Why Charles S. Dutton Should be in Every Movie

I was watching Rudy the other day, which is an underdog story of a kid who dreams of playing football for the University of Notre Dame's Flying Irish. I watched most of the movie with specks of tears in my eyes, not because I've had the privilege of visiting the University of Notre Dame campus to present a paper at a film conference held there, but because the movie is so nice and honest and uplifting. Movies aren't nice very often anymore (or honest for that matter), so I cherish the ones that are when I stumble across them.

More to the point, Roger Ebert often writes about actors who are so good in such a wide variety or roles that, when they come on screen, people perk up in their seats because you know something good is coming. Often included on this list are Christopher Walken (my favourite actor, by the way), William H. Macy, Peter Dinklidge, Richard Jenkins, and a slew of others that don't come instantly to mind. I'd like to add another one: Charles S. Dutton. You may not know him by name, but I guarantee you've seen him before and, despite his being in some bad movies, I've never seen him give a bad performance.

Just look at him as the Notre Dame caretaker in Rudy and how much life and emotion he brings to this scene without once pandering to the camera or announcing himself as an actor in the midst of a big dramatic moment. Even more impressive is the way he holds himself. You never once believe that he isn't actually a caretaker.



And now look at him in the trailer for John Sayles' underrated The Honeydripper playing a totally different role.



He's also played a hard-as-nails sheriff in A Time to Kill, a wise father with one or two powerful scenes in Menace II Society, a doctor in Gothika, and a man on the bus in Spike Lee's Get On The Bus, along with many, many others. My question is: the man is so talented and has such a wide range of notes that he can play, when is he going to get a really juicy lead role? All he needs is a film like The Visitor of Crazy Heart and he'll be set. Fingers crossed.

I'm in the Big Leagues Now!

Okay, so I'm not going to be posting anything today or tomorrow other than this post to tell you that I won't be posting anything today or tomorrow. With me so far?

I'm off to see Crazy Heart tonight and will hopefully get a review up of that sooner than later. I've also got some good stuff planned for the upcoming weeks. I've got a big analysis of black comedy to correlate with my glee over the news that Todd Solondz's Love During Wartime has been picked up by IFC, a friend from school wanted to know just what in the heck is so darn special about Adaptation that I would name it my favourite movie of the decade so I feel I have to humour him, and I have a plan for a new regular feature called: Movies That Are Just Like Other Movies. I can hear your love for it already.

Anyway, on a final note, I wrote a guest blog over at Kid In the Front Row and I think it might be worth your time, even if just to give Kid more props than he already gets. Click here for that.

Golden Globes 2010

So I just finished watching the Golden Globes. It was the first time I've ever watched the entire show because, quite frankly, I don't care much about television and the Golden Globes always seemed to me to be the poor man's Oscars. They aren't as funny, as shamelessly glamours, and their comedy categories (which sometimes do good work by honouring worthy films that otherwise wouldn't garner serious awards consideration as was the case this year with The Hangover) give a certain credibility to films that would otherwise be thrown on the scrap heap to be forgotten about as history moves on without them. I'm talking about stuff like The Proposal, It's Complicated, Sherlock Holmes, Julie and Julia, and Nine.

I'm not going to talk about the winners and whether or not they were truly the best in their category (okay I'll do it once: 500 Days of Summer was clearly a better film than The Hangover, and really, Robert Downey Jr.? But no hard feelings) because, unlike other years, I haven't seen all the nominees and therefore don't have the adequate information to pass informed judgements.

What I want to do is make an observation. The other day I was reading Matt Singer's brief review of An Education over at Termite Art and he made the comment that TV is getting so good that it is beginning to overshadow the cinema. This comes as absolute horror to me as someone who has lived and breathed cinema and kept TV at even greater than an arms length away.

But as I was watching the Golden Globes and seeing all the TV nominees for shows I've never seen like Big Love, Dexter, True Blood, Glee, and so on, I realized that Singer was maybe on to something, especially when compared to those above listed nominated films like Julie and Julia and It's Complicated.

Then I got to thinking back over what were the most popular films of 2009: X-Men Origins: Wolverine, New Moon, Night at the Museum 2, Terminator: Salvation, and the absolute stinkiest of them all, Transformers: Rise of the Fallen. It was a depressing realization: Hollywood really was in the crapper this year. It's 2009 and instead of producing our own contemporary classics the best we can do is honour a hack musical remake of one of Fellini's most invaluable masterpieces?

Then Martin Scrosese took the stage to accept the Cecil B. Demille Award and things got worse for me. Sitting through a montage of one of America's most value directors to ever stand behind a camera's work, I was left thinking: There were more essential, classic, absolutely unforgettable moments in those few minutes of montage then there have been in all of 2009. I considered myself definitely depressed.

And then, with the TV awards behind and the major awards just over the horizon, I was reminded that, even if 2009 looked and felt like a total wash, amid all the meaningless wreckage, were films made out of the very stuff that make us fall in love again and again with the cinema every day of our lives. Film's like Inglourious Basterds, 500 Days of Summer, Up in the Air, The Hurt Locker and Avatar.

Then Jeff Bridges, one of America's true acting treasures, won best actor for Crazy Heart (a film I haven't seen but am planning on and hope you are too) and was given a standing ovation. "Yes," I thought, "these moments are the reason why we film lovers stick it out even through the worst of years." It was a reminder of what is still, after over 100 years of history, the most unchanged fundamental necessities of film: good actors, playing strong characters, immersed in good stories.

Then, as Avatar began winning all the big awards, I was indeed satisfied in my realization that the most popular film of the year was also the best. It wasn't the one about mutant super heroes, vampire lovers, living museum displays, intergalactic robots or any other such gimmick. It wasn't based on a theme part ride, a video game or a toy chain. It wasn't a sequel, a remake, a reboot, or any other such quick money making scheme. It was a bold, beautiful, original piece of art and a glorious entertainment to boot. And it is a film that I hope Hollywood has learned a valuable lesson from: that people essentially crave and are drawn to new concepts and new ideas that are presented in classical film conventions (stories told with pictures). In 20, 10, even 5 years Twilight and Transformers will simply be the bad aftertaste of an era in filmmaking in which big studios thought they could get away with phoning it in.

At the end of the day, there will never be a shortage of kids who buy into fads and trends because it is the "it" thing to do at the time, and even more people like my girlfriend's friend (who I alluded to not so lovely the other day) who have no concept of transgression or originality or passion or emotion or even intelligence and whose narrow tastes, day in and day out, are making it harder and harder for me and people like me to see the films that matter the most to us.

Regardless, in spite of everything, I must hold my head up high and look forward to tomorrow because, no matter how bleak it may look right now, as history has proven and as Brandon Lee so truthfully said in The Crow: "It can't rain all the time."

A complete list of Golden Globe winners can be found here, and probably just about everywhere else too.