November 2002 guests...
Name: Teelbee
Courntry: USA
Fave Oliver Reed film: The Trap
Fave item on this website: Reeders Poll
Comments:
This site was so interesting and helpful. I "discovered" Oliver
Reed only recently (I'm not much of a movie goer at all). I remembered his
striking performance as Bill Sikes from seeing Oliver! as a teenager,
but I never saw any of his other films until Gladiator.
Recently, I saw a little theater production of Oliver!, which inspired me to buy the DVD. And, that sparked a fascination with Oliver Reed that is difficult to explain.
In the last month or so I've been acquiring his movies and seeking biographical information. You guys are all so right - he was hugely under-rated by the film industry.
His performances exude sexuality and physical power in a way that is nearly unequalled in films on either side of the pond. His screen presence, humanity, and male mystique make him leap right off the screen. Oliver Reed brought such a great sense of reality to his roles, you can *almost* smell him!
The performances are often so good and so real, that other actors in a movie often come off looking stagy, overdone, or flat (The Devils, Oliver!, Gladiator, The Three Musketeers, The Four Musketeers, The Prince and the Pauper, Women in Love).
Though he often played a menacing heavy, I don't believe there was ever a more tender or passionate onscreen kiss as when Jean La Bete (finally) kisses Eve in The Trap.
Name: Anthony Ritchie
Comments:
Excellent website with so much information on someone who will be sadly
missed in the film industry.
Keep up the fight
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