Melanie Lynskey — Actress Turned Movie Blogger

I am a huge fan of actress Melanie Lynskey.  Most people will recognize her from “Two and a Half Men,” but it is her deft, varied, and utterly natural performances in small, independent films that have made her one of my favorites.  Whether she is playing a damaged and damaging substance abusing mother in Win Win, a heartbroken adoptive mother mourning a miscarriage in “Away We Go,” a not-so-evil stepsister in Ever After, a journalist in “Breaking Glass,” or, in her breakthrough role with Kate Winslet as a teenage murderer in “Heavenly Creatures,” her choices are always fresh, heartfelt, and touching.  She has just been a guest blogger for the The Film Experience and her posts have been thoughtful, creative, and utterly captivating.  In DVDs I Had to Own she charmingly lists classics like the tearjerker Terms of Endearment and Woody Allen’s bittersweet Manhattan but some delightfully oddball choices like the obscure horror film Blue Sunshine, the critical and box office failure Mickey Blue Eyes with Hugh Grant (she says it has her “favourite scene in the history of cinema”), and one of the worst reviewed movies of all time, Gigli.

And I love the post where she asks the actor friends she’d like to write love letters to about their work to tell us the people they think are so good they’d be inspired to write fan letters.  There’s a part 2 as well.  Ms. Lynskey, consider this my love letter to you for your work as an actor, a blogger, and a citizen of the planet.