The Screen Addict | Robbie
One of the last films released by a major studio before the COVID-shit hit the fan, was Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn (2020). This Suicide Squad (2016) spin-off in the DC Extended Universe, is built around one of its more memorable characters and performed to perfection by the phenomenon that is Margot Robbie.
I first became aware of Robbie more than 10 years ago when we were talking about acquiring a new Martin Scorsese picture for our territory. This film was to revolve around Jordan Belfort, a fast-talking investment banker with questionable morals. Everybody was excited to learn that Leonardo DiCaprio had signed on to play Belfort, but when we were invited to look at some dailies from the shoot, it was not necessarily DiCaprio who caught our immediate attention.
The scene that was showed to us is the one that everybody now remembers from the film, because it featured one of those brilliant Scorsese shots that will just forever etch itself into your movie-memory. You know the scene I am talking about – Belfort, desperate to get with his beautiful partner played by Robbie, crawls across the floor of his nursery towards her, only to be stopped dead in his tracks when she carefully places one of her stiletto-clad feet on his forehead.
Surprisingly, not the veteran Scorsese-muse DiCaprio, but the relative newcomer Robbie completely commanded the sequence. We bought the film – which was later released as The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) – immediately after seeing this scene. Robbie instantly shot to stardom and now, exactly ten years later, the staggering box-office haul of Barbie (2023) definitively cemented her status as a true Hollywood icon.
I referenced BoPatFEoOHQ and SS earlier because these films already were a clear testament to Robbie’s star power. We all know that DC is struggling to keep up with Marvel in the battle for superhero domination, but who knew that a relatively unknown character played by the right person could become more interesting than the crown jewels Batman and Superman?
To me, the idea of one day seeing Robbie return as Harley Quinn is much more exciting than watching the whole Ben Affleck - Henry Cavill / Bats - Supes casting-clusterfuck slowly unfold. Either way, I feel that BoPatFEoOHQ deserves much more love than it got upon release, and felt like writing this short blog to amplify that.
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Twitter (X): Robin Logjes | The Screen Addict