The Best Things Said About the Late, Great Philip Seymour Hoffman

On Sunday, we lost one of our finest actors, Philip Seymour Hoffman. There is no doubt there has been an outpouring of thought on the web about his terrific work and how sad it is that there will no be more of it (other than the completed or almost completed works of his to be released in the future). I could devote an article to my thoughts on his tremendous career, but it would be better instead to include the writings of those who are far better writers than me. Here are some of them:

David Thomson, the New Republic
Philip Seymour Hoffman did not look like an actor. That was the most alarming and promising thing about him, and now that he is dead, aged 46, in his apartment in New York, of an apparent drug overdose, so many things about him fall into place--if it is a story, instead of a helpless tragedy. He was overweight; he was unkempt; he was blond--which is really not common in actors; he had the quality of seeming blurred sometimes, as if there was such turmoil inside him that he had been unable to settle on a fixed appearance, or a simple presentation of self. It's one thing to say that he was a very good actor, or a brilliant, or a genius; it's probably far more important to realize how contemptuous he was of those labels and how thoroughly he lived with their inadequacy. Actors are meant to take care of themselves. That is part of the code of being good-looking, an identifiable type or brand, endlessly castable and bankable. Hoffman had never given the least indication of following that code. For several years, it was a matter of wonder what he might do as he grew older after the astonishing luck or rightness of "Capote," "Syndecdoche, New York," "The Ides of March," or whatever you might think of.

Derek Thompson, the Atlantic
Daniel Day-Lewis, the most decorated male actor of his time, has astonished as America's most famous president and most ruthless fictional oil titan. But he excels at playing  superlatives--at commanding the aristocratic awe of characters who are bigger than life. Day-Lewis playing a game of pick-up basketball in a romantic comedy isn't a movie scene. It's a discarded SNL skit. It's a bad joke. He would never do it, and nobody would ever want to see it. Hoffman was different. He could put himself up and play larger than life, but his specialty was to find the quiet dignity in life-sized characters--losers, outcasts, and human marginalia.

Wael Khairy, robertebert.com
I remember the first film that made me recognize the great actor in Philip Seymour Hoffman. It was his magnificent turn in "25th Hour"; from then on, his career spiraled into that of a legend. In fact, when you look back at his career, you can tell he was bound to reach legendary status. With "Punch Drunk Love", "25th Hour", "Empire Falls", "The Savages", "Capote", "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead", "Charlie Wilson's War", "Doubt", "Synecdoche, New York", and "The Master" all released within a decade, I think it's safe to say he was to the noughties what De Niro, Pacino, and Dustin Hoffman were to the '70s.

Forrest Wickman, Slate
"Twister" was little more than a feature-length excuse for animating CGI tornadoes, and Philip Seymour Hoffman was cast in the relatively thankless role of the radio man. And yet he managed to turn this small supporting role into a character memorable enough that fans have cut highlight reels of just his performance.

Total Film
It might be called "Charlie Wilson's War," but this is Philip Seymour Hoffman's film. He steals it from under the feet of the titular Tom Hanks, with his foul-mouthed CIA agent being the most memorable element of the film. He was Oscar-nominated for it, and rightly so.

His director, Mike Nichols, said of Hoffman, "Last year, he did three films--'The Savages', 'Charlie Wilson's War' and 'Before the Devil Knows You're Dead'--and in each one he was a distinct and entirely different human. It's that humanity that is so striking--when you watch Phil work, his entire constitution seems to change. He may look like Phil, but there's something different in his eyes. And that means he's reconstituted himself from within, willfully rearranging his molecules to become another human being."

A.O. Scott, the New York Times
Lancaster Dodd sacrifices his intelligence on the altar of his ego. Truman Capote risks his integrity and betrays his friends in pursuit of his literary ambitions, his motives a volatile mixture of compassion and morbid curiosity. The schoolteacher in "25th Hour" and the lonely predator in "Happiness" are both indelibly creepy. The frustrated academic of "The Savages" is merely (if also splendidly) misanthropic, and the grumpy theater artist of "Synecdoche, New York" may be merely (if also baroquely) frustrated. The priest of "Doubt" and the would-be criminal of "Before the Devil Knows You're Dead" are potentially much worse.

These are not antiheroes in the cable television, charismatic bad-boy sense of the term. They are, in many cases (and there are more, going all the way back to "The Talented Mr. Ripley" and even the 1992 "Scent of a Woman"), thoroughly awful people: pathetic, repellent, undeserving of sympathy. Mr. Hoffman rescued them from contempt precisely by refusing any easy route to redemption. He did not care if we liked any of these sad specimens. The point was to make us believe them and to recognize in them--in him--a truth about ourselves that we might otherwise have preferred to avoid. He had a rare ability to illuminate the varieties of human ugliness. No one ever did it so beautifully.

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon
For want of a better word, Phil Hoffman was incandescent. Once you'd seen him, even in a small role in a movie destined for oblivion, you never forgot him. In another era he might have been a classic Hollywood character actor, playing villains and sidekicks and cuckolded husbands by the dozen. Scratch that--he might just as well have been a star. If he didn't have the bland, perfect good looks or impressive musculature required of today's romantic leading men, you could say the same about Edward G. Robinson, Humphrey Bogart or Jack Nicholson. It's too early to say these things, of course, but he may well be remembered as long as they are.



Rest in peace...

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The Ides of March

"The Ides of March have come."
"Ay, Caesar; but not gone."

This is a most unique political tale. Every once and a while, there's a candidate to restore law and order, to never lie to us, to be the man from Hope, to be a uniter and not a divider, and to be the change we have been waiting for. While there is one side that generally sides with loyalty and discipline, another is disorganized, panicky and whiny. The latter side needs some growing up, and if the latter side is American liberalism, and George Clooney's "The Ides of March" is a movie by, of and (some would argue) for liberals, so this might be a good film to provide some needed medicine.

Ryan Gosling is Stephen Myers, a young and successful campaign adviser to Mike Morris (George Clooney), the governor of Pennsylvania and a popular candidate for president. While Morris is in the lead against his rival for the Democratic nomination, both campaigns are dueling in the must-win state of Ohio, while also trying to secure the endorsement of a North Carolina senator (Jeffrey Wright). Myers is not only intelligent but likable, unlike his boss, Paul Zara (Philip Seymour Hoffman), who despises the campaign manager (Paul Giamatti) of Morris's opponent. What would seem like a rather predictable and more boring version of the 1993 documentary "The War Room" suddenly evolves during the second act into a much more unsettling film. Myers is courted by the rival campaign, while trying to bury a scandal that could destroy his own.

There are several accolades in terms of acting that should be given. As a director, Clooney not only has done a fine job of guiding these actors but simultaneously has delivered yet another stellar performance. Ryan Gosling, its star, has gradually improved in each of his films this year--from annoyingly playing a hot shot stud in the terribly overrated "Crazy Stupid Love" to delivering a solid performance in the mediocre "Drive" to finally being in a movie that matches its quality with his impressive acting. Additionally, in smaller roles, Hoffman and Giamatti do their characters justice as rivaling campaign managers. Particularly stunning is Evan Rachel Wood, a young intern engaged in a affair with Myers; her character starts with almost a Jean Harlow grin and a bit of strawberry in her hair, but as the film progresses she's given the opportunity to show more depth. 

Remarkably though, despite its twist, pessimism, and score, "The Ides of March" seems less relevant, powerful and worthwhile than Clooney's attempt at recreating McCarthyism and journalism's reaction to it in "Good Night, and Good Luck" from 2005. "The Ides of March" isn't as good as "Good Night, and Good Luck," and at times it doesn't seem to be trying hard enough to be. It takes up silly little trivial pursuit tidbits, like Rush Limbaugh's strategy to have Republicans vote in the Ohio primary for Hillary Clinton to derail Obama's campaign in 2008, and Morris's campaign signs look awfully similar to Obama's. While Clooney's character is probably the most interesting, he also seems the most farcical. Still, for its direction, acting and overall story, it is a commendable movie.   

In many respects, Clooney's Morris is a nostalgia of everything liberals liked about Obama before his presidency: the idealism, the honesty, the bravery in taking difficult choices. For Obama it was a denunciation of indefinite detention or not falling for the gasoline tax holiday gimmick; for Morris it's not selling out to the religiosity of America's voters or promising potential supporters cabinet positions for their support. In other ways, it's a defense of Obama's pragmatism, mocking at times youthful idealism in one singular candidate and then sitting back and waiting for results. But at other times, it's a warning that all politicians, even Mr. Nice Guy Barack Obama who hails for the hardliner tactics of Chicago politics, are likely to not hesitate when it comes to the stomach-churning toughness of politics. Gosling's Myers grows up quickly in this movie, and the American public with its non-stop criticism of flawed politicians, had better do so soon.

Two final notes. There's been an almost "Inception"-like discussion over what happens at the end. I've done my best to avoid revealing the twist, which I think is a good one and ultimately, no film's twist ever deserves to be ruined by anyone. Without revealing it, I can only remind audience members after they view it that politics is the art of survival. Morris is a survivalist, as is his young protege Myers. It does not make sense for Myers to act against his own interest in an illogical or irrational manner. If he would, it would go entirely against Clooney's thesis here. Second, while the movie was mostly filmed in Michigan, it takes place in Ohio and some college campus like my cousin's school Xavier University and my beloved ulma mater Kent State University make some cameos.

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