Just the Ticket #18: You Can't Make This Up
This week on Just the Ticket, we look at two films that use makeup to turn big named stars into famous historical figures, with varying degrees of success.
Meryl Streep becomes former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady, a tragic retrospective of the title figure set in motion by what at first appears to be Alzheimers, but is largely due to her grief at the loss of her husband.
Peppered throughout her grief-filled last days are unmarked flashbacks that show how Thatcher got to where she is (one of which basically amounts to a speech therapist teaching Meryl Streep to not shriek like Julia Child, and few, if any of which are in any kind of followable order to the average Brit-hist layman). The lack of order adds a measure of sympathy between the audience and Streep's Thatcher, who can no more keep track of her memories than we can.
But amid the confusion, copycat characterization, and take-it-or-leave-it "plot," three things manage to leave an impression. The first is the incredible make-up job that turns Streep into Thatcher, and "later" makes her unrecognizable as an elderly, post-PM Thatcher. The other two points of emphasis come as sad but welcome effects of Meryl Streep's acting chops as she comes to fill the role of an elderly Iron Lady struggling with the memory of her late husband: Thatcher's ultimate acceptance of his death and what are depicted as the ironic circumstances of her own death.
The approach to this portrayal of Margaret Thatcher's life may not make the most sense, but to do such amazing work with old age makeup and to have that kind of emotional impact was worth the logical jerkaround.
B-
Clint Eastwood delivers once again, casting Leonardo DiCaprio as J. Edgar, the controversial pioneer and champion of many modern law enforcement procedures and director of a then-budding FBI. Joining DiCaprio is a who's-who of TV's finest, including Jeffry Donovan (Burn Notice) as Robert Kennedy, Josh Lucas (The Firm) as Charles Lindbergh, and cameos by Geoff Pierson (Dexter), Kaitlyn Dever (Justified), and Geoff Stults (The Finder).
J. Edgar mostly centers around the Lindbergh Baby investigation, but covers almost everything from his beginnings as an agent to his death as director of the FBI, including his closest relationships (secretary Helen Gandy, played by Naomi Watts, life partner Clyde Tolson, played by Armie Hammer of The Social Network, and his mother, played by Judi Dench) and his most crowning achievements and damning personal secrets, all presented in a linear fashion as he relays his life story to Agent Smith (Ed Westwick, Gossip Girl).
Unlike The Iron Lady, J. Edgar is easy to follow, consistently engaging, and extremely informative, yet suffers from some less-than-stellar makeup work. On the positive side, Watts' and DiCaprio's old age work is flawless, and DiCaprio becomes unrecognizable behind the face of a more recent Hoover. But the aged Tolson makeup is so prominent on Armie Hammer that his eyes become too sunken, the seams between flesh and latex too obvious.
Another winner for Eastwood.
A
Meryl Streep becomes former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady, a tragic retrospective of the title figure set in motion by what at first appears to be Alzheimers, but is largely due to her grief at the loss of her husband.Peppered throughout her grief-filled last days are unmarked flashbacks that show how Thatcher got to where she is (one of which basically amounts to a speech therapist teaching Meryl Streep to not shriek like Julia Child, and few, if any of which are in any kind of followable order to the average Brit-hist layman). The lack of order adds a measure of sympathy between the audience and Streep's Thatcher, who can no more keep track of her memories than we can.
But amid the confusion, copycat characterization, and take-it-or-leave-it "plot," three things manage to leave an impression. The first is the incredible make-up job that turns Streep into Thatcher, and "later" makes her unrecognizable as an elderly, post-PM Thatcher. The other two points of emphasis come as sad but welcome effects of Meryl Streep's acting chops as she comes to fill the role of an elderly Iron Lady struggling with the memory of her late husband: Thatcher's ultimate acceptance of his death and what are depicted as the ironic circumstances of her own death.
The approach to this portrayal of Margaret Thatcher's life may not make the most sense, but to do such amazing work with old age makeup and to have that kind of emotional impact was worth the logical jerkaround.
B-
Clint Eastwood delivers once again, casting Leonardo DiCaprio as J. Edgar, the controversial pioneer and champion of many modern law enforcement procedures and director of a then-budding FBI. Joining DiCaprio is a who's-who of TV's finest, including Jeffry Donovan (Burn Notice) as Robert Kennedy, Josh Lucas (The Firm) as Charles Lindbergh, and cameos by Geoff Pierson (Dexter), Kaitlyn Dever (Justified), and Geoff Stults (The Finder).J. Edgar mostly centers around the Lindbergh Baby investigation, but covers almost everything from his beginnings as an agent to his death as director of the FBI, including his closest relationships (secretary Helen Gandy, played by Naomi Watts, life partner Clyde Tolson, played by Armie Hammer of The Social Network, and his mother, played by Judi Dench) and his most crowning achievements and damning personal secrets, all presented in a linear fashion as he relays his life story to Agent Smith (Ed Westwick, Gossip Girl).
Unlike The Iron Lady, J. Edgar is easy to follow, consistently engaging, and extremely informative, yet suffers from some less-than-stellar makeup work. On the positive side, Watts' and DiCaprio's old age work is flawless, and DiCaprio becomes unrecognizable behind the face of a more recent Hoover. But the aged Tolson makeup is so prominent on Armie Hammer that his eyes become too sunken, the seams between flesh and latex too obvious.
Another winner for Eastwood.
A
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