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Variety's film awards editor says that Kristen is currently the frontrunner of the Best Actress Oscar Race. So let's hope it stays that way:
https://variety.com/feature/2022-oscars-best-actress-predictions-1235021150/
[quote][b]2022 OSCARS PREDICTIONS:
BEST ACTRESS
UPDATED: Dec 16, 2021
AWARDS PREDICTION COMMENTARY:[/b] Kristen Stewart leads the critics’ prizes for her turn as Princess Diana in “Spencer” from Pablo Larrain. The Neon and Topic Studios drama may be incredibly divided with general audiences. Still, there’s an appreciation and respect to what she brings to the role, and she may have reached her moment in the awards circle after being passed over for strong outings in films like “Clouds of Sils Maria.”
Her biggest competition seems to be Lady Gaga as the murderous Patrizia Reggiani in “House of Gucci” from Ridley Scott. However, she’s already picking up a very high-profile win from the New York Film Critics Circle; she’s working the circuit and seems prime for her second acting nomination.[/quote]
Whether of not Kristen will remain the frontrunner has yet to be seen. But one thing that is almost certain is the Best Actress Oscar winner will be one who is portraying a famous person:
Kristen Stewart as Princess Diana
Lady Gaga as Patrizia Reggiani
Nicole Kidman as Lucille Ball
Speaking on the topic of embodying real-life people, last year's Best Actress Oscar winner Frances McDormand won the golden statuette for portraying a lackluster, nondescript, uninspiring and fictitious character who lived her life as a nomad and formed no emotional connection with any of the other characters in the film. I mean, there is no point of reference on whether or not McDormand convincingly and realistically portrayed her character Fern, as Fern never existed.
So I don't understand why some naysayers are splitting hairs on Kristen's performance, claiming she did not look or sound exactly like the most famous woman of the 20th century and for this reason should not win an Oscar. In my opinion, Kristen came as close as any actress has ever come to realistically portraying Diana Spencer on the big screen and for this very reason is worthy of the golden statuette.
Of course, Kristen winning still depends on whether Kristen's portrayal was superior to that of Lady Gaga and Nicole Kidman, who also portrayed famous people. And to be fair, they too have naysayers, as the haters claim Kidman looks nothing like Lucille Ball while Lady Gaga had a Russian accent, not the Italian one she should have had in House of Gucci.
For my most recent Kristen Stewart music video, Carved, I chose Lana Del Rey's hauntingly beautiful song [b]Young and Beautiful[/b], for the hauntingly beautiful actress: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PL89iQBgfrM
[quote]Interspersing Princess Diana's comments with Kristen's portrayal of Princess Diana really brought home how perfectly Kristen captured the character, from her mannerisms to her accent. I only hope that those who actually vote for the Academy Awards realize it as well. Hmm, perhaps this video should be mandatory viewing just before they cast their votes.[/quote]
This is such an important point Carved, that my latest Kristen Stewart edit juxtaposes several clips of Kristen from [b]Spencer[/b] with clips of Princess Diana from her BBC Panorama interview to further illustrate the similarities between their accents: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sn2FdpZ4RFQ
As far as losing that video of Kristen from [i]The Cake Eaters[/i] that you adored, I've learned a valuable lesson to do my edits on a reliable computer, not on a computer that I found abandoned on the side of a street. That computer was actually pretty reliable--until it "crashed and burned" as you stated.
And here's the link to my latest Kristen Stewart movie edit which you also commented on, in case Carved or anyone else perusing this thread is interested in watching:
[b]Kristen Stewart Portraying Famous People: Diana Spencer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGJvF8QpAZc[/b]
For my latest Kristen Stewart movie edits I'm doing a series on the famous celebrities she portrayed in past films:
[b]Kristen Stewart Portraying Famous People: Jean Seberg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXy6vprTy8Y
Kristen Stewart Portraying Famous People: Joan Jett https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZSKLQjSBGw[/b]
I'm assuming Ron already watched these videos as he often leaves comments on my YouTube channel vids.
<spoiler>"I finally stopped sending them when a package I had sent was returned unopened and stamped Return to Sender.
This was around the time that Kristen had changed agents, something which happened several years ago."
Was that around the time when Kristen left Gersh and her agent Ken Kaplan to sign with WME to represent her, which happened circa August 2019? If so, was your reason based on WME being one of the four major Hollywood talent agencies, which might make it more difficult to contact her? Of course Gersh is no slouch either as they are currently the sixth largest talent agency in the U.S.
I'm wondering if Kristen listened to the mixtape CDs you sent her previously, considering she did not send them back. One would think that if her agency at the time abided by a hard-and-fast rule of no unsolicited mail, they would have sent all of the CDs back. Now I feel like sending her a PDF copy of my screenplay on a CD, in hopes that she might just take a look at it. I did, after all, spend years writing the script for her to direct and star in.
The only Criterion Collection Blu-ray movie I own which Kristen starred in, Carved, is [b]Clouds of Sils Maria[/b].
Bluray.com, a site I look to before buying a Blu-ray, gave high ratings to this Blu-ray transfer for both video and audio quality, ratings which I wholeheartedly agree with:
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Clouds-of-Sils-Maria-Blu-ray/129379/
Reviewers on this site have yet to rate the Spencer Blu-ray transfer.
<spoiler>But for the record, she damn well better thank me for all those CDs I sent her in the past. ;-)
You actually sent Kristen CDs in the mail, Carved? Did you ever receive confirmation from her that she received them? I ask because I'm thinking about sending her a PDF copy of my screenplay on a CD. I tried contacting her agent about the script by sending a query letter but she has yet to respond. I read somewhere that most agents and talent agencies, especially the top ones, such as the agency that represents her (William Morris Endeavor Entertainment), don't accept unsolicited emails--so perhaps this is the reason--although I'm wondering why her email address is posted on IMDb Pro if she doesn't want to be contacted. Another reason could be her agent represents some of the biggest names, as far as popular actresses working in Hollywood, so she probably receives tons of email making it virtually impossible to respond to all of them. Yet another reason is Kristen is focusing all of her attention on the movie she is about to direct based on a screenplay that she wrote. I also read that a screenwriter doesn't contact an actor/director's agent but the agent contacts the writer. Say hypothetically, if the screenplay wins a major screenwriting competition, interested parties will seek out the writer, not the other way around.
So I went ahead and entered my script in one of these contests. Some claim that screenwriting competitions are a waste of time as the winner is determined by the subjective whims of its judges. And I'm hoping my script isn't disqualified because it contains some typos which were the result of my rushing to cut the script down from 220 pages in PDF form to 150 pages, which is the maximum allowed in this contest, within a few days to meet the last minute deadline for entry. Man, I needed to eliminate a major scene, a handful of characters, all of the subplots and slash much of the dialogue to reduce it by 70 pages. </spoiler>
I see you've watched my latest Kristen Stewart video edit, Ron, as evidenced by your comment on the video. In case Carved or anyone else perusing this thread is interested in watching this vid entitled [b]Kristen Stewart Awards Season Buzz[/b], here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEEskCoSq9s
The film critics are definitely in Kristen's corner along with awards experts from the major trades publications such as Scott Feinberg, Senior Awards Analyst for The Hollywood Reporter and Clayton Davis, Variety's Film Awards Editor who are giving her major props. Hopefully, voters from the Actors Branch of the Academy are listening and will go witness for themselves her phenomenal performance in Spencer.
This is the best answer I've read so far as to why the song may have been chosen, Carved. Yet even if this was the primary reason, what about all the other songs with the word Miracle in its title. For example, Whitney Houston's 1991 song [i]Miracle[/i] which peaked at #9 on the Billboard Hot 100 was released the same year the events of Spencer supposedly took place, which was Christmastime 1991. According to Kevin Costner, Princess Diana was in talks with him and nearly starred in a sequel to [b]The Bodyguard[/b]. I'm sure you're aware that Houston costarred with Costner in the original film. The melody of Houston's "Miracle" also matched the somber tone of Spencer. And to illustrate how this comes full circle, speaking of bodyguards, Diana's former bodyguard in 1991, Ken Wharfe, praised Kristen's portrayal of the Princess of Whales stating how "she managed to perfect her mannerisms."
Speaking of the soundtrack, while I was impressed by the original musical score written by Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood, I'm scratching my head as to why Pablo Larrain used the 1985 song [b]All I Need Is a Miracle[/b] by Mike & The Mechanics in the finale when there are literally thousands of songs from the 1980s which would have been a better fit, especially since Princess Diana was a huge fan of pop music. Larrain himself claims he narrowed it down from over 100 choices. So I'm now curious to see what was on his relatively short list. And don't get me wrong, it's quite catchy and it did peak at #5 on the Billboard Hot 100, but it didn't fare so well in the UK, so I'm still baffled as to why this song was selected.
Case in point, Princess Diana's all-time favorite song was the 1984 hit "Hello" according to Lionel Ritchie while her fave band was said to be Duran Duran. Had the soundtrack boasted hits from Ritchie such as "Hello", "Say You, Say Me", or the more upbeat "Dancing on the Ceiling" or Duran Duran's "Save A Prayer", "Come Undone" or "Ordinary World", I wouldn't have a dissenting opinion.
And being that she was friends with the likes of George Michael, Elton John, Michael Jackson, and Freddie Mercury, to name a few giants in the pop music industry, why wasn't one of their songs chosen instead? And don't get me started with the songs that she listened to regularly and were part of her music collection which comprised of albums from Diana Ross, Stevie Nicks, Celine Dion and Rod Stewart.
While it did contain some spoilers, Ron, they weren't spoilers that film critics didn't discuss in their reviews. I wanted to make the video longer as there were so many great clips of Kristen which I couldn't include because of time constraints as I didn't want to run the risk of having it removed just as one of my [b]Happiest Season[/b] edits which was over ten minutes in duration was taken down.
[quote]I haven't seen the movie so didn't want to see all the video, but I saw enough to understand what you mean that Kristen loses herself in the role. The accent, mannerisms and speech are all done so well![/quote]
The primary reason why [i]Spencer[/i] is my fave performance of Kristen's in terms of acting prowess--displacing Clouds of Sils Maria.
If you think that was impressive acting by Kristen, Carved, wait till you watching my latest movie edit which contains additional clips of her mesmerizing performance with three of the songs from the [i]Spencer Original Motion Picture Soundtrack[/i] resonating in the background, entitled: [b]Oscar-Caliber Portrayal of Diana?[/b] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omSgMqUR6F0
[quote]I've wondered if or when she would change up her acting style in some way, for some roles or if she felt the need. Maybe she's done some studying to expand her approach to roles. [/quote]
I realize that my words fail to sufficiently express what I meant when I stated that Kristen took her acting to another level--she's so comfortable in her own skin--so much so that I decided to do a [i]Spencer[/i] movie edit to showcase this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agrDWwLLqGk
Initially, I was thinking about going with the original [b]You Don't Own Me[/b] sung by Lesley Gore or one of the well know cover versions of the song performed by artists such as Dusty Springfield, Joan Jett and SayGrace but for some reason the clips seem to match better with Kristin Chenoweth and Ariana Grande singing in the background.
And I'm not the only one who thinks this is Kristen's best performance ever. Here are my fave excerpts from a review written by Peter Travers of ABC News who showers her with very high praise:
https://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Culture/spencer-review-kristen-stewart-performance-life-diana-spencer/story?id=80913652
[quote][b]'Spencer' review: Kristen Stewart gives the performance of her life as Diana Spencer[/b]
It’s not a biopic. You should know that about “Spencer,” only in theaters, in which LA-born Kristen Stewart gives the performance of her life as Diana Spencer, Princess of Wales. Oscar should smile on Stewart, who makes “Spencer” a spellbinder from first scene to last.
Other Dianas, from Emma Corrin and Elizabeth Debicki in “The Crown” to Jenna de Waal in Broadway’s “Diana: The Musical,” paint their portraits of Diana on a larger canvas. But Stewart‘s three-days-in-a-life interpretation is beyond compare and tellingly, thrillingly alive.
Without flashbacks or a mansplaining script, Stewart nails every nuance as Diana wanders the estate where she grew up as a carefree child in a rental house, now boarded up and full of ghosts to remind Diana of her once unscrutinized bliss as part of the Spencer family.
Stewart, 31, knows the fame drill, having been a tabloid princess since her teen idol days as the star of the “Twilight” saga. That popularity probably influenced the snob Academy to ignore her stunning work in “Clouds of Sils Maria,” “Personal Shopper” and “Seberg.”
But there is no ignoring the Stewart tour de force in “Spencer.” The technical demands of the role from strict posture to posh accent are absorbed into an intimate and indelible portrayal that finds the grit, grace and grieving heart of a caged spirit.
What starts as an emotional horror show ends as the best jailbreak movie since “Shawshank.” There’s nothing here of the car crash that tragically ended Diana’s life at 36 in1996. Instead, “Spencer” shows Diana in the revitalizing act of escape from her privileged prison. And thanks to Stewart’s brilliant, bittersweet, utterly transporting performance, we get to watch her fly.[/quote]
You're preaching to the choir, Carved, with regard to Speak as I now realize that this may be her most flawless performance in her pre-Spencer era. The Cake Eaters could be her runner-up. That being said, my sentimental fave will always be her character Em in Adventureland as her performance in this rom-com is what made me a fan of hers. The first rock song I fell in love with growing up was I Love rock 'N Roll, so Kristen portraying Joan Jett in The Runaways likewise elicited in me feelings of nostalgia especially since her performance was spot on.
Her best dialogue driven role is easily Valentine in Clouds of Sils Maria. I believe this was a major reason why she was a critics darling, receiving more awards from the most prestigious critics groups of any actress in 2015, which included winning awards from the [b]New York Film Critics Circle, National Society of Film Critics, Los Angeles Film Critics Association, and Boston Society of Film Critics[/b] to name a few. From a critical acclaim perspective, this was by far her biggest pre-Spencer snub.
That being said, in my opinion, Kristen obliterated all of her pre-Spencer performances in her portrayal of Princess Diana. Here she not only conveys so much emotion with her facial expressions and gestures like the article you quoted from mentioned, but also communicates with utmost clarity and confidence, befitting of the most beloved princess of our time.
[quote]Actors are always learning and Kristen has always been smart and mature from a young age. [/quote]
Many moviegoers don't seem to realize this as they judge Kristen almost exclusively by her role in Twilight. Yet even in that movie, when principal photography began, she was only 17 and when filming completed she turned 18 just a few weeks prior.
My first recollection of Kristen was watching her in [b]Panic Room[/b], where she co-starred with Jodie Foster. Here's a case in point regarding her being mature way beyond her years, as she was a 10-year-old budding star when filming began.
One of her all-time best performances was in Speak where she was 13. When she was 16, she churned out two more stellar performances in The Cake Eaters and Into the Wild.
Some say that Hollywood actresses peak at around 30, so this may be the case for Kristen as well. But the again, throughout her career she has proven her doubters wrong time and time again. So who knows? Her best may be yet to come. I mean, if she can realistically portray the nuances and subtleties of someone of the stature of Princess Diana, then surely she can portray a much maligned 30-year-old billionaire philanthropist who will have an integral role in saving humankind.
[quote]For your preamble, the first paragraph, I've had that thought from the trailers I've seen. They do seem to show the actress disappearing into the character so very well.[/quote]
Saying so may even be an understatement, Ron, as all of her previous performances can't hold a candle to this one in terms of her communicating and projecting a character which bears little semblance to her real-life persona while masking her mannerisms, quirks and idiosyncrasies. Even if we were to contrast this with a similar role, such as when Kristen played Snow White in SWATH, during the finale when she was crowned the queen of Tabor, the similarities are virtually nonexistent.
I'm now wondering if she's taken some method acting classes to finally allow her to exorcise all of her Bella Swan eccentricities. Even if we were to compare this to her best performances prior to this one, be it Valentine in Clouds of Sils Maria, Joan Jett in The Runaways, Lydia Howland in Still Alice, Jean Seberg in Seberg, Melinda in Speak, Georgia in The Cake Eaters or Maureen in Personal Shopper, none of her past performances can hold a candle to her portrayal of the Princess of Wales. Yes, it was that good.
Now I can declare with confidence that Kristen has finally come into her own, taking her level of acting maturity and stature to another level. Whether or not this is the best version of her acting self, her magnum opus, remains to be seen. But all I can say with a measure of certainty is I doubt there exists a dramatic role she cannot convincingly portray after nailing this one with an exclamation point. Contrary to what I stated in the outset in jest, you will not be disappointed.
[quote]I like your summary outline. It'll be interesting to see how things develop, studio, director, cast. That said, of course I realize that it can be quite difficult to get a film going. [/quote]
I wish I could divulge more--what I've mentioned about my script is barely scratching the surface of what the film is really about--but because it takes up to 6 months (3 months average) for the copyright to be formally registered with the U.S. Copyright Office of the Library of Congress, I'll keep most of the details under wraps.
But then again, a film usually takes much longer than 3-6 months to produce, so I shouldn't really be worried about someone ripping off the entirety of my screenplay verbatim, for by then it will be legally protected.
Anyhow, thanks for the vote of confidence, Ron, and hopefully one day this script sees the light of day and made into a film.
I finally completed the screenplay, Ron and recently copyrighted it with the U.S. Copyright Office/Library of Congress. As far as securing funding if this project is ever greenlit, hopefully a potential director and producer will find it.
My job is to contact Kristen or whomever else might be interested in using the script to base a film upon. Russell Brand would be a good alternate choice as he is extremely vocal about several topics being explored in my screenplay on his immensely popular YouTube channel, which currently has 4.34 million subscribers.
When I mentioned those two films I was primarily talking about the backdrop and type of world the main character will be living in. In my opinion, the story goes much deeper than these films, especially at the moral and spiritual level.
I'm still working on my query letter to send out to Kristen or her agent, but so far it goes something like this:
[quote]
[b]The Philanthropist[/b]
Dear Ms. Agent:
Jobina has it all: beauty, brains, good health, a loving family and friends, along with fame and fortune. Her story is set in the not-too-distant future where in stark contrast many have very little as inequality runs rampant. For this reason, it is her mission in life as a philanthropist to use her considerable influence and wealth to help change society for the better. But little does Jobina know that there are powerful forces lurking behind the scenes, both human and otherworldly who engage in a tug-of-war to compete for her allegiance, both sides wanting her to represent their interests—whether it is her becoming the leader of a nation or the last of the chosen ones.
Jobina experiences a reversal of fortune as she comes face to face with death while the future of the world hangs in the balance. She’s a pawn in the ultimate battle of good versus evil. She is tested to her very core—losing everything she holds dear via betrayal and death. But she reemerges victorious as a result—going from riches to rags and back to riches. She will undergo radical change in her station in life once more, this time allowing her to make a difference of epic proportions.
But in the end, reality sets in as this was all part of a full dive virtual reality simulation which Jobina unknowingly took part in. Like deja vu, some of the things now happening in the present occurred in the VR simulation, making one wonder how much of it will transpire in real life. Scary indeed as some of the incidents which happened during the simulation involve some of the most terrifying events imaginable. But on the flip side, Jobina also experienced heaven on earth. So how does it end when virtual reality and reality become indistinguishable in the mind of the protagonist--as a dystopia or a utopia?
This screenplay was written specifically for Kristen Stewart as I took into consideration her penchant for choosing certain genre roles and character archetypes she excels at portraying. I believe this script has something for everyone: action, adventure, drama, suspense, fantasy, horror, epic, thriller, comedy, and romance. Please let me know it you or Ms. Stewart is interested in obtaining a copy of the script. Thank you for taking the time out of your busy schedule to read this.
Sincerely,
LL Owens [/quote]