I thought Natalie Portman and her family were living in Paris by now, but I guess not. These are photos of Natalie in Jerusalem yesterday, where she’s filming an adaptation of Amos Oz’s A Tale of Love and Darkness. Natalie is not only the star, she’s the director. And she’ll be speaking Hebrew in the film, which is exciting because I didn’t realize she was that fluent in Hebrew (fluent enough to play a Hebrew-speaking character, I mean). But, as with most things, there’s a controversy. Natalie is currently filming in an ultra-orthodox neighborhood in Jerusalem and now people are mad:
Oscar-winner Natalie Portman has been accused of mounting a “foreign invasion” by protesters from Israel’s ultra-orthodox community after arriving in Jerusalem to shoot her directorial debut, reports the Times of Israel.
Portman is in the city to work on a film adaptation of Israeli novelist Amos Oz’s acclaimed memoir A Tale of Love and Darkness, which has been translated into 28 languages and has sold over a million copies worldwide. The film details Oz’s childhood in Jerusalem in the chaotic period at the end of the British mandate for Palestine, as well as the writer’s experiences during the early years of the state of Israel and teenage years on a kibbutz. Portman, who was born in Jerusalem to an Israeli father and an American mother, will also take a supporting role as Oz’s mother.
Ultra-orthodox residents of the city’s Nahlaot district have written to Jerusalem deputy mayor Rachel Azaria in protest at the decision to shoot scenes there. “The film shooting is set to take place on several sensitive streets close to synagogues and yeshivas, and the scenes being filmed should have been examined first to make sure they don’t offend anybody’s sensitivities,” the letter reads. It insists authorities failed to inform residents about the shoot, and suggests they only discovered it was happening in recent days.
The Times also reports incidents of ultra-orthodox protest graffiti in the district labelling Portman’s film a “foreign invasion”. Authorities said all actors involved in the shoot for A Tale of Love and Darkness would dress modestly, and pointed out the difficulty of balancing the cultural interests of the city as a whole with those of local religious groups.
“There is a constant tension between the desire to celebrate diverse and interesting Jerusalem and the attempts by extremist groups to prevent this,” Azaria said. “The attraction of the city, its unique architecture and the efforts of the film and television industry will triumph and the cinematic growth we’ve seen in Jerusalem in recent years will continue to flourish with Natalie Portman in Nahlaot.”
Portman, received 1.6m Israeli New Shekel (£276,500) from the Jerusalem Development Authority to bring her film to the city. Observers report scenes featuring schoolchildren dressed in traditional 1940s clothing – wool knee-length shorts for the boys and pinafore dresses for the girls – have already been shot. Portman, who left Israel for the US at the age of three, will speak Hebrew in the film.
Eh, I’m kind of on Natalie’s side. It seems like she did her due diligence and got all of the permits and such that were required, and it seems like some people in the orthodox community are upset with their representatives more than Natalie. Let her make her movie! Besides, if the mess that went down on Jane Got a Gun is any indication, Natalie will likely have bigger problems than some minor protests by the orthodox community. Jane Got a Gun was Natalie’s last producer-credited film, and it was an utter production disaster.
Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet.
I don’t know, but I ‘ve always found Natalie to be more annoying than even Goop. Maybe it’s the Roman Polanski- supporting – horrible-acting- in- the -horrible-Star Wars-prequels thing. in my eyes she can never live that down. So I guess I am too biased to comment on the current controversy.
I agree. Goop is at least interesting.
Natalie is lucky she became famous before celebs blogs became a thing seven or eight years ago. She had this whole spiel about how eating meat is like rape and saying she knows what it is like to feel black because she is famous. If she had done that now, she’d be branded Goop-esque and her constant foot-in-mouth moments would cause her problems Anyway, she seems to have matured and her acting is so much better than it was in Star Wars.
She said that? When?
I remember that clearly-and since then haven’t liked her. She still seems like she’s stuck up her own rear end.
She didn’t say that before gossip blogs were created–she said it a few years ago, in 2009, in an essay for Huffington Post.
“I say that Foer’s ethical charge against animal eating is brave because not only is it unpopular, it has also been characterized as unmanly, inconsiderate, and juvenile. But he reminds us that being a man, and a human, takes more thought than just “This is tasty, and that’s why I do it.” He posits that consideration, as promoted by Michael Pollan in The Omnivore’s Dilemma, which has more to do with being polite to your tablemates than sticking to your own ideals, would be absurd if applied to any other belief (e.g., I don’t believe in rape, but if it’s what it takes to please my dinner hosts, then so be it).”
http://www.celebitchy.com/150160/natalie_portman_is_no_longer_vegan_is_currently_raping_dairy/
@starrywonder…The comment about feeling black was in the early 2000s. I remember because I’m a WOC, and I used it as one of many (then) contemporary examples of how clueless people can be about their white privilege in a college sociology paper. I just googled “Natalie Portman feels black” because I was curious about where she said it and it was in an Allure Magazine interview. I don’t remember when the vegan thing was, but I remember that too because I have a hardcore militant vegan cousin who sent me the essay (and it made me laugh hysterically).
To her credit, that was a long time ago (and a lot of us say stupid shit in our early 20s) and she seems to have seriously matured. I only brought it up because someone mentioned the Roman Polanski thing and Goop
What Virgilia said.
Natalie wouldn’t necessarily have to be fluent in Hebrew to play a native Hebrew speaker. Both Robert De Niro and Al Pacino spoke in Italian (Sicilian dialect) in ‘The Godfather’, and neither spoke Sicilian at all, let alone fluently. I’m sure there are other examples as well.
BTW there was some speculation a month or two ago that Natalie might be pregnant again. These pictures would suggest otherwise.
Natalie seems to love showing us that she’s of the “elite”. Speaking Hebrew is her way of doing this.
I’m actually a bit shocked Kaiser didn’t know she was fluent. She found a way of dropping that fact in every other interview for the longest time. She spoke about it heavily when she named her son Aleph.
Yes indeed. Natalie loves to think of herself as an ‘intellectual’. After all she attended Harvard and is multilingual – supposedly.
Imho, Natalie is living, breathing proof that an elite education doesn’t make you remotely interesting, or even intelligent. I’m amazed that so many people buy into her ‘thinking person’s film star’ spiel, when she’s as deep as an ashtray. And just about as interesting.
How exactly does speaking Hebrew make her “elite?” Tons of people are bilingual and speak their native language to their kids who grow up in America and thus become bilingual too.
I think that’s the point we are making. Being bilingual or even multilingual is no biggie. But Portman seems to think that everything about her is somehow unique and special. Mostly, it isn’t.
I’m not sure how speaking the native language of your native country, in a film set in Israel is elitist.
Just what Portman needs…
I recently saw Thor 2: The Dark Loki and she annoyed me so much in that. I’m not a huge fan of hers, I thought she was good in black swan and amazing in The Professional but jeez she was like a charisma vaccum in the Thor sequel. Kat Dennings was great, and I kept wishing that she had gone to Asgard instead of Natalie’s boring a$$ character.
Oh my God, I thought she was bad in the first movie (bad but still very much tolerable), but on the sequel of Thor, her acting was so awful, she ruined every scene in which she appeared. Even Loki couldn’t save me from hating that movie.
she will be directing also?
yay for more directresses in Hollywood!
Yes to this! I’m always going to root for the woman making a power move. And I dont give a damn if shes any good, Hollywood is filled with mediocre male directors and producers. We may as well push one of us.Go Natalie!
If she’s a mediocre director that’s pretty bad.
Women will only level the playing field if we show we’re greater than mediocre and then will be more in demand.
Otherwise the argument will revert back to “she got the job because she was pretty” just as “He only got the job because he’s a guy.” Not, they got the job because they earned it and are talented.
Ugh, I hate that. That’s the same way I feel about being black. My mom had to tell us this, because we live in a very ignorant, nearly all white town, and went to a school that bragged that it was the most integrated school in the area. You know what that means?? That means that there’s 6 asian kids in the middle and high school, and two black kids (me and my twin) in the middle and high school. Whatever.
But anyway, my mom basically told us, it’s up to us to do our homework, etc. But if we don’t take pride in doing our work correctly, than to a lot of the people there, we’re going to be another freaking stereotype…..which, why should I always to be better than everyone else, just because of my skin color? Especially when there are a ton of dumb, white kids—I knew this one kid that was the same age as me, we were in 9th grade and he was doing 3rd grade math.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-dst9YjoC8
Twice as good#DaddyPope
But FLORC, how is anyone to know if she’s a mediocre director or a good one before her first film is complete? Good Lord. Should all pretty women be banned from directing for fear that some will say she got the job on her looks?
What nonsense. Minorities shouldnt have to be twice as good as their mainstream counterparts. Furthermore, one minority doesnt represent all others in the same way that a bad male director doesnt represent all other males. There is room for great female directors, average female directors and bad female directors alike. Your mother was wrong to lead you to think that you must represent your race at school. Very wrong.
Ohh, I love that blue dress.
Me, too. I love that era of fashion.
Modcloth ladies. Modcloth.
Me too!! And I love mod cloth!!
I’ll wait for her movie to come out before I judge.
I think she can be annoying and elitist, but she did go to Harvard, so she really is smart, and when your work/peer group consists of a large percentage of people who “moved to the big city to make it” right after high school, I’m sure the differences in intellect can be pretty glaring often enough to make you feel the difference.
I really think she’s drastically over-rated.
‘Wooden’ is the only word that comes to mind.
Absolutely. She has as little personality on screen as off – which is to say, none whatsoever. She sucks the life out of every role she’s allowed near, and yet she’s hyped up as some amazing actress, not to mention an ‘intellectual’. As if. In reality, she has no more acting talent than, say, Scarlett Johansson or Kiara Knightley, yet to listen to the hype, you’d thinks she was a younger Meryl Streep.
“Sucks the life out of” is the best way to describe Natalie Portman’s wooden acting. I would go so far as to say that she sucks the life out of every scene she is allowed into. And it isn’t like she is great with her selections of films to shoot, either. For every okay flick she’s been in, there are five stinkers in her resume. Even Black Swan struck me as mostly special effects, marketing hype, and blatant piggybacking on Sarah Lane’s talents. I seriously do not understand the fame of this woman.
I remember watching the scene in Brothers where Toby McGuire finally mentally collapsed. The entire scene was him delivering a passionate, deranged, and exhausting performance…opposite Natalie Portman, who was listlessly standing there with glazed eyes and her mouth hanging open. McGuire seems to be a decent guy, but I bet he wanted to slug her during that shoot.
+1. The best film she was in was The Professional, and it was odd, a long time ago, and she was just a kid.
I will say that the period dress looks nice on her. Better tailored than most of what she wears to events.
That’s the same thing I said. i think she was amazing in the professional, and I think ion a weird way she’s still coasting off that amazing perfprmance. So if she gives not so good performances people are like, ‘but she was in the Professional! and she was sooo good in that and at such a young age! must be a fluke’ So they give her the benefit of the doubt and she gets another role and the cycle continues. And she throws in enough good performances a la Black Swan to keep it going.
I don’t think her performance in ‘Black Swan’ was particularly good. It wasn’t awful, but it was definitely nowhere near Oscar worthy. She just did what she always does – sulk and look angsty. Oh, and flailing her arms around as though her bra was on fire (as someone hilariously described Portman’s ‘dancing’ on this page). Of course, she campaigned for the award big time, and the Academy loves a story of supposed struggle and sacrifice behind a role – never mind that it was later revealed that almost all of the genuine dancing was done by a body double.
I agree with Ice Maiden–I saw Black Swan and it was meh. The only scene I actually liked was the one with Vincent Cassell, when he’s trying to show her how to put sensuality into her dancing. That was pretty hot. Other than that? I wouldn’t ever watch the movie again.
I found her performance good, decent—but the entire movie just seemed Oscar-baity. Like it just seemed like they made the movie so everyone could say, ‘Oh, her character is so depressed! Her character’s such a sexually repressed being!’–not for the sake of telling a story, but just to get accolades, etc. There didn’t seem to be any heart into it, no emotion. For me, at least. It didn’t make me feel anything,
I think ‘Black Swan’ was much worse than just ‘Oscar-baity’, though it was that too. I thought it was tacky, cynical and misogynistic. Vincent Cassell was the only good thing about it. Like I said above, Portman was meh at best, but Mila Kunis was downright embarrassing.
“I really think she’s drastically over-rated.”
Yep. The amount of luck she’s had is just incredible, because her position cannot be attributed to anything else: not physical apearance, not personal charisma, not – God knows – acting talent. Sheer dumb luck. Or maybe not dumb, but certainly luck.
For some reason, this really annoys me. Especially the “foreign invasion” part. She obtained the required permits, but she was supposed to show the scenes to you beforehand for your approval. And she was supposed to know that, how?
She’s so beautiful, and more female directors is always a good thing.
Anyone in this part of the world knows this is part and parcel of everyday life around ultra-Orthodox Jews. They build walls on public sidewalks to segregate women and men, routinely block streets in ultra-Orthadox neighborhoods to keep people from driving on Shabbat, and even spit on little girls who they feel are not dressed modestly enough. Here, it’s said to be very similar to the Taliban and causes tons of problems for the rest of the Israeli population.
Well as long as she got permits and permission I dont know what else she can do. She seems to be very respectful of the country/city and I am sure knows about the orthodox Jews. Unfortunately I don’t think there is going to be much she can do about it.
You’re exaggerating WAY too much. This isn’t the Taliban women’s cult and no one is being spat on. It’s the Orthodox part of Nahla’ot, where they have big signs requesting the public to dress modestly all year round. I think it’s reasonable of them to request that of Natalie Portman as well. And honestly it’s really not OK that the municipality didn’t notify them in advance of this regardless of everything.
It’s no exaggeration. It’s truth.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4411396,00.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/28/world/middleeast/israeli-girl-at-center-of-tension-over-religious-extremism.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
There are more stories than this.
It is very much the truth. Women are spat on, forced to ride in the back of the bus and threatened and hit if they do not wear appropriate clothes.
I don’t like the Haredim and their influence any more than the next person in Israel. They are dogmatic, backward, and do try to force their provincial mindsets on everyone in a mostly liberal country.
But it is a massive exaggeration to call them the Taliban. Scattered reports of nasty incidents involving them do not constitute an everyday reality.
For goodness sake, these ultra orthodox people are ridiculous. Since when do they hold a mandate on what is sacred there? It’s all about their own egos and feelings than the actual holiness of a street. I don’t find them to be any different from fundamentalist Muslims. They segregate women, they restrict women, they don’t believe in contraception, women are covered…and on it goes. They protest wherever they feel that ‘their’ status is threatened, even resorting to calling young girls [as young as 8] whores if they’re not covered.
The future looks troubled in Israel that’s for sure.
This lot are probably more upset at Natalie being clothed this way. They find this type of dressing provocative and whorish. That is how backward they are.
One thing I NEVER got about the ultra conservatives, is why do they have their woman SHAVE their heads, and then wear a wig???? How does that make sense?
That’s a very good question, I hope somebody can answer – I am very curious as well.
The most ridiculous thing though – this was shared with me by a Jewish woman (“the most ridiculous” part is all mine) was that the only duty of the religious? Jewish man is to be the spiritual guide of the family. And the woman who told me this was speaking about one of her family members, a cousin I think, who had to work the whole day, come home, take care of the two children, do all house chores etc. by herself. Her husband was there to offer spiritual guidance, and that’s it. He was not working, nothing . Heck, only the kids she didn’t make them by herself.
+I love Natalie’s dress.
It has to do with a ridiculous notion in our religion (I’m Jewish) that a woman should, once married, be modest so she doesn’t tempt another man. Because of course it’s her fault if a guy gets carried away by her Rapunzel hair.
This is why I’m a Reform Jew.
I’ve never heard of anyone shaving their heads
Religious extremists in any form are dangerous.
I reallly love, loooooove this book. I cry every time and I forced everyone (my parents, my partner, my friends) to read and they all was “it’s so great”. And I’m happy that someone is making a film. I don’t even protest to Natalie Porman as The Mother. But Portman as a director….. not feeling it, but maybe because of my relationship with the book.
But anyway, JUST READ IT, you won’t regret it 🙂
Another talentless actor paid millions to walk through roles. I don’t get it…
Portman is Israeli, it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that she’s fluent in Hebrew
Actually it’s not that great… it’s good considering she spent most of her life in America. She can communicate. But from what I remember of her Hebrew interviews she has a thick American accent & she kinda fumbles around with her words (like what you’d expect from someone who isn’t speaking their native language).
With that said, talented actors don’t actually need to speak the language they’re acting in… Togo Igawa had a Hebrew-speaking role in an Israeli movie, and he was amazing, you’d think he’s really fluent from watching the movie – but he actually has zero prior knowledge of the language! Don’t know if Natalie has that kind of acting prowess, but we’ll see 🙂
Thanks for the info. I suppose you are a native speaker? It’s interesting to get a proper assessment of something that plays such an important role for her image.
OK here’s a quote of a resident’s post on Facebook:
“It’s not easy, living in a film set. First they blocked our street, then they nailed tin shacks to the houses’ walls and poured black paint over them. And now I came back home and found out my neighbor has completely lost it and sprayed graffiti in protest against the mayor. On her own house. Fun times in Nahla’ot”
Here’s the Hebrew source: http://cinemascope.co.il/archives/17136
It has nice pics of the set if anyone’s interested.
So yeah I think you can’t really dismiss the residents’ complaints here. It seems like both the municipality fucking up & the production not really caring. I mean it’s truly the resposibility of the municipality, but I think it’s not too much to expect Natalie & co. not to bother the residents that much.
As for the religious/modesty aspect I’m assuming at this point that both the media and some residents are over-exaggerating it, each for their own reasons…