Hafidha
At the time of writing about the problem of
American child actors, I was thinking about the apparent conventions
of American child acting, conventions that favor a highly elaborate and
stylised technique or approach. How can I put it? The actors act like
children trying to be adults playing children, indeed they sometimes seem
like children trying to be movie stars trying to act like children. It is a kind
of 'cute' aesthetic, and as such shares affinities with the grotesque. It
may derive from or at least be fed by child acting conventions in advertising.
It may be partly related to the difficulty children strike when it comes to
actually doing art. It might be related to the artifice demanded by a
cinema highly regulated by genres. It may be encouraged by adults and
directors who want to promote the children, or by a widespread cultural
aspiration for children to do well, to shine, to star, or by a certain kind of
American ideology of the child. I dont know. It is a tradition that goes
back at least to Shirley Temple and it persists.
There are exceptions. (I made my original inquiry
though because I just could not think of one.) Thanks for the suggestions. And
sometimes the stylisation works.
Ross
