Character Actress Queen Melissa Leo Gets Her Close-Up in "Frozen River"

Phil Nugent — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 17:00:00 GMT

For four seasons on NBC, Melissa Leo played Kay Howard on Homicide: Life on the Street and sustained one of the most compellingly unglamorous characterizations in the history of American network TV. A mess of exposed nerve endings and untamed brick-red hair, Howard was a capable, dedicated detective shackled to a self-destructing partner (Daniel Baldwin) and a locker-room professional atmosphere that demanded that she keep her softer feelings under wraps as part of her eternal duty to prove that she was One of the Guys. Leaving that series just around the time that the actors populating its sets began to look less like a cops and more like Gap ad models, Leo began appearing in a lots of movies, many of which were so embarrassed by their failure to be worthy of what she brought to them that they wouldn't have dreamed of acquiring a theatrical release. (Two of her better roles can be found in movies written by Guillermo Arriaga: The Two Burials of Melquiades Estrada, directed by its star, Tommy Lee Jones, and 21 Grams, directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu, in which her brief performance as a hard-bitten but not insensitive woman whose husband--Benecio Del Toro--upends her family's life by accepting insisting on taking responsbility for his actions is practicially a movie in itself.) This weekend, Courtney Hunt's Frozen River opens in theaters after an attention-getting run on the festival circuit, and it offers what many fans have been waiting for: the chance to see Leo carry a highly touted movie. She plays a single mother, up against it financially after her husband absconds with her savings, who is driven to raise money by smuggling illegal aliens into the country across the Canadian border.

In a New York Times piece on the actress and the movie, Leo is quoted as saying that “I do the work that’s in front of me.”But, as Karen Durbin reports, she'll go that extra mile for a really good role, as when she agreed to go to California to audition for the part in 21 Grams after she'd already sent the filmmakers a taped audition, and then another. In the case of Frozen River, her determination seems to have included propping up the first-time director. "Ms. Leo agreed, as she has on other occasions with novice directors, to appear in a short film by Ms. Hunt, who was hoping to make a calling card to raise money for the feature. 'I didn’t realize she had a full-length script until after the short was finished,' Ms. Leo said. At which point enlightened self-interest kicked in. It took four years and a lot of bad meetings before the money was raised, and more than once Ms. Hunt nearly gave up. So Ms. Leo would call every so often and ask, 'We still making our movie?'” Whatever Leo saw in the script, it wasn't the chance to play the glamour star. Durbin writes that Frozen River affords viewers "the weird pleasure of seeing how bad Ms. Leo is willing to look for the camera. Ray is old and haggard before her time, her gullied face framed by terrible hair, crimped and dyed a harsh, aging red with bangs that coil wormlike across her forehead but telegraph the message: I’m still trying. 'That was mine,' Ms. Leo said proudly. 'Successful or not, Ray’s hair and mascara say that she’s a woman, and she cares to be pretty. It’s something she did in high school when she met her husband, and it worked then, so maybe it’ll work now.'”

Cannes 2008: Meet the Jury!

Paul Clark — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 15:00:00 GMT

Yesterday, The Screengrab was the 152nd blog on the web to post the Competition slate for next month's Cannes Film Festival. But before you start predicting the winners sight unseen, we suggest you get to know the members of the Competition jury. That way you'll know whose names to curse when your favorite filmmaker gets smoked by some little-known furriner whose name you can't pronounce.

This year's Cannes Competition Jury:

Sean Penn (Jury President) is a filmmaker of some note, directing four films since his 1990 debut, The Indian Runner. His most recent film is the memorably Oscar-snubbed Into the Wild. When not behind the camera, Penn is also known for his political and charitable work, which has taken him to Iran and to the post-Katrina New Orleans. Penn has also been known to act on occasion.

Sergio Castellitto has appeared in several films in Competition, including 2001's Va Savoir and 2002's The Religion Hour (My Mother's Smile). Once referred to by Screengrab favorite Mike D'Angelo as "maybe the most underrated thesp alive," he also starred in the popular Mostly Martha, better known as No Reservations, Except Good. Castellitto has also directed two features, including the 2004 film Don't Move, in which he exercised his director's clout in order to give himself several love scenes with Penelope Cruz.

Natalie Hershlag, alternately known as Natalie Portman, made her big-screen debut at age 13 in Luc Besson's The Professional, sometimes referred to as Léon by various talkbackers on Ain't It Cool News. Since that time, she has become one of the most sought-after actresses of her generation, particularly among horny fanboys who despair that she will never get completely naked onscreen. Hershlag is set to make her directorial debut in this year's omnibus film New York, I Love You, where her short film will appear alongside new works by such acclaimed filmmakers as Brett Ratner and Scarlett Johansson. She also wants you to know that the Shins will totally change your life.

Alfonso Cuaron first gained international critical attention with his 1995 film A Little Princess, and subsequent films like Y Tu Mama Tambien and Children of Men have proven him a formidable talent (he also allegedly made a low-budget adaptation of a little-known English fantasy novel, but no one knows what became of this). In 2006, his high-profile friendship with fellow Mexican filmmakers Guillermo Del Toro and Alejandro Gonzalez Iñarritu let to the trio briefly becoming known as "The Three Amigos" for several months before they were sued by Chevy Chase, Martin Short and Steve Martin.

Apichatpong Weerasethakul has such a long name that I run the risk of hitting my character limit simply by typing it. Luckily for me, he prefers to simply be called "Joe." Joe has garnered widespread critical acclaim for his whimsical, magical-realist films, which include Mysterious Object at Noon, Blissfully Yours, and Syndromes and a Century. His 2004 film Tropical Malady won the Jury Prize at Cannes, and Roger Ebert called the film "a meditation on portentous but incoherent themes." By which we're guessing he meant "awesome."

Alexandra Maria Lara, a ravishing Romanian who moved to Germany at age 4, made her movie debut at 16. However, the role that brought her international acclaim came in 2004's Downfall, in which she portrayed Hitler's personal secretary Traudl Junge. Since then, she costarred in Francis Ford Coppola's Youth Without Youth and in last year's Ian Curtis biopic Control, where she met current boyfriend Sam Riley (isn't that cute?). Lara will next appear in Stephen Daldry's The Reader, as well as taking a supporting role in Spike Lee's WWII drama Miracle at St. Anna, a role you won't find out about by looking her up on IMDb.

Rachid Bouchareb is a French director-producer who last appeared at Cannes with his 2006 drama Days of Glory. In addition to his own films, he has also produced the work of numerous other filmmakers, including all four features to date by Bruno Dumont. Sorry, I have nothing humorous to say about this guy.

So there you have it. Seven jury members, down from nine last year. How will they vote? Will Penn insist on a political bent, or at least something appeals to his artier side? Will Cuaron stump for his fellow Latin Americans? Which Bouchareb will show up- the one who directed the rousing WW2 or the guy who produces Bruno Dumont movies? Will Joe gravitate to fellow talking-primate lover Charlie Kaufman? Will the paparazzi devote most of their attention to Portman and Lara (yes, they will)? Let the blind prognosticating commence in 5, 4, 3...

The Screengrab : alejandro gonzalez inarritu

Character Actress Queen Melissa Leo Gets Her Close-Up in "Frozen River"

Cannes 2008: Meet the Jury!