Dafoe played a paraplegic, wheelchair-using Vietnam veteran who befriends the film's subject Ron Kovic (played by Tom Cruise), another paraplegic veteran. The critic Peter Brunette felt the cast's performances, especially Dafoe's, were unconvincing. Streets of Fire is a 1984 American neo-noir rock musical film directed by Walter Hill and co-written by Hill and Larry Gross. "[5] Par said of his character, "He's someone who can come in and straighten everything out. It is described in the opening credits and posters as "A Rock & Roll Fable"[2] and is a mix of various movie genres with elements of retro-1950s woven into then-current 1980s themes. [114][115] Roger Ebert commended Dafoe's and Gainsbourg's performances as being "heroic and fearless". The film received mixed reviews, although Peter Travers felt that he added a note of "vulnerability to the menace he has made his stock in trade". Gross says they wanted Tom Cruise and made him an offer, but he had already accepted another role. The Damen Avenue stop (Blue line, at Damen, North, and Milwaukee avenues) was used. The same year, Dafoe played Vincent van Gogh in the biographical drama At Eternity's Gate, for which he received the Volpi Cup for Best Actor and an Academy Award for Best Actor nomination among other awards and accolades. ", "Streets of Fire movie review & film summary (1984) | Roger Ebert", "From The Other World Walter Hills Streets of Fire in 70mm", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Streets_of_Fire&oldid=1151764782, Album articles lacking alt text for covers, Rotten Tomatoes template using name parameter, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Worst Supporting Actress: Diane Lane (1984), This page was last edited on 26 April 2023, at 02:41. It's kind of amazing how intimidating Willem Dafoe can look with just the silhouette of his face. [11], When it came to casting the movie, Hill wanted to go with a young group of relative unknowns. He had his first leading role in the outlaw biker film The Loveless (1982) and then played the main antagonist in Streets of Fire (1984) and To Live and Die in L.A. (1985). Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. We're gonna have to do it. [16], Dafoe made his film debut in a supporting role in Michael Cimino's 1980 epic Western film Heaven's Gate. William Dafoe in Streets of Fire (1984) This thread is archived . And I felt, as I watched the post-production process going on, I just saw the film getting better and better. No director holds a candle to Hill for sheer visceral expertise. Rick Moranis, Diane Lane, and Willem Dafoe in the opening scene to 1984's Streets of Fire. The Hollywood Reporter thought that Dafoe appeared to think he was "in a pantomime",[101] while a New York Times reviewer felt he was "amusing" in the role. Their son, Jack, was born in 1982. That night, Tom has a change of heart and agrees to talk to Ellen's manager and current boyfriend, Billy Fish, about rescuing her. Tom and Raven duel using sledgehammers and their fists, with Tom ultimately being victorious. [38], Dafoe made a cameo appearance in John Waters' musical comedy Cry-Baby (1990) as a prison guard who gives a brief lecture on values to the title character, who is played by Johnny Depp. "People think that he doesn't like women and he knows that's not true. The fact that they made a deal with real gangs to be extras in the film. 3 yr. ago. The sound of the tarp flapping in the wind interfered with the actors dialogue. That whole scene was a Walter thing. We only get the final song. In 2009 Dafoe starred in von Triers controversial Antichrist, which centres on a couple who struggle to cope with the death of a child. [70] The Chicago Reader critic Jonathan Rosenbaum opined felt the film's "only redeeming quality" was Dafoe's "enjoyably over-the-top, eye-rolling performance". He later appeared in The Last Thing He Wanted (2020), an adaptation of a Joan Didion novel. Ellen performs on stage, while Tom rides off with McCoy. He was born on July 22, 1955 in Appleton, Wisconsin as William James Dafoe. He played a tormented T.S. Steinman has said the filmmakers were convinced they would have the rights to the Bruce Springsteen song "Streets of Fire", and filmed an ending using it. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. That said, he's still a pretty impressive physical specimen, and he often takes on roles where he needs to portray an intimidating. Maybe if we'd had Tom Cruise, we might have had a success. The point is that we had in mind one sentence inspired by George Lucas: "in a galaxy long ago", a futuristic past. [94], With the avant-garde drama Manderlay in 2005, Dafoe began another actor-director collaboration, this time with Danish filmmaker Lars von Trier. And I thought that we had done what we set out to do. When they said "We need to ADR the love scene." [5] An additional district, Ardmore, also appears in the film, but it may be a separate municipality as it is not prefaced with "the". [5] All 10 days of filming in Chicago were exteriors at night, on locations that included platforms of elevated subway lines and the depths of Lower Wacker Drive. Dafoe was an early member of experimental theater company The Wooster Group, which he is credited as co-founding in the 1970s. His performance as a hotel manager in the latter film earned Dafoe his third Oscar nomination. He also portrayed Nuidis Vulko in the DC Extended Universe films including Aquaman (2018), and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023). [53] Next, he played a Canadian Intelligence Corps operative in the romantic war drama The English Patient, which starred Ralph Fiennes as desert explorer Count Lszl Almsy. And just so you know, this is the early 80s and you had stylized filmslike New York Citythat were all done on set and that idea was in the air. I guess maybe I am. [121] Dafoe reprised his role from The Boondock Saints in The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, making a brief cameo appearance. [13], After attending Appleton East High School, Dafoe studied drama at the University of WisconsinMilwaukee,[14] but left after 18 months to join the experimental theater company Theatre X in Milwaukee, before moving to New York City in 1976. [49] Dafoe portrayed the poet T. S. Eliot in the drama Tom & Viv (also in 1994), which tells the story of Eliot and his first wife, Vivienne Haigh-Wood Eliot, who was played by Miranda Richardson. Nishitani said that, at the time, the team were not "aware of Streets of Fire, but I've Googled it and there does indeed seem to be something familiar about it" but that "this style of story was very popular back then" and many "fighting games made use of it" so "I guess we were part of that crowd! I think he thought that I was a needy guy. It's such a hard-shelled picture that it barely has moods. Dafoes other credits that year included Guillermo del Toros film noir Nightmare Alley and The Card Counter, a crime drama directed by Paul Schrader. . [91][92] Dafoe co-starred in XXX: State of the Union (2005), an action film sequel starring Ice Cube in which Dafoe played a US Secretary of Defense attempting a coup d'tat against the President of the United States. [5] The version of "Sorcerer", composed by Stevie Nicks, that was featured on the soundtrack album was performed by Marilyn Martin. And you're dumb. It's funny. Because I wanted to be on that stage singing with those guysBut back then I always played those quirky characters. Reply . [23], Dafoe's sole film release of 1986 was Oliver Stone's Vietnam War film Platoon, gaining him his widest exposure up to that point for playing the compassionate Sergeant Elias Grodin. I've always wondered why Walter has never wanted to work with me again. And I remember, in the park, Joel saying, 'Today Is What It Means to be Dead'. I got those best friend of the leads, quirky, funny characters. A world where it's raining all the time. The Ardmore Police roadblock was filmed near 6th street in East Los Angeles, near the flood basin. Dafoe recalled in 2010, "We were having lunch and I said, 'Do you want to get married tomorrow?'" [146] In 2014, Dafoe portrayed a wealthy private banker with connections to the Russia mafia opposite Philip Seymour Hoffman in Anton Corbijn's espionage thriller A Most Wanted Man. [28] Dafoe provided his voice to the documentary Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam (1987) and, in 1988, Dafoe starred in another film set during the Vietnam War, this time as Criminal Investigation Command Agent Buck McGriff in the action thriller Off Limits. [36] While the film was negatively received, Dafoe's performance was lauded by some critics; Peter Travers of Rolling Stone felt he gave a "disciplined performance" and Janet Maslin thought he was "harrowingly good". He played an underground fight promoter in Out of the Furnace (2013), the menacing employer of the sex-addicted main character in Nymphomaniac: Volume I (2013) and Nymphomaniac: Volume II (2013), a German banker in A Most Wanted Man (2014), a henchman in Andersons The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), and an assassin in John Wick (2014). [173] Owen Gleiberman of Variety said "Both actors are sensational (and they work together like one), but in terms of sheer showboating power its Dafoes movie. *Real* dumb if you think you can pull this off. There's this whole wave of insult comedy. The English Patient was filmed in Tuscany, where Dafoe said he particularly enjoyed the "quiet moments in the monastery between shoots". In the cult film The Boondock Saints (1999), he portrayed a detective tracking down two renegade killers who believe their actions to be righteous. [5][9][10], The film's title came from a song written and recorded by Bruce Springsteen on his 1978 album Darkness on the Edge of Town. I think he was too much of gentlemen to tell me that I was too needy at the time. And we started giggling, in that way people do when things are terriblethere's the song in the movie called 'Tonight Is What It Means to Be Young'. "He wanted to create his own 'comic book movie', without the source material actually being a comic book", said Gross, which led to the creation of Tom Cody.[4]. There was tremendous love and confidence. I'm just not that handy with that. In one of his most complex performances to date, Dafoe embodies the listless John as he reconnects with his old girlfriend, Marianne, who inevitably draws him back into the dangerous underworld. Birds who had nested in the tarp provided their own noisy interruptions.[5]. It's not Chicago. This is a fairy tale. Willem Dafoe. [178], In February 2021, it was announced that Dafoe will be co-starring alongside Emma Stone and Mark Ruffalo in Yorgos Lanthimos's Poor Things. The film received a polarized response from critics and audiences,[113] receiving both applause and boos at the Cannes Film Festival and was called the "most shocking movie" to be shown at the festival because of its graphic sex scenes. That was the first sentence out of his mouth to me in Joel Silver's office. But the moods didn't linger. [71] Dafoe received numerous awards and nominations for his performance, including his second Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor nomination. [155] Dafoe made his second guest appearance in the animated sitcom The Simpsons in November 2014, voicing a new school teacher who bullies Bart Simpson profusely. Actor: Spider-Man. I blamed you but you can't be upset with me. Although the film was largely dismissed by critics,[62] critic David Stratton found there to be "compensation" in the performances. Tom then goes to a local tavern, the Blackhawk, where he meets a tomboyish mechanic and ex-soldier named McCoy and lets her stay with him and Reva. Willem Dafoe. Janet Maslin of The New York Times felt there were no great performances in the film, but praised Dafoe's "perfectly villainous" face. [96] His fourth and final film appearance of 2005 was the crime thriller Ripley Under Ground, in which he played a museum curator. [5] Dan Hartman's selection "I Can Dream About You" is the most successful song from the movie, and became a Billboard top 10 hit in 1984 (also from his studio album of the same name). Corrections? Hill was reluctant to cast her because he felt that she was too young for the role. William James Dafoe (/dfo/;[1] July 22, 1955) is an American actor. Starring Michael Pare, Diane Lane, Amy Madigan, Willem Dafoe, Rick Moranis, Bill Paxton and Deborah Van. [5] At the time he was cast in March 1983, Par had appeared in two films, Eddie and the Cruisers and Undercover, which had not yet been released. Dafoe received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for Oliver Stone's war film Platoon (1986). [23] In an interview, shortly after the film's release, Par said, "Everyone liked it, and then all of a sudden they didn't like it. "Don't ask me how to act! Richard Corliss of Time magazine wrote that Dafoe "triumphs over some awful dialogue by giving the role his nutsy-greatsy weirdness". William James "Willem" Dafoe (born July 22, 1955) is an American actor. The choreography for the two songs Ellen Aim sings and the one by the Sorels was done by Jeffrey Hornaday. We look back at the cult classic '80s rock and roll fable, Streets of Fire. This was the fastest ever greenlight Hill had received and he put it down to the box office success of 48 Hours.
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