ONE of the most important elements in a movie that usually influences me to enjoy and like the movie or not, besides 'the story' and 'the direction', is 'the characters'. With the right conflicts in the story, 'the characters' can play and manipulate your emotion the most. Happy. Sad. Angry. Fear. Bravery. Coward. Smart. Idiot. Arrogant. Greed. Paranoid. Crazy. The more you carried away with a character, the successful the actor who played the role. Actually, watching a great actor playing a great character is like having a great feast that you will never forget.There were so many great male actors that has come and gone in our movie history, who has successfully played their characters in the movies of their times (or they themselves were the characters in their real lives). Many of them has even become the legends and the icons of the industry. A few of the greatest that has shared a lot of joys to many people through movies before our time, or even now, are (in honoring them): Cary Grant, Humphrey Bogart, James Stewart, Clark Gable, John Wayne, Gary Cooper, Henry Fonda, James Cagney, Gregory Peck, Spencer Tracy, Laurence Olivier, Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Charlton Heston, Burt Lancaster, William Holden, Orson Welles, James Dean, Jack Lemmon, Charles Chaplin, Errol Flynn, Buster Keaton, Edward G. Robinson, The Marx Brothers, Robert Mitchum, Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, and Marlon Brando. Our cinema would not be the same without these wonderful actors. And their names, with many others that I have not mentioned here, shall be remembered forever in the movie history.
Every year, many new actors come to the industry to catch the Hollywood dreams. But after years of fierce competition in Hollywood, only a few of them that will survive and really shine. Even less will mark their names with golden ink and will be remembered until their old age because of their greatness.So, when thinking about the actors in their 30's (the years usually the actors start entering their mature stage) who will become the next big thing, I think of someone who can draw a big box office success like Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Will Smith, and Johnny Depp, all from one generation older. Or maybe like Tom Hanks and Mel Gibson, who used to be a box office drawer. Or Harrison Ford, who has his glorious years with his icon role, Indiana Jones (anyway, who doesn't like Indy?). But besides as the box office drawer, that actor should also possess great acting skills, who in another 30 or maybe 40 years, we can imagine his achievements in par with the character-actor living legends, such as Jack Nicholson, Robert De Niro, and Al Pacino. And don't forget also other big living legends' names, Kirk Douglas, Clint Eastwood, Sidney Poitier, Sean Connery, Gene Hackman, Peter O'Toole, Robert Redford, Morgan Freeman, Anthony Hopkins and Dustin Hoffman, who have given us so many great films, some even as great directors.
Even though there are many potential actors in their 30's now, I didn't find it difficult to pick a name that I think will become the most successful actors in the future among his generation, as a very strong name quickly popped in my head (actually it was already there for quite some time). And I only have one name. Leonardo DiCaprio.
So, why Leonardo DiCaprio? And why do I fall in love with this (wonderful) actor?
1) A very talented actor with great acting skills.
REMEMBER how he played Teddy Daniels in Shutter Island? How he expressed his frantic and paranoid feeling trapped in a no-way-out island?And how he played Frank Wheeler in Revolutionary Road, as a husband who torn between his wife's dreams and their reality?
How about Danny Archer in Blood Diamond, as an ex-mercenary with a strong survival instinct, that caught in the middle of the diamonds business and political chaos in Sierra Leone?
You must remember him as Billy Costigan in The Departed, as a tortured soul undercover cop who infiltrated into the mob's lair, but just didn't know how to quit the game.
Or as an eccentric Mogul, Howard Hughes in The Aviator, who thirsted for power, but suffered an obsessive-compulsive disorder that brought him to madness.
Leo has grown to become a solid actor these days. And he is getting better and better, especially after his collaboration with one of the greatest directors of our time, Martin Scorsese, in so many films (Gangs of New York, The Aviator, The Departed and Shutter Island). This director seems to have put him in the right track as a matured actor.
But, if you happened to follow Leo's career from the beginning, you will find that he was a very talented actor from the start. As people first widely knew him as Luke Brower in the popular TV sitcom "Growing Pains" (he played in 1991-1992), Leo quickly knew that his place was actually on the big screen. And if we notice his choices of roles in his earlier career, we could see that Leo was an actor who was not afraid to take big risks. And he already gave very good performances in his earlier big screen movies.
Leo was impressive as Arnie Grape, Johnny Depp's little brother who suffered from autism disease in What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), which got him nominated for Oscar's Best Supporting Actor the next year at the age of 20. He also was good as a drug-addicted teenager in The Basketball Diaries (1993) and as a mental instability son of Meryl Streep in Marvin's Room (1996). He even took the risk to play a homosexual poet in Total Eclipse (1995), a film of him that I believe not many people know (I have not yet watched This Boy's Life, 1993, a movie that collaborated him with Robert De Niro for the first time, before they met again in Marvin's Room). So, he was not just a spoil brat with a cute face that didn't know how to act at the beginning of his career, as he has already shown what a big potential he has in his very young age.
Recent years, his other two Oscar nominations were for Best Actor in The Aviator (2004) and Blood Diamond (2006). He has also won and nominated for quite handsome awards for his acting achievements in various Festivals and Awards events for his movies What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), Romeo + Juliet (1996), Marvin's Room (1996), Titanic(1997), Catch Me If You Can (2002), The Aviator (2004), The Departed (2006), Blood Diamond (2006) and Revolutionary Road (2008), including winning the Golden Globe award for Best Actor in The Aviator. And I believe, it is only time that separate him from his first Oscar.
I don't think that the peoples disliked Leo in Titanic really hated him for his acting. Were you thrilled when watching the scene where Jack (Leo) has to drag Rose (Kate Winslet) running all the way for their lives when the water started to flood the ship? When Jack was being handcuffed in a pole and Rose has to break it with an axe? Or when Jack has to open a locked-gate while the water kept rising through his head, and he suddenly dropped the key? Or when Jack and Rose on top of the sinking ship, ready to jump and swim, just before the ship sinked? Or when Jack said his final words to Rose while he was suffering in the cold water that slowly killing him? I call that a very good acting (from both Leo and Kate), that thrilled us. I agree that Titanic was such a huge success, both at box office and various award events, because of the brilliant direction from James Cameron, the impressive visual effects of the sinking gallant ship, and the theme of the movie itself, as one of the biggest disasters ever happened in the history. But do not forget that Titanic will also always be remembered for its two great leads, Leo and Kate, whose chemistry and actings really made this movie work and unforgettable. And I think that the casting of Leo and Kate in Titanic was one of the perfect castings in the movie history.
2) A successful metamorphosis of an actor.
LEO has gone through several stages in his career. From a teen star playing in TV series, he quickly jumped to the big screen with several teen roles, then he suddenly became a Hollywood heartthrob in Titanic. After that, his star seemed to dim for around four years, but he made a successful comeback with Gangs of New York (Martin Scorsese) and Catch Me If You Can (Steven Spielberg) in 2002, and since then, his star began to rise and shine again. And everybody loves a success comeback story. In Hollywood, it is very difficult for a kid or teen stars to become really success when they reach their adult age. We know so many famous kid and teen stars whose names were slowly vanished as the time went by. But Leo could overcome that. When I imagined him again as the kid in What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993) and compared to his last appearance in Shutter Island (2010), I was really amazed by how Leo has changed as an actor. He has gone through a metamorphosis that changed him from a very talented teen star to become a very fine actor now.
Many peoples said that Leo owed Martin Scorsese for who he becomes right now as an actor, because since his first collaboration with this great director in 2002 and many other collaborations afterwards, Leo has continuously raised up his bar as a serious actor. His acting also improved significantly and he slowly shaped himself as a great character actor. So, Leo did owe Scorsese for bringing back his career.
But, actually I have a slightly different thought about this matter. Martin Scorsese is a very smart director. He didn't just pick any actors to play in his movie, especially the one that he planned to have a long-term collaboration with (like the sweet one he has with Robert De Niro, with whom he made 8 films together). Scorsese surely needed a good actor that possessed good acting skills, with a box office potential drawer, the actor that he needed to fine tune and polish a little in order to bring that actor right on track, and then run together with him. And he knew Leo was like a raw diamond that needed to be polished and has a huge potential to be big (the same as James Cameron, another very smart director, who saw the potential of this actor before he brought him and Kate on board in Titanic).
So yes, Scorsese has polished Leo to become a fine actor. But on top of that, their collaboration is actually a mutual relationship, since Scorsese also found back his rhythm (since his highly acclaimed Goodfellas, 1990), after his successful collaboration with Leo (maybe a slightly new rhythm at the box office success for Scorsese, if you do not totally agree with me). Just compare the box office results of Scorsese's last four films before he collaborated with Leo and Scorsese's four films after he collaborated with Leo, and you will know what I mean.
3) A high star power & a bankable actor, with a generous heart.
EVERYBODY will agree that Leo has a high star power as an actor. He possesses a charisma to be big in this industry (somebody may call it an X-factor). And needless to say, he definitely is a bankable actor, as he is also one of the most highest paying actors now. After Titanic, he has not yet played in another very big budget movie, since he has been a very selective actor for some years after the huge success of that movie. But as his star continues to shine now, many producers are hunting him again for playing in their movies, because they know Leo is a guarantee for success.
Leo is one of the busiest actors in Hollywood nowadays. If you check in IMDb (The Internet Movie Database) at this current moment (around May'10), then you will find that his total film projects (whether it is in "pre-production", "in production" or "in development") are almost the same amount of those of Will Smith and Brad Pitt, slightly more than those of Johnny Depp, and much more than those of Tom Cruise. And if we compare him with the other actors of his generation, then his total film projects are much more than those of Matt Damon, Christian Bale, Ryan Reynolds and Sam Worthington.
Besides as a busy actor, Leo is also a committed environmentalist, who concerns a lot about environment preservation and global warming. He has received praises from environmental groups for his concrete actions and he has also inspired other celebrities to do the same. In 2007, he co-produced a documenter film about global warming, The 11th Hour, which he also acted as a co-writer and a narrator.
Leo is also known as an actor with a generous heart. In 2010, he donated US$1,000,000 to relief the sufferings and efforts in Haiti after the big earthquake.
After Titanic, which was 13 years ago, Leo just needs another big vehicle to shoot his star right up to the sky and to bring him into another level as the box office ruler. And then, he will become very big and unstoppable. And if my prediction is right (as I believe many peoples must have expected the same), that vehicle will be the INCEPTION (2010). If Christopher Nolan did not somehow mess the story of this movie up (and I really-really doubt that he would, since he's a hot young good director with a very impressive track record), this movie will become a very big hit for both Nolan and DiCaprio. And you will soon see Leo becomes a household name again.
***
MAYBE you have a question, when did I actually start to love Leonardo DiCaprio as an actor. In What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), when he got his first Oscar nomination? Absolutely not, because I just watched this movie recently (with other three of his earlier movies), while I was preparing this article. Titanic (1997)? I have to also say no. Gangs of New York (2002), when he first collaborated with Scorsese? No. The Departed (2006), the movie that won Oscar's Best Picture. No either. My first encounter with Leo was in Romeo + Juliet (1996), a film that I did not really like. But it was in the Revolutionary Road (2008), that I was really hooked by Leo with his brilliant performance and awesome acting (together with his film soul mate, Kate Winslet), even though I have accumulated to like him more and more since the Titanic. I also really liked him in Blood Diamond, but Revolutionary Road was definitely my most favorite movie of him so far, period.
I am not trying to compare Leonardo DiCaprio with other great legends that I have mentioned in the beginning of this article, because he is still young and still has a long way to go. But, I strongly believe that he possesses more than huge potentials to become one of the greatest actors in our movie history. And I think he is already on his way. (MJ)
Leonardo DiCaprio
Born: 11 November 1974, Hollywood, California, USA
Selected Filmography:
1) This Boy's Life (1993) - Tobias 'Toby' Wolff - N/A
2) What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993) - Arnie Grape YYYY
3) The Quick and the Dead (1995) - Kid - YYY
4) The Basketball Diaries (1995) - Jim Carroll - YY1/2
5) Total Eclipse (1995) - Arthur Rimbaud - YY1/2
6) William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet (1996) - Romeo - YY
7) Marvin's Room (1996) - Hank - YYYY
8) Titanic (1997) - Jack Dawson - YYYY1/2
9) The Man in the Iron Mask (1998) - King Louis XIV/Philippe - YY
10) The Beach (2000) - Richard - Y1/2
How about Danny Archer in Blood Diamond, as an ex-mercenary with a strong survival instinct, that caught in the middle of the diamonds business and political chaos in Sierra Leone?
You must remember him as Billy Costigan in The Departed, as a tortured soul undercover cop who infiltrated into the mob's lair, but just didn't know how to quit the game.
Or as an eccentric Mogul, Howard Hughes in The Aviator, who thirsted for power, but suffered an obsessive-compulsive disorder that brought him to madness.
Leo has grown to become a solid actor these days. And he is getting better and better, especially after his collaboration with one of the greatest directors of our time, Martin Scorsese, in so many films (Gangs of New York, The Aviator, The Departed and Shutter Island). This director seems to have put him in the right track as a matured actor.
But, if you happened to follow Leo's career from the beginning, you will find that he was a very talented actor from the start. As people first widely knew him as Luke Brower in the popular TV sitcom "Growing Pains" (he played in 1991-1992), Leo quickly knew that his place was actually on the big screen. And if we notice his choices of roles in his earlier career, we could see that Leo was an actor who was not afraid to take big risks. And he already gave very good performances in his earlier big screen movies.
Leo was impressive as Arnie Grape, Johnny Depp's little brother who suffered from autism disease in What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), which got him nominated for Oscar's Best Supporting Actor the next year at the age of 20. He also was good as a drug-addicted teenager in The Basketball Diaries (1993) and as a mental instability son of Meryl Streep in Marvin's Room (1996). He even took the risk to play a homosexual poet in Total Eclipse (1995), a film of him that I believe not many people know (I have not yet watched This Boy's Life, 1993, a movie that collaborated him with Robert De Niro for the first time, before they met again in Marvin's Room). So, he was not just a spoil brat with a cute face that didn't know how to act at the beginning of his career, as he has already shown what a big potential he has in his very young age.Recent years, his other two Oscar nominations were for Best Actor in The Aviator (2004) and Blood Diamond (2006). He has also won and nominated for quite handsome awards for his acting achievements in various Festivals and Awards events for his movies What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), Romeo + Juliet (1996), Marvin's Room (1996), Titanic(1997), Catch Me If You Can (2002), The Aviator (2004), The Departed (2006), Blood Diamond (2006) and Revolutionary Road (2008), including winning the Golden Globe award for Best Actor in The Aviator. And I believe, it is only time that separate him from his first Oscar.
I don't think that the peoples disliked Leo in Titanic really hated him for his acting. Were you thrilled when watching the scene where Jack (Leo) has to drag Rose (Kate Winslet) running all the way for their lives when the water started to flood the ship? When Jack was being handcuffed in a pole and Rose has to break it with an axe? Or when Jack has to open a locked-gate while the water kept rising through his head, and he suddenly dropped the key? Or when Jack and Rose on top of the sinking ship, ready to jump and swim, just before the ship sinked? Or when Jack said his final words to Rose while he was suffering in the cold water that slowly killing him? I call that a very good acting (from both Leo and Kate), that thrilled us. I agree that Titanic was such a huge success, both at box office and various award events, because of the brilliant direction from James Cameron, the impressive visual effects of the sinking gallant ship, and the theme of the movie itself, as one of the biggest disasters ever happened in the history. But do not forget that Titanic will also always be remembered for its two great leads, Leo and Kate, whose chemistry and actings really made this movie work and unforgettable. And I think that the casting of Leo and Kate in Titanic was one of the perfect castings in the movie history.
2) A successful metamorphosis of an actor.
LEO has gone through several stages in his career. From a teen star playing in TV series, he quickly jumped to the big screen with several teen roles, then he suddenly became a Hollywood heartthrob in Titanic. After that, his star seemed to dim for around four years, but he made a successful comeback with Gangs of New York (Martin Scorsese) and Catch Me If You Can (Steven Spielberg) in 2002, and since then, his star began to rise and shine again. And everybody loves a success comeback story. In Hollywood, it is very difficult for a kid or teen stars to become really success when they reach their adult age. We know so many famous kid and teen stars whose names were slowly vanished as the time went by. But Leo could overcome that. When I imagined him again as the kid in What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993) and compared to his last appearance in Shutter Island (2010), I was really amazed by how Leo has changed as an actor. He has gone through a metamorphosis that changed him from a very talented teen star to become a very fine actor now.Many peoples said that Leo owed Martin Scorsese for who he becomes right now as an actor, because since his first collaboration with this great director in 2002 and many other collaborations afterwards, Leo has continuously raised up his bar as a serious actor. His acting also improved significantly and he slowly shaped himself as a great character actor. So, Leo did owe Scorsese for bringing back his career.
But, actually I have a slightly different thought about this matter. Martin Scorsese is a very smart director. He didn't just pick any actors to play in his movie, especially the one that he planned to have a long-term collaboration with (like the sweet one he has with Robert De Niro, with whom he made 8 films together). Scorsese surely needed a good actor that possessed good acting skills, with a box office potential drawer, the actor that he needed to fine tune and polish a little in order to bring that actor right on track, and then run together with him. And he knew Leo was like a raw diamond that needed to be polished and has a huge potential to be big (the same as James Cameron, another very smart director, who saw the potential of this actor before he brought him and Kate on board in Titanic).
So yes, Scorsese has polished Leo to become a fine actor. But on top of that, their collaboration is actually a mutual relationship, since Scorsese also found back his rhythm (since his highly acclaimed Goodfellas, 1990), after his successful collaboration with Leo (maybe a slightly new rhythm at the box office success for Scorsese, if you do not totally agree with me). Just compare the box office results of Scorsese's last four films before he collaborated with Leo and Scorsese's four films after he collaborated with Leo, and you will know what I mean.
3) A high star power & a bankable actor, with a generous heart.
EVERYBODY will agree that Leo has a high star power as an actor. He possesses a charisma to be big in this industry (somebody may call it an X-factor). And needless to say, he definitely is a bankable actor, as he is also one of the most highest paying actors now. After Titanic, he has not yet played in another very big budget movie, since he has been a very selective actor for some years after the huge success of that movie. But as his star continues to shine now, many producers are hunting him again for playing in their movies, because they know Leo is a guarantee for success.Leo is one of the busiest actors in Hollywood nowadays. If you check in IMDb (The Internet Movie Database) at this current moment (around May'10), then you will find that his total film projects (whether it is in "pre-production", "in production" or "in development") are almost the same amount of those of Will Smith and Brad Pitt, slightly more than those of Johnny Depp, and much more than those of Tom Cruise. And if we compare him with the other actors of his generation, then his total film projects are much more than those of Matt Damon, Christian Bale, Ryan Reynolds and Sam Worthington.
Besides as a busy actor, Leo is also a committed environmentalist, who concerns a lot about environment preservation and global warming. He has received praises from environmental groups for his concrete actions and he has also inspired other celebrities to do the same. In 2007, he co-produced a documenter film about global warming, The 11th Hour, which he also acted as a co-writer and a narrator.
Leo is also known as an actor with a generous heart. In 2010, he donated US$1,000,000 to relief the sufferings and efforts in Haiti after the big earthquake.
After Titanic, which was 13 years ago, Leo just needs another big vehicle to shoot his star right up to the sky and to bring him into another level as the box office ruler. And then, he will become very big and unstoppable. And if my prediction is right (as I believe many peoples must have expected the same), that vehicle will be the INCEPTION (2010). If Christopher Nolan did not somehow mess the story of this movie up (and I really-really doubt that he would, since he's a hot young good director with a very impressive track record), this movie will become a very big hit for both Nolan and DiCaprio. And you will soon see Leo becomes a household name again.
***
MAYBE you have a question, when did I actually start to love Leonardo DiCaprio as an actor. In What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), when he got his first Oscar nomination? Absolutely not, because I just watched this movie recently (with other three of his earlier movies), while I was preparing this article. Titanic (1997)? I have to also say no. Gangs of New York (2002), when he first collaborated with Scorsese? No. The Departed (2006), the movie that won Oscar's Best Picture. No either. My first encounter with Leo was in Romeo + Juliet (1996), a film that I did not really like. But it was in the Revolutionary Road (2008), that I was really hooked by Leo with his brilliant performance and awesome acting (together with his film soul mate, Kate Winslet), even though I have accumulated to like him more and more since the Titanic. I also really liked him in Blood Diamond, but Revolutionary Road was definitely my most favorite movie of him so far, period.I am not trying to compare Leonardo DiCaprio with other great legends that I have mentioned in the beginning of this article, because he is still young and still has a long way to go. But, I strongly believe that he possesses more than huge potentials to become one of the greatest actors in our movie history. And I think he is already on his way. (MJ)
Leonardo DiCaprio
Born: 11 November 1974, Hollywood, California, USA
Selected Filmography:
1) This Boy's Life (1993) - Tobias 'Toby' Wolff - N/A
2) What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993) - Arnie Grape YYYY
3) The Quick and the Dead (1995) - Kid - YYY
4) The Basketball Diaries (1995) - Jim Carroll - YY1/2
5) Total Eclipse (1995) - Arthur Rimbaud - YY1/2
6) William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet (1996) - Romeo - YY
7) Marvin's Room (1996) - Hank - YYYY
8) Titanic (1997) - Jack Dawson - YYYY1/2
9) The Man in the Iron Mask (1998) - King Louis XIV/Philippe - YY
10) The Beach (2000) - Richard - Y1/2
11) Gangs of New York (2002) - Amsterdam Vallon - YYY1/2
12) Catch Me If You Can (2002) - Frank Abagnale Jr. - YYY
13) The Aviator (2004) - Howard Hughes - YYYY
14) The Departed (2006) - Billy Costigan - YYYY
15) Blood Diamond (2006) - Danny Archer - YYYYY
16) The 11th Hour (2007/D) - Narrator/Producer/Writer - YY1/2
13) The Aviator (2004) - Howard Hughes - YYYY
14) The Departed (2006) - Billy Costigan - YYYY
15) Blood Diamond (2006) - Danny Archer - YYYYY
16) The 11th Hour (2007/D) - Narrator/Producer/Writer - YY1/2
17) Body of Lies (2008) - Roger Ferris - YYY
18) Revolutionary Road (2008) - Frank Wheeler - YYYYY
19) Shutter Island (2010) - Teddy Daniels - YYYY 1/2
18) Revolutionary Road (2008) - Frank Wheeler - YYYYY
19) Shutter Island (2010) - Teddy Daniels - YYYY 1/2
