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The Way He Was
by Richard Horgan |
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5/27/2008 at 12:29:41 PM |
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Though Sydney Pollack’s last three directorial efforts The Interpreter, Random Hearts and Sabrina were all handsome misfires, few filmmakers have had the kind of mainstream run that he enjoyed between 1975 and 1985.
This career decade began with the Redford-starring Three Days of the Condor, ended with the Redford-starring (and Oscar-winning) Out of Africa, and in-between offered the impeccable pleasures of 1981’s Absence of Malice and 1982’s Tootsie. Sure, there was the bizarre flick The Electric Horseman, but also during this time Pollack found time to make the still underrated Al Pacino race car drama Bobby Deerfield. Ten years, six films, three bonafide classics and two seamless pieces of movie entertainment. That’s undeniably the mark of a master.
Certainly, of all Pollack’s films, the one that endures most timelessly is Condor. If you want to figure out from whence Jason Bourne sprung, cinematically at least, look no further than Robert Redford’s previous on-the-run CIA agent Joseph Turner. Intriguingly, Condor’s lone Academy Award nomination was in the Best Editing bracket, a category claimed this past Oscar season by The Bourne Ultimatum.
Another film that recalls the exquisite labyrinth New York corridors of Condor is this year’s Best Picture runner-up Michael Clayton, part of Pollack’s more recent canon of producing efforts. As with just about every other artstic endeavor of this Indiana native, Clayton lined him up with exquisite acting talent and exquisite source material. It’s also a mark of Pollack’s eye for talent that he was able in this case, along with leading man George Clooney, to recognize - and be willing to bet on - the directorial talents of Bourne auteur Tony Gilroy.
How lucky we all were, before Pollack was sadly diagnosed last year with cancer, to be treated also in Clayton to one of his two best ever performances as an actor. This latest example of marrying Pollack to a super-rich character able to manage the complexities of modern shareholder life wasn’t exactly Method acting; it was more like titanium type casting. But be it Clayton or 1999’s Eyes Wide Shut, Pollack was magisterial, Machiavellian and monumental as, respectively, capitalst society oracles Marty and Victor.
In fact, what Pollack’s late run as an actor and middle run as a director makes you appreciate most is the genius of Clint Eastwood, still balancing both sides of the camera with the Cannes competing Changeling (a.k.a. The Exchange) and the upcoming drama Gran Torino. To do so while well into your seventies is something that Clint has made look easy. But as Pollack discovered and others like Woody Allen know, it’s well neigh impossible.
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