LenaOlin Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Villains We Love: Romeo is Bleeding
Filed under: Fandom », Trailers and Clips »
I cannot possibly think of villains without thinking of Lena Olin's Mona Demarkov. While the trailer for Romeo is Bleeding suggests that the film is nothing more than a ridiculous camp fest, her portrayal of the sadistic Russian hitwoman is mesmerizing and scary. With ease, she oozes every aspect of evil.
She can be the stoic, gravelly voiced baddie who bides her time, waiting for the perfect moment -- her eyes not missing a thing. She can be the seductress, using her beauty to easily prey on Jack's (Gary Oldman) continually wandering eye. She can be the villain who never gets killed -- not swayed by a shot to the arm, or other wounds that challenge her. But her most memorable evil -- her most villainous aspect -- is her adoration of real, intimate, bodily violence. She's not some bad gal with firepower. Her violence is within her, her weapons being the things lying around, or her own body. And she loves to give pain. She doesn't just smile -- violence makes her happy.
Take the scene after the jump (strong language warning!): She starts to choke Jack, and as he struggles for air, she laughs -- not just a giggle, but an eruption of pure, seemingly sexual, delight -- the throaty laugh, eyes closed, back arched. When Jack finally breaks free, her panting body looks post-coital, not post-choking. He hurts her. She keeps fighting. She chokes him with her legs, and then frees herself. It's almost absurd, but not in the carefully crafted fictional way -- it seems just crazy enough to be true, like Peter Medak pulled a real villain off the streets to play Mona. In one package, she's the femme fatale and the tough-as-nails baddie.
Retro Cinema: Romeo is Bleeding
Filed under: Drama », Fandom », Home Entertainment », Retro Cinema »
Yes, this is Gary Oldman week for me and retro cinema, but you won't see me complaining. Usually, the chameleon Oldman morphs and slides onto the screen for one of his many diverse supporting roles. Most recently, he's taken on heroes like Sirius Black and Lt. James Gordon, but he's got a past that includes the little person Rolfe, the creepy Mason Verger, Pontius Pilate, Zorg, a Russian hijacker, and as I shared earlier this week, Ludwig van Beethoven. 1993's Romeo is Bleeding, however, marks one of the few times like Immortal Beloved where we can see him shine in the lead.
Oldman plays Jack Grimaldi, a cop who has been lured by the dark side in a noir '90s landscape. (Think Twin Peaks' timeless quality and haunting music, but set within a violent urban environment.) To supplement his low-pay job as a sergeant, Grimaldi is working for the mob -- directing them to the locations of different witnesses under protection. For his efforts, he gets thousands of dollars, which he hides in the back of his yard. But this is only the tip of Jack's moral failings. While he has a wife named Natalie (Annabella Sciorra) at home, he's also acting out fantasies with his grating girlfriend, Sheri (Juliette Lewis).
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