Two sweaty men in combat for their lives against a tyrant whose subjects don't respect him. Two actors who are notoriously fond of themselves. Two alpha males of Hollywood's pantheon. It's the second consecutive showdown of 30's icon Clark Gable & 00's icon Russell Crowe in our "Best Pictures From the Outside In" series.
You can read the whole discussion over @ Goatdog's Blog
It's fun how closely the Gable/Crowe stars align.
- Blatant self-regard
- High school dropouts
- Late blooming -- both started acting young but became huge stars in their early 30s
- Storied prickly relationships with other movie stars
- Heighth, well, by Hollywood standards at least ...Crowe is nearly 6' and Gable was 6' 1"
- Public adoration and true box office power
- Gable had songs written about him / Crowe sings songs with his band
- And finally, most importantly to our purposes here, there's the Oscar magnetized filmographies: Crowe starred in 5 Best Picture nominees, 2 of them winners in a span of seven years: LA Confidential (97), The Insider (99), Gladiator* (00), A Beautiful Mind* (01) and Master and Commander (03); Gable starred in 5 Best Picture nominees, 3 of them winners in a span of seven years: It Happened One Night* (34), Mutiny on the Bounty* (35), San Francisco (36), Test Pilot (38) and Gone With the Wind* (39)
For Nick this episode was all about realizing how little he'd seen from 1935 (and new 2000 indecisions). For me this BPFTOI episode was all about reconsidering both Gable and Crowe, neither of whom I've been all that attached to in the past. Crowe's Oscar'ed turn as Commodus Maximus improved for me a lot on this revisit (though I still think either Javier Bardem or Ed Harris' would have made a stronger choice for Best Actor in 2000 --and those are both biopic turns so, whaddya know? I'm not entirely predictable)I admired Gable's 1935 performance, too. After his work in Mutiny on the Bounty (I'd only seen the 1984 Mel Gibson version) plus that recent return trip to It Happened One Night and my virgin screening of Red Dust, plus his connections to two of my favorite leading ladies (Carole Lombard, his wife pictured left with their siamese kittens awwww and Norma Shearer, his three-time co-star), I am officially considering membership in Team Gable.
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and you?
