At least they don’t go back to his childhood, and there actually are some interesting things about the way he deals with fame, but can we please stop making films about asshole “geniuses”?ĭespite the criticisms, yes, you’ll leave this movie remembering Marcia Gay Harden if you remember anything. It hits all the beats: of course Jackson is an alcoholic who does all kinds of showy bullshit when he’s drunk, of course he quits drinking and then tragically resumes, of course he meets a sad end. I put up with this bullshit when I needed something to pull me through the winter, but I’m not here for it now. In the US, pandemic restrictions are mostly lifted, I can go out and enjoy the world, and my energy for boring biopics is really at a low.
Harden brings a reality to this performance that grounds the film. Like, even in the background, she’s always up to something.
(Photo: GMH/RCS) 'It just felt great,' Harden told Vulture of her big Oscar moment. She does her best to bring Lee to the screen, and Lee really does feel alive. Marcia Gay Harden accepts her Oscar for Best Supporting Actress at the 73rd annual Academy Awards on March 25, 2001. She’s not some Hollywood superstar, but she’s consistently good, and she puts in the work, and we should reward that more often. The main problem with this performance is that Lee Krasner has very little interiority: she’s a prop for Jackson Pollock, so Harden doesn’t get to really tap into a deep well of character.īut I love Harden anyway, and I’m glad that she won. I won’t get too hung up on categories, since the academy system is nonsense, but it’s a bit annoying. Yippee.įirst of all, Marcia Gay Harden is NOT a supporting actress in this movie, she’s just as present as Reese Witherspoon in Walk the Line. Pollock returns the favor by blatantly, repeatedly cheating on her, and generally being a drunken terror. Really, she’s Jackson Pollock’s manager, the person who makes him successful, whether that means scrambling endlessly to get him grant money, or dragging his drunk ass to a job interview. Lee Krasner is supposedly an artist, but the only reason we know that is because we see her painting for a couple of seconds every once in a while. “You're not just randomly putting paint on the canvas, you're painting something.”ĭoes it really shock you to know that Jackson Pollock (Ed Harris), the guy who threw paint on a canvas and made millions was a dick to his wife, Lee Krasner (Marcia Gay Harden)?įorgive me if I half-ass this entry: it’s just that I feel like I’ve written over and over again about self-sacrificing women who give everything for horrible men, and get nothing back in return.