Win,

Beasts of the Southern Wild? I saw a mention of that one. Now I will definitely have to go see it upon your recommendation.

Regarding Robert De Niro, yes, I did see that he was barely putting any effort into the role but I also saw how he let himself become the role and I think he really believed in it. He’s gotten to the point where he’s no longer De Niro. Robert De Niro really doesn’t exist. You see him on talk shows and he’s like wall paper. He really has no personality. He is what is going on in that moment as he puts himself into a role. He disappears. So of course it would look like he mailed it in. He didn’t show up to act. He became the role.

In that last clip I linked, the one with the Katie Couric interview with Director David O. Russell and Robert De Niro, you hear Russell describe De Niro’s acting style in this film. Russell’s son has a mood disorder and he described how this can be very scary and his home was definitely not a normal one. He wanted to direct a film about this so others can see that there are many not normal households in America, “this chaos in your house that’s so humbling”.

His son has a cameo in the film. He’s the nosy kid next door that comes to the door at the most inopportune times to ask if he can "interview" the son and film a documentary on mental disorders. De Niro plays the Dad and is also very protective of his son, as David O. Russell is of his. He’s always telling the kid to “get out of here” and slams the door. An ironic role for the kid to be playing when in real life he has what Bradley Cooper has in the movie that Robert De Niro is protecting him from. Amazing to hear that anecdote.

De Niro improvised so much of this movie its not funny and to have come across as though he’s mailing it in is a true testament to disappearing your own ego and letting the moment dictate your lines. In one scene where some more craziness goes down with his crazy son and his crazy family, where De Niro and Cooper just had a father and son fist fight and both had blood on their faces, De Niro again has to go to the door and deal with this nosy kid next door, played by David O. Russell’s real son, the guy who really has the crazy mood disorders, and the scene spontaneously evolves where De Niro chases the kid down the street in his pajamas, and starts pushing him, none of this being scripted, and comes out with this extemporaneous dialog, “I’m gonna come back here and break that camera over your head, and then I’m gonna come back and "interview" you with what its like to have that camera broken over your head and…what are you laughing at, I’m sorry…”. He immediately realizes that this is wrong for a grown man to be talking to a kid that way. The Kid was not coached to start laughing. He’s the guy in real life with the mood disorder. When faced with real stress he usually reacts with an inappropriate response and he spontaneously begins to laugh where a trained actor would have chosen a different strategy. De Niro picks this up immediately on the fly and modifies his impromptu soliloquy to adapt in real time. NONE of this was scripted, none of it was planned, De Niro did not even have a conversation with Russell about it, it just happened, for no apparent reason.

In a later scene, the father (De Niro) is trying to reach his son (Cooper) and without having any of the inter personal skills to do so (remember, he was kicked out of the Eagles stadium so many times for fighting he’s banned for life) but he breaks down and starts to cry and gives an incredible soliloquy, all totally improvised with no prior conversation with anyone about what is going to transpire. No one told him to start to cry. That was the take. Right there.

Watch that interview. Near the end De Niro tries to speak on the subject of mood disorders and breaks down on camera talking to Katie Couric when she asks him, "how do you feel making a movie about David O. Russell's life with his son", and only manages to squeeze out, “I know exactly what he’s gone through”.

No, I think De Niro nailed this one, not mailed it. He’s a consummate actor and was so many decades ago. He walked into this role in full knowledge and let his real self slip away and become the Father of a son with horrific mood disorder, whom he loved but could not save. De Niro’s character could not even save himself. He played a 65 year old man (De Niro is 70) who was in real trouble, his own life falling apart around him, laid off, failing in the bookie business, searching for the right “ju ju” that he could win with and he thought his son had that ju ju. That was the only way he could relate to him.

Killer, Win, just Killer. Watch it again. De Niro mailed his ego out the door and let another character take over like a possesion, a spirit that had almost but given up on life, til he found redemption through his crazy son and his new crazy girl friend who found themselves by not giving up on a crazy dream they had built in their heads. I forgot that was Robert De Niro up on that screen. That was me or a friend or a neighbor and we’ve all known trouble from without but it’s that trouble from within that will getcha.

Thanks for your response to my long missive regarding how much this movie affected me. This movie meant something.