May 27, 2004

I saw The Notebook last night and now is not the time to write about the whole movie, but I do want to make this brief note… Rachel McAdams may be the next huge female movie star.

She is kind of fearless and off beat in Mean Girls as the lead mean girl, but the humor was broad, so it was hard to tell. But take a look at The Notebook and you'll see an actress whose face is an amalgamation of the faces of major actresses from many years. And she is, indeed, fearless about using it. It doesn't hurt that the camera adores her. But she is born into the look, like Reese Witherspoon, and she still is completely willing to go for it, just as Ms. Witherspoon used to.

I'm not saying that she will be the next Reese. That requires a lot more than skill. The two sample films aren't quite enough to get a full picture and neither role is as challenging and extraordinary as Witherspoon's turn in Election. But if she and her representatives are ballsy enough to hold the line, the starring roles are coming. McAdams is shooting The Wedding Crashers right now, playing The Girl to Owen Wilson's movie star comedian. Nice enough, but she should not be in a movie where she isn't a lead again for a while… unless it's a very high-end art film.

McAdams steals this movie. Ryan Gosling is okay, but still doesn't have the magic in his eyes like a young Pitt, Cruise or DiCaprio. But McAdams, all angles and lips and ever-changing hair grabs your eye and demands you attention in every scene, whether with Gosling or even Joan Allen. And she has the physicality of the great female comic and light drama stars of this era. She's a beauty, but approachable. She's sexy, but no body part defines her. You get the feeling that she can get what she wants and that what she wants is the right thing.

Honestly, I wasn't expecting much from Ms. McAdams. I liked her in Mean Girls, but again, a very broad piece. And I watched her on the set of The Wedding Crashers one afternoon, but I don't think she ever got a line in while I watched the shooting of the segment of the table scene that they were shooting for a third day. As I walked around, Walken eyeballed me… which is scary/funny/weird. But McAdams seemed like a pretty, small, nice girl. I had no idea how she would light things up on screen.

I don't think The Notebook is going to be big enough to launch McAdams as a superstar. But she should hold out for the right roles. I'm not 100% sure who she is, really. She may be a fine actress, but she is born to be a movie star, which means finding her soul and bronzing it for repeated use. Perhaps she needs a Katherine Hepburn part. She threatens to be perfect for a remake of The Lady Eve, in the Stanwyk role. She might rip it up with a Woody Allen script. I'm not really sure. But I know when someone owns the screen. And this girl does.

E ME: There is an MCN column today. A full column for the long weekend will be here tomorrow.