World Cup, Expressive Actors

[A. Vulgarweed]

Rachel Bray:
>
>USA lost to Germany this morning.  And just by 1 point!
>Sad.  :-(
>
>But!  Our rank this year is still fantastic.  Last year we
>were 32 out of 32 teams.  And this is the best we've done
>since 1930.

It's something to be proud of for sure! There's no shame in losing
honorably to a powerful opponent, and I'm happy the US got as far as we did.

I'll be dodging some English rocks for this but I'm happy 'cause, um, Viva
o Brasil! (My mom's from there, what can I do?)

This is brilliant, I have been meaning to say:

>LORD OF THE SNITCH
>Three men form the chaser-squad under the sky
>Seven are the teammates on their brooms of wood
>Two are Bludger balls charmed to fly
>One is the dork Ref all on his own
>On the field of Quidditch where the Quaffles lie.
>One Snitch flits over all, one grab will win it
>One game may take three months, or may take but a minute
>On the field of Quidditch where the Quaffles lie.
>
>http://home.att.net/~coriolan/hpfilks.htm
>
>
And Boggles says:


>Not only many boys and teenagers, but many male actors under the age
>of about 50, IMHO!  Annoyance, anger, rage, yeah, they're all there -
>but ask them to do something else . . .  This is, in fact, the one
>reason I like Keanu Reeves despite his occasional extreme woodenness
>- he doesn't really do anger very well at all, and generally doesn't
>take parts that require him to try.  He does do *very* well at
>baffled surprise ("Whoah . . .") and the "Oh, I get it" look - which
>very few actors in his (read: my) generation manage.
>
Well, he's not under 50, but an old friend of mine pointed out, and was
dead right, that the reason why Harrison Ford is a truly great
action-adventure actor is that he is brilliant at conveying *anxiety,
stress, fear, exasperation, and pain.* We noticed this back when he was Han
Solo and Indiana Jones--you could believe this was a real guy in these
ridiculous situations, trying to get his rattlebag ship to start before
they get blasted or trying not to be crushed by the boulder or whatever. He
looked _deeply uncomfortable_, just like an actual person would be! Wow!
(The fact that I am so impressed by this demonstrates what a rare gift it
is.) I saw 'Air Force One' on TV a little while back, and he's still got it
even when he's trying to be "Presidential" at the same time. Jackie Chan is
also a master of this (and of its vast comic potential), which is why so
many people who don't usually like martial-arts action films like him.

I've gotta say I haven't really liked Keanu Reeves very much in anything
since the Bill & Ted movies, which used his range to greatest advantage. :)
'The Matrix' did make pretty good use of the "Whoa...." and "Oh, I get it,"
though.


AV