I have a confession to make. I love Kurt Russell. Not the Kurt Russell who made his mark in acting in Disney movies, but the Kurt Russell who grew up to make his mark in sci-fi and especially the horror genre.
I'll never forget the first time I saw the man wearing those snakeskintight breeches and the eye patch in
Escape from New York. And when he took his shirt off, and you got to see that huge cobra tattoo that coiled so provocatively down into the waistband.
"Hey, Snake! I thought you were dead!"
"Don't call me Snake."
And then, twenty years later, to reprise his role in Escape from L. A. In an interview with Carpenter, the director lamented the fact that when they pull those pants from storage, Russell still fit in them!
Then came Carpenter's remake of The Thing. People screamed about someone daring to re-do a "classic". Then they screamed at the monster that totally blew away every critic, and invariably rewrote the book on alien movies. Again, Russell's character of MacReady was you -- the poor schlub caught in the middle of this unending nightmare in the arctic cold. You rooted for him, suffered with him, and tried to second-guess with him.
Russell's forays into the horror genre have been sparse in the past few years, but I was thrilled to learned he'd teamed with Tarantino for
Death Proof.
No longer the hero, this was a different Russell that you loved seeing getting his butt kicked big time. Yet, you still couldn't help but admire the fact that this man was playing the bad guy this time, and doing a hell of a great job getting you to hate him!
Russell uses no mask or specialized weapon to make his mark in the horror genre. He can be the man with the white hat, or the devil's son in black. Either way, you'll believe what he tells you, and you'll remember his performance long after you forget the details of the movie.
