2. Silence of the Lambs, Carny, Stealing Home, Bugsy Malone, Taxi Driver, The Hotel New Hampshire, Freaky Friday, Nell, Contact, Foxes, Little Man Tate, Anna & the King, The Accused, Sommersby, Maverick
From Quiz From Coppertone to Golden Girl
Answer:
In the introduction to this quiz, it was highlighted that Jodie Foster excelled at portraying lonely women placed under enormous pressures and, possibly, two good examples of these are her as a rookie FBI recruit coming face to face with a cannibalistic serial killer, "The Silence of the Lambs" (1991), or "Contact"(1997), where she launches, solo, into space, firm in the belief that there is life out there.
Don't get me wrong though, there are also the light and fluffy within her impressive oeuvre such as the Disney friendly "Freaky Friday" (1976). Here's a brief, but chronological, look at her movies in this quiz.
"Taxi Driver"(1976): Robert de Niro plays Travis Bickle, a Vietnam veteran who suffers from insomnia, so he spends his nights driving a taxi through New York's sleazier streets. He has his own perceptions of right and wrong and his deteriorating mental state appears certain to crescendo in violence. Into his life journeys Iris, a twelve year old streetwise prostitute, played by Foster, whom Bickle feels he has to save. This was Jodie's first adult film and, in her words, it was "life changing", stating that for the first time she was dealt a character that she had to "create from scratch". The strength of the characters that she would convey to audiences in the future was already in evidence here. This was a very raw and honest performance from Foster but it becomes a scary observation when you realize that this was coming from a girl who was only thirteen years old at the time.
"Bugsy Malone" (1976): Alan Parker's G-rated, gangster musical was a rather bizarre piece of film, that tells the story of the rise of Bugsy Malone in the gangster hierarchy and his battles with his main rival Fat Sam. Bizarre in the fact that the cast of gangsters is made up of children and the weapons they use are "splurge" guns that cover their victims with cream. Most of the cast in this film are very ordinary, including Scott Baio, who was highly popular at the time. Foster, however, plays her role as a gangster's moll with effortless aplomb.
"Freaky Friday" (1976): A mother and her daughter (Foster) are always at odds until, this particular Friday, they make the same wish at exactly the same time, and they wind up switching bodies with each other. Despite being thirteen years of age, Foster shows incredible agility in being able to switch personalities. Not only did this earn her a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress, but it also stamped her as a bona fide star of the future.
"Carny" (1980): In 1980, as Foster was about to enter Yale, she took on two film roles that carried a fair deal of risk with them. "Carny", the first of those, sees her as a bored teenage waitress who runs off with a two con-men from a travelling carnival. The film does not reach great heights, but Foster, yet again, shows her skill and proves that graduating (no pun intended) into more adult roles would not be problematic for her.
"Foxes" (1980): The other risk was with "Foxes", another teen drama that seemed to be flooding the cinemas at the time. Foster is part of a group of four friends who are caught up in a range of issues, spanning from drugs, to abusive parents, sexual awakenings, and weight worries... and the only way they know how to deal with them is to party hard. Foster's character is the conscience of the group, and she seems to be the one that is looking for a way out of the spiral that they're in.
"The Hotel New Hampshire" (1984): This film is a faithful adaptation of John Irving's 1981 novel, and it features Foster as one of a family of oddball characters, trying to resurrect a rundown hotel in Vienna. The hotel has prostitutes residing on the top floor and a group of radicals, who are planning to blow up the Vienna State Opera, living in the basement. Foster would later remark that this film came at a low point in her career and that taking on this role saw her turning down worthy roles in "Splash" (1983) and "The Terminator" (1984).
"Stealing Home" (1988): The movie poster for this film is dominated by Foster's somewhat ghostly image, hovering above that of Mark Harmon as he stares away, dolefully, into the distance. You get the impression that Foster's is the major role here but hers is merely a small part. Harmon plays a washed up baseball player who has to face his past when he returns to his home town to collect the ashes of his childhood sweetheart (played by Foster), who'd committed suicide.
"The Accused" (1988): This is the film that revived Foster's career and she had to work extremely hard to get her name at the head of a long queue of actresses, clamoring to play the role of Sarah Tobias, a young woman who is gang raped at her local bar and then sets about fighting for justice. Her harrowing performance was a stark reminder of the open honesty that she'd bought to her previous role as Iris in "Taxi Driver", and it won her a deserved Oscar for Best Actress.
"The Silence of the Lambs" (1991): Jodie Foster is Clarice Starling, an inexperienced FBI operative who employs the aid of a notorious serial killer named Hannibal Lector (a chilling performance from Anthony Hopkins) to catch another serial killer, Buffalo Bill, played by Ted Levine. In "The Accused", Foster gave an extraordinary performance as a vulnerable woman who displayed great fortitude and smarts to extract herself from her predicament. Here, as Starling, she provides us with the double feature, playing a hero who doesn't believe that she is one... and walking away with her second Oscar for Best Actress in the process.
"Little Man Tate" (1991): Foster plays the mother of a boy who is a prodigy and is struggling to live up to the expectations that are being placed upon him. Foster's mother is a torn soul. While she wishes to support her son's genius and see him develop it she also sees the importance of him having the opportunity to be a child. This film marked Foster's debut as a director.
"Sommersby" (1993): The kindest thing I could find to say about "Sommersby" is that it is an overwrought, sappy, romance film. About the only thing going for it is the teaming up of Foster and Richard Gere. Foster plays a woman who's soldier husband (Gere) has returned home from the Civil War. Problem is that Foster suspects the man is an imposter and yet... she kind of (somehow) loves him. This is not the usual fare that we see from Jodie but it did come hot on the heels of the somewhat heavy fare of "The Silence of the Lambs" and "Sommersby" may well have been the creative break that she needed.
"Maverick" (1994): Mel Gibson is Bret Maverick, a con man trying desperately to come up with a large sum of cash to enter a high stakes poker tournament. He is constantly frustrated in his efforts to achieve this goal by the challenges presented by Annabelle Bransford (Jodie Foster), a very charming young lady, who is both a thief and a con artist. This film is another deviation for Foster as it is one of those rare occasions that she plays a romantic interest and also plays it for laughs. While most of the attention is focused on Gibson, whose star was at its brightest at the time, Foster proves that she has a deft hand when it comes to comedy and her performance is an absolute hoot.
"Nell" (1994): While Foster produces a performance in this movie that is worthy of another Oscar nomination, the film has very little to brag about. Nell (Foster) is a young woman raised in a cabin in the woods and the only people that she has ever encountered in her life are her mother and her deceased twin sister. When her mother dies, a naïve Nell is about to be confronted by the "real" world.
"Contact" (1997): "Contact" is a film about faith. Foster is Ellie, a scientist who believes she has found evidence of the existence of aliens. She is also a woman who has turned her back on God. These two points bring her into conflict with both the government and a Christian philosopher (and former lover) named Palmer Joss, played by Matthew McConaughey. The films becomes uneven as it starts to mix pockets of philosophy with blockbuster style special effects and the only thing that keeps the film grounded is a strong performance by Foster.
"Anna & the King" (1999): This is a fictionalized account drawn from the diaries of Anna Leonowens. Foster plays Anna, an English school teacher who winds up being the tutor of the wives and children of King Mongkut, the King of Siam. This, unfortunately, is a sad note on which to finish a quiz about an extraordinary actress. The film is a rather misguided attempt to create a serious version of a much loved (classic) musical. Worse, Foster is required to play a role that she is no way qualified to play - someone dull and stupid. Movie critic Roger Ebert sums this up rather succinctly when he quotes "She seems subtly uncomfortable... it's almost impossible to play a dumb person who is supposed to be smart, and that's what she had to do with Anna".
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