Yes, he does, but what about his acting?
I wouldn’t have thought Humphrey Bogart, quntessentially cool and cynical, could play a pathetic paranoid nutcase, but here you go.
If I told you during the hay-day of Friends that David Schwimmer would be cast as a hard ass Lt/Cpt of one of the most venerated companies of the 101st Airbore Division you would have laughed in my face. He’s too nervous, neurotic, and nebbish, you would have said. But in Band of Brothers his portrayal of Sobel was brilliant because of all those things.
Lord of War is one of my favorite movies over the past ten years, but casting Nicholas Cage as the title character has always bothered me just a bit.
The main character, Yuri Orlov, supposedly escaped from the Ukraine with his family. His parents look, sound, and act like Ukrainians. They are swarthy with Slavic accents and even if Yuri could escape from the neighborhood often enough to develop an American accent of his own, it would have been a New York accent, because, well, they live in fucking Brighton Beach.
He should not look and act like a guy from the Valley complete with a SoCal accent. They could have dug up John Belushi’s corpse and just parade it around in front of the cameras, and that would have been a better casting decision than hiring Nicholas Cage.
And yet, Nick stole the show. He was fantastic in that role. Nick does “haunted” very well, and he really has turned into a good actor over the years. I didn’t even think to question the casting until an hour after the credits rolled.
Oh, thank you! For years I’ve felt all alone in this belief…convinced that I must be wrong about what I felt because “experts” told me I was wrong. But I really, really liked Keaton’s interpretation the best.
My sister and I were just talking about Michael Keaton as Batman the other day while watching the Machinist. We both love Christian Bale and agree he’s a wonderful actor. BUT, he’s not Batman and we don’t care what anyone says. I’m not even going to talk about the others.
You are correct.
The film is not. Keanu played Some Guy Who Happened To Be Named John Constantine, not THE John Constantine.
John Constantine was originally patterned after Sting (true story) with uncombed hair and a cigarette jones… on a bad day.
So, since Mr. Reeves had neither a Brit accent, blonde hair, wrinkles, or depth, he’s just A John Constantine.
How about the original Broadway McMurphy, in 1963? Kirk Douglas!
Viggo Mortensen does not look like a Dunedain at all. They’re supposed to have long faces, not square ones. I’m not complaining either about the eye candy or about his performance, mind you, nor about having noticed him as an actor and gone looking for other movies of his, but he does not fit the description.
She also did a topless scene, and played a cynical, bitter woman, in Brokeback Mountain before playing Rachel.
Speaking of Brokeback Mountain, who would have thought Heath Ledger could pull off the Joker?
Hugh Laurie’s audition tape for House is one of my favorites. One minute he’s the proper Engilshman apologizing for his scruffy appearance; then he starts reading the script and just becomes House.
The casting people must have fallen off their chairs.
Jerry Orcbach was a song-and-dance manbefoefore being cast as a tough deetective in Prince of the City, which led to his Law & Order gig.
For me, Summer Glau as the terminator in Terminator: the John Connor Chronicles. She has a massive amount of emotional depth and I thought it was a big disservice to give her a character who had no emotions, but by the end of the show I thought she’d done a phenomenal job at eliciting sympathy and compassion for an emotionless character.
Charlie Sheen in Platoon. The guy is basically a comedic actor, but did an excellent job as the naive n00b.
I swear on all that is holy, Sheen stopped “acting” around 1990. Ever since then, he has done nothing but play a bad caricature of himself.
I also loved Micheal Keaton as Batman. Kilmer wasn’t bad, Clooney was ok, Bale was crappy, but Keaton nailed it.
Mark “Marky Mark” Wahlberg in pretty much everything. If you’d told me twenty years ago that the musclehead rapper who intentionally pantsed himself onstage would someday be one of my favorite actors, I would have found it difficult to believe.
Keaton was also very good in Pacific Heights as a Very Bad Man.
“Pull off” is understating things a bit. Ledger took an iconic role and absolutely owned it to such a degree that his portrayal is now the icon.
And yes, hardly anybody thought he was the right choice. How many people on here complained about him getting the role? Dozens, at least.
When Alec Baldwin got cast on “30 Rock” I remember thinking, “Well, he’s been pretty funny on SNL… but I don’t see him as being a very successful comedic actor.” Boy was I wrong.
Ok, they’re dumb movies based on silly comics, but–
Hugh Jackman as Wolverine. Wolverine is supposed to be short, burly, Canadian, & arguably a bit smelly. They went for a tall, lanky, Aussie dancer. But the dancer can act.
Nitpick: If he’s proved his mettle once, he’s hardly “miscasted” in subsequent roles.