OK we currently have the Film Casting That Disappointed You thread gathering opinions. But I prefer to be an optimist (at least on a Friday). So what films were the best cast?
Of the main cast: Gene Wilder would have been tough to beat in the title role Peter Boyle did an excellent job as The Monster Marty Feldman as Igor was possibly the best casting job ever Madeline Kahn did a good job as Wilder’s fiancée Cloris Leachman was also excellent
Among the leads the only out-of-place seemed to be Teri Garr who looked more than a little lost playing the bimbo with a thick accent.
Russell crowe as John Nash (Best Actor-IMHO)
Jennifer Connelly as Alicia Nash
Ed Harris as William Parcher
Judd Hirsh as Nash’s professor
Paul Bettany as Nash’s Roommate
Christopher Plummer as Dr. Rosen
After reading the book and seeing the stage play before the movie came out, I was quite disappointed in Jack Nicholson as Randall P. McMurphy.
From an interview with Dale Wasserman, who wrote the play version:
"Ken Kesey “hates the movie and he loves the play. The reason is very simple. The movie excises the heart of the book and the play puts it back in.
“The heart is the Indian’s schizophrenic vision of the world, which is a frightening but fearfully accurate vision. That’s the essence of the piece to me. The movie deleted it. It ended up with a fast-moving story with Jack Nicholson doing his Jack Nicholson act."
I met Kesey a couple of times (including getting very drunk with him and Howard Hesseman at the Fillmore. I still have the toy ray gun Ken gave me.) and he really disliked (maybe too mild a word for Kesey) what Michael Douglas did with the movie.
The stage play I saw in '73 (not the Kirk Douglas version) had a powerful McMurphy, much more like Kesey than Nicholson’s. If you ever have the chance, go see the play!
As far as best cast movie…
without a doubt, “The Hellstrom Chronicles.”
From the lead roles ; Frances McDormand - William H. Macy, to the smaller: Steve Buscemi - Peter Stormare, to the tiniest roles and extras, this was one heck of a well-casted film.
Mutiny on the Bounty (1935)
My Man Godfrey (1936)
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Gone With the Wind
The Philadelphia Story
The Little Foxes
Mrs. Miniver
Casablanca
For Whom the Bell Tolls
The Song of Bernadette
Since You Went Away
Gaslight (1944)
Gentleman’s Agreement
Johnny Belinda
I Remember Mama
All the King’s Men
Pinky
Come to the Stable
All About Eve
Sunset Boulevard
A Streetcar Named Desire (all four leads got Oscar nominations)Death of a Salesman
From Here to Eternity
On the WaterfrontMarty
GiantPeyton Place
Sayonara
The Defiant Ones
Separate Tables
Some Came Running
Room at the Top
Anatomy of a Murder
The Apartment
Judgment at Nuremberg
The Hustler
Bird Man of Alcatraz
Sweet Bird of Youth
Tom Jones
Hud
My Fair Lady
Ship of Fools
Othello (1965)
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (all four leads got Oscar nominations)
A Man for All Seasons
Bonnie and Clyde
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
The Graduate
Midnight Cowboy
They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?
Love Story
The Last Picture Show
The Godfather
The Exorcist
The Godfather Part II
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
Network
Rocky
Julia
The Goodbye Girl
The Turning Point
Notwithstanding Fibonacci’s insightful post about it, I think One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest gets my vote. It’s my favourite film, and I think the casting is superb.
Some excellent choices so far. Fargo is a good one, but then again the Coens get very little wrong, in my view.
I think to really qualify for this thread, it should be a film where the casting posed obvious problems, and on which a skilled casting director has obviously worked hard to solve these problems. Cuckoo’s Nest, given its subject matter, fits this bill.
Kubrick spent a lot of time and care casting his great movies. Dr. Strangelove is a good example. All the ‘types’ are very well cast and convincing. The whole movie has to walk a fine line between farcical comedy and bleak tragedy, and the entire cast manage this very well.
Psycho would be another good example. It’s not easy to get Marion and Norman ‘right’. Hitch did, Gus van Sant didn’t (and I like Anne Heche).
Possibly a little Brit-centric, but the movie of The Great Escape boasts a truly brilliant cast, all superbly well-suited to their roles.
Hey Walloon, got a lot of extra time to type long lists, do ya?
My pick is “Animal House,” with
John Belushi as Bluto (the half-insane party machine)
Tim Matheson as Otter (the sex machine)
Thomas Hulce as Larry Kroger (the naive freshman)
Stephen Furst as Kent Dorfman (the fat loser)
John Vernon as Dean Wormer (the authority figure out to spoil our heroes’ fun)
Bruce McGill as D-Day, (the wild man)
Variations of these characters have been staples of every teen exploitation flick made since, from “Porky’s” to “American Pie.”
I can barely think of a role in that movie that is not perfectly cast:
Cary Elwes as Westley - perfect
Robin Wright as Buttercup - perfect
Wallace Shawn as Vizzini - perfect
Mandy Patinkin as Inigo - perfect
Andre the Giant as Fezzik - perfect
Billy Crystal as Miracle Max - perfect
whoever played his wife - perfect
Christopher Guest as the 6-fingered man - perfect
Whoever played the old king - perfect
The albino and the priest - perfect
the other roles (most visibly Fred Savage, Peter Falk, and Chris Sarandon) are all fine jobs, if not quite as good
.