(2016) Sunset Boulevard

At first, I didn't really get Gloria Swanson's acting in Sunset Boulevard. Even if I considered that Norma Desmond was supposedly more or less deranged from the very beginning, her odd manners just didn't make sense to me, at least not as a good performance. Maybe it could work without further explanation if I saw Norma as a kind of vampire in her castle (with her somewhat Igor-like servant), but her situation didn't feel magical enough for that Neither the reviews helped me find out how is it supposed to be good acting, until I've read that of James Berardinelli, who illuminated to me that almost every single moment – except for her “rare times of lucidity” – Norma is acting theatrically, like they did in the silent films. She missed acting so much that her life turned into a never-ending act, but her neurotic refusal to behave normally may also stem in the despise of the “talkies” that moved from the theatrical acting style of silent films to more realistic acting. It's a little surprising that she's even willing to talk, but the movie wouldn't have worked with a mute Norma, and she isn't supposed to make perfect sense anyway. The chimp is another interesting element that usually isn't discussed too much. Maybe there isn't more to it than what Joe's dream implies – that is, he becomes a kind of amusement for Norma –, but there’s another, possibly unintentional parallel between them. Even though chimpanzees are still occasionally kept as pets, they're inherently so agressive that there's practically no way to raise them as peaceful adults. Sooner or later, they have to go. Joe described the chimp as an old one (which is possible if Norma got it old to begin with, or it wasn't not actually a chimpanzee), but if he was mistaken about it, the chimp might have been ended up just like Joe: maybe it was shot down for refusing to be Norma's obedient companion. A pet chimp is usually disposed of by being sent to a zoo or a lab, but Norma isn't the kind who likes being left like that.