyoncé wore an awful House of Dereon black and gold dress to the Oscars that made her look like a huge Chinese lantern? Do you remember when a few years later Halle Berry showed Ms. Knowles how to do black and gold? Well, Jessica Chastain now occupies the title of best black.and-gold wearer of all time, in this majestic Alexander McQueen that culminates Chastain's impeccable red carpet season with what might become her most iconic look. She is picture perfect and too flawless for words.

3. Rooney Mara
Bangs? Check.

Intense red lipstick? Check.
Givenchy structured dress? Check.

Mara was another newbie princess bringing it all together with a flawless Oscar look. 

The dress' texture made it look like she was surrounded by clouds. Perfection!

2. Meryl Streep
Upon first looking at Meryl's liquid gold Lanvin, one would've thought she was dressed like an Oscar because she knew she'd go home empty handed. As the night progressed, the color gave the Queen of Actors a certain glow that made her look holier than ever.

Then, she won and Meryl achieved a new power, that of prophecy given how beautifully her newest statuette looked against her dress. This is the best Streep has ever looked at any awards ceremony. Well done! Posterity will be thankful.

1. Gwyneth Paltrow
On a night that was all about nostalgia and old Hollywood glamour, Gwyneth Paltrow set the bar higher than the rest in this absolutely exquisite Tom Ford dress complete with a Joan Crawford-esque cape. This look is so perfect that not even the cape is mock-able. It gives her a demure consistency that's only surpassed by the simplicity of her makeup, hair and accessories. If she had gone for a tight bun or a high hairdo, she might've been too severe, or too old. The ease with which her pony tail let the dress take over and highlighted her sinfully beautiful bone structure, might just be Gwyneth's most astonishing red carpet look. Some are crediting the dress to the fact that she had first dibs on Ford's ultra secret new collection but come on, how many actresses out there can pull off a cape?
Gwyneth's boldness and refreshingly oxymoronic effortless glamour are what sartorialist dreams are made of!

What were your favorite looks?

I also discussed fashion with the awesome Nathaniel and Kurt over at The Film Experience. So what are you waiting for? Head over there and join the merriment!

Golden Globes Style.

I know y'all love Angelina and stuff but sometimes she looks extremely constipated. I'm loving that she's pulling the big guns for the Globes though (remember last year's emerald work of art?). This year she's back in Atelier Versace, wearing a luscious ivory dress with a curious red fold. It reminded me a bit of Cameron Diaz's napkin dress from the Oscars a few years ago but Jolie makes it seem almost vampiric, no?

Simple Chanel Couture dress + green earrings = perfection. (Remember what I was saying about redheads and green?)

For the 2006 Oscars, Charlize Theron wore one of the ugliest dresses I have ever seen: a mucus-colored contraption that had her carry a huge crazy bow around. Apparently she got in touch with the people at Dior and begged them to fix that previous sartorial sin. The result is this perfect pink confection. The bow is still there but the way she pulls it off this time screamed "movie star" like no one in the ceremony.

Jessica Biel's mind: I wanna so be like Florence Welch when I grow up! Especially cause sometimes I think I'm a machine and all.

People outside Jessica Biel's mind: are you trying on Victorian wedding dresses for your future nuptials?

Va-va-voom Viola! Seeing her sport this burgundy Emilio Pucci creation after looking like crap in The Help says: good acting!

Jessica Chastain had been flawless in all her red carpet appearances until the time came for her to actually attend big award shows. She was Pepto-Bismol embodied at the Critics Choice Awards and this time, even if she looks much better in Givenchy, there is something that still feels wrong. The dress is lovely in a Marilyn Monroe-meets-Joan Collins way but the hair makes her look like an extra from Nashville.

Oh you goddess of all that's avant garde and amazing...this Haider Ackermann pale blue dress-suit might be one your best looks EVER and you always look astonishing! 

Foregoing her usual Calvin klein fetish in favor of this demure J. Mendel worked wonders for Claire Danes. She certainly keeps it very simple and safe most of the time but this was slightly more playful, despite the simplicity of the black and white.

Am I alone in thinking that Michelle Williams totally looked like Grimace?

It's lovely to see Kate doing something other than dominatrix meets Metropolis looks, so we'll let this slightly boring Jenny Packham go by without any fanfare.

Natalie Portman seems to have been doing an audition for Marilyn Monroe, yet somehow this Lanvin does wonders for her. I loved her all throughout last season and bless her baby and all, but pregnant women rarely get to make the most out of couture, so it's lovely to have her finally showing off what she can do when she dresses up minus baby bump.

This custom made dual tone Lanvin makes Emma Stone look positively diabolical and extremely sexy. Who knows what the hell that eagle's doing below her boobs, those smoky eyes have long hypnotized you before you get to question her.

Marchesa dresses are showy enough without the crazy-ass Lea Michele turning them into sideshow attractions. it would've been lovely to see this in someone less craving for attention, perhaps it would've made more sense (the liquid skirt is still to die for though)

Even if Rooney Mara has made us all get used to her love of black and white, this is quite an unexpected turn by Nina Ricci. The dominatrix meets old time screen siren dress is absolutely astonishing. The top recalls January Jones' Versace look from last year's ceremony but Rooney makes it all her own by toning the sexuality down, in the same way that January turned it up. The simple makeup and the - gasp - severe ponytail, were magical.

Diane Lane in Reem Acra is how all movie stars should look.

Octavia Spencer was lovely in this pale lavender Tadashi Shoji design. The slight folds made her curvaceous body achieve new levels of sexiness. The clutch, ring and smile were the perfect compliments.

I've said it once and I'll say it again: Sofía Vergara should be Vera Wang's spokeswoman. 

Nicole Kidman has found a new ally in Versace. Their dresses make her absolutely ravishing and sexy. Some designers highlight her beauty and if this had been Chanel for example, she would've been more "ivory tower" than milky lusciousness. 

Madonna isn't only perfect for having Andrea Riseborough (in Vivienne Westwood) as her date, she also rocks for making this Reem Acra dress look so fierce. The shiny top screams Joan of Arc, while the bottom alludes to Madge's love of the adventurous. The look, complete with crucifix and fingerless gloves seem to pay tribute to her legendary career and as her Globe win showed us, she is ready to give us much more.

Who of these ladies impressed you the most?

Short Takes: "The Other Woman", "Kaboom".

Will someone please tell Gregg Araki that he's no David Lynch? Despite his florid use of intense white lights for scene transitions, psychosexual explorations and use of actors with animal masks, Araki lacks the conviction of Lynch to deliver stories about chaos within the quotidian. Take this for example, in Kaboom, Dekker plays Smith, a sexually "undeclared" film student who lusts after his surfer roommate (Zylka) while having an affair with ferocious British import London (the truly and utterly fantastic Temple). One night after consuming hallucinogenic cookies, Smith accidentally realizes there's more than meets the eye at his campus and soon finds himself part of a dangerous game involving masked cult members and apocalypse worshipers.

Araki fails to make his film's plight something worthy of our attention and the more he deviates into selfindulgent moments where he uses witchcraft and sci-fi, the less we are thrilled by his film. What Araki gets right is the extreme horniness and carelessness of college students: the irresponsible way in which they engage in affair to affair as if life was merely comprised of hookups and partying. He also aces the relationship between Smith and his best friend (Bennett) even if Dekker is too passive an actor to inspire more sympathy towards his character.

Best in show? Temple, whose fierce London asks "would you like to have sex?" seconds after meeting you. The fact that you wouldn't think of saying no to her is what the whole movie should've felt like.

Natalie Portman is a truly hit-and-miss actress. Send her to a great director and she blossoms onscreen (Black Swan, Closer), place her under the tutelage of a more divisive filmmaker and all bets are off.

While Don Roos has proven himself to be one of the most clever makers of "movies for grownups" (see the underrated Bounce and Happy Endings) Portman lacks the presence to play The Other Woman her baby face and whining come off as annoying more often than not as she plays a second wife, trying to get her stepson (Tahan) to like her. The film's languid pace doesn't help to convince us that any of these characters even want their lives to be onscreen.

Grades

Kaboom **½

The Other Woman *½

Thor ***

Director: Kenneth Branagh

Cast: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman

Stellan Skarsgård, Tom Hiddleston, Kat Dennings, Idris Elba

Renee Russo, Anthony Hopkins,

Superhero movies can be divided into three main kinds: the obnoxiously preachy ones (Watchmen, The Dark Knight), the blissfully entertaining and therefore more memorable ones (Spider-Man 2, X2: X-Men United) and the Daredevil ones (i.e. the worst kind).
Directed with unusual glee and un-selfconscious gravitas by Kenneth Branagh, Thor falls into the second category. Breakthrough star Chris Hemsworth plays Thor, son of the Nordic god Odin (Hopkins) who has maintained peace in the world for millennia. When Thor is about to succeed his father as king of the realm of Asgard (imagine a Pink Floyd album cover turned into an 80s amusement park) they are suddenly attacked by their dormant enemies: the Frost Giants.
After the crisis is averted, Thor, encouraged by his sneaky brother Loki (Hiddleston) goes against his father’s wishes and attacks the Giants’ kingdom: Jotunheim. After learning of his son’s disobedience, Odin has no choice but to strip him of his godly gifts, exile him from Asgard and send him to a place so hideous that he’d spend the rest of eternity trying to ascend back to the heavens: Thor lands in New Mexico.
Lucky for him, his father out of some Shakespearean whim (can’t have Branagh without the Bard) also throws Thor’s mythical hammer Mjolnir to Earth, in the hopes that, sooner than later, his son will regain its power. Thor is discovered by scientist Jane Foster (the absolutely ravishing Portman) and her colleagues Erik Selvig (Skarsgård) and Darcy (a scene stealing Dennings) as they study wormholes and strange storms in the desert.
Like an alien version of Tarzan, Jane has to teach Thor about the ways of the world but in the meantime, watching Hemsworth in all of his brutish glory is a true spectacle. He enters pet shops demanding horses, calls New Mexico a realm and kisses the hands of the delighted ladies. Darcy’s comments about Thor’s undeniable hotness are hilarious (Dennings’ dead pan delivery is comedic wonder) and soon enough Jane has developed a crush on this man from the stars who might just prove her scientific theories right.
The film tries to stress this out a bit too much (people from different worlds learning from each other) without ever realizing that the more it points us to this, the more we’ll question the film’s motives and discrepancies. How many different gods from how many different cultures coexist for example? Or is the film choosing Nordic mythology as the one?
This is why the movie works best when it’s simple fun. The action sequences are done with just the right amount of kitsch (a 50’s inspired robot attacks a small town!) and the characters are interesting enough without being overdone (Hiddleston’s slimy Loki is the right mix of angst and silly comic book evil). Branagh shines in scenes where he gets to make the actors truly act: Hopkins’ Odin is King Lear minus the actual tragedy and the director is kind enough to give comic book enthusiasts a peek at upcoming projects as well as filling the movie with references only some of them will get.
Interestingly enough, with all of its fun and seeming silliness, the film also works as a fascinating study of gender dynamics and homoerotic identification. There is one particular scene in which Thor, who seems ignorant about the attractiveness of his physique, takes his short off revealing a perfectly chiseled torso. Branagh lingers in this moment more than any heterosexual filmmaker would dare to (directors like Nolan for example prefer showing the ugliness of masculinity) and then cuts to reactions of Jane and Darcy who literally open their mouths in disbelief.
However in doing so, Branagh also forces audiences (heterosexual males included) to embrace the beauty of another male body and heck, even admire and envy it.
When the year comes to an end, this will still remain one of the most talked about scenes of the year and if Branagh manages to make strictly heterosexual and even homophobic audiences talk about Hemsworth with the same spark Jane Foster does in the movie, he’ll have achieved something slightly divine.

She's After Me!

"After Beth, do you need another controversy?"

- Nina (Natalie Portman) to Thomas (Vincent Cassel) in Black Swan.

Remember Sarah Lane? The lady who keeps messing with Natalie Portman's "dancing" in Black Swan?

Well, she's back! Not satisfied with Darren Aronofsky's recount of the dance shots Portman did (he said 111/128) Lane had the film's editor, Andy Weisblum, do another count of long shot scenes in which you see Nina's full body, not just Portman's gorgeous face.

Weisblum confirms that in fact out of those full body shots, almost 70% are Sarah, but wait, why is she doing this again?

According her she doesn't want "the fame, the recognition or anything" yet she keeps on making a big deal and blabbing on and on about her important part in the role to whoever lends an ear. the truth is that anyone in their right mind knows that Portman didn't become a ballerina in less than two years, it's just impossible! Even if out there, there might be a potential movie from the makers of The Blind Side that might try to prove me wrong.

Lane was interviewed by ABC News where she went on and on and on and on and on... (read full interview here)

The one thing that remains clear to me about this whole thing is that,

I also have been thinking what would happen if ALL people who inspire characters, went on to seek recognition for their influence and the ungratefulness of the actors?

Oh Meryl Streep, you'd be in deep shit...

Holocaust Survivors would demand she endured Auschwitz before making Sophie's Choice.

Catholic school survivors would send her to a convent before she even dared take on her role in Proof.

She'd have to be Anna Wintour's intern before taking on The Devil Wears Prada.

She'd have to be exposed to radioactivity for Silkwood, have an affair with a photographer for Bridges of Madison County and well, die for Death Becomes Her.

Isn't it ridiculous that some people have forgotten that actors, act? I'm buying Portman as a psycho ballerina and if not even the documentary in the Blu-ray lessened the impact of her performance, this lady keeps losing her time...

Got any more examples of actors that would have to redo their filmography to please Ms. Lane?

Perfect way to end my bday.

Disclaimer.

Natalie Portman only does 10% of this website.

Now proceed with your day.

(My) Best of 2010: Picture.

10. Somewhere

Like Lost in Translation before it, Somewhere is a non-story that evokes beautiful nostalgia. Once again set in the world of Hollywood (stick to what you know, right?) Sofia Coppola delivers a delicate portrait of a movie star (Stephen Dorff) and his down to earth relationship with his young daughter (Elle Fanning).

Dialogs are limited, "actions" are sparse and yet, coming out of it, you can't help but feel that the world has been shown to you for the first time. Coppola's ability to find beauty in the quotidian has made her a true master.

9. Undertow

The year's best love story (sorry Never Let Me Go), had fishermen, photographers and ghosts. As delivered by Javier Fuentes León though, the film is able to avoid extreme quirkiness and/or melodrama, instead becoming a remarkable exercise of how to transport Latin American magical realism, into seamless visual narrative.
Manolo Cardona and Cristian Mercado will break your heart as the star crossed lovers, who must cope with denial, secrecy and death.

Kudos for being a love story between men that doesn't scream "gay movie". Love after all should transcend sexual orientation.

8. The Ghost Writer

Done with gleeful mischief by Roman Polanski, this was the year's most entertaining political thriller. Its layers and secrets more fun, not because of their real life parallels (Tony Blair mostly) but because they transport us to a time and place where movies could be entertaining and smart.

Ewan McGregor and a remarkable Pierce Brosnan take their game to splendid levels but it's Olivia Williams' role, straight out of The Manchurian Candidate, that gives this film its final laugh.

7. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

Icy, distant and furiously feminist, this adaptation of Stieg Larsson's novel was a stunning throwback to suspense thrillers at their best. Noomi Rapace gives an iconic performance as goth hacker Lisbeth Salander but the movie's best asset is its straightforward approach to its genre.

It's not reinventing the wheel but it never pretends to, instead it throws us sepia flashbacks, newspapers clippings and gasp worthy moments, with full understanding that it's main purpose is to entertain and seduce its audience. Action flicks are rarely this sincere.

6. I Am Love

If Luchino Visconti and Sergei Eisenstein had a baby, it would be I Am Love. Luca Guadagnino's epic work is a breathtakingly beautiful portrait of a collapsing world.

Tilda Swinton plays a Russian immigrant married to an Italian heir. The way in which love falls with violent aplomb onto their lives makes for a subtle political statement that leads us to ask questions cinema hasn't made us since the 1960s.

Is capitalism a force that opposes love? Can personal history be adapted in lieu of social class upgrades? Is there anything Tilda Swinton can't do?

5. Carlos

Olivier Assayas and Edgar Ramírez deliver one of the few biopics that can be called complete. This encompassing study of Carlos "The Jackal" forgoes ridiculous mentions of childhood traumas, facile Freudian diagnosis or unnecessary romanticism to tell the story of the world's most notorious terrorist. Assayas himself begins the film with a disclaimer saying that parts of the film are complete fiction, yet his assured direction and Ramírez's star making performance make us disbelief this. If this isn't the real Jackal, they could've fooled us.

4. Toy Story 3

People who attribute the success of this installment to nostalgia for the first two chapters, might run into a dead end when they bump into my Toy Story experience.

I'm most definitely not a fan of the first two and never held any high regards for Woody, Buzz or company. However nothing prepared me for the emotional punch of this film.

Who would've thought that Ingmar Bergman's explorations of mortality would live, not through Eastern European art cinema, but through computer animated toys?

3. Dogtooth

One of the year's funniest comedies and also one of the best horror films, Yorgos Lanthimos' Dogtooth is a remarkable work of originality that thrives in spite of its tendency to push the level with every minute of its running time.

A morality play, a modern interpretation of Plato, a sexual comedy and much more, this film roots its perverse power in the best and worst of human nature; in our need to protect the ones we love and the fear of never living up to satisfy the universe that created us.

2. The Social Network

The Facebook movie proved to be much more than what anyone expected and delivered the thrills in more than one way.

As a comedy, it recalls some of the bitterest satires put on the stage. As a drama, it's a heartbreaking story of how money and power are never enough when it comes to eradicating loneliness. As a court movie, it's an exemplary work of how to push genres into fresh directions, as auteur work it's an unmistakable masterpiece made only better by David Fincher's ability to turn a great screenplay into an intimate, personal work.

Jesse Eisenberg delivered the best male performance of the year as Mark Zuckerberg and the film's stunt casting made a case for how its characters' values are the sad faces of an entire generation. Those who have compared it to Citizen Kane, are not using hyperbole.

1. Black Swan

In Black Swan, Darren Aronofsky explores the nature of creation while exploiting his very own creative sense. He creates an imperfect world within our own, where high camp, terror, psychological drama and insanity coexist with such balance that they make us wonder about the elements that conform our existence.

Natalie Portman gives the year's greatest performance as ballerina Nina Sayers: a fragile beauty trying to find perfection within chaos. Like the actual black swans, which remained a myth until they were discovered by explorers a few centuries ago, she undergoes a Kafka-esque process in which she discovers that she's becoming that which she once feared and thought impossible.

Her quest for perfection mirrors the film's own search for artistic sublimity, yet as an organism, the film seems to "learn" just in time that in order to achieve perfection, it must compromise with itself.

As Nina surrenders to insanity worthy of the most tragic Catholic saint, the movie takes an alternate path and observes Nina's quest, while it develops its own route. There's a moment in the film, where it stops being Nina (after following her path through most of the running time) and decides that perfection is perhaps too much to aim for.

That the film ends up being perfect in its own sense, makes for an interesting dichotomy between artistic expectations and actual aesthetic realities.

Black Swan was a reminder of why people go to the movies: to be transported to different worlds, to know people they could never meet in real life, to see the world from a different perspective, to bask in the face of the incomprehensible and metaphysical, and sometimes to be shaken to our core so all we are left to say is just "what the fuck?".

(My) Best of 2010: Actress.

5. Hilda Péter in Katalin Varga

Some of 2010's greatest female performances had actresses playing heroines of archetypal myths, fairy tales and urban legends (off the top of my head, Jennifer Lawrence in Winter's Bone, Paprika Steen in Applaus and my number one choice come to mind...)

Few played them with the authority and command of Hilda Péter; playing the title role she's the embodiment of motherhood at its most primal.

In the film, Katalin is vanished from her village, after her husband discovers their child was fathered by another man. Instead of begging for forgiveness, Katalin decides to leave with a mission: to kill the man who raped her years before.

The directorial debut of Peter Strickland bursts with natural beauty (Terrence Malick must've influenced him) and an Eastern European, ominous dread worthy of Lars von Trier. Péter shines in all of her scenes, giving a performance so committed and steady that you never catch her trying. Katalin acts as if commanded by the gods but we know Péter is the driving force behind.

4. Noomi Rapace in The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

Modern legend has it, that when Stieg Larsson was writing The Millennium Trilogy, he had originally centered it on journalist Mikael Blomkvist. The character of goth hacker Lisbeth Salander was just a peripheral creation.

Then he realized that Lisbeth was getting out of his hands and overtaking his original intentions. When the books were adapted into films, Lisbeth continued her bewitching effect over popular culture as the beautiful Noomi Rapace took on the role.

Making Lisbeth's introverted nature and her violent demeanor, all her own, Rapace delivered an action heroine that had us rooting for her unconventional methods, even when we could detect a morbid sense of evil delight in her deceiving, crooked smile. Because we don't know whether to love or fear her, Lisbeth Salander gets under your skin.

Rapace's "best" performance might not be in the first movie but without her iconic work in the first installment we wouldn't be curious about the rest of the series.

Perhaps in the very same way that Larsson found himself typing her name compulsively page after page.

3. Tilda Swinton in I Am Love

Like some of the greatest screen icons, Tilda Swinton has the ability to take violent hold of the screen and command our eyes towards her, just as she can blend herself in the background with distressing effortlessness.

In Luca Guadagnino's operatic I Am Love, she does the latter, turning in a beautifully quiet performance as Emma Recchi.

We learn that she's a Russian immigrant who married an Italian heir, but other than that her character flowers in front of our eyes with each passing scene. As usual Swinton impresses; her Russian accent over her mastery of Italian is unique to say the least, but the beauty of Emma is how she allows us to watch her being seduced (by food, by the senses, by idealism, by a younger man...) without the self-consciousness that comes whenever "sinful" or forbidden behavior is portrayed onscreen.

If you thought you'd seen Tilda do it all, think again. She makes eating a meal seem like a master course in acting.

2. Nicole Kidman in Rabbit Hole

Becca is a truly damaged soul who lost all the will to live after the death of her only child. However she doesn't opt for an easy path of destruction, instead she lives her life as penance for not having been there, for not having seen...

Yet seen through the eyes of Nicole Kidman, her tragic character reaches an unexpected amount of humanity and soul.

Watching the actress take control of this controlling character, is watching something that resembles supernatural possession. Kidman breathes each of Becca's breath. She lives her pain and delivers a uniquely crushing portrayal of self pity and eventual enlightenment.

When Becca achieves catharsis, she does it in the most unexpected of places and under the strangest circumstances, with Kidman acting as her very own exorcist.

1. Natalie Portman in Black Swan

The first time I watched Black Swan I hated it. Its crescendo of ballet, histrionics and horror seemed like a parody in the making. One thing blew my mind off though, and that was Natalie Portman.

Her performance is unlike anything she's ever done before and not because she plays an insane person but because it's the first time where she completely surrenders to the power of her creation.

In the past, whenever she attempted to play "dark", you could see her acting, she's an actress who has trouble hiding discomfort and it usually gets the bes of her. But playing ballerina Nina Sayers in Darren Aronofsky's masterpiece, she tapped on a level of artistry that's both disturbing and inviting.

As Nina goes from mommy's girl to Kafkaesque tragedy, we see that Portman has vanished. How could she not you might say when she's playing a ballerina, who's playing two different characters. Yet the truth is that her performance is effective because it goes beyond technique and mannerisms (bonus points for acting so seamlessly along with the visual effects, something she never achieved in those little space fantasy movies...).

There's one particular scene that lingers long after the credits have rolled and it's the one where Nina realizes what she's done, minutes before her big performance.

Then and there she makes a choice and it's so powerful that even we feel it, for a second Nina stares right into the camera, right into our eyes and she's telling us "I will give you the show of a lifetime, even if it kills me".

As her harsh director in the movie asks her to try harder, the truth is that Natalie has done it all along. The moment the movie begins Rothbart has already put his spell on her, she's been the black swan all along.