Nicole Kidman: A Kind of Life (32 page)

Director: Gus Van Sant

Writers: Joyce Maynard, Buck Henry

To Die For
begins with news coverage of a murder. As it turns out, the prime suspect is the local cable-television weather girl, Suzanne Stone Maretto (Nicole Kidman). She is charged with enlisting the help of three teenagers to kill her husband. This is not so much a murder mystery, since viewers have a good grasp of the situation early on, as it is a fascinating glimpse into the distorted mind of the supremely ambitious weather girl.

Nicole Kidman does an amazing job with this character, making her lovable, yet despicable, diabolically brilliant, yet simple-minded beyond belief—and perhaps best of all, icy cold, yet sensual. In one scene she dances to the music of “Sweet Home Alabama” in the headlights of her teenage boyfriend’s car, providing the sexiest cinematic moment of 1995. This movie is a must-see for Nicole Kidman fans.     

CAST

Jon Bon Jovi

Anna Galiena

Lambert Wilson

Thandie Newton

Nicole Kidman

Producers: Paul Raphael, Bertil Ohlsson

Director: John Duigan

Writer: Virginia Duigan

The Leading Man
is about an arrogant American actor, Robin Grange (Jon Bon Jovi), who goes to London to star in a new play written by Felix Webb (Lambert Wilson). Felix is having an adulterous affair with Hilary Rule (Thandie Newton), the female lead in his play. When Felix’s wife learns of the affair, she makes life miserable for her husband, so much so that he persuades Robin to seduce her. A romantic quadrangle develops when Robin also seduces Hilary. The movie is very slow moving, but it has its moments. Nicole Kidman has a cameo role as an Oscar presenter.

CAST

Nicole Kidman

John Malkovich

Barbara Hershey

Mary-Louise Parker

Martin Donovan II

Shelley Winters

Shelley Duvall

Producers: Monty Montgomery, Steve Golin

Director: Jane Campion

Writers: Laura Jones, based on the Henry James novel

Isabel Archer (Nicole Kidman) is an American who goes to England to visit her wealthy uncle, Mr. Touchett (John Gielgud). When he dies, he leaves her a fortune, setting her up for two predators who want to take advantage of her position of newfound wealth. John Malkovich plays the cold-hearted Gilbert Osmond, who marries her for reasons that are not entirely clear at first. Nicole’s Isabel Archer is a little on the cool side, but she is still the best thing about the movie.

CAST

George Clooney

Nicole Kidman

Marcel Iures

Aleksandr Baluyev

Rene Medvesek

Producers: Walter Parkes, Baanko Lustig

Director: Mimi Leder

Writer: Michael Schiffer

Nicole Kidman plays Julia Kelly, a nuclear scientist who heads up a government operation to investigate a nuclear explosion that occurs in Russia after a train accident. She soon learns that it was no accident and was staged to conceal the theft of other nuclear devices being transported on the train. She teams up with Thomas Devoe, a U.S. Army colonel played by George Clooney, in an effort to recover the devices before they can be used by terrorists. It was Nicole’s most physical role to date.

CAST

Sandra Bullock

Nicole Kidman

Stockard Channing

Dianne Wiest

Goran Visnjic

Aidan Quinn

Evan Rachel Wood

Alexandra Artrip

Mark Feurerstein

Caprice Benedetti

Producer: Denise DiNovi

Director: Griffin Dunne

Writers: Robin Swicord, Alice Hoffman (book)

Practical Magic
is about two sisters, Sal Owens (Sandra Bullock) and Gilly-Bean Owens (Nicole Kidman), who must live with the curse of family witchdom handed down to them from Puritan days. Each sister handles it differently: Sal marries and settles down, while Gilly-Bean falls in love with every man that comes her way. Their lives are complicated when they kill—sort of by accident—one of Gilly-Bean’s suitors. When the sisters try to use black magic to bring him back to life, the situation only gets worse. Their situation becomes complicated further when Sal falls in love with the police detective sent to investigate the man’s disappearance. 

CAST

Tom Cruise

Nicole Kidman

Madison Eginton

Jackie Sawiris

Sydney Pollack

Leslie Lowe

Peter Benson

Todd Field

Michael Doven

Sky Dumont

Louise J. Taylor

Gary Soba

Producer: Stanley Kubrick

Director: Stanley Kubrick

Writers: Frederic Raphael, Stanley Kubrick, Arthur Schnitzler (book)

Tom Cruise plays Bill Harford, a doctor who samples the sexual offerings of New York City, always as a voyeur and never as a participant, after his wife Alice (Nicole Kidman) tells him that she once fantasized about having a sexual affair with a naval officer they met in passing while on vacation. There is no plot, per se—only the impressions of Bill and Alice as they deal with the realities of their marriage, realities that are complicated by a mysterious death and a descent into the secret sexual rituals of the city’s social elite. Nicole performs the most sexually explicit scenes of her career in this movie.    

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Ewan McGregor

Jim Broadbent

John Leguizamo

Richard Roxburgh

Kylie Minogue

Jacek Koman

Caroline O’Connor

Matthew Whittet

Kerry Walker

Garry McDonald

Producers: Steve E. Andrews, Fred Baron, Martin Brown, Catherine Knapman, Baz Luhrmann, Catherine Martin

Director: Baz Luhrmann

Writers: Baz Luhrmann, Craig Pearce

Impoverished writer Christian (Ewan McGregor) goes to Paris to write about love, even though he has never experienced it. He quickly falls in with Toulouse-Lautrec and a rowdy band of Bohemians who want to sell a show to the Moulin Rouge nightclub. As it happens, the club’s owner Harold Zidler (Jim Broadbent) needs a financial backer and decides to use the proposed show to attract The Duke of Monroth. The story gets complicated when both Christian and Duke fall in love with the nightclub’s consumptive star Satine (Nicole Kidman). Nicole sings and dances her way through the movie, giving one of her most energetic performances of her career, one that earned her a nomination for an Academy Award.

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Fionnula Flanagan

Alakina Mann

James Bentley

Christopher Eccleston

Eric Sykes

Elaine Cassidy

Renee Asherson

Gordon Reid

Keith Allen

Michelle Fairley

Producers: Fernando Bovaira, Jose Luis Cuerda, Sunmin Park

Director:  Alejandro Amenabar

Writer: Alejandro Amenabar

Grace Stewart (Nicole Kidman) lives in a darkened house with her two children, convinced that they will die if exposed to sunlight. Her husband has gone off to war and not returned, and her servants have disappeared without warning. Just getting by day-to-day is all she can manage. Luckily, three servants appear at her door one day and take over Grace’s household duties. Soon it becomes clear that Grace is in for the fight of her life, though what that fight is does not become clear until the final scenes. 

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Ben Chaplin

Vincent Cassel

Mathieu Kassovitz

Kate Lynn Evans

Stephen Mangan

Alexander Armstrong

Sally Phillips

Jo McInnes

Ben Miller

Producers: Eric Abraham, Steve Butterworth, Julie Goldstein, Colin Leventhal, Diana Phillips, Sydney Pollack, Paul Webster

Director: Jez Butterworth

Writers: Tom Butterworth, Jez Butterworth

Nicole Kidman plays a Russian main-order bride, Nadia, who travels to England to marry a mild-mannered bank teller named John (Ben Chaplin). He is distressed to learn that she speaks no English and he tries to send her back, only the Internet dating service that connected them will not return his telephone calls. He learns to make the most of it and things seem to be progressing well until Nadia’s cousin Alexei shows up with his friend Yuri. One thing leads to another, and before John knows what has happened he is robbing his own bank to keep Yuri from hurting Nadia. It is at that point that the story takes a wicked turn and heads into unforeseen territory.  

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Julianne Moore