Jake's ladies - Ellen, Catherine and Chloe

The other day we were looking at Jake Gyllenhaal's leading ladies - and chap - in the movies, but there were one or two that weren't mentioned, and chief among these is Ellen Pompeo. Moonlight Mile is one of my absolute favourite films of all time and is so completely independently of my Jakebug, which I caught a little later. And one of the reasons why I love this film so much is Ellen Pompeo.



Ellen's portrayal of grief-stricken, struggling Bertie, staying strong and engaged with life despite all it had thrown in her path, was wonderful and at the end, a rarity for some Jake films, there were tears of joy. Now when I watch this film, with or without the illuminating commentary by Jake, Dustin and director Brad Silberling, I give Jake the full appreciation he deserves - getting past those shades of brown and yet another bad haircut. As Jake says in the commentary, in his films, it's the hair that has to suffer.




The chemistry between Jake and Ellen is perfect and real. I wasn't surprised when I learned quite a while ago that Jake had come up to her in a car park and told her she was the most beautiful girl he'd ever seen. Jake hadn't known he was about to act with her in just a few weeks. Later on, Ellen came to see this moment as fate, but she herself dismissed this encounter as 'an awkward sort of flirtatious moment', in which they both flirted with the other, leading to real chemistry on the set of Moonlight Mile. Ellen agreed that he had the 'It' factor: 'I said it 500 times before and I'll say it again, it can't be articulated. Watch the movie and you see it. Watch anything he does and you'll see it.' Ellen also tells us how Jake loves to cook and had rustled up for her 'Pasta, salad, chocolate chip cookies, anything. He's a great guy. He likes to have fun and he loves to live life.' Jake AND chocolate chip cookies baked by Jake - does it get any better than that? Judging by the picture here of Jake and other co-star Susan Sarandon, the chemistry wasn't confined to Ellen! The picture of Jake and Maggie was taken at the Hollywood premiere of Moonlight Mile.



I'll be back to Ellen another time, but I want to have a brief look at two of Jake's less familiar leading ladies, Catherine Keener in Lovely and Amazing, and Chloe Sevigny who had the fortune to be cast as Jake's wife in Zodiac but suffered all the disadvantages of a match less than perfect and so she didn't even get a kiss.


I'll admit to something here: Lovely and Amazing is the only film by Jake I've not seen. To me it's an example of a film in which Jake has been picked to play the stereotypical young, handsome lover of a woman going through a midlife crisis. I realise I may be doing the film an injustice and I make no judgement on the quality of the acting as I've not seen it. Undoubtedly, it's a great cast. One thing I can uderstand is that Jake would clearly have been a top choice for any director because he is so clearly the type of young man any woman of any age would fall for. Director Nicole Holofcener said of his choice of Jake: 'Jake -- when he walked in the room our knees just went weak! I needed a guy who was young enough for it to be appalling, but sexy and manly enough to be understandable... Well, he's got the Bubble Boy hair in it and the Bubble Boy eyebrows. That was not planned, but that's what I got and he looks great.' No argument there - not certain about the appalling bit though.


Jake himself looked back on Lovely and Amazing as a film he enjoyed. In the runup to The Day After Tomorrow, Jake was asked which of his performances in his 'independent' films he looked back on with fondness and he picked Lovely and Amazing: 'I probably would say there are pieces of every performance that I like, not one performance that is great. But I do like the movie "Lovely and Amazing".' This was because there was 'A comfort, a real sense of camaraderie on the set which made me feel comfortable. I was a young actor not having the experience that so many other actors have who have been in the business for a long time. Building up a defense and figuring out ways of bringing things up even when you're not supported, is something I don't have. Whenever I feel like I falter, it's because I don't feel like I'm completely supported. In that movie, I walked into rehearsals with Catherine Keener and she immediately made me feel sexy and I remember Nicole Holofcenter, the director was like, 'Do you want some coffee?' and I'm 'Yeah, I'll have some coffee.' She's like [Catherine] 'I'll have anything he has.' And I was like, 'Okay, cool!' You don't get that from other actors. Usually you walk on and you're like, 'Can I have a coffee?' And they're like 'oh, you want coffee.' And I'm like, 'what? What's wrong with coffee?' So I like that film because I just felt relaxed and myself, and honest, and happy.' Here's a picture of Jake at the premiere.


As for Chloe Sevigny's Melinda, she had to deal with being there simply to make Jake Gyllenhaal seem less physically attractive, those are her words and I think that's rather unfair to herself. As the only woman on set and a relatively minor major character, she had to watch her co-stars become consumed by their own obsessions. Melanie, by contrast, wanted no part in the Zodiac world, seeing how it was directly affecting their family. So she was an outsider, in the story and on set. And her clothes... 'The wardrobe really affects me, and the hair and make-up, and all of that. I felt like they were trying to make me look frumpy to make Jake look less attractive. [Laughs] He has this unattractive girlfriend, therefore you can believe he’s less attractive. I don’t know. That’s my own insecurities. But I did like that she wasn’t glamorous obviously in any regard. She was a working mother, and she was very practical. I got to be kind of cute in the beginning. I liked that she was this practical, sassy, no nonsense lady.' I had no idea that Melinda had also worked at the Chronicle.



When Chloe is asked what it was like working with Jake, she paints a rather adorable picture of a clever, funny and rather frustrated individual bouncing all over the place: 'We had some rehearsals where we went through all of our scenes and talked through the scenes and the dialogue, and he was very active in rewriting or adjusting his dialogue. I’m not a writer. I’m happy with the lines you give me to a certain extent. But he was very active in that and he would come with new ideas for me, for my lines. [Laughs] He was very boyish and very funny. He kept the whole crew in stitches. They were all very charmed by him. He’s very creative. He has so much energy. He’s always bouncing off the walls. After 80 takes, of course, I think he would get bored a little bit, especially when it was my coverage, so he’d be switching up the lines and stuff. His mind is always very active.'



Includes pictures from IHJ.