20 Amazing Moments with Emma Stone in Easy A

Up until today I had been quite adamant that the best female lead performance that I saw for a 2010 film was not Natalie Portman, Annette Bening or Christina Aguilera, but actually Robin McLeavy in The Loved One. That's truly a performance that will become an iconic one for the ages... once people actually see it, that is. People - well, horror aficionados, anyway - will be talking about that one for a long, long time. That's the trouble with horror flops, they're rarely given much credence until people later down the line get to watch it without the stigma attached.

Unfortunately for McLeavy, I can't say she's my no. 1 anymore because I just watched Emma Stone blow every other actress of 2010 out of the water with her performance in Easy A. She has a way with a zinger - a cleverly written one or not - and a perfect balance of flamboyance and holding back. She never verges fully into caricature territory, but remains suitably bubbly and active throughout the film's entirety. She's like the Energizer Bunny's sexy, throaty voiced cousin. Plus, she has a veritable closet full of faces and expressions at her disposable - she's like a perkier Laura Dern. She gives a better performance in the blooper reel than most others gave in their completed films! I know I'm not the only one, and I can only hope more are willing to come out of the proverbial closet as time wears on.

I'm not sure if the movie is completely up to the task of supporting Ms Stone, but it does a fairly good job of it. Sure, the romantic interest played by Penn Bagdley is curiously under-developed, the religious subplot isn't taken far enough and comes off as a lesser Saved!, while I wish Dan Byrd - so fabulous on Cougar Town - had stayed around for longer. Easy A wears it's John Hughes influence like a badge of honour, although I could have done without the obviousness of it. I mean, for a film that wants to say something about teenagers it sure does assume a lot of them are idiots. Nevertheless, Emma Stone (and the fantastic adult cast) are always there to keep the film going strong. B+

Anyway, because she's so great, here are just some of my favourite Emma Stone moments from Easy A. And trust me, there were so many more that I could have included, but I had to draw the line somewhere, and screencapping every single face she made felt slightly excessive. Slightly.


"Tom Cruise?"


"Thank you. They're Costco!"


"Isn't that always the way? The books you read in class always seem to have some strong connection with whatever angsty adolescent drama is going on. Except for Huckleberry Finn, 'cause I don't know any teenage boys who have ever run away with a big, hulking black guy."


"Perhaps you should get a wardrobe, you abominable twat!"


"I will take that challenge!"


"What?"


"What the hell is a lemon squeeze?"



"I hope you don't mind, but we had a few pre-cocktail party cocktails. Like, before the cocktail party. With cocktails."


"What do you think I have down there? A gnome?"


"Put it in the pile of gifts from my other suitors."


"What's your problem?"


"You wanna know what my problem is?"
"No, that was a rhetorical question. I don't wanna know anything from you."



"Oh rats!"


"He got a Coke Zero again? Oh that Roman. Incorrigible!"


"A is for 'awesome'"


"Sharpening you pencils? Getting them nice and sharp? Hmm? Sharpenin' 'em up? Look at you! Look at you! *gasp* So sharp! *gasp* Sharpening those pencils! Sharp, sharp, sharp, sharp! Ooh, god they're sharp!"


"So I guess I shouldn't be too shocked that these people wanted my diseased ass outta there. The funny this is, the whole time this all was going down I couldn't help but think I could have come up with better signs.


"Not now, Quiznos!"


"Ugh, YUM!"


"You're funny."



"Knock, knock, knock on wood..."


"I know it interferes with the basketball game, but, come on, would you rather be here cheering on the Woodchucks or watch me do one?"
I don't particularly have the time nor the inclination to do what I just did but for all of the wonderful moments the rest of the cast have, like Lisa Kudrow's "I'm the guidance counselor, I should know all the students. Especially the ones that dress like prostitutes", but I wanted to single out the fabulous Patricia Clarkson. Isn't she just magical? She and Stanley Tucci ("It sounds like you're having sex up here, which I know can't be true due to the fact that you have a homosexual boyfriend",) work wonders together. I particularly got a ridiculous amount of chuckles out of this sparkly moment, but then there's also the "spell check" line, the talk about homosexuals ("he seemed a little... incredibly gay",) and the car bonnet sequence late in the film. She's a treasure, I tellsya! A treasure!


"Is there an Olive here?"
"There's a whole jar of them in the fridge!"

You've done a good thing, National Board of Review

Jacki Weaver done gone and won some fancy award or somethin'! Who'da thunk it?

Hey Randall, before you go on, this boy who's currently being looked after, tell me if you agree with this, this boy who's being looked after... he knows who you are and you know how these things go. They're gonna ask him all sorts of questions about everythin' he's ever seen or done. Everyone he's ever met, the whole shamozzle. And you've done some bad things, Sweetie. Haven't ya?

I want this part to be clear, this is not about you doing me a favour or me blackmailing you or anything like that, it's just a bad situation for everyone. Esra's got the address, it shouldn't be too hard to set up a raid on the house. It'd be reasonable grounds what with all the strange activity, the comings and goings, day and night. One of the neighbours might have seen a gun or something. This is your area of expertise, I'm not trying to tell you how to suck eggs. What do you think?

...

Randall, I feel sick about this. I'm not happy at all, not one little bit. But we do what we have to do, we do what we must. Just because we don't wanna do something doesn't mean it can't be done.

The King's Joy

Back in early November we got a look at the poster for Harvey Weinstein's big Oscar contender The King's Speech. It was not good. We later heard from the film's director Tom Hooper that the poster was being scrapped and that a new one was coming along very soon. It made sense that they would do that since, well, did you see that first poster? It was one of the worst posters you'll ever see for a major release.

We now have said new poster and while it is certainly an improvement over the first one's poorly Photoshopped goofiness and strange constipated expressions, there is more to object to. Let's take a look at the British quad (a design from which I'm sure the new American poster will be incorporated out of).


Yes, I think we can all agree this is better. However, I call umbrage on that quote from Empire.

"LIKE ALL GREAT FILMS IT SIMPLY FILLS YOU WITH JOY"
Empire

While I might normally expect a quote such as this to come from a hack quote whore critic whose sole job in life is to appear on posters for everything from The King's Speech to Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous sounding like a rabid wowser frothing at the mouth, but Empire are usually a bit better than that.

Still, this quote is all kinds of wrong no matter who said it. "Like all great film"? you say. Like "ALL" of them? It's nice to know that, according to Empire, you can only be considered a great film if it "fills you with joy". Sorry Lars von Trier, Michelangelo Antonioni, Darren Aronofsky, Ingmar Bergman, Andrey Tarkovskiy, Stanley Kubrick, Yasujirô Ozu, Claire Denis, Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, Gus Van Sant and any other director over the last 100+ years of filmmaking. Unless all those miserable and challenging films you made over the years didn't fill us with joy then they can no longer be hailed as great. Don't even get me started on your films being called masterpieces. Only the most joyful of joyous films get that title.