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Post by Mr Dedlock on May 5, 2020 0:08:36 GMT
if she is starring they would mention it, so this is just as a producer.
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Post by WizLemon on Jun 17, 2020 19:52:16 GMT
I finished 'A Good Marriage' yesterday. And I must say, I was pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed it. I have become a bit jaded with the predictable BigLittleLie-esque formula. But in this case it absolutely worked!
I will give you a brief synopsis and it may contain some soft spoilers so proceed only if you want to know.
The protagonist is Lizzie. She is a star attorney but struggling in her marriage with Sam, her alcoholic writer husband. They are also struggling financially because of a litigation. Lizzie's old law school friend, Zach Grayson calls her out of nowhere and is arrested for the murder of his wife, Amanda after they attend a sex-orgy party. He convinces/blackmails her into taking up his case. We also find out Amanda, his wife, had been running from her dark past, but it seems like her past had caught up with her before she is found dead. Lizzie retraces Amanda's steps and starts to read her journal - all of which exposes a spider web of lies and deceit spun around the lives of the who's-who of Manhattan/Brooklyn.
Zach's character is deplorable and SO juicy. He is short, slight appearing and seedy. Like Matt Smith (The Crown/Dr Who) or Michael Kelly (House of Cards) or John Slattery (Mad Men) etc. Amanda is young and gorgeous and has a nervous energy about her. Almost like Margot Robbie's character in Bombshell. May be like a young Claire Danes or January Jones.
Lizzie is the only main character that Kidman can potentially play. It's a gritty, sharp, focused lawyer whose life is imploding while working on an explosive case. I kept thinking though, this doesn't seem like an older woman. May be someone in their early 40s. Like Kidman in Birth or The Invasion. Other choices: Elizabeth Moss would be phenomenal. May be Kerry Washington. There's a really really small but powerful role of Lizzie's 'investigator fairy godmother' that Kidman in a Top of the Lake wig would KILL. May be Whoopi Goldberg or Kyra Sedgwick too.
Anyway. Quite a thrilling read. I can't wait for the screen adaptation.
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Post by paperboy88 on Jun 18, 2020 1:15:42 GMT
mmm interesting, I should give it a try, i'm still trying to finish 'My lovely Wife' ...
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Post by paperboy88 on Jun 18, 2020 2:14:21 GMT
PS. am I the only one that so confused with A Good Marriage, My Lovely Wife, Pretty Things, can't tell the the difference between like.. at all? Nope me too lol there are so many projects she is linked to.. they all sound the same, we should just wait and see what actually gets done, with whats going on right now i dont think anything is happening soon.. it's kinda scary, specially in the US. I'm still hoping she gets a small independent film announced... maybe like many of us wish, move to Europe for a couple of years and do more interesting material.
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Post by curdey on Jun 18, 2020 7:14:58 GMT
Nope me too lol there are so many projects she is linked to.. they all sound the same, we should just wait and see what actually gets done, with whats going on right now i dont think anything is happening soon.. it's kinda scary, specially in the US. I'm still hoping she gets a small independent film announced... maybe like many of us wish, move to Europe for a couple of years and do more interesting material. that AGC period dramedy is gone, right? OMG completely forgot about that one! God, I hope that eventually happens...!!!!
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Post by triflo on Jun 18, 2020 7:28:30 GMT
that AGC period dramedy is gone, right? OMG completely forgot about that one! God, I hope that eventually happens...!!!! Not a single mention since the other brief:) mention from last year. I remember it was during last year's Cannes FF but neither of other projects mentioned in article went into production.
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Post by triflo on Jun 18, 2020 7:30:47 GMT
PS. am I the only one that so confused with A Good Marriage, My Lovely Wife, Pretty Things, can't tell the the difference between like.. at all? I know! Keep confusing them. I've read The Expatriates and Female Persuassion. Now I will try My Lovely Wife because it will be published at the end of the month in my country.
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Post by misstoker on Jun 18, 2020 13:20:38 GMT
PS. am I the only one that so confused with A Good Marriage, My Lovely Wife, Pretty Things, can't tell the the difference between like.. at all? You are not alone Kaniska...
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Post by brittany on Jun 18, 2020 21:12:35 GMT
PS. am I the only one that so confused with A Good Marriage, My Lovely Wife, Pretty Things, can't tell the the difference between like.. at all? You are not alone Kaniska... The Good Marriage, My Lovely Wife, The Expatriates, Truly Madly Guilty, The Last Anniversary, Mice, Nine Perfect Strangers, The Silent Wife, You Should Have Known, Pretty Things, and Big Little Lies all kind of fall under the domestic mystery category of books. I think like at least seven of them (trying to remember them all) are mysteries regarding someone dying and it affecting either a group of friends or a couple... I love Nicole (obviously lol), but I wish her taste in books was as adventurous and daring as her taste in film and directors. A lot of those books kind of blend together after having read them. There are so many better novels out there.
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Post by triflo on Jun 18, 2020 21:41:41 GMT
You are not alone Kaniska... The Good Marriage, My Lovely Wife, The Expatriates, Truly Madly Guilty, The Last Anniversary, Mice, Nine Perfect Strangers, The Silent Wife, You Should Have Known, Pretty Things, and Big Little Lies all kind of fall under the domestic mystery category of books. I think like at least seven of them (trying to remember them all) are mysteries regarding someone dying and it affecting either a group of friends or a couple... I love Nicole (obviously lol), but I wish her taste in books was as adventurous and daring as her taste in film and directors. A lot of those books kind of blend together after having read them. There are so many better novels out there. Exactly. They are all like from the same book club:) Similar to that one which was organized by Reese Witherspoon in Little Fires Everywhere:) Safe, a bit cliche, comforting. These books are not really provocative or truly moving. It's not "good literature". It's entertaining, quite "easily" written, meant to be a bestseller. I would love see at least ONE more ambitious choice like, for example Elizabeth Strout, Zeruya Shalev or Zadie Smith adaptation. Pedro Almodovar did Alice Munro adaptation and now is working on Lucia Berlin short stories - wonderful work, absolutely loved it. Yorgos Lanthimos is adapting Ottessa Moshfegh - My Year of Rest and Relaxation - great, very modern, provocative full of great observations and dark humour - read during pandemic, not a best moment for a book about isolation but I loved it:) Lynne Ramsay is working on Margaret Atwood short stories which I also liked very much. Have You read Big Little Lies? It's laughable how domestic violence/rape is described there (I felt the same amount of shallowness in The Expatriates with another "heavy" subject matter like loosing a child). It's like another "experience", very lightly and mostly used for "mystery". Of course the show elevated that so incredibly and took that mediocre book to another level so maybe Nicole simple sees some sort of deeper potential in all these adaptations. Like exploring subject matters which are only signalized in these books. I don't know.
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Post by brittany on Jun 18, 2020 21:59:27 GMT
The Good Marriage, My Lovely Wife, The Expatriates, Truly Madly Guilty, The Last Anniversary, Mice, Nine Perfect Strangers, The Silent Wife, You Should Have Known, Pretty Things, and Big Little Lies all kind of fall under the domestic mystery category of books. I think like at least seven of them (trying to remember them all) are mysteries regarding someone dying and it affecting either a group of friends or a couple... I love Nicole (obviously lol), but I wish her taste in books was as adventurous and daring as her taste in film and directors. A lot of those books kind of blend together after having read them. There are so many better novels out there. Exactly. They are all like from the same book club:) Similar to that one which was organized by Reese Witherspoon in Little Fires Everywhere:) Safe, a bit cliche, comforting. These books are not really provocative or truly moving. It's not "good literature". It's entertaining, quite "easily" written, meant to be a bestseller. I would love see at least ONE more ambitious choice like, for example Elizabeth Strout, Zeruya Shalev or Zadie Smith adaptation. Pedro Almodovar did Alice Munro adaptation and now is working on Lucia Berlin short stories - wonderful work, absolutely loved it. Yorgos Lanthimos is adapting Ottessa Moshfegh - My Year of Rest and Relaxation - great, very modern, provocative full of great observations and dark humour - read during pandemic, not a best moment for a book about isolation but I loved it:) Lynne Ramsay is working on Margaret Atwood short stories which I also liked very much. Have You read Big Little Lies? It's laughable how domestic violence/rape is described there (I felt the same amount of shallowness in The Expatriates with another "heavy" subject matter like loosing a child). It's like another "experience", very lightly and mostly used for "mystery". Of course the show elevated that so incredibly and took that mediocre book to another level so maybe Nicole simple sees some sort of deeper potential in all these adaptations. Like exploring subject matters which are only signalized in these books. I don't know. I agree completely. They're not bad books, but they're quite conventional. I get it, these kind of stories are probably easy to get studios to green-light and actually get made, and a lot of people love these kinds of films and television shows (Big Little Lies was incredible!). But I just wish she would acquire some weird, unique, or risky stuff as well. Rachel Weisz is about to produce and star in a film based on 'Lanny' by Max Porter, which is one of the best books I've read in years. Along with your Lanthimos/Moshfegh suggestion (I loved that book as well!), Lanthimos is also adapting a Jim Thomson novel and a Richard Brautigan one, both of which are very off beat and which I absolutely loved. I know these kids of novels are likely harder to get made, but I think the end result can be more rewarding. I hope Nicole can mix it up with the next books she gets the rights to.
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Post by triflo on Jun 18, 2020 22:38:16 GMT
Oh yes! I was thinking the whole time about Rachel Weisz and her 'Lanny' adaptation and eventually forgot about it:) Thanks for bringing that up. So true. Wonderful novel. Lanthimos is on fire with these choices. I totally agree with You. I wish Nicole could be at least more adventurous in choosing literature material. I wish she could do at least one more time something as daring as The Hours.
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Post by paperboy88 on Jun 18, 2020 23:07:56 GMT
" I just wish she would acquire some weird, unique, or risky stuff as well"
Yea I know, we need her to do something outrageous again 😬.
I completely agree with you guys, these stories are easy fun read, entertaining, but that's about it.. like Brittany said, they just get produced easier, but I want her to hopefully produce, star in something more edgy and fresh.
Pushed these boundries Nic.
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Post by raneto on Jun 19, 2020 7:49:05 GMT
Totally, this books looks all the same, but sometimes is more easy to adapt average/mediocre books to film or tv. It's very hard to translate a complex/great book into a great movie, I can think about The Goldfinch, to be in Kidman's field. I would love to see her going after more daring/good literature, but it's not every screenwriter that can keep the magic and turn a great book into a satisfying adaptation. What I would love to see Kidman looking for it's a more diverse kind of stories in different genres, doing things like Watchmen, sci fiction, horror. This plotlines from all this books she is working on looks cliche and formulaic.
I mean, I never wanted to read BLL, the book seems well done and entertaining, but watching the show from HBO you can assume that the source material it's not complex/robust literature. So, if you have a great director and screenwriter and a good production with great cast there can be magic all over things. What bothers me most in those recent projects it's that the stories looks just the same, in general. I loved Watchmen, I wanted so badly Kidman doing something really different like that. And all those things it's happening in TV, so, a place that she is doing great deals. It's not like we are talking about this kind of stories in movies; but in TV, with so many platforms and money rolling out right now with all the streaming companies. She locked deals with Hulu, Amazon, HBO. So why not bring different projects to them? I understand that with the huge success of BLL they want to repeat the magic maybe, but it's a little bit frustrating. Hope in the near future we can hear good things about different projects, like a period piece - yes watching The Great and loving it, the episode 08 was just PERFECT - or she working with a more bold writer/showrunner.
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Post by triflo on Jun 19, 2020 8:38:46 GMT
Totally, this books looks all the same, but sometimes is more easy to adapt average/mediocre books to film or tv. It's very hard to translate a complex/great book into a great movie, I can think about The Goldfinch, to be in Kidman's field. I would love to see her going after more daring/good literature, but it's not every screenwriter that can keep the magic and turn a great book into a satisfying adaptation. What I would love to see Kidman looking for it's a more diverse kind of stories in different genres, doing things like Watchmen, sci fiction, horror. This plotlines from all this books she is working on looks cliche and formulaic. I mean, I never wanted to read BLL, the book seems well done and entertaining, but watching the show from HBO you can assume that the source material it's not complex/robust literature. So, if you have a great director and screenwriter and a good production with great cast there can be magic all over things. What bothers me most in those recent projects it's that the stories looks just the same, in general. I loved Watchmen, I wanted so badly Kidman doing something really different like that. And all those things it's happening in TV, so, a place that she is doing great deals. It's not like we are talking about this kind of stories in movies; but in TV, with so many platforms and money rolling out right now with all the streaming companies. She locked deals with Hulu, Amazon, HBO. So why not bring different projects to them? I understand that with the huge success of BLL they want to repeat the magic maybe, but it's a little bit frustrating. Hope in the near future we can hear good things about different projects, like a period piece - yes watching The Great and loving it, the episode 08 was just PERFECT - or she working with a more bold writer/showrunner. You beautifully lead us to another question:) Why she sticks only to book adaptations? And only these "hot" and "new". She's giving money along with Meryl Streep to that female screenwriters sort of University:) Sorry, don't remember the name of it. I'm sure she could use some of the ideas from these ladies and really elevate some talents. I sort of trust Nicole in "seeing something deeper" in these novels she choose. If she will continue to bring the best out of these books like she did with BLL I'll be fine with it. I think she truly works on that simply by choosing really talented people to collaborate with. I just hope The Undoing will clarify that. I know conventional bestsellers popular in some demographic are easier to make but doing more provocative/fresh/even controversial series wasn't the reason why we are witnessing such a revival of "good television"? Why almost everyone in very different stages of careers are making tv now? Maybe Nicole doesn't have power to bring something fresh/provocative/original by herself in cinema but I think she could clearly do that in tv, especially now after four years of successes. On the other hand, I truly admire her for being now such a bussinesswoman, making deals with HBO/Hulu/Amazon, creating female-centered projects. It's quite impressive and I think she's not receiving enough credit for that. Like for acting talent really:) So again, like many times before it's very complex situation:) Nicole is always full of contradictions just like our reactions towards her career choices:)
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