Jennifer Tilly's breathy voice is easy to recognise; the determination beneath it deserves as much attention. We enjoy her broad comedy, but rate her most in Bound, where attraction gives us a reason to care about the crime.
Fi1m perspective
In Bullets Over Broadway (1994), Jennifer Tilly's Olive Neal wants attention and sees little reason to wait for it. Dianne Wiest's Helen Sinclair has the grander manner, but Tilly makes Olive's less polished self-regard equally insistent. She plays the caricature forcefully, without softening it to ask for our affection. Woody Allen's backstage comedy gives her a useful task: keep the character's determination visible through the exaggeration. We can laugh at Olive without forgetting what she wants.
The breathy voice and comic timing make her easy to cast as someone ditzy or seductive, as she frequently has been. Her early parts often reinforced that narrow image. The risk is that we recognise the type before we have much reason to think about the woman. Olive was her breakthrough, but Bound (1996) gave those familiar qualities a more demanding use. As Violet, she makes seduction, vulnerability and cunning believable together.
The Wachowskis pair her with Gina Gershon's Corky, an ex-con, while Violet is involved with Joe Pantoliano's mobster Caesar. Tilly and Gershon make the attraction persuasive without treating the romance as something that needs announcing. We were more anxious about whether the women could trust each other than about the mechanics of the crime, because they make planning together feel intimate. That concern carries the thriller through some conspicuously clever plotting.
Bill Pope's glossy cinematography sometimes competes with the performers, and Eve Cauley's polished, retro surroundings can make the danger look too carefully arranged. The Wachowskis also write complications that seem more concerned with proving their ingenuity than with these women. Tilly and Gershon keep us interested when the film starts admiring its own cleverness.
Bride of Chucky (1998) began her long association with Tiffany Valentine, with writer and director Don Mancini a recurring collaborator across the franchise. The combination of horror, comedy and camp makes clear use of her broad playing; voice work, including Celia in Monsters, Inc. (2001), gives that recognisable delivery another use. We would welcome another director as interested in her vulnerability as the Wachowskis are. For anyone who knows only Tiffany, Bound is the next film to try.
Biography
Jennifer Tilly (born Jennifer Ellen Chan) is an American-Canadian actress and poker player. She trained in theatre at Stephens College and began her career with stage work and small film and television roles in the 1980s.
She received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Olive Neal in Woody Allen's Bullets Over Broadway (1994). She is also known for her performances in Bound (1996), voice roles including Celia in Monsters, Inc. (2001) and Bonnie Swanson in Family Guy (1999–), and as Tiffany Valentine in the Chucky franchise. Tilly won a World Series of Poker Ladies' Event bracelet in 2005 and is the sister of actress Meg Tilly. She received a Theatre World Award in 1993 for her stage work in One Shoe Off.
