Easy Come Easy Gaughin

Charlton Heston

Charlton Heston passed away a few weeks back. Young people have little appreciation for his body of work, as his last major role, as Captain Matthew Garth in the WWII film Midway, was released in 1976. But he leaves behind an impressive selected filmography, the equal of nearly every contemporary star. A square-jaw action hero, comparable in many ways to Ah-nuld, he was arguably much more a star than an actor, but his best films are rousing in the best sense.

I think his peak period was 1965-1971, which saw the release of The Agony and the Ecstacy, Khartoum, Will Penny, Planet Of the Apes, and The Omega Man, but his highest profile roles occurred earlier, in Touch of Evil and Ben Hur.

Ten best roles

10) Midway 9) El Cid 8) Khartoum 7) The Three Musketeers 6)  The Agony and the Ecstasy 5) Will Penny 4) The Omega Man 3) Touch of Evil 2) Ben Hur 1) Planet Of the Apes

Percentile score (when compared to contemporary actors): 99.24

Juliette Lewis, the rocker

The actress

After playing small roles, typical teenage-daughter sort of things in film and TV, she exploded with an Oscar nomination in the really icky remake of Cape Fear (which got savage brutality just right, and, in retrospect, hardly anything else.) Over the next 2 years, she played the younger love interest to Woody Allen, and in a nice turn for his films, essentially outgrew him emotionally (which I guess could be argued for Mariel Hemingway in Manhattan as well, although her baby-doll voice made it difficult to imagine she had out-matured him. She basically just ran away.)

Lewis was the female lead in Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers, and got to play the part she really wanted in real life, a Patti Smith/PJ Harvey type rocker in Strange Days.

And then, apparently, conventional Hollywood wisdom caught up with her. While certainly not unattractive, she’s not many people’s idea of a Hollywood pin-up starlet. You might see posters of her in hipster indie video and record stores (yes kids, in the middle 90s there actually were video stores other than Blockbuster,) but you weren’t going to find her plastered up on the walls of the Sigma Chi house; Walmart wasn’t going to be featuring the Juliette Lewis Collection as a loss leader.

So she works less frequently, and often is limited to very marginal background characters, like in Starsky and Hutch and Old School. She’ll get a nice indie role occasionally; the recent Aurora Borealis was a nice turn. But she seems to be focused more on becoming the sort of singer she portrayed in Strange Days. Her band, Juliette and the Licks, get pretty good press; they get to play a lot of festivals, and she’s had a few marginal hits in Europe. And dang if the clips on Youtube don’t look like they might have been fun before I got closer to the Depends crowd than to the dormitory gang.

Ten best roles

10) Renegade 9) Aurora Borealis 8) Hysterical Blindness 7) Some Girl 6) Strange Days 5) Natural Born Killers 4) Kalifornia 3) What’s Eating Gilbert Grape 2) That Night 1) Husbands and Wives

PS, it’s not a mistake that I’ve left off Cape Fear. I saw it again recently, and outside of sort of grudgingly accepting that DeNiro’s level of savagery was truly masterful in a “why don’t you fledgeling actors really dig into what he’s doing here…..with your teeth”, it’s not NEAR the top of Scorsese’s work.

Percentile score

84.27

Drew Barrymore

She’s not my favorite, but in the right movie (like The Wedding Singer) she can be an acceptable support for the main action. She was HORRIBLE in the recent song movie with Hugh Grant (who makes the worst movies of any major star lately.) She’s basically Sandra Bullock minus the mysterious gaze plus a little bit of borderline skeezy eroticism.
Ten best roles

10) Poison Ivy 9) Never Been Kissed 8) Home Fries 7) Ever After 6) The Wedding Singer 5) Charlie’s Angels 4) ET 3) Confessions Of a Dangerous Mind 2) 50 First Dates 1) Fever Pitch

Percentile rating

86.28

Al Pacino

Lambdamoo’s nutmeg (Kylie, to me) requested I take a look at the career of Al Pacino. He’s not as big in my personal preference list as DeNiro or Hoffman, but completes the trinity of best 60ish New York actors. I think I saw him first in the weepie Bobby Deerfield, and then enjoyed his freak-out act in And Justice For All, but didn’t see most of his best work until I got out of college. His hamminess puts me off, but when he walks that line rather than jumping across it, he can be very effective. HOOO-ahhh.

I am going to catch some grief here, because I am including as his best performance Angels In America, an HBO mini-series. Still, the rule has been that long-form films can count if there was a theatrical version anywhere, and there was a 3-hour European version that was released to theaters, so it’s in. With it, he’s in a virtual tie with Dustin Hoffman, at 3rd place (out of 1300 assessed so far.) If you don’t include Angels in America, it doesn’t hurt him much; he drops into 5th, just behind Clint Eastwood, and just ahead of Catherine Deneuve.

Ten best roles

10) The Godfather Part III 9) Glengarry Glen Ross 8) Heat 7) The Insider 6) Insomnia 5) The Godfather 4) Serpico 3) The Godfather Part II 2) Dog Day Afternoon 1) Angels in America

Percentile rating

99.85

Omar Sharif

Doctor Zhivago was huge when I was a kid, and that famous ad ran in the paper for weeks, with Sharif in profile and Julie Christie. I remember either my Mom or one of her buddies using the term tall, dark, and handsome to describe him, I think the first time I ever heard that saying. Strangely, even though I am a big movie buff, I think the only thing I have ever seen him in other than backgammon videos is Top Secret, wearing a compact foreign car. I don’t have much interest in Zhivago, but I count not seeing Lawrence of Arabia as one of the biggest holes in my personal movie history.

Ten best roles

10) The Horsemen 9) Ayoub 8) Mayrig 7) Hidalgo 6) Lawrence of Arabia 5) Monsieur Ibrahim 4) Juggernaut 3) A Man In Our House 2) Funny Girl 1) Doctor Zhivago

Percentile rating

93.54

Earlier today I was asked this question

“Could you do a javier bardem/bill murray face-off, in honor of the fact that I once confused ‘The Sea Inside’ for ‘The Life Aquatic’ when looking for a weekend video rental?”
Consider it done

Round 1

Bill Murray transcends his well-established goofiness and rolls himself into a major gonzo star in Stripes. Bardem stars as a struggling artist in a Cuba that wants to repress him both for his artistry and his homosexuality in Before Night Falls. 80 points each.

Round 2

Both Murray and Bardem are directed by hotshot directors moving into the third stage of their lives, as evidenced by films revolving around more mature themes, Murray in Jarmusch’s Broken Flowers, Bardem in Almodovar’s Live Flesh. Two exceptional roles in two fine films. 80 points each.

tied, 160 each

Round 3

Murray appears as a camp couneslor in one of his earliest break-out-of-TV roles, the sloppy but occasionally hilarious Meatballs, spawning an example of one of the worst things Hollywood has to offer, the miserably unsatisfying franchise (Meatballs 3? uggh.) Bardem’s good as one of a number of unemployed dock workers in Mondays in the Sun, a film that could be 20% better had it been 20% shorter. 70 points each

tied, 230 each

Round 4

Bill Murray, and, well, everyone in it with the exception of Ernie Hudson is a laugh riot in the first Ghostbusters. 90 points. Pray there’s not a third one. Bardem’s the spycatcher who learns that the ballet teacher he has fallen in love with may be implicated in a plot to overthrow his government in the taut suspense thriller/romance the Dancer Upstairs. 80 points

Murray 320, Bardem 310

Round 5

Murray’s near perfect in the exquisite Groundhog Day, his first opportunity to portray an emotion that was not smothered in sarcasm (that emotion would be longing, with a side dollop of regret.) With better casting in the film, it could have been a 100, but it’s a 90. My favorite Bardem film is an update on the themes visited in Whose Life Is It Anyway (and to some extent, Million Dollar Baby,) they wonderfully underplayed (especially when compared to Dreyfuss’s out of contral hammy shouting in Whose Life) The Sea Inside. 80 points.

Murray 410, Bardem 390

And at that point the towel gets thrown in. Murray still has some of his greatest roles, including Lost in Translation and Rushmore (90 each), The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, What About Bob, and Quick Change (70 each), for a total of 800 points. Bardem’s got Los Lobos de Washington (60), Second Skin (50), Jamon Jamon (49), Between Your Legs (45), and Mouth to Mouth (40), for a total of 634.

Despite the wide difference in raw scores, Bardem’s about a 92 on the percentile scale, while Murray’s a 98, more or less, which just goes to show that you can establish yourself as a major star with a much lower level of achievement than it takes to get into the pantheon.

A couple of more facts about Murray that might surprise some folks; I occasionally define a peak period for actors. While Murray’s been hot in films for over 25 years, I would argue that after 30 or so films, he’s at his peak right now, as evidenced by Lost in Translation, The Life Aquatic, and Broken Flowers. Despite the fact that he’s at this creative peak, and he’s done work as good as almost anyone in the last 5 years, he’s still seen as a goofball lightweight comedian. But that’s contradicted by his “neighborhood”, the 6 actors whose achievement in film acting most closely matches his own. Those would be Jeff Bridges, Nicolas Cage, John Cusack, Richard Dreyfuss, Mel Gibson, and Tom Hanks. Wow, it’s really kind of hard to breathe up here.

I frequent Lambdamoo, a social environment that’s been up and running for nearly 20 years. From time to time I post battling filmographies in a boxing-match style, film to film, trying to decide which of two or more actors have had more significant careers. One of my Moo pals, Jaybird, requested a Hannah vs Reynolds face-off, probably for no real reason other than it sounded like fun. So here goes.

Round 1

Hannah in Splash, Reynolds in The Hollywood Sign. This doesn’t bode well for Ms Hannah, one of her most note-worthy roles, and it barely manages to stack up against Reynolds in a direct to video but surprisingly entertaining comedy, featuring Reynolds, Tom Berenger, and Rod Steiger! playing washed-up action movie stars who plan to turn their thespian skills into a real-life heist. 72 points each

Round 2

Reynolds in Sharkey’s Machine, Hannah in Kill Bill Volume1. Reynolds is the star in one of his more skillful, but still lackluster self-directing jobs. Hannah’s the 3rd or 4th wheel in KB Vol 1, which is a better film, but her part is not big enough in a good ensemble cast to rate her lots of points. 60 for Burt, 56 for Ms Hannah.

Score: Reynolds 132, Hannah 128

Round 3

Hannah, 81 points for Steve Martin’s best screenplay Roxanne, the goofy update of Cyrano. Hannah’s the title character, but Martin’s the lead, by a mile. Burt Reynolds, 80 points for the original version of The Longest Yard. Hard to believe that an NFL quarterback couldn’t attorney his way out of a prison stay for anything short of a child murder, but if you can get beyond that, this film that essentially extends the football scenes in MASH to feature length is fun.

Score: Reynolds 212, Hannah 209

Round 4

Hannah gets 63 points as one of 5 strippers who find solace in one another as they are plying their, uhhh, trade in Dancing at the Blue Iguana. Burt gets 60 points for phoning it in in Smokey and the Bandit, pretty much a silly waste of everybody’s time, and yet it still makes me laugh.

Score: Tied at 272!

Round 5

Burt’s a stunt man in Hooper, one of the 600 comedies that Hal Needham directed for Burt and whoever happened to be having lunch with anybody officially in the cast. Hannah gets 56 more points for Kill Bill Volume 2, for much the same reason she got 56 points for Volume 1 .

Score: Reynolds 332, Hannah 328

Sadly for Ms Hannah, that’s the end of the game. Burt’s still got Boogie Nights (90), Deliverance (90), Starting Over (80), The End (70), and Semi-Tough (70). All Hannah has left is Wall Street (56), Diplomatic Siege (54), Memoirs of an Invisible Man (54), Reckless (54), and High Spirits (50). Burt 732, Daryl 596.

Now, the REAL shocker is that Burt’s 732 places him at the 97.51 percentile! He’s a star’s star. Of course, his peak period was 77-81, and ended some 26 years ago, but still, it was a nice streak, and he seemed, most of the time, to be having fun, which always comes across better than a sullen temperament. Leonardo, take note. Hannah’s peak is 84-88, but she’s attained elevated hipness with her indie work and Tarantino roles, so there’s still a chance for her to add to her total. She’s an 88.26.

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Until she proves otherwise, she represents one of the greatest career flameouts in history. Her career cranked up like a firecracker, doing her best work as she transitioned from child-star to stunningly attractive adult. She was hip at a very young age, as a sort of an alternative-youth-lifestyle-role-model for disaffected kids in Lucas, Beetlejuice, and her master work, Heathers. But 9 of her best 10 roles covered only an 8-year span that ended in 1996, and she’s had only one significant role since then, starring and executive-producing Angelina Jolie’s Oscar; oops, it was actually called Girl Interrupted. And then bang bang bang bang, there was the breakup with Depp, the shoplifting charges, allegations of addiction, and delivering an Oscar to Jolie on a platter, in a film that was intended to showcase Ryder’s dramatic chops. Personally, I hope she comes back strong. Why would I choose Heathers as her best film? Because I can.

Ten best roles

10) Girl Interrupted 9) Mermaids 8) Reality Bites 7) The Crucible 6) Bram Stoker’s Dracula 5) Night On Earth 4) The Age Of Innocence 3) Edward Scissorhands 2) Little Women 1) Heathers

Percentile rating

94.07

Chief Dan George

This was by request soon after I posted Graham Greene, continuing a motif, I suppose. I’m not sure what to say about him, but here you go.

Ten best roles

10) Spirit Of the Wind 9) Americathon 8) The Bears and I 7) Smith! 6) Cold Journey 5) Shadow Of the Hawk 4) Dan Candy’s Law 3) Little Big Man 2) Harry and Tonto 1) The Outlaw Josey Wales

Percentile rating

63.15

Terrence Howard

After his highly acclaimed role in Hustle and Flow, Terrence Howard’s career is hot; according to IMDB, he’s got 5 films due in the next 18 months, including the high profile Iron Man. But until now, he’s mainly been stuck with supporting roles in which he has consistently drawn attention to his ability to flesh out a character with a small amount of screen time. If you were setting up a Howard filmfest, I would avoid Crash, owing to its focus on the ensemble; Howard’s scenes are good, but few and far between. The SUV gets almost as much screen time as he does. Plus, feeling humiliated by Tony Danza must be at least the 6th level of hell.

Ten best roles

10) Four Brothers 9) johns 8) Hart’s War 7) Ray 6) Angel Eyes 5) The Best Man 4) Idlewild 3) Spark 2) Hustle and Flow 1) Boycott

Percentile rating

71.63