I’m a really big fan of his. He’s one of those men that can play an unattractive nerd and a hot guy both convincingly. He has a chameleon-like feature to him, thanks to his superb acting chops too. I must say, with makeup, he can really be unrecognisable. I’m always wondering why Hollywood never came knocking for him. He’s obviously pretty boy-ish enough and he’s a great actor, even if he can’t quite master the American accent. Yet he seems to get the short end of the straw all the time. It’s not like he has a solid artistic integrity anyway. Hell, he did The Musketeer. He even said himself: “I have a bad time between jobs because I’m always convinced I’ll never work again. I think it may be an English thing, this fear of unemployment.” So he obviously takes whatever he can get. The only thing he ever turned down was “Sid & Nancy”, because he’s a big Sex Pistols fan and he thought the movie was too close to Sid’s death. Why nobody ever gives him anything good is a wonder. But he’s not fully innocent either. He was the first choice to play Snape in the HP movies. He dropped out to be in Planet of the Apes. Probably the dumbest thing he ever did.
And does anyone else think that he could have made the perfect Constantine instead of Keanu Reeves?
I did not see Constantine.
But I am indeed a Tim Roth fan.
He does indeed sink into and completely become every character he plays; to me, Nicole Kidman also has that believable quality. Not every actor does.
Loved Roth in Rob Roy. “Love is a dung hill, Betty, and I am but a cock that climbs upon it to crow.”
I’m a big fan of the Constantine character, so I had a list of several actors who would have been better than Keanu Reeves:
Daniel Craig (from Layer Cake)
Paul Bettany
James Marsters
Ewan McGregor
Kiefer Sutherland
Gary Oldman
Tim Roth
I like Roth a lot in everything I’ve ever seen him in, except *Planet of the Apes * (which I hated, but not because it was his fault). Still never saw Rob Roy, though.
I have a feeling that I’m one of very few people who, upon seeing him in the opening scene of Pulp Fiction, thought “Hey! It’s the guy who played Guildenstern!”
The Legend of 1900 is one of the best movies I’ve ever seen, and he’s downright awsome in it. It is such a moving, sensitive performance. I cannot say enough about him. Whatever I thought about him before this (and I thought highly of him) has been magnified a thousand times. He’s wonderful.
The actor I think he’s most similar to is James Woods.
Also, maybe it’s just me but it seems that since his two “cash-the-big-paycheck” roles in Planet of the Apes and The Musketeer, he hasn’t been that visible (at least not to American audiences). He had a supporting role in **Dark Water ** with Jennifer Connelly this summer but that’s been about it over the last few years. Did he take a break?
His role as Archibald Cunningham in Rob Roy was singularly memborable for me. That’s still the best villainous performance I’ve ever seen. As I wrote in this Cafe Society society discussion on fictional villains, never before did I experience the desire to kill a fictional character with my bare hands. Just a tour de force of acting.
I kept my eye out for Tim Roth after that. I enjoyed his work in Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs, and Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead. He was virtually the only good thing about Little Odessa.
Thanks to Kalhoun, I’ll have to look for Legend of 1900.
One of the Roth’s best films is also one of his earliest: The Hit (1984), with John Hurt and Terence Stamp, directed by Stephen Frears. Definitely check it out.
Big, big fan. I was dreaming of him in high school while everyone else was into boy bands. Like most, I loved him in Reservoir Dogs and Rob Roy, though I also reeeally recommend Gridlock’d. Funny, sad, very underrated.
I know he’s not conventionally pretty, but he’s so charismatic, etc. I find him unbelievably sexy (but Liza Minelli gets no love from straight guys? WTF? Sadly, I do notice this as a trend…)