I was just planning to make what I thought was the singular observation that after several years of increasingly bizarre transformations, Mickey Rourke has now morphed into an amalgam of Captain Jack Sparrow and Ritchie Sambora.
Sadly, when I went online to find a pic of Mickey’s snazzy new pirate-ing fashion sensibility, I was dismayed to realize that a zillion other people had already come to that conclusion. I guess you could say they beat me to the “punch.” HA! Get it. I wrote “punch.” Cuz like Mickey plays a boxer in his new movie. Oh wait, dangit, he’s a wrestler. In fact I think the title of the movie is…The Wrestler. Way to go, Movie. Ruin the surprise of whether or not Mick’s a boxer by using his occupation in the title. Now obviously since I haven’t seen this movie I can’t be totally certain, but judging from his past performances from back in the day when he was still considered an A-lister, I’m thinking Mickey’s win last night was more about the critics’ penchant for comeback stories than about real Mickey merit. I mean, he’s just never been that good of an actor. I was always baffled when they used to compare him to a young Marlon Brando. (Hint for any future actors attempting to emulate Brando: his brilliance had nothing to do with either mumbling or dishevelment!)
Far from the likes of Brando, Mickey seemed more like a poor man’s early version of Richard Gere, back in the days when Richard could only express two emotions – quiet rage and regular rage. Like Mickey, Gere was also undeservedly compared with Brando. In fairness to Gere however, while the Brando thing was and continues to be ludicrous, Gere’s has actually gotten better as the years have past. I guess age brought him a broader range of emotions and an understanding of subtlety.
Coincidently both of these actors have also co-starred with Diane Lane, who similarly, is simply not as outstanding an actress as the Hollywood Foreign Press would have had you believe when they gave her a nomination for Unfaithful. Then again, the powers that be over at the Golden Globes have never hidden their love of an actress willing, for the sake of artistry, to show off her own golden globes. (I truly am sorry for that. It really couldn’t be helped. But hey, I’m not the one that named an award show after their love of boobies!)
Still another coincidence concerning these three is that they have all worked with Adrian Lyne, director of Unfaithful. Not surprisingly he, like his aforementioned actors (Gere was also in Unfaithful and Mickey was in Nine ½ Weeks), Lyne has had a lot more attention than he deserves. In fact, I’m unclear how Adrian Lyne garnered any acclaim at all much less how or why he is able to continue to make movies. He is perhaps one of the most unimaginative directors of all time. Thank goodness he’s only had the opportunity to be boring nine times. Here’s hoping he doesn’t direct a tenth movie otherwise we might be stuck with another film filled with starkly lit sets and voyeuristic camera work, consisting of a multitude of rapidly cut sequences and extreme close-ups. Yes, Adrian is clearly fond of the quick zoom button on the camera. Additionally, a new Lyne film would no doubt feature yet another shot of a rickety old elevator – either those big freight kinds or one of those open-gated kinds that you have to manually pull shut.
Lyne has used elevator footage in Unfaithful, Fatal Attraction, Nine ½ Weeks, and Flashdance. I never saw his first film Mr. Smith and offhand I can’t remember if Foxes, Indecent Proposal, Jacob’s Ladder or Lolita were elevator-laden or not; but I’ve got to assume they were. Adrian jest loves himself any chance to film rip-roarin’ elevator action. It doesn’t matter what kind. Hanging out with dead bodies like Richard Gere in Unfaithful or just riding up with a bike like Jennifer Beals in Flashdance. Naturally it was a forgone conclusion, as infamously showcased in Fatal Attraction, Adrian had to film this favorite piece of imagery while incorporating his other favorite piece of imagery – sex.
An Adrian Lyne film would be nothing without gratuitous sex. Nevertheless as with anything in a Lyne movie, even the sex scenes are derivative. Nine ½ Weeks' fun with food scene referenced Jennifer Beals’ love of lobster in Flashdance. Fatal Attraction borrowed its exhibitionism from Nine ½ Weeks. Indecent Proposal used bits from the last two and certainly Unfaithful grabbed stuff from all of the above. Why has no one noticed the fact that Lyne is a one-note hack.
But more importantly, how does this man merit such esteemed status? Because the bottom line is, for every one of Adrian Lyne’s films, if you take out big-name actors and remove the respectable soundtrack, all you’ve got left is late night Cinemax fare. There seems to be only one fundamental difference difference between Lyne and the Skinemax guys. Just like Lyne, the Skinemax directors are fond of recycling their scenes; but when they do it, they get labeled makers of soft-core porn. Lyne, conversely, gets labeled a visual maverick. I don’t get it.Maybe he made some sort of deal with an unnatural, otherworldly thing and then Mickey found out about it and threatened to expose him and so in retribution, Lyne’s unnatural, otherworldly buddies messed up Mickey’s face because who’s going to listen to someone who looks like they chose to look like that. That can be the only explanation. Or else Mickey really did want to emulate Brando and in a hackneyed way, resorted to various physical transformations in order to possibly one day play the following people. You be the judge:
And just to remind you this is what Mickey’s punim looked like right around Nine ½ Weeks.
Nah, it’s definitely not the Brando thing. Adrian Lyne’s got himself some friends in some very low places who have access to an unending arsenal of ugly sticks.
