Thank God Cameron Diaz is back

ONEIn the culture, we are hard on our beautiful blondes. We can automatically assume that everything should be easy for a traditionally beautiful, flaxen-haired performer with a visible-from-room smile. We might even assume that because she’s pretty, she can’t be that smart. Tell that to Marilyn Monroe, who felt pressured throughout her all-too-short career to prove she was a serious actress, something we can now see clearly in her body.

A comic actor is of course also a serious actor – there is nothing more serious than the art of comedy. And sometimes we don’t know how much we’ve missed an actor until she’s been gone for a long time. That’s what happened to Cameron Diaz: One minute she was there, the next she wasn’t. Actresses often take breaks to have children, a privilege we grudgingly grant them. But they usually come back after a year or two. Diaz did not. After the 2014s Annie, her IMDb trail went cold—until now with the release of her Netflix comeback film Back in action, where she reunites with Jamie Foxx, her co-star in Annie and the 1999 film Any given Sunday. The movie is not great. But if that means there’s more Cameron Diaz in our future, let’s take it.

Why does a wonderful actress stop when she is still getting roles and when she is still young and beautiful enough to dazzle a world obsessed with youth and beauty? Diaz has said she stopped making movies to focus on raising her children with Benji Madden (of the rock band Good Charlotte). For a selfish universe, this is a boring reason to step away from the entertainment business; to a human being, and the children who grow up in her care, that’s all.

If you look at Diaz’s credits, from her debut (and surprising success) in 1994’s The mask by Annie, you will see that she worked steadily for two decades. Her movies have clearly made money – Hollywood doesn’t keep asking you back if your movies hold up. But for each performance, we remember clearly – as the good-natured addict of “hair gel” i There’s something about Mary, as wonder-ditz Natalie i Charlie’s Angels, as Tom Cruise’s unhinged but oddly likable one-time girlfriend Vanilla Cloud– there are dozens of others that we may not have thought about for years. Ridley Scott’s the advisor, Kirk Jones What to expect when you are expecting Curtis Hanson In her shoes: It’s not that Diaz was bad in those movies; it’s simply that they’re unmemorable movies, and in some cases she’s the best thing about them.

But scrolling through Diaz’s credits also reminds us of how many times she’s been truly amazing. Back in action may not be the comeback many of us were hoping for: directed by Seth Gordon, it’s the story of two former spies (Foxx and Diaz) who, 15 years after quitting and going underground, are drawn back for one last mission, this time with their children in tow. The film has a relaxed, family-friendly vibe, which might be a problem: its wholesomeness means there’s very little chance of either Foxx or Diaz being obscenely naughty even if they try. But even though Back in action is generally tame and bland, you can’t hold that against its stars. Their timing still has that precise zing; their off-the-cuff casualness gives the film whatever it has. And Diaz, who looks amazing not just for her age but for any age, centers the film without getting bogged down in it. She needs a smarter, nuttier comedy or caper than this – but that’s a prayer we have to offer to the movie gods.

Because looking back at the highlights of Diaz’s career—even some of the movies we might not have thought about in a long time—reveals the extent of her swashbuckling talents. In her comedic gifts, she is one of Marilyn’s heirs. She’s not afraid to get dizzy, a little checkered – but it’s all part of her cute prank. Her face is not just beautiful; it has a great second banana’s expressiveness – the face of someone who might have been surprised to find himself a movie star. With the apple-contoured cheekbones, the electric blue eyes that are always in jest, Diaz is like a 30s cartoon heroine come to life, always ready for a good time. But she can also be serious – i vanilla sky, As her seemingly carefree character realizes that she has been betrayed and humiliated, the depth of her insecurities becomes painfully apparent. She is the most believable element in an otherwise ridiculous film.

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And how many times has she made us laugh, seemingly without even trying? Like Natalie in Charlie’s Angels, she lets herself be wooed by the equally charming Luke Wilson. They have just met; they flirt with each other in a space beyond sensible language. “Thursday?” he says, hoping to set up a date. “My favorite day!” she replies brightly. “I’ll get tickets,” he offers helpfully. “I love tickets!” she anoints back. This is a love affair that blossoms on the planet of non-sequiturs, the kind moviegoers used to get with William Powell and Carole Lombard or Cary Grant and Irene Dunne.

But two of my favorite Diaz performances are the ones that have somehow fallen through the cracks, in films that are rarely revisited or talked about. In Danny Boyle’s wonderfully unhinged confection from 1997 lovers-on-the-lamb A life less ordinary, Diaz plays Celine, an heiress kidnapped by a hapless janitor, Ewan McGregor’s Robert. Robert has no idea how to pull off a successful kidnapping. Celine, who has been through this before, takes pity on him and shows him the ropes. This is how the two fall in love. Diaz, so young at the time—she would have been about 24—already knew how to convey the perfect mix of vulnerability and discomfort. She makes her entrance as Celine, the bored little rich girl, by pointing a gun, William Tell-style, at an apple perched on the head of one of her servants. From the first minute, we can tell she’s ready for this go-for-broke adventure, a picture that’s both chillingly weird and unrepentantly romantic.

And then there’s Jake Kasdan’s 2011 masterpiece – and I don’t use that word lightly –Bad teacher. Diaz plays Elizabeth Halsey, a shallow, checkered middle school teacher who, as the film opens, thinks she wants to leave her dreary classroom full of rugrats forever. She’s about to marry a rich guy—as she peels out of the school parking lot in her shiny red sports car, a cigarette dangling from her lips, she calls out to her painfully serious colleagues (including Lucy Punch, John Michael Higgins, and the wonderful Phyllis Smith), “Adios, bitches!” Little does she know that the rich fiance is going to dump her, which means she’ll have to crawl back to her job, in her usual teaching uniform of tiny body-hugging mini dresses and sky-high Louboutin heels.

Elizabeth is worst teacher – on her first day back she storms into class so hungover she can barely walk and skips Stand and deliver into the school’s DVD player; she then pulls up her hoodie and puts her head down on the desk to take a nap. All she wants is to meet a rich guy and get out of this teaching job for good. She believes that bigger breasts will help her achieve this goal, but she has no money, so she embezzles money from the school’s annual car wash to raise her funds – even though she showed up to that car wash in short shorts and towering espadrilles , so you can argue that she earned that dough fair and square.

In any case, Elizabeth is a terrible teacher through most of it Bad teacher. Her redemption comes very late in the film, so we have plenty of time to enjoy her utter and unrepentant evil. That’s the way it should be. Bad teacher might not be the kind of movie Diaz wants her own kids to see — at least not yet. But its unwholesomeness, with Diaz in the driver’s seat, is the purest form of cinematic pleasure. Diaz has grown up and matured – everyone has to at some point. She played the bad teacher Elizabeth Halsey at just the right time. Perhaps in her near future there is another unhinged role that will be perfect for where she is now. Another 10 years will be too long to wait.