Apropos The stars according to Peter
Bogdanovich, who cites John Wayne, James Stewart and Henry Fonda as
stars able to make audiences “instantly suspend their disbelief” — which many of today’s stars can’t
do — David Nuzum writes that he’d rather see unknowns.
When he saw “Maria Full of Grace,” he says,
he “totally forgot” the lead actress was acting. “I thought she was the character. I
attributed it to the fact that she was an unknown. I much prefer films with unknowns for precisely
this reason.
“That John Wayne, Stewart and Fonda were able to achieve suspension of disbelief in spite of
their stardom is indeed remarkable,” Nuzum adds. “But I think the comparison to contemporary
actors is unfair. For one thing, those guys frequently played the same types of characters, in
contrast with somebody like Tom Hanks, as Bogdanovich mentions.
“I’m no fan of Tom Hanks, but it’s a lot harder to achieve suspension of disbelief when you’re
playing a FedEx employee (somebody who could be my neighbor) stranded on a deserted island;
it’s comparatively easy when you’re telling a story set in the Wild West. Even the use of B&W film
and mono sound must’ve created a kind of alternate reality for audiences, in which anything was
possible.”
Point taken, particularly the idea of an alternate reality in black and white.
A friend writes: “I haven’t see “Open Water” (the shark film),
but articles about it attributed its effectiveness, in part, to the casting of unknowns who play an
ordinary couple with whom viewers could more readily identify (than with, say, Cameron Diaz
and Matt Damon). In this case, the unknowns intensify the horror element of the film.”
Couldn’t agree more. Nobody would believe in Cam and Matt actually floating around in the
middle of the ocean surrounded by sharks, still less the possibility they might not
survive. Besides, no production company would have paid the risk insurance.
