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Still chipping away at the Premiere list, and YAY! One I had seen before starting this project!
88. Christopher Walken as Nick Chevotarevich
The Deer Hunter (1978)
This is the kind of movie that could only have been made in the 1970s. Incredibly raw and unafraid to demand our attention for as long as it needs to. The first 30 minutes or so are very atypical for the opening of a movie. That section of the movie is entirely devoted to establishing characters and their relationships with one another, and it almost all takes place at a wedding. We need that - we need those introductions to set us up for what these characters go through for the rest of the film.
Robert De Niro plays the main character Michael. He represents us - our eyes and ears, and the voice of hard-earned experience through a war that no one understood. But Walken's character, Nick, is the real heart of the film. At the time the film was made, Walken was a gorgeous man, something that certainly didn't hurt him in portraying the epitome of innocence lost. When he and his fellow soldiers are being forced to play Russian Roulette early in the film, it breaks him. You can see the torture all over his face. Then later, when we see him for the last time - again playing Russian Roulette, but this time by choice - the change is breathtaking. He doesn't even recognize his best friend who has come back to Vietnam to take him home and even spits in his face. When he puts the gun to his head and pulls the trigger, he barely blinks. His face is hollow, his big, beautiful eyes are blank, and he couldn't care less what happens to him - because, in every way that matters, he's already dead.
An incredible performance in an incredible movie - but perhaps one that you can't watch that often. This is a movie that hurts to watch.
88. Christopher Walken as Nick Chevotarevich
The Deer Hunter (1978)
This is the kind of movie that could only have been made in the 1970s. Incredibly raw and unafraid to demand our attention for as long as it needs to. The first 30 minutes or so are very atypical for the opening of a movie. That section of the movie is entirely devoted to establishing characters and their relationships with one another, and it almost all takes place at a wedding. We need that - we need those introductions to set us up for what these characters go through for the rest of the film.
Robert De Niro plays the main character Michael. He represents us - our eyes and ears, and the voice of hard-earned experience through a war that no one understood. But Walken's character, Nick, is the real heart of the film. At the time the film was made, Walken was a gorgeous man, something that certainly didn't hurt him in portraying the epitome of innocence lost. When he and his fellow soldiers are being forced to play Russian Roulette early in the film, it breaks him. You can see the torture all over his face. Then later, when we see him for the last time - again playing Russian Roulette, but this time by choice - the change is breathtaking. He doesn't even recognize his best friend who has come back to Vietnam to take him home and even spits in his face. When he puts the gun to his head and pulls the trigger, he barely blinks. His face is hollow, his big, beautiful eyes are blank, and he couldn't care less what happens to him - because, in every way that matters, he's already dead.
An incredible performance in an incredible movie - but perhaps one that you can't watch that often. This is a movie that hurts to watch.
*wants to hug Chris Walken*