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An Unlikely Pair in an Unlikely Genre

She's 13. But She Has an Old Soul / Dustin Rowles

Trade News | March 18, 2009 | Comments (26)

It’s probably because my first and fondest cinematic experience with Natalia Portman was Beautiful Girls, but I have a difficult time thinking of her as an older man’s love interest, unless she were to star in another remake of Lolita. Closer, in fact, creeped the ever-living shit out of me; I really wanted the girl to put on some clothes and get away from the skeevy old man, and it’s not easy to think of Clive Owen as skeevy.

Anyway, the perpetually pubescent Portman (alliteration!) has signed on to a romantic comedy with, perhaps, the most agonizingly, tediously long name in the annals of cinematic history: Important Artifacts and Personal Property From the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including Books, Street Fashion and Jewelry (thank you, copy/paste function). She will be starring opposite Brad Pitt, an awkward romantic pairing to say the least.

However, the script does call for the age differential. It’s about a four-year relationship between a man in his 40s and a woman in her late 20s. The movie, based on a just published book of the same name (which was brought to Pitt’s production company by Portman), tracks their relationship based on 325 photos and artifacts put up for auction at Sothebys.

I don’t really buy Brad Pitt as a romantic-comedy star, but that’s because I like Brad Pitt and romantic comedies are beneath him. Perhaps, with him and Portman together, romantic comedy can raise to their level, and they won’t have to stoop so climb under the genre bar.

And really: How do you picture Brad Pitt with this girl?


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Comments

Umm...the Professional?

How can you even possibly have an conversation about Natalie Portman as "perpetually pubescent" without discussing her Lolita-esque debut?

Posted by: Big Daddy Bacchus at March 18, 2009 8:35 PM

It’s probably because my first and fondest cinematic experience with Natalia Portman was Beautiful Girls,

Mine was The Professional. I have been smitten ever since. It was such a moving love story.

Posted by: admin at March 18, 2009 8:38 PM

do you mean late 20s? or are we really supposed to buy 'perpetually pubescent Portman' as late 30s??

as someone almost exactly her age (who wasn't aware of her until star wars) i have no problem at all seeing her in closer or anything else that asks me to be to see her is insanely hot to a man of any age

Posted by: dg at March 18, 2009 8:39 PM

LEON!!! XD I LOVE YOU!!!

Posted by: gp at March 18, 2009 8:45 PM

I don't know - after her performance in Closer, I've accepted Natalie as a grown-up.

Posted by: Cindy at March 18, 2009 8:50 PM

It's awkward, but like you said, Dustin, they could probably pull it off. I actually secretly hope it doesn't fail, especially since I like Pitt and Portman individually.

I always enjoy that scene from Beautiful Girls, but I'm with admin. She was phenomenal in The Professional.

Posted by: KP at March 18, 2009 8:55 PM

Maybe she just LOOKS 14 in the movie, but she was born an old woman and is aging in reverse, so she's really, like, 72 ... wait, that's even skeevier.

Posted by: bucdaddy at March 18, 2009 8:56 PM

I find both of these actors decent but extremely boring. But somehow this appeals to me. I think Natalie and Brad would be good in a Rom Com together. I liked them both more in goofy or comedic roles than the more serious ones.

Posted by: kayla at March 18, 2009 8:58 PM

So, I know this has nothing to do with this particular post, but RIP Natasha Richardson. Jeez...

Posted by: Ummm at March 18, 2009 9:37 PM

in my humble opinion, the professional is cinematic perfection.

Posted by: stopthemadness at March 18, 2009 9:38 PM

Um....Natalie Portman is only like 27 or 28 -- so how do we go from an age difference which isn't that skeevy (late 30s to 40s) to one that's almost two decades? Oh, crazy Hollywood....

Posted by: Ariel at March 18, 2009 9:51 PM

Yeah, strange. I think in the book she's 26, and he's 39. Who knows, who knows?

Posted by: Jo 'Mama' Besser at March 18, 2009 10:01 PM

Yep dg, he meant late 20's.

Posted by: Another Jen at March 18, 2009 10:08 PM

Also, is that picture of Brad Pitt really strange, or is it just me? He looks...constipated, but really happy about it. Like really happy.

Posted by: Another Jen at March 18, 2009 10:16 PM

Her character is in her late 20s, not her late 30s. Her character is a food critic, his is a photographer. It's based on a book that charts their failed relationship primarily through all the shit they accumulated. (So that sad box of shit we all make after a breakup turned into a film.)

I read the film will just be called Artifacts.

Trivia: Portman and Pitt were both considered for the lead roles in Almost Famous at one point. Why do I know this shit?

RIP, Natasha Richardson.

Posted by: Jon at March 18, 2009 11:05 PM

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Posted by: Justin at March 18, 2009 11:08 PM

Justin, I have a letter from the Debt Reconciliation Committee of Nigeria written better than that.

Posted by: bucdaddy at March 18, 2009 11:12 PM

I hate the Debt Reconciliation Committee of Nigeria, those fuckers! I'm still waiting for my god damn check.

Posted by: admin at March 18, 2009 11:25 PM

"How do you picture Brad Pitt with this girl?"

With a bottle of lube in my hand and my pants around my ankles, that's how.

Posted by: Jim Bob Cooter at March 19, 2009 12:13 AM

ugh. Brad Pitt has become nothing more than a way to sell magazine covers... and for the record,I HATED him in Burn After Reading.

Natalie Portman, on the other hand, will always get me interested in a film.

Posted by: missh at March 19, 2009 6:11 AM

I will concede that Natalie Portman is stunningly beautiful, but, in the immortal words of Janet Jackson, Natalie, what have you done for me lately? I simply don't think she's all that talented. I can't imagine her and Pitt having any chemistry. Cate Blanchett could scarcely manage that in Benjamin Button and Portman's no Blanchett.

Posted by: samantha t at March 19, 2009 8:00 AM

Dear White Hollywood,

When will your love for skinny white women die? And when will you common people free yourselves from thinking that if your ribs and hip bones protrude outward that that shit don’t look fucked up?

When I’m knocking a bitch doggy style, the last thing I want to see as I’m looking down and admiring my work is her motherfucking vertebrae.

Posted by: Pookie at March 19, 2009 8:53 AM

I don't, know, it seems to me that the last time Portman "acted" was in The Professional. It's like she blew her wad WAAAAY early. She doesn't emote, she doesn't give any depth, or nuance to any of her portrayals. She's stuck in Amidala hell.

Posted by: BarbadoSlim at March 19, 2009 10:02 AM

I'm still pissed with both of them after Benjamin Button, Attack of the Clones (The only Star Wars film I really hate.) and Revenge of the Sith (A good film, but my god, Portman's performance was bad.)

I expect nothing. Even if it's worse than 27 Dresses, I won't bat an eye.

Posted by: George at March 19, 2009 10:18 AM

::drool:: It's like someone anticipated my two favorite beautiful people and put them in a movie.

Though I agree with the relative blandness of Brad and Natalie's recent acting, I will watch anything with either of them in it. Yum.

Posted by: pseudoliterati at March 19, 2009 10:23 AM

How does anyone think Portman was bland in Hotel Chevalier or My Blueberry Nights? Closer? I hate the manic pixie whathehellever stereotype but she was cute as a button in Garden State.

Y'all are fucking crazy.

Posted by: Jon at March 20, 2009 3:51 AM