When I started this blog was to have notes that I didn't wanted to forget.
One more time here it goes another subject I know I will come back again later.
The note is here but I will do a transcriptions since many links I had in the blog get lost with time (links broken etc.)
Get here to read the article:
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
If it doesn't exist by the time to find it, then check this one:
Article taken from Business Insider 2014 by
Marcus Geduld,
Quora
"
How to differentiate good acting from bad acting "
"How do you differentiate good acting from bad acting?" appeared as a question on Quora. Below we are printing one of the top answers.
If anyone tells you there are objective standards, they're full of s--t. This is a matter of personal taste. There are
trends.
There are many people who loved Philip Seymour Hoffman's acting. But if
you don't, you're not wrong. At worst, you're eccentric.
(An interesting question — and one you didn't ask so I won't answer it, here — is why are there trends? Even if Hoffman isn't
objectively
a great actor, why do so many people love him? For that matter, why do
so many people love the Beatles, Shakespeare, and Leonardo Da Vinci?
Maybe someone will ask a question about why there are general trends in
taste ...)
I'm a director who has been working with actors for almost 30 years, and I'm the son of a film historian. I'll give you
my
definition of good acting. But I really want to stress (for the last
time, then I'll quit) is that if I say Pacino is great and you disagree,
my experience does not make me right and you wrong. It just means we
have different tastes.
For me, an actor is good if ...
1. He makes me believe he's actually going through whatever his character is going through.
I'm talking somewhat about physical stuff ("He really
is getting shot!" "He really
is jumping off a moving train!") but mostly about psychological stuff. ("He really
is scared!" "He really
is in love!") If an actor seems to be "faking it," he's not doing his job (as I define it).
2. He surprises me.
This is the most nebulous requirement, but it's important. Except for
really small parts that aren't supposed to call attention to themselves
(e.g. a bank teller who just cashes the hero's checks), it's not enough
for actors to just seem real. Seeming real is a requirement, but a
second requirement is that I can't predict their every reaction before
they have it.
Think of how a woman might react if her boyfriend breaks up with her. There are many, many
truthful ways — ways which would seem like a human being reacting and not like a space alien behaving in some bizarre, unbelievable way.
She might break down and cry; she might laugh hysterically; she might
throw water in his face; she might go completely numb, having no
expression at all ...
An actor's job is to know the breadth of human possibility and the
depths of their own possibilities. They must pull from this well and
surprise us. Otherwise, they become boring and predictable.
There are many ways and actor can surprise. Gary Oldman and Johnny
Depp surprise us by being truthful while playing multiple, very
different roles. Jack Nicholson surprises by being ... surprising. Even
though he's not a chameleon like Oldman or Depp, you never know what
he's going to do next. But whatever her does, it's grounded in
psychological reality. It never seems fake.
Christopher Walken, Glenn Close, Al Pacino, and many others have a
surprising danger in them. They're a little scary to be around, because
you feel they might jump you or blow up at you at any time. They are
ticking time bombs.
And, of course, many comedic actors (e.g. Julia Louis-Dreyfus)
surprise us in all sorts of quirky, zany ways. Or watch Katherine
Hepburn and Cary Grant in "Bringing Up Baby." Absolutely surprising and
absolutely truthful!
Another great example of surprising acting that never seems fake is Diane Keaton's work in "Annie Hall."
3. He is vulnerable.
Great actors share the parts of themselves that most people keep
hidden. They are always naked. (Some are literally naked, but I'm
talking about emotional nakedness.) Bad actors are guarded. They don't
want to share the parts of themselves that are ugly, mean, petty,
jealous, etc.
There are so many examples of actors being naked on stage and screen.
My favorite is Rosalind Russell in the movie "Picnic." Rent it some
time if you haven't seen it. She plays a middle-aged schoolteacher who
is in danger of growing old and dying alone. There's a heartbreaking
scene in which she begs a man to marry her. She goes down on her knees
in front of him. She gives up every scrap of dignity inside her and lets
the scared, hurting parts of herself burst out.
These are the same scared, hurt parts that are inside all of us — the
parts we work hard to hide. Hiding them (by holding them in) takes a
toll on us, and one of the greatest gifts actors can give is to
sacrifice their dignity for us for us. They expose themselves so we
don't have to. They are like Christ dying for our sins.
This ties in with everything I wrote above: when actors are exposed
and raw, it's always surprising. And if it doesn't seem real, there's no
point in it. In fact, this sort of emotional nakedness is very hard to
fake. If you ever get a sense that an actor is showing you a secret part
of himself, he probably is.
Examples (in my opinion) are Julianne Moore and Bryan Cranston. Also,
rent "The Browning Version" sometime. The early one (not the remake).
Watch Michael Redgrave. He turns himself inside out and wrings out all
his pain.
4. He knows how to listen.
It's fascinating to watch actors when they're
not speaking.
Some are too caught up in ego or technicalities (e.g. trying to remember
their next line) to totally focus on whoever it is they're acting with.
Others seem to register everything they hear. You can see whatever is
being said to them physically affecting them, as if the words are
slapping them across the face. Watch Claire Danes. She's an amazing
listener.
5. He has a well-honed "instrument."
By which I mean he knows how to use his voice and body to serve
whatever role he's playing. This doesn't necessarily mean he's slim and
has a six-pack. James Gandolfini used his body well. It means he knows
how to move and talk in expressive ways. His voice and body aren't
fighting him or holding tension that's inappropriate to his role.
One negative example: Kristen Stewart. It's almost painful to watch
her. She looks like she'd rather be anywhere else besides in front of a
camera. She is (or seems) very self-conscious.
To me, Hoffman was great because he embodied all of these traits. He
was vocally and physically gifted. He wasn't in great shape, but he used
the shape he had in expressive ways. If you watch him closely when he's
not speaking, you'll see he always listened to his co-stars closely.
What they say affected him deeply, and his reactions grew organically
out of whatever they had previously said or done to him.
He was profoundly vulnerable. Always. This was his most distinctive
trait. You always knew what you were getting from him was raw and
honest. It was this rawness — as well as intelligence and a sly sense of
humor — that made his work surprising and fresh. And I never once saw
anything from him that seemed fake.
I don't hate Tom Cruise the way some people do. To me, he's
believable most of the time. He's just not very interesting. He rarely
surprises me, and he doesn't seem to dig deep into anything raw or
vulnerable inside him. He seems guarded. The must vulnerable I've seen
him is in "Eyes Wide Shut," in which he did some good work. But it
wasn't brilliant. And it's not his norm.
Keep in mind that many people (who aren't themselves actors,
directors, or obsessive film buffs) aren't very clear on what an actors
contributes to a film. Which is fine. It's not necessary for most
audience members to understand who does what during production.
Lots of people think an actor is great if they like his character.
But that's often a function of good writing more that good acting. Or
they think he's good if he pulls off some impressive effect, such as
gaining or losing a lot of weight or pretending to be handicapped. Those
are impressive stunts, but they aren't the core of what actors do. If
you forced me to rank Dustin Hoffman in "Rain Man" vs. Dustin Hoffman in
"Kramer vs. Kramer," I'd say he did more exciting work in the latter.
In "Rain Man" he was able to hide behind some stunts. In "Kramer vs.
Kramer," he just had to be truthful.
Some people think acting is good if they like the movie. Keanu
Reeves, in my mind, is a horrible actor — mostly because he's wooden and
fake. It often seems as if he's reading from cue cards rather than
saying words that are his. But some people like him because they think
the Matrix films are cool. They confuse the movies with the actor. If
some other actor had been in those films, those same people would have
liked
him. It's not really the actor (or not entirely the actor) they're liking. But since he plays the protagonist, they focus on him.
Finally, many people confuse an actor's life with his work. Tom
Cruise is a good example. He's a high-profile Scientologist, and many
people dislike that religion. They dislike his acting at least in part
because they find him unsavory as a person. To some extent, this may be a
sign of bad acting on his part. At least, he's not a good-enough actor
to make people forget about his private life while they're watching him
in movies. To some extent, it wouldn't matter how skilled he was.
Currently, many people are having strong reactions to work by Woody
Allen and Mia Farrow that have nothing to do with what they're doing on
screen. I'm not even remotely saying such people are wrong, stupid, or
crazy. I'm just saying that people's reactions to actors are often
complicated and not 100% influenced by their performances.
UPDATE: A couple of people have asked me to
elaborate on my claims about Keanu Reeves. They feel that although he's
often wooden, this is appropriate for his character in "The Matrix." I
will admit up front that I only saw the film once, when it first came
out, so it's possible I'm misremembering. Certainly, a good director can
sometimes put bad actors to good use.
Let me confine my remarks about Keanu to his acting in general, not
just in "The Matrix," though I am still skeptical about his work in that
movie.
There is a difference between playing an undemonstrative person and
being a wooden actor. In fact, playing someone who is reserved is very
difficult (because you have to act without showing very much), and the
actors who pull it off are brilliant.
I would point you to Anthony Hopkins in "Remains of the Day," Tommy
Lee Jones in many of his roles, and even Clint Eastwood in "Dirty
Harry." These actors manage to convey the sense that though they have
stony exteriors, there's much going on underneath. To me, Keanu Reaves
conveys an actor who is showing up and saying his lines. I don't believe
much else is going on underneath except maybe nervousness. If you feel
otherwise, that's fine. Remember, it's subjective.
Having auditioned many actors, I'm used to hearing ones that can take
any writer's lines and make it sound like their own words. And I'm also
used to less experienced (or less gifted) ones who sound uncomfortable
with words that aren't their own. They sounds as if they're are
reciting or reading
something. They sounds
scripted.
Listen to Keanu in the clip, below, especially at around 10-seconds in,
when he says, "I have offended you with my ignorance, Count." Many of
his line-readings sound like that to me. He has not fully lifted them
off the page and into his own mind and body.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqotT8iERxk
I don't know if you can see a difference between Keanu, above, and Tommy
Lee Jones, below. They are both pretty deadpan. The difference, for me,
is that Jones seems to be speaking his own words, even though they are
just as scripted as the ones Reeves speaks. Jones is just much more
comfortable in his skin and much more able to "own" his lines
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aJGy7zlxXA
