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Age Lift: Difference between revisions
rewrote first film example into standard English and added all proper markup, pothole texts, CAPS to italics, spelling
Goo Monster (talk | contribs) (Undo revision 1762537 by Goo Monster (talk) I assumed that this was using the same definition as the TvT one. In the TvT one, the reason for the age change is irrelevant.) Tag: Undo |
Looney Toons (talk | contribs) (rewrote first film example into standard English and added all proper markup, pothole texts, CAPS to italics, spelling) |
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{{trope}}
[[File:Picture 36.png|link=Hamlet|frame|What passes for a rebellious young man in some Shakespearean acting circles.]]
Not quite [[Dawson Casting]], but a related phenomenon particular to adapted works. Dawson Casting is when actors play roles for which they are clearly too old. '''Age Lift''' is when this happens, but the age of the character(s) in question is/are changed or glossed over for the sake of the story. For example, instead of having a 35-year-old actor trying to pass for 17, you age up the character from 17 to 27. The idea is that the discrepancy between character and actor is much smaller.
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== Film ==
* ''[[Tuck Everlasting]]'': In
▲* Tuck Everlasting In The book Winnie is eleven in The film she is aged up to 15 possibly to somewhat justify the Dawson Casting of the in her late teens Alexis Bidel. Also possible since there is a slight romance with one of the forever 17 year old Tuck which would have seemed weird with an 11 year old.
* The title role in ''[[Hamlet]]'' is a role that this often happens with. Laurence Olivier was 41 when he played Hamlet in 1948, Richard Burton was 40 in 1964, Innokenti Smoktunovsky was 39 in the same year, Derek Jacobi was 42 in 1980, Kevin Kline was 43 in 1990. Mel Gibson (34 in 1990) and Kenneth Branagh (36 in 1996) are almost in the right age group, considering that there are a couple of lines in the play itself that place Hamlet's age near 30.
** The pictured above Nicol Williamson was actually the youngest notable actor to play the role (at 33, in the 1969 film).
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* Roberto Benigni playing the title role in his film version of ''Pinocchio'', at the age of 50.
* In the BBC film versions of [[Philip Pullman]]'s books ''[[Sally Lockhart|The Ruby in the Smoke]]'' and ''The Shadow in the North'', actor [[Matt Smith]] plays street kid Jim, who is 11 in the first book and 16 in the second, as a man in his late teens/early twenties. Which could cause problems if they ever get around to filming the fourth book, ''[[The Tin Princess]]''.
* In ''[[Forbidden Zone (film)|Forbidden Zone]]'', all the children are played by adults. The most [[Egregious]] example being Flash Hercules, who is played by a ''70
* In ''[[The Adventures of Robin Hood (film)|The Adventures of Robin Hood]]'', the 48-year-old [[Claude Rains]] is cast as Prince John—who was historically 26 at the time of his brother [[Richard the Lion Heart|Richard]]'s imprisonment. Like most fictionalizations of [[Robin Hood]]'s story push John up to middle age.
* This probably has to do more with legal compliance than artistic reason, but no matter what actress is playing her, the character of ''[[Lolita]]'' always starts the movie at age 14 or 15 rather than 12, which she is at the beginning of the book.
* In the film version of ''[[Logan's Run]]'', the mandatory death age was increased to 30 (compared to the book's 21) for this reason.
** The book's notion that sexual activity becomes legal—and practically encouraged—at the age of 14 probably doesn't help.
* In the book of ''[[Interview with the Vampire]]'', Claudia was changed at the age of five. In [[The Movie]], Claudia was played by Kirsten Dunst, who was twelve
* None of the actors who've played [[Dune|Paul, Leto II and Ghanima Atreides, or Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen]] have been under 20. Of course, since Paul and Feyd-Rautha were 15 during ''Dune'' itself and Leto II and Ghanima were ''8'' this is understandable. Generally, Paul and Feyd's ages are not mentioned in the adaptations, which makes this arguably a case of [[All There in the Manual]] and [[Dawson Casting]], but for the [[Syfy]] version of ''Children of Dune'', Leto and Ghanima's ages were upped to around 18. The 1984 adaptation of Dune also has the 4 year old [[Creepy Child|Alia]] played by the 9 year old (at time of release) Alicia Witt.
* In ''Picnic'' William Holden considered himself too old (he was 37) to play Hal Carter, supposedly of the same generation as [[The Chick]] played by Kim Novak (22).
* One of the biggest criticisms of the ''[[James Bond (film)|James Bond]]'' movie ''[[A View to a Kill]]'' was that Roger Moore was still playing Bond at age 58 (he was 46 he was first cast as Bond in ''[[Live and Let Die (film)|Live and Let Die]]''). [[Sean Connery]] himself said "Bond should be played by an actor 35, 33 years old. I’m too old. Roger’s too old, too!".
* Most of the main cast of ''[[Percy Jackson and The Olympians]]'' was aged up from their preteens. Most notorious in Annabeth's case - sure, they aged her up from twelve to sixteen, but that didn't stop Alexandria Daddario from being in her early twenties.
* In ''[[The Godfather]]'', Marlon Brando (age 47) played the title character Vito Corleone (who ages from 55 to 65 over the course of the film). All his children except Talia Shire also fit him under [[Playing Gertrude]] too.
** Also in the sequel ''[[
* ''[[Superman Returns]]'': 22 year old [[Kate Bosworth]] played [[Lois Lane]] in a movie that was supposed to take place five years after ''[[Superman II]]'' in which Lois was already years into her career and was played by the then 30 year old Margot Kidder.
* In the 1995 film of ''[[Richard III]]'', [[Maggie Smith]] plays the Duchess of York, mother to [[Richard of Gloucester]], Edward IV and the Duke of Clarence. Smith was 61 at the time the film was made. [[Ian McKellen]], who placed Richard was 56, John Wood who played Edward was four years older than her at 65, and Nigel Hawthorne who played Clarence was ''sixty-six''. To be fair, Maggie Smith has been playing older women for most of her career.
* The grandpa of all slasher flicks ''[[Blood Feast]]'', the character of Fuad Ramses is referred to several times as an "old man" even though the actor playing him was all of 30 years old. Thus, Fuad had some rather unconvincing gray streaks spray-painted into his hair.
* The musical ''[[Nine (theatre)|Nine]]'' is about a filmmaker experiencing a mid-life crisis as he turns forty. For the film version, his age was upped to fifty to match Daniel Day-Lewis (52 in 2009, when the film was released).
* In every film and television version of ''[[Wuthering Heights]]'', Heathcliff and Cathy are played by the adult actors during the scene where they eavesdrop on the Lintons, making giggling
* ''[[Watchmen (film)|Watchmen]]'' has multiple examples, which are justified as the characters also appear in flashbacks set at least 20 years prior, and it's easier to add age with makeup than it is to subtract it: [[Carla Gugino]] as Sally/Silk Spectre I and Jeffrey Dean Morgan as the Comedian (she was 37, he was 42, both play characters that
* The ''[[Star Wars]]'' prequels end up causing this to Darth Vader, who died at the age of 46 - but his unmasked and ([[Recut|original]]) Force Ghost actor in ''[[Return of the Jedi]]'', Sebastian Shaw, was ''72'''.
* In the book of ''[[A Clockwork Orange (novel)|A Clockwork Orange]]'', the band of droogies were adolescents of about 14 or 15. When Kubrick chose Malcolm Macdowell for the role of Alex, all were aged up accordingly. Echoes of the book occur when Alex is depicted as school age and when (years later) Dim describes himself and his partner as "of job age" in the scene where they torture Alex.
* Though it seems odd, the film adaptations of ''[[Harry Potter]]'' do this ''accidentally'' with Lily and James Potter. Looking at the flashback clips, the moving pictures, and the images in the Mirror of Erised, Lily and James appear to have been in their 30's or 40's when they had Harry. Which would make sense, since their ages weren't revealed until the seventh book, six years after the first movie had been made. Though the film versions of Harry's parents look quite middle-aged, the book version of Harry's parents were only 20 when they had Harry and 21 when they died.
* Fittingly ''[[Shakespeare in Love]]'' has a few examples. Shakespeare himself is actually played by an actor the right age (28 year old Joseph Fiennes) and Geoffrey Rush was only slightly older than the real life Philip Henslowe but Rupert Everett was a decade too old to play the then 29 year old [[Christopher Marlowe]] and Richard Burbage who was only 25 in 1593 was played by a then 37 year old Martin Clunes.
* For the film adaption of ''[[The Giver]]'', Jonas’s age was changed from 12 to his mid-teens.
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