JCC Movies that would be completely ordinary without a specific performance[s]

I watched Silence of the Lambs for the first time ever a couple weeks ago. Good movie, but considering how legendary it is, I was expecting it to be incredible. The Lecter/Starling scenes are indeed magnetic--and I have found myself rewatching them numerous times--, but the rest of the film is completely ordinary as far as police procedurals go. The ending in particular with Buffalo Bill inadvertently giving up his location by loading his gun was as cliche as it gets. A prisoner escape using an improvised tool as a lock pick? Wow, never seen that before. I think that without Hopkins, and to a lesser extent Foster, this goes from one of the most decorated movies in history to some kind of mildly-remembered cult classic.

What are some other movies about which this sort of thing could be said?

 

Training Day. Denzel Washington's acting was really the only good, memorable thing about it.


Well, I guess you could say that about a lot of his movies.

 

Liar, Liar


Without Jim Carrey's brilliance, this film would be less than ordinary.

 

The Silence of the Lambs

Without it, you get Manhunter which, while good, no one really remembers even though it had Hannibal Lecter in it.

 

Iron Man. And even with Robert Downey Jr., the two sequels are completely ordinary.

 

Definitely agree with that.

I'd have to disagree on Silence though. That's a genuinely magnificently written film in my opinion. I consider the original novel something of a masterpiece and it didn't have Anthony Hopkins or Jodie Foster!

I'd nominate One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I still don't consider it the classic a lot of people consider it; it dumbed down a lot of stuff from the novel and oversimplified a lot of the ideas Kesey was really writing about. But Nicholson is undeniably electrifying and compelling. I don't think the movie would really be remembered as anything but a poor adaptation of a great novel if anyone but Nicholson had been in the lead.

 

Superman. Without Christopher Reeve inhabiting the role we'd have something akin to the 1980s Marvel movies.

 

True, but again so was Red Dragon / Manhunter and the movie nowhere near did as well as Silence due, basically, to Hopkins' performance.

 

Stephen Hawking in "A Brief History Of Time". A truly mesmerizing performance if ever there was one. So much emotion.

 

No Country For Old Men, without Javier Bardem.

The film would be fine with the work of Josh Brolin and Tommy Lee Jones, but with the Academy Award for
Best Supporting Actor performance by Javier Bardem as the coin-tossing, psychotic assassin Anton Chigurh
(and his arsenal of pneumatic weapons), No Country For Old Men goes well beyond ordinary.




"I need you to step out of the car, sir."

 

FTFY.

 

Taken, The Grey, Non-Stop


The Liam Neeson quality control effect.

 

Agree that lots of movies fit here. Take Schindlers List to many the greatest movie ever made (and the most important). I just can't see anyone else playing Oscar Schindler except Liam Neeson. This movie I am sure would still be just top 10 ever but ensemble aside he was amazing, I cried my eyes out when he blames himself for ever Jew he feels he should have saved. Its going against the grain of the thread but like Silence of the Lambs which Jodie Foster also won and Oscar for best actress Anthony Hopkins is the only actor you can imagine in that role.

Peter O'Toole-Lawrence of Arabia again on of the top 10 movies of all time and yet who the hell else plays that lead……..nobody

 

Arnold-The Terminator a good/cult not great movie that's probably pretty spot on for the definition of this thread agreed?

 

Particularly if O.J. Simpson had ended up with the role.

 

OJ was up for the role? I hadn't heard this

 

No porn references yet, JCC? You're slipping.

 

Too much lube will do that.