When I was thinking about my chances of see
Red Riding Hood, I could only put it down to one thing: I like Amanda Seyfried, and she is the prime reason as to why I'd see this. I've always admired Miss Seyfried, and usually always watch a movie which she's in. But then I had a little think. I don't really like any of her movies. And that got me thinking even further. Can Amanda be one of my favourite actresses even though I don't like any of her movies? Let's take a look at the movies of hers that I have seen, and I'll weigh up my options: to like or not to like?
Tier One: I actually do like this one.
Mean Girls is one of my favourite movies of all time. While Rachel McAdams is undoubtedly the stand out in this movie, Amanda does a brilliant job in her first feature film as the really stupid Karen. There's dumb, then there's so dumb air is the only thing in ones head, and then there is Karen. In an ethical world, we shouldn't really laugh at ones misfortune, Amanda makes Karen Smith kinda likeable, but still really stupid. Like, a lovable kind of stupid. And, without our Karen, we wouldn't have known that this wasn't true:
"So, you have your cousins, and then you have your first cousins, and then you have your second cousins..."
And, of course, if all else fails in life, you can use your breasts to find out whether it's raining or not. Karen is like the forgotten heroine of
Mean Girls.
Tier two - I don't mind you, but I could do without you.
Okay, I admit, I do like
Mamma Mia! Well...I did. I haven't seen it in two years. But seriously, I watched it
a lot back in 2008, and I could sing you every one of the songs in that goddamn movie. Oh, and you wouldn't want to try and beat me at ABBA Singstar, because I rock at that. However, because half of the cast can't sing,
Mamma Mia! is a painful experience for many. However, Amanda can sing, even though she comes across as trying a little too hard. She's pretty sweet in this movie, as she is in any movie, which is probably why she has built up this persona as the 'sweetest girl on the block'. She's a likeable heroine for such an annoying story, and the fact that her and Dominic Cooper click so well makes it so much easier to watch. I did feel like she couldn't quite stand up to all the talent around her (The Streep, Pierce 'I can't sing' Brosnan, Colin 'King of the World' Firth and Eric off
True Blood's daddy), but she made a good effort. And that's all we can ask of Amanda. No matter what everyone says,
Mamma Mia! is still great fun.
Here's another guilty Amanda entry...I did quite enjoy
Jennifer's Body, but only to a certain point. I would never watch this shit again.
Ever. I mean, it has Megan Fox in it. She was horribly terrible in that film. Absolutely horribly terrible. Then there's lots of strange sexualized horror in there which doesn't make any sense at all, and the story is effing terrible. Plus, not being homophobic at all, but there's random lesbian kissing which doesn't make any sense at all to the story. And the end is bloody annoying. Even though everything is so goddamn awful, now I remember it, I really quite enjoyed it. I don't know how, but I did. And I believe that most of that enjoyment came from Amanda Seyfried, because out of everyone in the film, she was the one who could act the most. Not that she had much competition. This is quite a random film to have on her filmography, as it required her to go back to high school long after she'd left, but the fact that it was written by Oscar winning
Juno scribe Diablo Cody does give it some credentials. Anyway, this, on paper, must be one of her worst flicks.
Tier three - Dear God, you suck!
Alright, alright. I get why a lot of people would dig
Dear John. It has a sad story, I admit. It has a father with mental issues, which is the kind of character I always get attached to. It has that hot buff guy from
Step Up. BUT IT'S WRITTEN BY NICHOLAS SPARKS. Therefore, it is awful. Before I launch into a huge rant on why Nicholas Sparks is the most annoying man to have anything to do with literature, I'll say this: how is it that this man can ruin our lives with his horribly schmaltzy pieces of work and still give us enough to get a wee bit emotional at the end of all his films? I hate myself every time I feel like crying at the end of a Nicholas Sparks movie. Which is why I avoid them like the plague. I thought
Dear John would somehow be different, since it has such likeable stars like Amanda and Channing, along with back up from Richard Jenkins. Mind you,
The Notebook had suck likeable stars as Rachel McAdams, Ryan Gosling and James Marsden, and it was still annoying.
Dear John was just so
boring. And to think that this was the film that knocked
Avatar off the top of the box office. Do cinemagoers really like being bored like that these days? Amanda shone, though, which was the main thing.
Ah...it's like deja vu. Amanda seems to like her letters. First she stars in
Mamma Mia! which opens with a scene of letter postin'. Then she stars in
Dear John, which is like a romance told through letters. To round it all off she stars in
Letters to Juliet, which is pretty much a film about letters. God help us when she discovers emails. I actually regard this one as a better film than
Dear John, even though you could pretty much watch the trailer and know exactly what was going to happen in the film. But, like
Dear John, this movie is bland. Just really, really bland. And totes forgettable. Because, since when were a whole lot of letters to someone who never existed in the first place an interesting plotline? Never. But when you have Amanda in the lead role, things just seem better already.
Chloe must be one of Amanda's better performances. The movie is pretty bland, and pretty awful (even though it has Julianne Moore and Liam Neeson in it), but Amanda's out of character turn as a high class hooker was actually pretty good. Even though I'm sure 55% of her performance is based on her being so good looking. Chloe is such a strange character, which I think Amanda played with really well. And this film managed to take all the sweetness out of her and make her a less than innocent being. Which was nice, considering that this is such a change of scene for young Amanda, but the rest of the film was pretty stupid, so it doesn't exactly offer fireworks and what not for her career. Though, to the minority of people who did check this Atom Egoyan flick out, she'll remain as the most memorable thing in this otherwise forgettable work.
What lies in the future for Amanda? Is she better than all of this?
I know that
Red Riding Hood is a very present movie, but it's very futuristic for me since I'm waiting for the DVD release. But I've heard quite a bit of praise for Amanda's work, even though this looks like crap. Which is exactly why I thought of this post. She's always good, but her movies? No. Her next movie is one called
Now, previously known as
I'm.Mortal, which also stars Justin Timberlake, Olivia Wilde and Cillian Murphy. If it has Cillian Murphy in it, it has to be good. And I like the look of it's plot: a world where aging stops at 25 years old. Yeah, Nicole Kidman would like a world like that, too. Then she wouldn't have to use all of that botox.
P.S. Notice how Amanda is sitting in Cillian Murphy's chair? She's great, but not
that great.
I think Amanda is still a pretty cool actress, but I'd place her well outside my most favourite actresses since her filmography isn't anything to scream about. But who knows? I think she could pick up an Oscar nomination before she retires.
What are your thoughts on Amanda Seyfried? Is she a yay or nay for you?
