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To someone born in, say, 1980 or later, Kevin Costner is now probably less famous than Kevin Federline. Sure, you may recognize Costner from having seen him on the cover of Good Housekeeping or Redbook that one time, but you'd hardly think of him as mega-celebrity. He's more like your mom's ex-jock boyfriend from high school, whom she occasionally runs into at the grocery store, and they exchange a few pleasantries, and then as you walk away she sighs wistfully while you wonder what all the fuss was about.
But see, back about fifteen years ago, Costner wasn't just a movie star: he was the movie star. And we don't mean some media-made-up, famous-for-nothing star like they have these days, like Colin Farrell and Josh Hartnett. Costner was, for a fleeting moment, a bright and burning star, the very King of Hollywood.
Costner could do it all. He'd go outside for a game of catch with the boys, then come inside and melt the ladies' hearts. He was handsome and rugged and just tanned enough. And, just when it looked like he might be getting a little too big for his celebrity britches, he turned around and directed the surprisingly not-bad Dances With Wolves. Then he stole a Best Director Oscar right out from under the nose of Martin Scorsese, thus assuring himself the number-one spot for all-time on the list of People Who Shouldn't Have Won Best Directing Oscars Instead Of Martin Scorsese.
But back in the days of The Untouchables, Costner's star was...well, untouchable. After The Bodyguard, he was the body every woman wanted to guard. After Field of Dreams, he was fields of dreamy. After No Way Out, there was, um, no way out of his huge celebrity.
We won't bother with Bull Durham. But people liked him a lot.
Given all that, what happened to him in the mid-'90s was almost painfully predictable. After all, if you were Hollywood's top male star, and then you'd bet the farm on this crazy Civil War epic that was so long and so over-budget that people sneeringly nicknamed it Kevin's Gate before it even came out, and then it did come out, and it was not only hugely successful but won a bloody Oscar for Best Picture, what choice would you have but to make a sprawling, ill-considered, money-torching disaster? Just like Waterworld?
And then, after you'd been humiliated, and your movie had become a punchline, what else could you do but make another post-apocalyptic, three-plus-hour sci-fi epic, but one that rectified the one major mistake of your last film -- i.e., not focusing enough on the heroics of the U.S. Postal Service?
And thus: The Postman. And thus endeth the career of Kevin Costner.
Or so it seemed. Every so often he'd show up in some obviously bad romantic comedy like Message in a Bottle or some transparent stab at recapturing his Bull Durham glory like For Love of the Game, or some transparent stab at recapturing his JFK glory like Thirteen Days, or some other movie that was just an out-and-out regrettable piece of shit, like 3000 Miles to Graceland. But for all intents and purposes, the Costner era had ended.
So when we heard that Open Range was kind of actually all right, we just shrugged it off. He can't possibly be back, we thought. He can't possibly reinvent himself. He can't possibly be anything in our minds ever again other than a big, soggy mail carrier with a thinning hairline, a thickening middle, and a bloated self-regard.
Well, lo and behold, look who's back, thin hair, thick middle, bloat, and all. With The Upside of Anger, Costner's reappeared in just the kind of role, in just the kind of movie, that he needs to be in right now: as a sodden, slightly depressing, but ultimately charming ex-jock, opposite Joan Allen. In other words, he's playing your mother's ex-boyfriend from high school! The guy who had it all, then got kind of sad and flabby and old, but who knows it, and can smile about it, and so retains a sliver of charm! He gets it! He finally gets it!
And in getting it, he's reminded us that, you know what, we actually found him damn charming way back when. And if Dennis Quaid can have a late career renaissance -- not to mention that thundering planet of cheese, John Travolta -- then why not Kevin Costner? Why not, we say?
We forgive you, soggy mail carrier! Come in from the rain, or, rather, from that entire world totally covered with water, where people live on rafts and wear feather earrings apparently stolen from Stevie Nicks.
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