The Arts Guild has posted their review on Alex of Venice. As always, you can read the full review by clicking on the link:
While the direction had a level of refinement, this film offers interesting, sophisticated performances. Mary Elizabeth Winstead successfully captures the broken Alex that we expect to see, slowly piecing together both her character and her life as the film progresses. Winstead ensures there is a balance of emotion, while not hiding her characters fragmented state.
Messina has created a film that does successfully look at a characters growth out of chaos, creating a story that isn’t exaggerated and characters that aren’t just found in fiction. Everyone experiences life’s brutal complexities and this film highlights that in a sincere and artistic fashion.
Crave Online caught up with Mary as well where they talked about Alex of Venice, Kill the Messenger, Faults and her possibly coming back for Die Hard 6:
I also felt for Alex with her sister when she’s all, “Man, why do you have to take your kid to school everyday?” As if you’re the bad guy for wanting to fulfill your responsibility. Did you relate to her in that scene?
Yeah, and I know a lot of mothers in my life and mothers who have a lot on their plate and they’re really just trying to hold it together. So I could see a lot of those women that I know in Alex, and how you do snap on your family. There were times where we discussed that scene before doing it. We don’t want her to be too mean. We don’t want her to yell at her sister and people won’t like her.
I was like, “That’s so real. People in families yell at each other. They freak out on each other.” To me that scene felt very real, in that moment when you’re so stressed, you have so much on your plate and you’re just trying to get your family to help you out and they’re screwing it up. So I felt like she was very validated in screaming at her sister at that moment, even though in the long run she was maybe being taught a lesson that she needed to learn. Man, that was frustrating. I felt the frustration for sure in that scene.
The latest Die Hard 6 talk is that they might be trying to get Samuel L. Jackson back. Has there been any mention of Lucy yet?
Not to me, no. I haven’t heard anything about it but that would be cool. Samuel L. Jackson coming back would be awesome. I’d like to see that.
Maybe you can have a sizable role, something in between 4 and the cameo in 5.
Right, exactly. If it keeps getting smaller it’s just going to disappear. I’ll be on the phone in the next one maybe.
And what do you get to play in Kill the Messenger?
I get to play the editor to Jeremy Renner’s character. We sort of together come up with this story and decide to print it. It’s a true story and it’s quite a crazy, crazy one. Basically Jeremy Renner plays this journalist Gary Webb who sort of discovers this link between the government and the crack epidemic in Los Angeles and did this big expose on it, but it was for the San Jose Mercury News which was a small paper.
They realized quickly that they were in way over their head because it was a story that was way beyond them, so eventually everyone was kind of forced to recant the story or to say they got things wrong, even though the story was true and Gary Webb ultimately, well, bad things happened. I don’t want to give too much away for people who don’t know the story but it’s an incredible story and Jeremy Renner’s amazing in it. I’m really excited to be a part of it.
Is the role of the editor a big part?
It’s definitely Jeremy Renner’s movie. He’s the star and there’s a big supporting cast, so it’s a supporting role but it’s a great one. She’s his boss and he really had a young female editor boss that he had to run everything by. She did end up making some minor mistakes which is part of their downfall in the end. It’s kind of a sad story about the two of them having this huge story that could potentially make their careers and it ends up crushing them in a lot of ways.