Saturday 28 February 2015

Cheering for the Other Side.

I just watched an episode of X Files in which one of the prominent characters was a female English police detective played by an English actress. She overacted to a factor of about ten, and overdid the plumby English accent even more. For an Englishman, it was horrible to watch. Frankly, she irritated me to perdition’s flame and beyond. In the scenes she had with Gillian Anderson, dear Dana acted her off the screen, and outdid her in just about every other aspect as well. Just thought the Americans in the audience might like to know.

2 comments:

S. said...

X-Files has always been a favorite of mine. I've long felt that there was something spooky (witchy) about Gillian Anderson, and I appreciate it immensely. Something about her tone of voice and her eyes. Didn't you say something similar? About her eyes? You've got good taste.

JJ said...

I've been watching out for this, and I've noticed that where David Duchovny acts with more elaborate and extensive variation of voice and body language, Gillian Anderson can convey a million meanings standing still.

There was a scene in last night's episode in which the flighty English detective is making up to Muldur. Scully stands by watching, and her face conveys such amused disdain that it had me cheering. Her eyes are - as you suggest - almost magically expressive, and her voice is always calm but full of meaning.

What Anderson did with the character of Scully is highly impressive. She's intelligent, wise, courageous, well balanced, emotionally responsive without being effusive, loyal - and then some. It would be hard to find a better exemplar for the idea of independent yet utterly feminine womanhood.

Good taste? Ahem?