Thursday, June 21, 2012

Nicole Kidman Appreciation

By s. Thursday, June 21, 2012


Nicole Mary Kidman
20 June 1967, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA

“She looks a little bit like Marlene Dietrich, a little bit like Madonna, a little bit like Marilyn. She’s all those iconic women.” - Baz Luhrmann on Nicole Kidman.

With a slight delay here is my appreciation post on this lovely actress. I can't believe beautiful Nicole is already 45. She used to be my favorite actress, ever since I saw her as lovely, charming and fascinating Satine, the whore with the heart of gold in Moulin Rouge!. She was excellent as Virgina Woolf in The Hours, the role that won her many awards including Academy Award, wonderful as lonely and depressed mother of two in The Others and finally as my favorite - Gillian Owens, mischievous witch in Practical Magic. Unfortunately, after the peek of her career, Kidman chose some really bad movies - The Stepford Wives, Bewitched and The Invasion. While she always looked gorgeous and delivered strong work, those movies were just awful.

My favorite work of hers is hands down her performance as cold and ruthlessly ambitious Susan Stone in Gus van Sant's To Die For. It is an incredible performance and for me definitely one of the best work I've ever seen delivered by an actress. While Kidman always brings in great work some of her movies are not very good - Australia - or just not very memorable - Cold Mountain. Fortunately, there are also films like Dogville - while for me repulsive, it was unforgettable and had great performance by her - and Eyes Wide Shut, where Kidman truly shined. She has recently made a comeback with Rabbit Hole which brought her Academy Award nomination and this year she is coming back with a bang - as a trashy, promiscuous and oddly charming Charlotte in The Paperboy.


5 favorite movies:
The Hours
The Others
To Die For
Moulin Rouge!
Practical Magic

5 favorite performances:
To Die For
The Hours
The Others
Moulin Rouge!
Eyes Wide Shut

5 favorite scenes: 
Every time Susan presents the weather in To Die For
Sparkling Diamonds from Moulin Rouge!
The prayer in The Others
"I am dying in this town!" in The Hours
Midnight margharitas in Practical Magic

5 fun facts:
  • Scared of butterflies.
  • Has never used a body double for her nude scenes.
  • Has Irish ancestry.
  • Studied ballet and drama in Australia.
  • Ex-girlfriend of Lenny Kravitz.

3 favorite screencaps of her:

10 favorite photos of her: 

26 comments:

  1. I absolutely love her. I was going to do something similar but unfortunately I was internet-less.
    I love her performance in To Die For too!! Closely followed by The Others, Moulin Rouge! and The Hours.

    I think she's such an auteur actress. It's wonderful.

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    1. Hey we like the same performances! :) To Die For is mesmerizing, love that the only creature she cares about is her adorable dog, kinda like me :) Illeana Douglas was also amazing in this movie.

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  2. Did you see her in Far & Away? She was pretty hilarious there. I also loved her in Practical Magic. Can't wait to see her as Grace Kelly. Didn't know that she can do ballet, what a beauty combo for actress!

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    1. Yes, she was great and the film was quite nice too! I think she screwed up her face a little too bad to be Grace Kelly, but with the right make up, who knows.

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  3. Replies
    1. She has so many great movies in her career that almost makes me forget about the bad ones.

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  4. Nice tribute! She's not my fave actress but I do like some of her work, particularly Moulin Rouge! She was also phenomenal in To Die For. She is absolutely stunning and very photogenic, the main photo you use here is from that W magazine I think, the one w/ Clive Owen, and I literally gasped at her beauty. It's unfair someone could be so beautiful, plus she's tall with a body to die for.

    I think she's gone the Botox route and injection for her lips, which is a pity as she's already so gorgeous. I wasn't sold on her as Grace Kelly at first but the photos in the W mag makes me change my mind.

    P.S. I had no idea she dated Lenny Kravitz! Wow, what a combo.

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    1. I think she is a bit too tall, much like Charlize Theron, no wonder they both have such commending presence.

      The photos from W magazine are lovely but she indeed really outdid it with surgeries and injections. It's particularly noticable in Rabbit Hole, I though her face was going to explode when she was crying in one scene.

      I too had no idea, it's quite shocking - she looks like porcelain doll and he is so, well, wild.

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  5. I think I first saw her in Batman Forever. She looked so different then and was largely just known as Tom Cruise's other half. But she has been in a lot of good movies since then and is a superstar in her own right now.

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    1. She was very pretty in Batman Forever, though her acting wasn't the best there.

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  6. Correction, she did use a body double in the last scene of Fur. That was an awful film.

    My five favorite performances from her are:

    1. To Die For
    2. Moulin Rouge
    3. Eyes Wide Shut
    4. Rabbit Hole
    5. Dogville

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    1. Really? Huh, never knew that. I actually love Fur, thought it was gorgeous movie and her and Downey Jr were great in it.

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  7. To Die For is also my favorite Kidman role. It's also one of my favorite movies from the nineties.

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    1. It's on my top 100 list (I think). Really adored it, so funny and superbly acted and written movie.

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  8. wow, she is hot in some of those images...I saw Nicole Kidman recently in disappoitment Hemingway & Gellhorn (2012), I have to admit her performance in that outshone Clive Owen...Great quote you found by Baz Luhrmann...

    Kidman's performance in Bangkok Hilton (1988) I feel is underrated, and is one of my favorite mini-series.

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    1. I totally forgot I was going to see this one, sorry to hear it's a disappointment.

      I never saw this one, will try to check it out!

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  9. I have always enjoyed her performances, but she's never been a favourite for me. I remember her role in Practical Magic really fondly though. Don't know why. There's just something immensely watchable about that film!

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    1. Yeah, it's so much fun, it has great soundtrack too. Kidman was really adorable in it.

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  10. Meow!!!!

    I recently added Eyes Wide Shut to my Amazon Instant queue, getting ready for a rewatch.

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    1. It's a fantastic movie, hope you will end liking it!

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  11. I love that you gave some love to her Eyes Wide Shut performance, which doesn't get talked about enough. Kidman is a great actress that, I think, often gets slighted because of her beauty, charm, and God-likeness.

    A few other Kidman performances I love (in no order): Birth, Rabbit Hole, and Dogville. I really wonder if Paperboy is going to be as nuts as people say. Can't wait.

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    1. She was absolutely brilliant in EWS, I think it's not only the best performance in the movie, it is also what makes it so damn memorable.

      I have yet to see Birth, seems like an interesting movie!

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  12. I first saw her in Dead Calm, which was a decent thriller. I then saw her in some typical "pretty girl" roles, but when I saw her in To Die For I sat up and said, "she can actually ACT". It also fun to see her singing in Moulin Rouge.

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    1. Dead Calm was pretty good indeed, she was grat in this one.

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  13. Love her too. Especially in Moulin Rouge!, The Hours (this film is all around perfect), and The Others.

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    1. The Hours is fantastic, flawless movie indeed!

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