Sunday Scene Stealer: Olivia Thirlby

Welcome to a new weekly feature here at Movies with Abe, Sunday Scene Stealer. Each week, I’ll be writing about an actor or actress who manages to deliver an impressive, film-enhancing performance with limited screen time. The performer will often have appeared in one or multiple new or recent films, though I may get nostalgic from time to time and hark back to a film from several years ago. Please chime in with your thoughts and comments on the abilities of this particular actor or actress and where you’ve seen their best performance, especially if you’ve had the opportunity to see any films I haven’t.

Olivia Thirlby
This lovely actress has graced the screen for mere minutes in two movies released in the past month. She was featured in Brett Ratner’s segment from “New York, I Love You” opposite Anton Yelchin and James Caan, and shared scenes with Lynn Collins in this past Friday’s release “Uncertainity.” The New York native first hit it big in mainstream hit “Juno” as the best friend of the pregnant superhero. Unlike the equally terrific Alia Shawkat, who portrayed Ellen Page’s best bud in “Whip It,” Thirlby’s character doesn’t yearn to break the rules. She’s a relatively good influence on her plucky teenage friend, yet she still manages to be memorable with a limited role. She’s positively charming and suggestively flirtatious at the same time. I can’t recall the specifics of her role in “Snow Angels,” but glancing back at my review, I see that I cited her as the “lone strong spot.” Thirlby greatly added to the romance as the love interest for the unenthusiastic Josh Peck in “The Wackness” last year, and it was terrific to see her finally get the kind of lead role she deserves. Thirlby’s two most recent performances have both been expectedly superb but equally fleeting. “Uncertainty” doesn’t give her much to do other than react to her sister’s decision to confide in her, but she still properly evokes a sense of family and helps tie down the otherwise free-wheeling lead characters to some sense of home. Her first appearance is actually on a television screen as her family huddles around to watch her performing in a play, and it’s a fantastic introduction. “New York, I Love You” gives her the chance to be alluring and artful as a girl in a wheelchair who gets the chance to go to a high school prom. Her sedated chemistry with Yelchin (“Star Trek,” “Charlie Bartlett”) is mesmerizing, and it’s easily the most affecting part of the whole movie. Thirlby also recurred on the TV series “Bored to Death” this past season as the ex-girlfriend of persistent private detective Jonathan. It’s the typical role for her that she plays so well – the unattainable and somewhat distant girl who just has some irresistible quality about her.

Quadruple Feature Part Two: The Wackness

The Wackness
Directed by Jonathan Levine
Released July 3, 2008

The title of “The Wackness” prepares you perfectly for the journey the film will take you on – a drugged-out yet remarkably grounded exploration of the intersecting lives of two malcontent 1990s New Yorkers dealing with problems at home and simple boredom with their unenthusiastic lives. The film has an incredibly distinctive style which is at times straight-up weird and at others intoxicating and moving. The music utilizes music entirely effectively, broadening the characters’ personalities while simultaneously giving the film a certain beat. Though the 90s were only a decade ago, the film still has a wonderfully appropriate dated feel which makes it all the more intriguing. It’s wicked fun to see the usually stock serious Ben Kingsley go out on such on a limb to portray a goofy psychiatrist who really has little idea what he is doing yet still searches continually for his own meaning in life. My impression of Kingsley is starkly contrasted by my lack of amusement with co-lead Josh Peck, fresh off of a Nickelodeon television show, whose lack of motivation and deep-rooted laziness seems to extend far beyond the character he’s portraying on screen. The character does contrast nicely with Kingsley’s, but as a result Kingsley is stuck with carrying most of the film all by himself. Fortunately, Olivia Thirlby, who shined recently as the best friend of the pregnant “Juno”, is on hand as Kingsley’s daughter and Peck’s love interest, a performance that showcases her talent and shows that this girl really needs to be in a lot of movies in the future. I was very saddened by the relative absence of Famke Janssen, who blew me away with her trippy performance on “Nip/Tuck” a few years ago, and who might have given an only appropriate similar performance here, or at least something along the lines of Annette Bening in “Running with Scissors”. Janssen’s screentime is limited, however, and we’re stuck with the oddball duo of Kingsley and Peck. The dialogue here is more than ridiculous, and I cannot honestly believe people actually talk like that, but it magically works just right for this heavily offbeat and massively entertaining film.

B+

Minute with Abe: Quadruple Feature Part Two

Read the full review.