It's no surprise to anyone who's read this blog for even a week that I find Kate Winslet incredibly hot. In fact one of the only stumbling blocks this film had in credibility was asking me to believe that a man married to her would become addicted to internet porn.
Nor will it be a surprise to anyone who has kept even one eye on her career that she has got to receive an academy award sooner or later, she is a fantastic actress.
I mention all this because I want to communicate something to you: I am speaking of something very special when I say that when watching this movie...I felt like I was discovering her for the first time.
Her characterization was so alive, a word that comes to mind for most of the actors in this movie, but Winslet most of all. As for her appearance, either the director, Todd Field, or his cinematographer, one Antonio Calvache, found a way to photograph her for this that she appears absolutely radiant.
I know what you're thinking: Wow, making Ben think Kate Winslet looks sexy on film. What next, making him think Terry Gilliam is a good director?
What I'm saying is that even for Kate Winslet, Kate Winslet in this movie is devastating. Okay, point made. Probably belabored. Onward!
Winslet's co-star, Patrick Wilson, I can mostly only judge as an actor, though I suspect the ladies and gay fellas won't be disappointed with the way he looks either. The last time I saw Wilson was in the justly-acclaimed Angels in America miniseries a few years ago.
Here, what I noticed is that although his good looks are a bit commonplace (IMO), he is incredible at suggesting the individual behind them.
Now I come to the actress who plays Wilson's wife, who he cheats on with Winslet in the movie. Her name is Jennifer Connelly.
There are maybe three actresses in the world attractive enough to make me think a man married to Jennifer Connelly would want to see them naked, fortunately, Winslet is one of them.
Connelly, like Winslet, is one of those actresses who besides being one of the most beautiful women in the world is also capable of giving a great performance. This is a supporting role so she's not able to give it her all, but she does very well with what she has to do.
It's a character who kind of splashes around the edges of the story, but has an obvious and growing import. And Connelly's eyes are so bright, and she is so able to convey an inner life for the character.
You really don't notice till hours after the credits have rolled that her character doesn't really have a conclusion. I didn't, anyway.
I also want to mention Jane Adams, endearing in an even smaller role. I admit I've been somewhat cold on Adams' previous work (The Anniversary Party, Frasier), but here she won me by hinting at (here's that word again) the inner emotional life of her character.
BTW, it's ironic that Adams played a cosmetic surgeon on Frasier, because she has a natural beauty that I suspect will stand her in greater stead than her silicone and Botox injected colleagues.
In fact, "natural" leads me to one of the things that comes through most clearly about Little Children: How true it all seems. It's the kind of movie that shows up "reality" TV shows for the lowest-common-denominator fantasies that they are.
It's also the kind of movie in which at any given moment you're truly not sure what you want to have happen, let alone what's going to happen. Only that there are some things you know you don't want to have happen.
Fortunately, most of them don't.
But it's exquisite torture till you know that.
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