Beyond the realm of matinee hunks such as Sylvester Stallone, there is a class of actors--those pictured on this page among them--who bring such unpredictable talent to their roles that they defy idolatry. Their characters, because they are so fully human, will never be cast in plastic and sold at Toys-R-Us. Yet they stand above the common lot; they are such off-the-wall on-screen presences that they skew the portion of reality that their films inhabit. They manage to be both quirky and heroic. Looking back at 1986, then, we salute those particular actors who made going to the movies so worth while.
In Children of a Lesser God, William Hurt turned in one of his usual intelligent, passionate performances as an exuberant teacher in a school for the deaf. Commenting on the Rambo/Rocky phenomenon, Hurt once said, "Our job as actors is to perceive our humanity, not [to create] pathological heroes." He has broadcast the humanity of such unlikely character as a devolving scientist (Altered States), a cynical Porsche-driving drug dealer (The Big Chill) and a jail-bound homosexual window dresser (Kiss of the Spider Woman); he could bring life to marble statuary.
Jeff Goldblum's talents are such that he broke Hurt's rule--he created a thoroughly yucky pathological hero in The Fly--and still became the only sympathetic film insect since Jiminy Cricket. On screen, Goldblum projects the steadiness of a man who knows the universe to be a madhouse but is using that knowledge to his advantage. So it is that when his disgusting Brundlefly said "I'll hurt you if you stay" to his screen lover in buzzing, menacing tones, audiences permanently retired their fly swatters. Sigourney Weaver, who at times resembled a (concluded on page 168)Hero(continued from page 99) female Rambo in Aliens, still managed to bring her cool intelligence and commanding height to the heroic job of alien bashing. Spitting out the line "You bitch!" at the she-beast and then blowing her away, she claims her rightful place as the first feminist superhero.
Many moviegoers might have liked to take a crack at Dennis Hopper with their own alien blaster after his slick sicko performance in Blue Velvet. As the sadistic Daddy to Isabella Rossellini's masochistic Mommy, he oozed menace as if he were breathing vapors from hell through his nasty little inhaler. Now that Harry Dean Stanton has moved on to nice-guy roles, Hopper is the degenerate of choice in Hollywood; and with that face, pockmarked by the shrapnel of hard times, he could fuel nightmares for the rest of the 20th Century.
Turn Hopper inside out and you find Bob Hoskins, an innocent movie lug whose head is a blunt instrument. But the dull-wittedness of Hoskins' movie characters spurs sympathy and loyalty, not contempt. In Mona Lisa, when he was called on to defend the honor of his leggy prostitute friend, played by Cathy Tyson, he blurted out in his characteristic Cockney tones, "She may be a tall, thin black tart, but she's still a fookin' lydy." Only Hoskins could make this defense stick.
There are others who deserve recognition. Brian Dennehy, a man for all screen sizes (he was bigger than the West in Silverado), did his usual rock-solid work in FIX; and Dianne Wiest neatly embodied the dizziness of the upwardly confused in Hannah and Her Sisters. For that matter, Woody Allen came up with his yearly gem in Hannah and again demonstrated that his best comic creation--himself--is still funny after all these years. So as the movie clones and sequels accumulate, it's heartening to know that there are still a few wild men and women who are stirring things up, making the movies new again.
