MovieChat Forums > Whale Rider (2003) Discussion > I'm all for national pride and that, but...

I'm all for national pride and that, but Keisha was overrated.

posted 12 years ago by The-Musicscope
4 replies | jump to latest

The speech was awesome, but besides that she was a piece of wood. Her expression didn't change during the movie apart from that. Even when Grandfather said "she has no use to me" and she ran outside the house to cry, her expression didn't change and she had the same blank face for most of the movie.

If you see potential in someone (which BTW, she hasn't fulfilled as she's had no notable roles in a long time) give them nominations for newcomers, not the top prizes in acting

Marcoli is really a muskrat.

[–] jlird808 12 years ago

I dunno...I thought she had a great smile and charisma. Her conversation with her dad outside after the incident u mentioned was pretty LEGIT. Her smile when she emerged from underwater with the lobster and the necklace was AWESOME, and her somberness when she asked Nanny "What's wrong with me?" was pretty heavy IMO.

She's supposed to be strong, and somewhat stern, maybe that means SOME "lack of emotion", but I thought she did a great job. So did a lot of other people.

[–] Eponymous-too 11 years ago

She did a great job with the acting. The whole point is that she WASN'T like the kids you see on Disney or Nickelodeon where they overact and mug for the camera. She was more subtle and realistic.

As for not having many notable roles, she committed the unpardonable sin of pissing off an entire studio when they couldn't use her to promote her first post-Whale Rider high profile role as Mary, the virgin mother of Jesus (emphasis on "virgin"), when she got pregnant at 16 and would have been noticeably showing during all the press junkets for the film. The studio was incensed, the movie got no advertising, it tanked, and she basically went back to New Zealand to act in smaller films after that.

"My name is Paikea Apirana, and I come from a long line of chiefs stretching all the way back to the Whale Rider."

[–] shred-com 11 years ago

I wasn't all that impressed with her performance either. Not bad, but ordinary *shrug*. Nothing Oscar nom worthy (-_- at the Academy), and nothing to start threads to complain about. Just a fairly good performance.

[–] Royalcourtier 10 years ago

National pride is no reason to overrate anyone. In fact there is no connection. Castle-Hughes is a poor actress, and Whale Rider is an overrated film.