Playing an embittered, curdled loser the
actor looks as vital and exciting as he did
in his pomp, writes Xan Brooks
The Venice film festival clearly believes that nothing succeeds like an excess of Al Pacino. In the course of one hectic 14-hour period, guests took their seats for two new films featuring the 74-year-old actor, a veritable banquet of volcanic brooding and rasping, actorly monologues. The first of these, The Humbling, provided a paunchy, punch-drunk adaptation of the Philip Roth novel. But the second, Manglehorn, showcased the finest performance Pacino has delivered in years.
Directed by the talented David Gordon Green, Manglehorn is a beguiling, minor-key study of the lion in winter, mane gone grey, claws all blunted. Pacino is Angelo Manglehorn, a one-time roustabout who ekes out a living as a locksmith in Texas. Green’s symbolism is neat, if a trifle heavy-handed. Manglehorn has no trouble rescuing a small boy trapped inside the family car, but can’t unlock his own damaged heart. “I got nothing but frustration and disappointment,” he growls, peering out at the town over wire-rim specs.
The film takes this sorry specimen and tosses him outdoors at intervals, where he pays weekly visits to the bank and fleetingly rubs shoulders with a garrulous hustler (played, appropriately enough, by Harmony Korine, erstwhile enfant terrible of American cinema). For the most part, however, Manglehorn is alone in the world, like one of those solitary figures in an Edward Hopper painting.
He asks for nothing and is seemingly content to give nothing in return. One senses that even the director is content to keep his distance from Manglehorn. Green allows the character abundant space to breathe and develop, perhaps half-fearing the locksmith might erupt if the film draws too close.
He frames his story with elliptical fadeouts and stylised, slow-motion reveries inside late-night diners or amusement arcades. In the movie’s operatic centrepiece, we watch as Pacino wanders up the highway and past a multiple pile-up of vehicles, a cargo of water melons smashed to a bloody pulp on the road. When Jean-Luc Godard shot a similar scene in his 1967 film Weekend, we were encouraged to view it as a sign of global apocalypse. But Manglehorn doesn’t care; his thoughts are elsewhere. He walks by the horror without missing a beat.
Are we meant to regard him as a noble hermit? Perish the thought. Manglehorn’s isolation turns out to be entirely of his own making. Beneath his thin veneer of charm, the locksmith is grouchy and curdled, a man who lies to himself as much as to those around him. He dotes on his pet cat to avoid showing love to his son, and mourns a bygone romance as a means of safeguarding against any future relationship.
Coaxed out on a date by Dawn, the bank teller (Holly Hunter, effective as ever), Manglehorn proceeds to regale her with a lengthy, lachrymose story about the one that got away, the one woman he will never forget.
When Dawn brightly requests that they change the subject, he draws a deep breath and gazes down at his plate. He says: “Whenever I eat beets, they always give me diarrhoea.”
Pacino’s Manglehorn is a subtle master class in neutral shading, with none of the garish flashes that sometimes bedevil his work. The actor’s natural tendency is to hit for the fences and crank up the volume, often magnificently (Dog Day Afternoon), occasionally not (The Scent of a Woman).
But Manglehorn provides him with a grand late renaissance, a fresh string to his bow. It takes the splenetic livewire of American film and installs him as condemned human property, boarded up and fenced off. The irony is that, by playing this wreck, Pacino looks as vital and exciting as he did in his pomp. Guardian News & Media
Mary-Kate Olsen a horse jockey now?
Actress-fashion designer Mary-Kate Olsen certainly likes to experiment when it comes to her career. She now seems to be attracted to horse riding as she was seen competing in the Hampton Classic Horse Show. The 28-year-old hit Bridgehampton recently for the Hampton Classic. Olsen suited up in a pair of riding khakis, boots, a navy blue blazer, and an equestrian helmet, reports usmagazine.com.
She competed with a horse named Swagger, and another named Uniek. At last year’s Hampton Classic, a horse she owned, Marvelous, competed and won first place. This isn’t the first time that Olsen has hinted at her horseback-riding skills. In her 2001 movie Winning London, Olsen played a high school student named Chloe, who shows off her riding talents in a game of polo. — IANS
At 17, Chloe Grace Moretz fights for roles
If I Stay actress Chloe Grace Moretz says she still struggles to land movie roles as she battles against ‘ageism’ in the film industry. The 17-year-old actress has starred in a string of box office hits, including Kick-Ass and Let Me In, but she admits she still has to work incredibly hard for role. “I’m still fighting hard for every role I get. I’m still fighting the boundary of how old or young I can be, or how they want me to be something I’m not,” contactmusic.com quoted her as saying.
“You are always having this struggle, especially as a female actor against the higher powers trying to keep you in a spot which makes them feel comfortable. That’s a major thing I’m battling right now,” she added. — IANS
IN THE RACE: Chloe Grace Moretz.
