Alternate Best Supporting Actor 2014: John Cusack in Maps to the Stars

John Cusack did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Stafford Weiss in Maps to the Stars.

Maps to the Stars is a bad David Cronenberg movie that wishes to be an abrasive satire about Hollywood. One is better off just re-watching Mulholland Drive instead, what a great film.

Anyways watching this bad (mostly, I do like Robert Pattinson and Mia Wasikowska in it) David Cronenberg film it got me wondering why do some of his films work so well, and some don't work at all. This definitely falls into the latter category, but I had to examine why. I think arrived to the why pretty easily though. Great to good Cronenberg is when he's making films about real people in strange situations, his bad films are just about strange people. Obviously a man turning into a Fly isn't realistic, but Cronenberg cares about Seth Brundle in that film, and part of the greatness of that film lies within that approach. The only argument against my thesis here may be Dead Ringers, however I'd argue as strange as the Mantle twins are, the emotions they're going through, the way their going through them is depicted with an honest humanity. When he lets his characters be strange entirely his films tend to fall off the rails. Anyways Maps is perpetuated largely with extreme Hollywood types, in which Cronenberg seems to hold very little sympathy, and in turn the film almost seems to become a zoological exercise "look how weird and shallow they are". Speaking of we have John Cusack as Stafford Weiss a Hollywood self-help guru.

I suppose this isn't quite the ideal review to first start with John Cusack, better known as a young leading man of the 80's and 90's, who, much like the academy, I've yet to encounter in all this time of my endeavor here, until now. I say it's not quite ideal as this isn't within his more typical wheelhouse in the strange world of Cronenberg's creatures. Cusack I'm not sure is ideal for this role either off the outset in that he doesn't really have the "look" or presence of the life style guru type. Cusack's vibe is typically more casual even down to earth, so theoretically Cusack should be working against that. We see him early on as he's treating Julianne Moore's neurotic Havana Segrand, and honestly, in a weird way, Cusack's probably the role where going a little broader probably could've been warranted, however he doesn't take this approach. Cusack sort of plays it as this soft speaker of reassurances to his client. These spoken with a thin sincerity in enough for the client yet Cusack grants no real passion within himself as he speaks the words to her. He does his job though in the most limited possible way. There's more to Weiss as he's also the father to a young child star Benjie (Evan Bird). We have a scene where he speaks to his son as sort of an interrogation put forth as a father son heart to heart. Cusack brings the same sort of emphasis on the lack of sincerity though there is a sense of a minor concern within his eyes, not really so much for his son rather his position. Complications ensue more when his daughter Agatha (Mia Wasikowska), who formerly started a fire that endangered the family, comes back to town from a mental institution. Cusack's scene with Wasikowska, has I think potential, but it doesn't quite work. Again, strangely enough, I think Cusack downplays it too much, this in the scene is kind of Stafford being the guru and "loving father"while threatening his daughter to make her go away. Cusack I suppose at least gets this across, but his rather just cold way of playing it makes it a tepid scene. Although again this may be a problem with Cronenberg in general who struggles with comedy, and in turn his actors often do too, unless you're William Hurt...oddly enough. Cusack's scenes honestly just don't work in general, he's just part of that clock that's broken. Cusack eventually breaks that zen state, although even then his zen state wasn't that refined so the break doesn't have that much impact, when he starts yelling about the state of disrepair of his family. Frankly his best scene is at the very end of the film just for the decently realistic reaction to seeing someone on fire (in a scene that otherwise has to be one of the most atrocious scenes from a filmmaker capable of greatness that I've seen due to CGI fire that needs to be seen to be believed). Cusack isn't the worst part of this film, but he doesn't overcome its weaknesses in the least. He's not ideally cast, he doesn't overcome that, and this is just a largely unsuccessful performance from him.