Am I allowed to admit I liked Ansel Elgort in West Side Story?

You are not allowed.

He was better than Richard Beymer, at least

Ansel did nothing wrong. So he’s a jerk to women. So what?

I saw it over the weekend - I liked him too!! He actually looked a little bit (don’t laugh) like Harve Presnell in Unsinkable Molly Brown. ….. I really liked the guys playing Riff and Bernardo also. I was all set not to like it but was really pleasantly surprised.

He was definitely better than Beymer. And he sang fairly wel - was no Russell Crowe in Les Mis. But he completely lost me in that scene when he found out Maria died - some of the worst film acting I’ve seen in years.

I thought he was pretty boring and bland. But Tony and Maria are inherently the weakest part of WSS so can I really blame him.

I don’t think either Elgort or Beymer were any good as Tony, but Beymer was just bland and forgettable, while Spielberg and Kushner tried to flesh out Tony and gave Ansel more room to fail, which he did.

I think R6 is right about the inherent weakness of Tony and Maria. Probably the only way to get those characters right is to give in to the idea that they’re not characters, they’re archetypes. Maria, Bernardo and Riff are characters. Tony and Maria are just symbols of young love, and the best depiction of them would probably embrace the artifice and abandon the pretense that they’re anything more than that.

He has a good singing voice, and Rachel Zegler has an amazing voice. Other than that, I wish the main characters were Riff, Bernardo, and Anita, and not Maria and Tony.

I liked him too. Go figure, I guess we are deaf, dumb, and blind.

I was pleasantly surprised and ended up really liking his version of Tony. And his singing voice was really nice. Thumbs up from me.

You "thought he sang beautifully?!" Was that supposed to be singing? That's not what I got from his spoken-word performance.

Ansel was much better in his role as Tony than Richard Beymer was. Also that is Angel's the singing voice you hear in the film, Beymer's singing voice was dubbed.

I thought he was great too OP,

Boring, bland, looks like some doughy potato thing and everytime he cried and made that creepy face he looked like Sloth from Goonies.

R3’

15-17 year old girls are “women”?

He should have worn this costume.

Agreed. He wasn't half bad, certainly not deserving of the universal trashing he seemed to receive. Nice voice, decent acting, better than Beymer.

I also saw over weekend and agree with OP.

And l'll add something else we're not supposed to admit - Rita Moreno's character ruined the movie. I love Rita, but not here.

I haven’t been following this film that closely so I didn’t realize the girl was only 17 when cast. Holy shit, she was prey for Ansel.

This perv likes deflowering and raping underage teen girls. Keep the same energy for him you had for Bryan Singer and R. Kelly.

He was good. Better than Beymer. Other people in the cast outshone him, but the character is so dull, there's not a lot you can do with it.

He was terrible. Pro tools (with a lowered register) and they still couldn’t pull it off. Op - like it or not - it matters. There was any number of people - with a voice. - that could’ve done it.

I could have played the part better than anyone else. As a matter of fact, I could have been a better Maria also.

boring, dull, no charisma, no chemistry with Zeglar, too old

I think he actually sang. If so, he did a great job...has a good voice. I think he's better than the first Tony in the original movie. Yes OP...you're allowed..lol.

He had more to work with in his character....his incarceration and the reason behind it. You see more of his anger and demons. That wasn't in the first movie. The original movie had Tony as a nicer, blander character....and you couldn't see why he would join a street gang, as a Jet. It didn't seem right.

I liked him very very much and don't get the hate for him. The one I had a problem with was the guy who played Riff. And they also took out the suspense of the "Cool" number. That song is NOT about a gun.

Ah yes Ansel is so street and rough. Totally believable as someone who would join a gang and did time. Lmao. In his khakis and button down.

He was trying to make his life better, and get away from the gang culture...so his veneer wasn't as tough and more mainstream. He still had his demons and was trying to fight them.

[Quote]The one I had a problem with was the guy who played Riff.

What?! Mike Faist as Riff is the performance of the film. It's a shame he isn't getting to awards love he deserves, but he didn't campaign at all.

R29 Get out more and actually interact with real human beings. The guy was a joke. Just like the whole film.

Ansel just doesn't the "it" necessary to be a movie star.

He looked like a fucking GAP commercial from the 1990s. Yeah, a real G. 🙄

Someone is bitter towards Ansel Elgort on here....lol.

Am I allowed to admit I’d like to get on my knees and service Ansel’s large penis?

R35 i posted above. Didn’t like him. Yet - I, too- would blow him.

Disgusting that y’all are drooling over a rapist pedophile.

If you like them stale and whiny, sure OP

[quote]Someone is bitter towards Ansel Elgort on here

I’m bitter towards Spielberg.

What a pile of shit.

I had no axe to grind going into this, but Spielberg managed to suck the life out of this.

No tension

No chemistry

No dancing - my god, he took out so much of the powerful, graceful, athletic dancing.

I appreciated Ansel’s butt - and that’s it.

Still not sure why anyone is praising the girl who played Anita. Not needing to compare her to Rita, who was a force!, but I did not get that she also lost the love of her life and struggled profoundly with Maria’s pleas, altered her opinion of Tony and rallied to save him for Maria in spite of her pain and sorrow.

And the drugstore scene was fucking pointless.

Her humiliation, her quelled hate then exploding all over the Jets - where was any of that? This felt more like a diss than a revolt.

The whole movie was so rushed and yet had no panic, urgency fear or fire.

And the camera angles were crap. No claustrophobia, no oppressiveness.

^^^ALL OF THIS. 💯

Tony is perhaps the worst major character to try to cast. The producer must find someone who can be believable as both a tough former gang leader and a sniveling simp.

r33 perfect!

Thanks R27, I agree. I had issues with the guy playing Riff too. He was almost cartoonish the way he played Riff. So overdone it smelled burnt.

Disney did not invite Rachel Zegler to the Oscars.

The idea of love at first sight resulting in life long commitment is outdated. In this case, the cultural difference just made it even more absurd.

PLUS: Romeo and Juliet are 13 years old.

R45 I had the same thought. That love at first sight shit just does not work anymore. Nobody says that. Nobody believes that. So stupid.

I reluctantly watched this thinking I would just checkout the first 15 to 20 minutes, but got completely drawn in and watch the whole thing late into the night. I really loved how the film making felt drawn completely from old movies like Rebel Without a Cause, especially with whatever they did to the colors in this film, technocolor, but muted. Elgort was stunning, I couldn’t take my eyes off him, and I really liked his singing. I thought all the young singers were very evenly matched in talent and looks, which held the movie together. I could have done completely without the whole Rita stuff, which really interrupted the flow, and stealing the final song for her was completely the wrong move. I particularly found the Jets to have very subtle homoerotic tension, which was a nice inclusion. Best change by far was setting I Feel Pretty in Gimbles.

No love at first sight? It's around, but not it's put on television.

[quote] The idea of love at first sight resulting in life long commitment is outdated.

The idea of long term commitments is outdated.

I mean the whole plot of WSS that Tony kills her brother and Maria immediately fucks him is pretty silly.

Isn't that what happens in R and J?

Romeo kills Tybalt, who is Juliet's cousin. And the timing is not as crazy.

He made Maria look like a slut.

I loved it. The songs are so gorgeous. The cast was great. Spielberg and Kushner managed to actually create characters out of most of them.

If you hated it, fine. Kudos. You're superior. But then you hated the original too, which is also fine.

In Romeo & Juliet they’re married and it’s their wedding night.

So you're slut shaming Maria!

The scene where Maria, the morning after meeting Tony on the balcony....she's lying on the bed still clothed. She wakes up and changes into her night clothes...messes the bed and tries to appear that she slept in her bed the entire night. The song that played when she did that....it sticks in my mind and really like it. It's an upbeat song....and don't remember it in the 1961 film. My parents had the Broadway album back then, and it was on the album...that's how I recognize it.

It's not in the '61 film. It's not a song. I believe it's from the Somewhere ballet. It's very Copland. In fact if somebody said who wrote that I would say it was Copland.

[quote]just bland and forgettable

I'm not quite old enough to have seen him live, but judging from the cast album, the photos and the Sulllivan show excerpt, that pretty much describes Larry Kert in the Broadway original. Carol Lawrence, too.

Larry Kert. Cheyenne Jackson v1.0.

Am I allowed to admit how bad I wanna suck the marrow out of him?

Elgort looks like a walking singing penis.

r33 Only not hot enough to be in a Gap commercial.

Thanks R59..

Ansel was as good as Renee. I liked them both. But both missed the dramatic highpoints of the '61 film. That's Spielberg's fault.

Even though I'm inclined to dislike Rita enormously for her lifelong trashing of Wood (or is this a more recent thing?) she's wonderful in it. I liked her as well singing somewhere though it takes away from the ending because it makes no sense Maria singing it to Tony while he dying. But this was so bad Maria would be more hysterical if her pet dog had been shot.

R65 She doesn't sing Somewhere when he's dying. She sings a section of Tonight

Yes, OP it's that weird looking queen Mike Faist that I don't get esp. as a gang leader.

I too thought Elgort was just wonderful.

[quote]I liked him very very much and don't get the hate for him. The one I had a problem with was the guy who played Riff.

I thought he was the best male actor in the movie, the only one who seemed to be giving a movie performance. He reminded me a few times of Marlon Brando. He had a lot of charm and he sang beautifully. Also he didn't push too hard.

Can I just say, though? I hated all the Tony Kushner additions. If others liked them, fine, but I thought all the simplicity as well as the mythic quality was gone. After all, it's a musical. It seemed like an eternity between musical numbers as all the characters blathered on about their backstories. It didn't flesh them out so much as make them into bores. Maybe we don't really need to know what motives all these people have - in the original it's just propelled by simple themes - much like Romeo And Juliet - the Jets and Sharks hate each other, they both hate the cops, Maria and Tony are on opposite sides of the fence and fall in love - boom, let's go.

I also thought Riff was terrible. So were some of the other Jets. Very "Broadway dancer does a tough act" (their voices were very high). I didn't think kids in the 50s would wear sneakers to a dance, and I didn't think an old lady working in a drug store would wear pants. I didn't think Anita was especially great - she didn't have a lot of screen presence - but I did like Ansel.

[quote]I also thought Riff was terrible.

For someone who really seemed to drive a lot of Tony's actions there were times when you felt, why does Tony feel drive to act on behalf of this guy? He did not have the charisma or come across as this great friend that would trigger that kind of loyalty.

I did not dislike the additions individually, but felt they added too much to the movie time and at times slowed things down.

I also like Ansel in the movie. I don't necessarily think he had the greatest voice, but I think they used it effectively for the most part.

I thought the actress playing Maria was decent as well, but while Natalie Wood might not be the strongest actress, she really effective in the final scene of the original movie, which as already mentioned as not as effective in the remake.

They made the Jets very weasel-ish in general but Riff was such a slimy little weasel and I thought, gave a kind of stagey performance. I didn't see why Tony would hang out with him ever.

[quote]I did not dislike the additions individually, but felt they added too much to the movie time and at times slowed things down.

Good point. I think in the end, though, the characters (as well as the setting) being fleshed out and made less archetypal does the opposite of what's intended. Keeping things rather simple and not giving characters motivations upon motivations (the whole Lincoln Center thing, also) just makes it "for the ages" instead of rooting it in specifics.

After somebody posted that degrading and hot clip of Alvarez I would so like to think he and Faist got it on. To me they both have charisma to burn.

Elgort is far better in Tokyo Vice. Serviceable in WSS, but not good enough for a "Spielberg lead".

It needed more hot Puerto Rican twink sex.

[quote]I liked him very very much and don't get the hate for him.

It's what they come here for.

He turned Maria into a WHORE!