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Thanks for the great Patricia Clarkson video from
"Elegy." She has been one of my favorites, both as an actress and as an
underrated sexpot, for some time now. I wonder if somebody out there has
any video of her from 2005's "The Dying Gaul." Not only does she have a
darkly-lit but clear nude sex scene, but she spends much of the movie
walking around in a wet white bikini. Stills can be found on her page in
the encyclopedia. Thanks
Scoop's response:
Simple enough.
I reviewed the film
some time ago, and I still had the DVD lying around. It's a good movie in
the sense that it is intelligent and slick. It's also depressing.
Clarkson plays a sexy role. I wrote, "What about Patricia Clarkson at
45? Has any woman ever done what she has - becoming a sex symbol after so
many years as the next door neighbor? There are other women who have
played sexy roles at age 45, but they were sexy when they were young -
Sharon Stone, Kim Basinger, Barbara Hershey. Beautiful women are expected
to start out sexy, and then the ones with real talent start to play the
character parts as they age. But Clarkson somehow went from the Eve Arden
roles to the Kim Basinger ones, and Eve Arden is not supposed to turn into
Kim Basinger! Throughout Clarkson's youth she was always the dependable
gal-pal with the sensible shoes and a husky voice which always sounded
best delivering wisecracks and sarcasm and compassionate, well-grounded
advice. Now, she appears in the credits in a white bikini with a
semi-transparent top, stays in that bikini for several minutes of screen
time, and does topless sex scenes. Our Miss Brooks isn't supposed to do
that!
And she is just fine in that role. She looks great in that bikini. Her
tummy is flat and her whole body looks young, slim, and well-exercised.
Her face is not a young woman's face but, hell, she didn't even have a
young woman's face when she was young. It was always one of those faces
with character. Yet her face is beautiful in its way. She looks much
better in moving pictures than in stills because she's pale and
fair-haired and from a distance she seems to have no eyebrows, so we need
to see how she moves her facial muscles to appreciate the humanity which
underlies her beauty. Her eyes are compassionate, and her face is
exceedingly expressive. It's surprising to me that she has never become a
recognizable name. Then again, given her astounding reverse career path,
she may yet make it."
Here are the clips.
(samples below)
Kill Kill Faster Faster
2008
Movies don't get much darker than this story of a wife-killer who is
paroled after seventeen years of prison because a hot-shot film producer
pulls some strings for him. The movie mogul offers the convict an
important job on the outside - creating a screenplay from the play he
wrote about prison life.
Not a good idea.
Although "Joey One-Way" has a conscience and wants to become a better
person, he seems to have violence, heroin addiction, and betrayal
hard-wired into his DNA. Soon after his release he is having an affair
with the wife of the man who vouched for him. Shortly thereafter he is
shooting up some smack. He is obviously headed for a great tragedy of some
kind, but the shocking nature of the denouement may shock and surprise
even jaded viewers.
The film pulls few punches. There are explicit scenes portraying life
in prison, including both forced and consensual sodomy. There are many
explicit sex scenes between Joey One-Way and the producer's wife, although
there is not as much female nudity as one might expect from all their
steamy encounters. There are also hot sex scenes in flashbacks involving
the young wife Joey killed so many years ago in a moment of uncontrolled
passion caused by her infidelity.
Audiences may be extremely surprised to see that the complex lead role
is essayed by Gil Bellows of "Ally Mcbeal," who normally plays likeable,
intelligent, and sensitive characters in light dramas and dramedies. His
portrayal of the parolee is not without sensitivity, but Joey is not a
person you'd care to hang out with, and he has absolutely no moments of
lightness. He carries the weight of his past transgressions with him at
all times.
KKFF is a brutal, bleak film which won some film festival acclaim but
has virtually no chance of a North American theatrical release because of
a certain NC-17 rating. Even if it could be trimmed a bit for a release,
the size of the potential audience would be miniscule, despite the fact
that it is a very effective and powerful film on its own ugly and
uncompromising terms. It's a feel-bad movie for the "movies as art" crowd,
and even many of them will find the film just too unpleasant in too many
ways.
You'll see even from these clips that the NC-17 is inevitable, but the
male/male sex is even more explicit, although the director did avoid any
clear penis shots.
We're sort of in Spaz territory here. Ray and Delain are both Canadian,
as is Gil Bellows. The strippers must be either Dutch or Americans, I
suppose, since the film was lensed in New York City and Rotterdam. (IMDb
says it is a British/Dutch co-production, although nothing seems to have
been done in the UK)
