GREAT PERFORMANCES YOU MAY NOT HAVE SEEN:
Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (a drag queen touring Australian backwater towns)
Factory Girl (Andy Warhol)
Hurt Locker (an army IED detonator)
Two Brothers (a hunter involved with the lives of twin tigers)
First Snow (a salesman fighting the spectre of a predicted death)
The Proposition (an 1880s outback outlaw out to kill one brother to save another)
Death-Defying Acts (Harry Houdini)
The Road (salvation, at the end)
BLOCKBUSTERS:
Count of Monte Cristo (Mondego)
L.A. Confidential (breakout role of too-ambitious L.A. cop)
Traitor (FBI agent)
The Time Machine (time traveling professor)
Rules of Engagement
THE REAL GUY:
Maybe the closest you could get to the regular “guy” who lives in Australia and defies any Hollywood star type attention is “Dating the Enemy,” though chances are he gets along better with his wife than that character.
ACTING STYLE:
Sometimes Pearce’s bad guys seem more likeable than his good guys. In either case, he mixes them up into fascinating shades of gray that defy categorization. Better able than any of his Australian colleagues to completely immerse himself in his roles, you’d never guess his origins. His choices for consistently unlikeable roles also has garnered him great critical respect.
BITS AND QUIRKS:
He mixes up an obvious slight build and trademark clean whisper with an odd tough-guy persona, brought out mostly by a “piercing” stare and dangerously angular head. His smile almost takes you aback, it is so out of place.
GREAT SCENES:
TRAITOR -
At the end, with Don Cheadle > Interrogating Cheadle in a Mideast prison
MEMENTO -
Reveal of all the tattoos on his body > The meeting with Sammy > Finding Dodd in the closet > Meetings with Joe Pantoliano, especially the one in the car where Joe gives him the motel address > Hitting the evil Carrie-Anne Moss as Natalie > The spit test with Natalie in the bar
THE TIME MACHINE -
Confronting Jeremy Irons, the leader of the Morlocks > Both encounters with Orlando Jones as a futuristic know-all library computer > Fighting the Morlocks > The time-forward sequence, watching everything change around him
L.A. CONFIDENTIAL -
Embarrassing himself with Veronica Lake > Love scene with Kim Basinger while Danny DeVito photographs from behind a two-way mirror > Getting beaten up by Russell Crowe
FACTORY GIRL -
Awesome turn as Andy Warhol
HURT LOCKER -
Getting blown up
GO TO THE... GUY PEARCE BIO
Guy Pearce, Acting Review - MovieActors.com
