Apart from his mentor role in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy, Liam Neeson has been too old to properly fit into the contemporary superhero boom, both practically and spiritually; he harkens back to an earlier form of hard-to-stop cinematic tough guy. As it happens, Sam Raimi’s comic-book pictures harken back to an earlier form of superhero, pulpier and weirder and more influenced by horror comics, and the anguish of a young Neeson turned out to be perfect for Raimi’s sui generis, pre-boom superhero: the melty-faced, gravel-voiced Darkman. God, that voice of his: the rare Irish actor whose attempts at an American accent lose little of his native musicality, Neeson is a pleasure just to listen to, and as such well-suited to playing a masked man.
Of course, he’s not concealed for all of Darkman, not even the sections after his character is horribly disfigured; his scientist’s whole deal is his attempt the development of a synthetic skin (hence the meltiness), and in one memorable scene he dons his own face in public before having a meltdown at a carnival. It’s a perfect yet counterintuitive use of Neeson’s intensity—not precisely parodic (Raimi sincerely loves this stuff), but pitched at a heightened level that’s almost gleeful. Neeson has played plenty of comic, self-kidding parts (and will presumably do more of that in the new Naked Gun movie); his deadpan is priceless, but his ability to play this precise version of a Sam Raimi superhero might be even more rare.
1. Schindler’s List (1993)
Universal/Everett Collection
Look, if you’re seeking some fun Liam Neeson movie-star vehicle, obviously this isn’t it. But Neeson gave a career-making performance in Steven Spielberg’s holocaust drama, and though he’s sometimes been retroactively overshadowed by Ralph Fiennes (who, like Neeson, received an Oscar nomination for his work) and Ben Kingsley (who, shamefully, did not!), his work as Oskar Schindler is instrumental to the movie’s power. Schindler, a member of the Nazi party and would-be profiteer, witnesses the atrocities of the Holocaust and quietly decides to save Jews by diverting them into a faulty munitions-building operation. He’s a con man who rises to the occasion, requiring Neeson’s charisma as well as a hint of the inner turmoil that comes to the surface in many later roles. In one of his most indelible scenes, he explains to his Jewish accountant Itzhak (Kingsley) where his skills lie: “That’s what I’m good at. Not the work, not the work… the presentation.” Maybe later appreciations tend to favor the Fiennes or Kingsley performances because Neeson is front and center for a late scene that takes some out of the movie: The typically unflappable Schindler breaks down, lamenting that he could have done more, could have saved more people. Personally, I can scarcely think of this scene without bursting into tears, so I tend to think it’s necessary. Neeson is giving the audience an outlet here. Sometimes it seems like that’s what he’s been doing for most of his career.
