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Ed Harris has been nominated for two Academy Awards. Did you know? You probably remember his second one, since it came in 1999, for his role as Christof in The Truman Show. But the first was for his supporting role as a member of Houston's mission control on (and in) Apollo 13. It wasn't a showy role -- it wasn't one of your Gary-Sinise-as-Lieutenant-Dan parts -- so naturally Harris lost out that year, to Kevin Spacey in The Usual Suspects. Ed Harris didn't have to do anything as Gene Kranz to, for instance, convince his audience that he was credible when in fact he had spent the entire movie lying. All Ed Harris had to do was act as the solid, dependable centre of a story in which precious little was either solid or dependable. But not affecting a limp, and not trying out a funny foreign accent, it's not surprising that he lost that award; what's surprising is that he was nominated in the first place.
Ed Harris followed that role with General Francis X. Hummel in The Rock. Whatever other atrocities Michael Bay has inflicted on the human race, we at Fametracker hope we can all agree that The Rock is a pretty good action movie, and it's to the credit of Ed Harris as Hummel that any of the scenery in Alcatraz remains unchewed, what with having to share the stage with the likes of Sean "My Hips Don't React Kindly To Bullets" Connery and Nicolas "Is My Hair On Straight?" Cage. As in Apollo 13, the movie depends on Ed Harris's convincing the audience that he was once a good citizen, one whose charismatic steeliness we believe could marshal an entire guerilla force. Never once does he falter in what must have been a deceptively difficult role, being at once the villain of the piece and yet the character with by far the most integrity. Sure, any movie will succeed when hotels get blown up and someone drives over cars in a Hummer, and yet it would have been a much more forgettable action movie were it not for Ed Harris's compelling performance.
If these were the only roles in which Ed Harris had stood out among his overwrought co-stars, it would make sense that the average moviegoer doesn't know who he is, and that you never hear anyone say, "Let's go see that new Ed Harris movie." But in fact the list of superlative Ed Harris roles goes on and on. John Glenn in The Right Stuff. Wayne Lomax in Places in the Heart. Virgil "Bud" Bridgman in The Abyss. Yes, he was in Milk Money and Stepmom. But he was also in Glengarry Glen Ross.
Ed Harris is a great actor -- generally better than the material he's given, in fact -- and one whose name deserves more renown than it has. We're not saying we want him to play a deaf amputee with Gulf War Syndrome, because we think he's above that kind of gimmicky part, but we do think that would put him on the map.
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