Brendan Fraser is more than capable of tackling darker, more serious roles, from dramatic appearances in the star-studded School Ties to heavy roles opposite Sir Ian McKellan in Gods and Monsters. The diversity of Fraser’s career is occasionally masked by lighter, more mainstream material. Here are some of the best Brendan Fraser movies and performances.
1. Montgomery “Monty” Kessler in With Honors (1994)
Director- Alek Keshishian
Student Monty is left with just one paper copy of his thesis after his computer fails. He runs outside to Xerox it out of fear of losing it, only to trip and drop it through a grate. He finds that Simon, a squatter, had located it after searching the building’s basement. Simon strikes a bargain with Monty: in exchange for each day’s lodging and food, Monty will provide him with one page of the thesis.
2. David Green in School Ties (1992)
Director- Robert Mandel
An elite boarding school for the country’s blue bloods accepts David Green, a star athlete, as a student. As the institution uses him to win football championships, Green aims to utilise the school to get into Harvard. Up until Charlie Dillon, a spoilt classmate, learns that Green is Jewish, everything is going according to plan. This doesn’t sit well with his peers given the time and the situation. As a result of a cheating scandal, the classmates are forced to choose between Green and Dillon, which brings the film to a dramatic conclusion. The film does a great job of highlighting the religious inequalities that existed in America at the time. One also learns how elites preserve their rank and privilege by continuing their education.
3. Alden Pyle in The Quiet American (2002)
Director- Philip Noyce
Thomas Fowler, an English journalist in Saigon in 1951, is in love with Phuong, a Vietnamese girl. He is married to a Catholic woman in England. At a bar, Thomas encounters Alden Pyle. The doctor Pyle falls in love with Phuong quite quickly while serving in an assistance mission. Thomas cannot provide her a marriage or a way out of Vietnam, but Pyle can. The French are attempting to regain control of the country, the Communists are attempting to impose their system in the south, and the Americans are secretly supporting a third Vietnamese region. In the meantime, the political situation in Vietnam is tense.
4. Clayton Boone in Gods and Monsters (1998)
Director- Bill Condon
James Whale, a once-powerful Hollywood director best known for “Frankenstein” and “The Bride of Frankenstein,” is far past retirement age and getting worse. While the director seems to be interested in new gardener Clayton Boone, a former Marine and Korean War veteran, for reasons other than his typical casual conquest, his steadfast housekeeper Hanna discreetly disapproves of Whale’s faceless, nameless procession of young gay lovers.
5. Doug Jones in No Sudden Move (2021)
Director- Steven Soderbergh
Three career criminals are employed to carry out what seems to be a quick and straightforward operation: keep the wife and kids of an accountant hostage while he retrieves a document from his boss’s office. However, things start to fall apart rather quickly, and it seems like more powerful forces are at play.
6. Rick Cabot in Crash (2004)
Director- Paul Haggis
A colourful tapestry of varied characters from both sides of the rails emerges against the backdrop of busy Los Angeles. While Farhad, a desperate Persian shop owner, looks for security in all the wrong places, Detective Graham and his colleague Ria are looking into a crime that may have been motivated by race. In another part of the city, a pair of carjackers connected to Park, a Korean man, target District Attorney Rick and his wife, Jean. Then, after coming into contact with TV director Flanagan and his wife, Christine, prejudice strikes Daniel Ruiz, a Hispanic locksmith, and bigoted senior police officer, Sergeant Ryan, fights with his rookie partner, Officer Hanson. And over the course of the following 36 exhausting hours, as prejudice, animosity, hatred, and terror become intricately entwined with everyone involved, they will inevitably collide.
7. John Crowley in Extraordinary Measures (2010)
Director- Tom Vaughan
John Crowley is a successful businessman who has a lovely wife and three kids. His two youngest children are diagnosed with a terminal illness just as his career is beginning to take off. John quits his work to focus only on preserving their lives. He teams up with the bright but quirky scientist Dr. Robert Stonehill. Together, they take on the medical and business establishment while searching for a solution in a race against time.
While many people remember Brendan Fraser Movies and his appearances in commercial triumphs such as The Mummy trilogy and George of the Jungle, his appearance in Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale made us consider the actor’s more serious side.
