Nicole Kidman: A Kind of Life (31 page)

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Tom Burlinson

Jill Perryman

Charles “Bud” Tingwell

Simon Chilvers

Kim Bullad

Stig Wemyss

Mark Williams

Alastair Cummings

Robin Miller

Producer: Paul D. Barron

Director: Vincent Monton

Written by: Everett De Roche, Bonnie Harris

Nicole Kidman plays a strong-willed rock singer who falls for a windsurfer (Tom Burlinson) who works at his father’s engineering firm. There is not much of a plot, except for a windsurfing contest, and most of the dialogue between Nicole and Burlinson is uninspiring. The movie’s chief importance is related to the fact that Nicole undertakes her first nude scene at the age of nineteen (she showers with Burlinson and can be seen jumping in and out of bed a couple of times). It was also the first time Nicole attempted to create a character with a punk attitude. She wasn’t entirely successful, but the energy she put into the role was admirable.  

Nightmaster (1987)

(a.k.a. Watch the Shadows Dance)

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Tom Jennings

Joanne Samuel

Vince Martin

Craig Pearce

Doug Parkinson

Jeremy Shadlow

Alexander Broun

Laurence Clifford

Paul Gleeson

Producers: Jan Tyrrell, James Michael Vernon

Director: Mark Joffe

Written by: Michael McGennan

Nicole Kidman plays a student who falls in with a group that engages in war games with paint guns. The plot revolves around a karate teacher, a crazed war veteran and cocaine addict, who kills a drug dealer. The only witness to the murder is a member of the war-games group. When the karate teacher goes after the witness, everyone gets involved in the action. Nicole has no decent lines in this movie, but watching her is a treat, especially when she loosens the throttle on a very heavy Australian accent. Movie fans will find little to satisfy them in this film, but Nicole fans will enjoy watching her maneuver with energetic grace through a very bad script.

Chris Haywood

Katrina Foster

Nicole Kidman

John Wood

Maurie Fields

Brian Mannix

Deborra-Lee Furness

Ian McFadyen

Maggie Millar

Mauren Edwards

Wilbur Wilde

Producers: Frank Brown, John Gauci, Peter Herbert, Ian Rogers, Steve Vizard

Director: Brendan Maher

Writers: Peter Herbert, Ian McFadyen

The
Bit Part
is a comedy that was released in Australia, and then quickly died a painless death. No one associated with the film was willing to discuss it, a commentary all unto itself, and no video copies of the film could be located by the author for review.

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Sam Neill

Billy Zane

Rod Mullinar

Joshua Tilden

George Shevtsov

Michael Long

Lisa Collins

Paua Hudson-Brinkley

Sharon Cook

Malinda Rutter

Producers: Terry Hayes, George Miller, Doug Mitchell

Director: Phillip Noyce

Assistant director: Stuart Freeman

Written by: Charles Williams, Terry Hayes

Nicole Kidman plays the part of a woman who loses her young son in an automobile accident and then goes on a cruise with her husband (Sam Neill) to recover from the loss. After three weeks at sea, they spot their first ship, a schooner that looms ahead, dead in the water. As they stare at the schooner, they see a man in a dingy rowing toward them. Played by Billy Zane, the man tells them that the ship is sinking and that all aboard are dead of food poisoning. At that point, the plot takes a wicked turn in this suspenseful psychological thriller and Nicole, giving a flawless performance, shines as a woman who must fight for the lives of herself and her husband. This is a first-rate movie, though the ending did bother some critics who thought it was just a tad over the top.  

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Chris Haywood

Dennis Miller

Bruce Venable

Michelle Torres

Ella Scott

Jan Ringrose

Dar Davies

Producer: Joan Long

Director: Michael Jenkins

Writer: David Williamson

Nicole Kidman plays the role of a woman who gets caught in a love triangle with a screenwriter and his wife (who expands it to a quadrangle when she falls for her boss). There is not much in the way of a plot in this Australian-made comedy, but Nicole did receive a nomination from the Australian Film Institute for Best Actress in a Supporting Role. The movie was released in the United States in 1992, but it quickly dropped from sight and never made it into video distribution.

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Noah Taylor

Thandie Newton

Bartholomew Rose

Felix Nobis

Josh Picker

Kiri Paramore

Marc Gray

Gregg Palmer

Joshua Marshall

David Wieland

Craig Black

Les Hill

Producers: George Miller, Doug Mitchell, Terry Hayes

Director: John Duigan

Writer: John Duigan

This story takes place in 1965 at two exclusive private schools in Australia. Since one of the schools is for boys only and the other school is for girls only—and they are located in close proximity—it surprises no one that romances occur from time to time, especially since the schools encourage joint educational and social programs between the two institutions.

The plot of this coming-of-age drama centers on the character played by Noah Taylor, a somewhat nerdy white student who falls in love with a beautiful and eminently more sophisticated black student played by Thandie Newton. The interracial nature of the relationship is never a factor in the story. The dramatic tension is derived from the obstacles the two must overcome to explore their romance.

Nicole Kidman plays an older student who assumes responsibility for Newton’s social development at the school. The romance presents a problem for Nicole at first, but she soon is won over by Newton’s determination to break the rules in the pursuit of love. Nicole does a first-rate job of acting in this film and, for the first time, shows an engaging wrinkle in her on-screen sexuality, one that does not require nudity.     

CAST

Tom Cruise

Robert Duvall

Nicole Kidman

Randy Quaid

Cary Elwes

Michael Rooker

Producers: Jerry Bruckheimer, Gerald R. Molen, Don Simpson

Director: Tony Scott

Writers: Robert Towne, Tom Cruise

Days of Thunder
begins with a Daytona 500 race and the announcement that a driver has dropped out of he lineup. It is a setup for race team owner Tim Daland (Randy Quaid) to cajole Harry Hogge (Robert Duvall), a retired pit boss, to come out of retirement and build a car for him. Hogge, reluctant and a bit testy, tells him that he needs to first find a competent driver. Daland invites him out to the track to watch his driver, Cole Trickle (Tom Cruise), take a turn or two around the track, Impressed, Hogge agrees to build the car and work as pit boss.

After several unsuccessful races, Hogge and Trickle have a verbal fight, after which Trickle admits that he is insecure because he can’t “talk car.” Hogge and Trickle patch up their areas of disagreement and Trickle goes on to become a winning driver. Nicole Kidman, who plays the role of Dr. Claire Lewicki, an Australian neurosurgeon, enters the picture when Trickle and another driver are involved in a serious accident.

The remainder of the movie deals with Trickle’s ability to deal with his fears about racing, his confusion over his romantic relationship with Dr. Lewicki, and his discovery of a world that is essentially a sub-culture with its own rules and expectations. 

CAST

Dustin Hoffman

Nicole Kidman

Loren Dean

Bruce Willis

Steven Hill

Steve Buscemi

Billy Jaye

John Costelloe

Timothy Jerome

Producers: Robert F. Colesberry, Arlene Donovan

Director: Robert Benton

Writers: E. L. Doctorow (novel), Tom Stoppard

Organized crime has always done well at the box office, so who could blame director Robert Benton for taking a swing at the genre. Loosely based on the organized-crime syndicates of the 1920s and 1930s,
Billy Bathgate
(the title role of which is played by Loren Dean) is about a young man’s entry into a life of crime, from the ground floor.

His boss is Dutch Schultz (a real-life gangster played by Dustin Hoffman), whose fictionalized and romanticized life is used as a backdrop for Billy’s coming of age story. It is a journey into manhood that gets a hormonal boost when he falls in love with Schultz’s mistress, Drew Preston (a married woman played by Nicole Kidman). As the characters move through assorted violence and nudity (all Nicole’s doing), it becomes apparent that the real theme of the movie is survival—that is, who will be left standing at the end of the movie.

CAST

Tom Cruise

Nicole Kidman

Thomas Gibson

Robert Prosky

Barbara Babcock

Cyril Cusack

Eileen Pollock

Colm Meaney

Douglas Gillison

Michelle Johnson

Producer: Ron Howard, Brian Grazer

Director: Ron Howard

Writers: Ron Howard, Bob Dolman

The story begins in the 1890s in Ireland, where Joseph Donnelly (Tom Cruise), the impoverished son of a farmer, is forced to flee his homeland after the death of his father, to make a new life for himself in America. Accompanying him is Shannon Christie (Nicole Kidman), the daughter of the well-to-do landowner who owned the land that Donnelly’s family farmed. In the beginning, the couple had a strictly platonic relationship (both are suspicious of the other’s intentions), but after suffering a series of hardships in America they discover that they are meant for each other. They break up after Christie is shot in a bungled robbery attempt (they were starving and only broke into the house to find food). Donnelly leaves her behind with her former suitor, who has followed her to America, and he goes out West to make his fortune. This is a slow-moving film that does not get its legs until the end, when Donnelly and Christie find themselves competing for land in the same land rush. Nicole seems uninspired by the script and Tom seems confused about his character’s motivation.    

CAST

Alec Baldwin

Nicole Kidman

Bill Pullman

Bebe Neuwirth

George C. Scott

Anne Bancroft

Gwyneth Paltrow

Peter Gallagher

Producers: Rachel Pfeffer, Charles Muloehill, Harold Becker

Director: Harold Becker

Writers: Aaron Sorkin, Scott Frank

In this heavily layered thriller, Nicole Kidman plays the role of Tracy Kennsinger, a teacher who seemingly is enjoying the good life with her husband, Andy (played by Bill Pullman), a dean at a women’s college. The story gets complicated at the get-go, with the rape of a student at the college and with the introduction into the household of Dr. Jed Hill, a surgeon played by Alec Baldwin. Tracy’s husband rents Hill a room because the surgeon has just moved to town and needs a place to stay—and because he and Tracy need the money to renovate their three-story home. Tracy professes to be unhappy with her new tenant, but she has a secret agenda that is slowly revealed through misdirection. Toward the end, there is one surprise after another as nothing is ever quite what it seems.

CAST

Michael Keaton

Nicole Kidman

Bradley Whitford

Queen Latifah

Producers: Herry Zucker, Bruce Joel Rubin, Hunt Lowry

Director: Bruce Joel Rubin

Writer: Bruce Joel Rubin

Bob Jones (Michael Keaton) is a public relations executive who learns that he has cancer. When doctors give him no hope of a remission, he decides to compile a video history of his life for his unborn child. He interviews himself, he interviews his family and his friends from grammar school—and he interviews his wife, Gail (Nicole Kidman). Most of the film deals with Jones’s lame attempts to get in touch with his feelings about his impending death. Nicole has a presence in the film, but since she whispers most of her lines, presumably to show respect for her husband’s affliction, she barely seems to matter in the story’s narrative development. This is one of her weakest performances, but that is due to the direction that she received and has little to do with her acting skills. Keaton’s character is so unsympathetic that by the end of the film, you are happy to see him go. 

CAST

Val Kilmer

Tommy Lee Jones

Jim Carrey

Nicole Kidman

Chris O’Donnell

Drew Barrymore

Producers: Tim Burton, Peter MacGregor-Scott

Director: Joel Schumacher

Writers: Lee Batchler, Janet Scott Batchler, Akiva Goldsman

This is the third
Batman
epic, with Val Kilmer replacing Michael Keaton as the Caped Crusader and Jim Carrey taking on the role of the obnoxious Riddler. Nicole Kidman plays Batman’s love interest, psychologist Dr. Chase Meridian. There’s not much plot to the movie—Batman goes up against two adversaries, the Riddler and Tommy Lee Jones’s Harvey Two-Face—but plot and character development are not at the core of the franchise’s success with moviegoers. Nicole delivers her lines well and she looks great, but that’s about all you can say about her performance in a movie that is all about Zap! Bam! Boom! 

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Matt Dillon

Joaquin Phoenix

Casey Affleck

Illeana Douglas

Buck Henry

Producers: Laura Ziskin, Jonathan Taplin, Joseph M. Caracciolo