Colin Firth: 5 Awesome Performances And 5 That Sucked
4. Lord Henry Dashwood - What A Girl Wants
Oh, Colin, Colin, Colin. If anyone, ever, wanted to see you in leather pants we can pretty much guarantee that it would have been in a film directed by Atom Egoyan and not, er, Dennie Gordon. Again, similar to Mamma Mia!, he takes all that rich work of layering the traditional English gent stereotype, and throws it all away as Lord Henry Dashwood, a rich British politician who's, you know, forgotten his hippy roots. Really? Really. Granted, this is a teen flick starring teen queen Amanda Bynes but even looking at the film like this, it's hard not to see the glazed expression in Mr Firth's eyes as he bounces off Four Weddings' Duck-Face, ice-queen Anna Chancellor and Hollywood hippy Kelly Preston. In fact, this film is so full of cultural stereotypes it's sickening. In a world where teen flicks can be well constructed and well acted, this plays off like a Hollywood Polaroid of staid Britishness in the face of American free spirits. It's the act that Firth plays up to all of this. We know he can do subtle. We know he can do romance. We know he can do comedy. Do we see any of it here though? No. In fact, he uses that slightly high-pitched voice that we hear in most of his awful films (see Mamma Mia!) almost as if he's pretending to be Colin Firth's slightly less talented younger brother. Colin. You were in Tumbledown. Stop it.
It's the act that Firth plays up to all of this. We know he can do subtle. We know he can do romance. We know he can do comedy. Do we see any of it here though? No. In fact, he uses that slightly high-pitched voice that we hear in most of his awful films (see Mamma Mia!) almost as if he's pretending to be Colin Firth's slightly less talented younger brother. Colin. You were in Tumbledown. Stop it.