In Contention

Tag: William Hurt

  • The Great Performances: 2005

    Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain2005 was the year of Heath Ledger’s beautiful, moving performance in “Brokeback Mountain,” which I saw for the first time in Toronto.  It instantly became the talk of the festival, and the film became the one to beat for the Academy Award.

    Ledger was astonishing as the taciturn cowboy who is more surprised than anybody when his soulmate turns out to be another cowboy, portrayed superbly by Jake Gyllenhall. If there is a more deeply felt moment in film history than Ledger gently adjusting Gyllenhall’s shirt at the end of the film, his eyes filled with tears, I don’t know what it is. That’s loss, that is absolute heartbreak, that is one of the greatest acting performances of the decade.

    Phillip Seymour Hoffman would win the Oscar for his transformation into “Capote” and he’s very good, but just not in the same league as Ledger. I wondered from time to time if “Infamous” had been released earlier if Toby Jones might have won the Oscar instead of Hoffman. Each becomes Capote in a very different manner, and side by side it is difficult to choose the stronger portrayal. Certainly I prefer Hoffman’s as it is darker, and for me more realistic, but there can be no denying Jones.

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  • ‘Kiss’ on DVD…at long last!

    Kiss of the Spider WomanSpeaking of the home market, Hector Babenco’s “Kiss of the Spider Woman,” one of the great films of the 1980s, finally arrived on my desk this week from the good folks at City Lights Entertainment. It has not been available on DVD until now. Kris previewed the release last month.

    Having not seen the film for more than 20 years, I anxiously popped it into my player and sat down to enjoy it once again with my wife. To my surprise, the film’s raw power is still there, the performances of William Hurt and Raul Julia have seemed to deepen over the years and the picture’s independent spirit remains intact.

    William Hurt was on the rise in Hollywood when he agreed to take the role after more than 14 months of the producers and director working with Burt Lancaster fell apart. Lancaster had very strong ideas about how he saw the film, and after a triple by-pass, the prducers went elsewhere for the part of Molina.

    Known as an intellectual actor, William Hurt would go on to win the Academy Award for his brilliant performance as a jailed homosexual who falls in love with his cellmate (a revolutionary portrayed with intense brilliance by Raul Julia). Shot on location in Brazil, the film had a gritty, honest look that attracted critics upon the poicture’s release in 1985.

    To the shock of even the producers it was nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Hurt) and Best Adapted Screenplay. Strangely, and sadly, Julia was snubbed for a nod alongside Hurt. James Garner probably took the nod that might have been his for “Murphy’s Romance.” Hurt’s ultimate win was something of a surprise over the heavily favored Jack Nicholson (in “Prizzi’s Honor”), scoring a point for indy films in the 1980s.

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  • Did Hector Babenco really get his Hurts confused??

    William Hurt in Kiss of the Spider WomanI’m not too privy to the behind-the-scenes drama of Hector Babenco’s “Kiss of the Spider Woman.”  I haven’t even seen the film in close to a decade and it’s one of those that slips my memory more often than not, maybe because it hasn’t been available in any home medium for so long, but likely because I didn’t respond to the material originally.

    I couldn’t deny William Hurt’s affecting (and Oscar-winning) performance, however.  Ditto Raul Julia’s concentrated work.  Regardless, I’ve been meaning to give it another look ever since.

    Anyway, I was reading through Lou Lumenick’s recounting of the film’s rocky road to the screen (as detailed in the documentary “Tangled Web: Making ‘Kiss of the Spider Woman’”), and my head was spinning.  I never knew there was such turmoil going on off-camera.  But nothing could have prepared me for this bit:

    [Leonard] Schrader’s screenplay originally attracted the attention of Burt Lancaster, who wanted to play Luis, and consequently of the major Hollywood studios. But Lancaster left the project after Weisman refused to use a different script written by Lancaster himself — who had done his own costume test in drag.

    [Producer David] Weisman went with Hurt, then an up and coming leading man. Hurt clashed repeatedly with director [Hector] Babenco, who thought he was going to be working with the British actor John Hurt.

    W…T…F?  And there’s more.  I encourage you to give it a read if you weren’t already aware of all of this (something tells me I should have been).

    “Kiss of the Spider Woman” is finally getting a DVD release this month, by the way.  It hits the market as a two-disc collector’s edition and on Blu-ray (both of them apparently Amazon exclusives) on July 22.

  • Edward Norton and the not-so-jolly green giant

    What can be said of the fearless Edward Norton, who recently became an on-screen comic book hero?  I never understood his choice to take on the role of Bruce Banner, a.k.a. The Incredible Hulk.  And now, post-release, I’m still puzzled.

    He walked into a franchise that became a fast mess just five years ago.  And according to IMDb, he turned the role down back then. Given the actor’s commitment to characterization in his performances, it makes sense that he would turn the other cheek.  After all, so much of Bruce Banner, or at the least what audiences might want to see, is a technological creation. Unlike any of the characters in “Iron Man” or in the upcoming “The Dark Knight,” Mr. Norton doesn’t get to sport a good makeup job and put his true talents on display. He has to disappear all together.  It seems so unlike him.

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  • REVIEW: “The Incredible Hulk” (***1/2)

    When Ang Lee set out to direct the first feature film adaptation of Marvel’s Incredible Hulk property five years ago, some things were…different.

    Lee was coming off of the major awards success of “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” which led audiences – many of them skeptics – to ponder what he might be able to accomplish with the psychology of another action-oriented effort.

    However, Marvel had its hands tied. Unlike Detective Comics properties, which fall under Time Warner ownership and therefore receive continual distribution out of Warner Bros. Pictures, Marvel was still at the whims of studio discretion, its properties scattered to the winds despite having the consistency of an Ari Arad behind the scenes.

    Nothing could be said less of Lee as a filmmaker when the finished, disastrous product was unveiled. He took a gamble and hit craps…hard. And he bought back in two years later, bouncing back with a Best Director Oscar to show for it. But Marvel was left with a serious consideration that had likely lingered for many years: how to get a developmental handle on a catalogue of material that was bursting at the seams with cinematic potential.

    The difference now is Marvel Studios, which saw its first production “Iron Man” held on high by critics and audiences alike just one month ago. It was a home run for an unexplored property on the big screen, but could it be duplicated? And via a franchise that wasn’t nearly far enough removed from it’s immediate past to be considered stale by any means?

    Apparently so. Because Louis Leterrier’s “The Incredible Hulk” is not only likely to be the biggest, most exhausting (in all the good ways) film-going experience you’ll have this year, but it also holds the second turtle dove of a young studio’s seizure of what promises to be one of the greatest cinematic roll outs the genre has, or perhaps will ever see.

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  • Best in show 2005: the year in superlatives

    It’s time to really round out the year and offer up my picks for awards in 2005.

    In addition to the typical categories – which finally see their winners announced today – you’ll find some other fun arenas for awards citation. Call it a mish-mash of MTV-Awards-type kudos and other frequently heralded categories we find time to time in various critics’ awards and precursor ceremonies.

    No one is better at this sort of thing than Nat Rogers over at The Film Experience, so I recommend you all take a look at his Film Bitch awards when he dishes them out in the coming weeks.

    These will likely be my last extensive thoughts on the awards season this year, barring any brief comments I may or may not make here and/or there. There will, of course, be one final predictions update before the end of the year.

    It feels good to wrap everything up before Christmas vacation, I have to tell you. But the Oscar season is by no means over, so I’ll be diving right back in once 2006 finally rolls around.

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