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February 21, 2003
I don't think Spacey's career
I don't think Spacey's career is necessarily over, but I do think his legitimacy as an important actor is now in grave doubt. What was the last movie in which he turned in a significant performance? Arguably American Beauty, which wasn't a particularly challenging movie. Before that, it seemed like maybe he was on the right track, with Hurly Burly and LA Confidential. In my opinion, since he won his first Oscar (for Usual Suspects), those two films are the only truly decent things he's done. And yet, somehow, he has been annointed both Hollywood's moral barometer (replacing Tom Hanks) and one of our great actors.
Listen, Kevin, I loved you in 1995, but you have to realize (like Spider-Man) that with great power comes great responsibility, and that means you need to make good movies, not schmaltzy, melodramatic, pseudo-Spielberg "important" fluff. It doesn't matter whether you do comedies or dramas or Bobby Darin biopics -- just please do things that have a fresh approach and challenge your audience. Everything you've done since Hurly Burly has bit the big Kahuna, if you catch my drift. So please, get yourself back on track, lest the same fate befalls you as DeNiro and Pacino, men whose later careers can be summed up with a deadly accurate, tossed-off phrase from someone I used to know: "What a waste!"
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posted by adm at 3:00 PM | #
