Not That Innocent

Natalie Portman grows up.

by Sean McManus
March/April 2008, Page 17

ALEX BAILEY, © 2007 COLUMBIA PICTURES INDUSTRIES, INC. AND UNIVERSAL CITY STUDIOS PRODUCTIONS LLLP AND GH THREE LLC ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Natalie Portman as Anne Boleyn.

Natalie Portman has long vacillated between sensuous and childlike. In the Star Wars trilogy, she played a queen so chaste that her twin children seemed the result of virgin birth. But in weightier work such as 2004’s Closer, which earned her an Academy Award nomination, Portman employed her sensuality to devastating effect. Perhaps that’s to be expected from a child actress whose breakout role at age 11 was as an ingenue-assassin in Luc Besson’s 1994 film, The Professional.

In her new movie, The Other Boleyn Girl, Portman plays a cunning and seductive Anne Boleyn, vying with Scarlett Johansson for the affection of Eric Bana as Henry VIII. “Make me your queen,” she demands of Bana, a lusty proposal that would tempt Anakin Skywalker to the dark side. At 26, Natalie Portman looks ready to leave the little girl behind.

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Keywords:

• Film and Television,
• The Arts

Mentioned:

• 
  Natalie Portman : College Class of 2003