Original AVQ&A*: After looking at last week’s A.V. Club Q&A (lifetime passes), are there any actors, directors, etc. who you now consider blacklisted because of a particular work or group of works? Is there anyone you will take a lifetime pass on?
SPCHQ A: I've been baffled and repulsed by Michael Douglas's film career since the 1980s. He's a terribly over-the-top hammy actor who doesn't just chew the scenery around him, he deep throats it. It is also puzzling that he was every considered "sexy", even in his younger, non-leatherfaced years. The sex scenes in Fatal Attraction, Basic Instinct, and Disclosure were completely nauseating - how were they every considered hot?
I largely avoid movies where he's in a leading role, and about the only film he's done that I've really enjoyed was Traffic, which was a large ensemble production which minimized his screen time. Unlike Nicolas Cage, who I granted a lifetime pass to, if I come across a Michael Douglas film while channel surfing, I can't switch it fast enough. While it's usually possible to find at least one redeeming quality in an actor, there simply isn't anything I find likable, appealing, or talented about Michael Douglas, and I'll gladly take a lifetime pass on his work.
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* This feature is cribbed from the AV Club, AVQ&A, where staffers answer a pop culture related question. Read who they have taken lifetime passes on.
4 comments:
I do agree with most of your statement, but if you have never seen a young Douglas, check out The Streets of San Francisco. His interaction with Karl Malden is amazing. Also, I think Douglas' strength is in producing, not acting.
Douglas is hammy but that's part of his appeal. (Unlike Cage, who has none and is just as big a ham.)
I hate him in schlock like The American President but like his less predictable movies, like Falling Down and The Game.
P.S. C'mon, you know you want to see him reprise Gordon Gekko in Wall Street 2 next year.
Anon: I'll check out Streets of SF when I can... not sure if it's on DVD or maybe Hulu.
Jack: I dispute your statement that Nic Cage is hammy without appeal... how can you not like WILD AT HEART or RAISING ARIZONA? Or CON AIR? "Put. The. Bunny. Down."
And, I've actually never seen WALL STREET. The combination of Douglas AND Oliver Stone was just repellent to me. Is Stone directing WS2?
I dunno... different strokes for different folks. If you like him I can't really talk you out of it, but Nic Cage always has this shit-eating grin that makes me want to slap him.
Anyway, yes, Oliver Stone is back for WS2. And your boy-toy Shia Labeouf is playing the naive apprentice character this time (similar to Charlie Sheen's character in the original). Watching the original would probably feel like a Nostradamus prophesy these days.
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