Admittedly, I haven't seen her in much. I was coerced into seeing "E.T." when that first came out, and, as I expected, I detested it (and still do). However, I blamed Spielberg, not the actors involved. She screamed well, and had been blessed (or, in retrospect, cursed) with the Barrymore name, and that was the only impression she made on me. I didn't see "Firestarter" or any of the other formulaic pictures she appeared in as she passed from childhood into her teenaged years. At one point, I read that she had a drug problem (who doesn't?) and had been getting drunk at something like the age of 8, and I remember idly thinking, "I hope she's not a reincarnation of Diana Barrymore, and I always knew her father was a kook from the time I saw him in 'High School Confidential'." And then I put her out of my mind.
When she was in her late teens or early 20's, I happened to see her in a remake of "Gun Crazy" (well worth checking out, as is the original, which starred Peggy Cummins) and she caught my eye. Not only had she become a beauty, but I thought she did a very good acting job. I was interested enough to seek out her autobiography, and learned that not only was her father a kook, but her mother as well. But I can't say I was interested enough to check out any of her other movies.
She seems now to be comfortable with insipid roles in trite Hollywood mega-multi-million-dollar product. "Charlie's Angels" or shit with Adam Sandler or whatever lucrative offer gets dangled her way. On the one hand, I don't completely blame her. Acting is a profession, and actors need to make a living. But after awhile, after an actor appears in enough shitty, shallow movies, you start to re-think your original feeling that the actor in question was ever as talented as you once thought. And Barrymore is even more blame-worthy than most, considering that she now has enough clout to be a producer as well as an actor. How about producing a worthwhile movie or 2 instead of the same old miserable garbage?
Maybe "Gun Crazy" was just a fluke after all.
