10 Great Posthumous Performances

This week sees the release of Eye in the Sky - Gavin Hood's drone warfare movie, playing now Stateside - in the UK. Already the film has been a hit with critics, with special notice going to one of the actors in particular: the late, great Alan Rickman. Rickman, who died earlier this year aged 69, gives one of the great posthumous performances in Eye in the Sky. This means he now joins a rare band of actors who gave notable turns in movies that were released after their death. In honor of him becoming part of this exclusive club of departed performers, join us as we take a look back at 10 other excellent posthumous performances. 10) Brandon Lee In The Crow Brandon Lee, like his father Bruce Lee, died partway through making a movie. Where Bruce died from acute swelling of the brain off-set, Brandon was killed directly because of the movie he was working on. The film was Alex Proyas' fantasy noir comic book adaptation The Crow, and the scene that resulted in the loss of Lee's life involved the actor being shot with blanks, one of which - fatally - turned out to be a real live round. Director Proyas finished Lee's remaining scenes by digitally replacing a stunt double's face with that of Lee's. Those few shots aside though, Lee's oddly charismatic, haunted performance is intact. There are moments in The Crow when Lee's Eric Draven - sadistic, face painted into a smile - looks like a proto-Ledger Joker, but there's something ghoulish and compellingly weird about Lee's performance that sets him apart. 9) Vic Morrow In Twilight Zone: The Movie Much like Brandon Lee, Vic Morrow was killed in a horrific on-set accident, but what happened to Morrow on the set of Twilight Zone: The Movie was even more brutal. Shooting a scene in his part of the anthology movie, which saw Morrow's bitter racist Bill Connor in the midst of the Vietnam War, director John Landis inadvertently ended up getting Morrow and two child extras killed, when a helicopter hovering above the scene span out of control. While the two children were crushed to death, Morrow was decapitated by the blades of the falling chopper. In this case, there was enough of the actor's work in the can that Landis was able to put his completed chapter of the Twilight Zone movie out. It's not a great film, but Morrow is the best thing in it and is particularly good in the movie's most effective sequence, playing a resentful bigot with a frightening conviction. 8) Gary Poulter In Joe If it seems like there's an uncanny rawness to Gary Poulter in Joe, then it's probably because Poulter wasn't really pretending. He was a man who was in fact quite close to the character he played for director David Gordon Green: a real-life homeless drifter and a drunk and the perfect choice to play the aimlessly wandering alcoholic father in Green's documentary-style drama. As a younger man, Poulter had dreamed of becoming an actor, and though he finally got his wish with Joe, he died of accidental drowning and alcohol intoxication before the film was released. It's a shame, too, as there are signs he could have gone on to better things: in Joe, Poulter brings a tragic sense of fragility and a touch of unpredictable danger to a deadbeat father. 7) James Gandolfini In The Drop Michael R. Roskam's underrated crime drama The Drop is notable for four main reasons: Tom Hardy, Noomi Rapace, Matthias Schoenaerts and James Gandolfini, in his final film appearance (he died aged 51, not long after filming on The Drop completed, of a heart attack). In this movie, it's the actors that tell the story, and for Gandolfini it was one last opportunity to prove why he was such a reliable mainstay of the gangster picture. Though Hardy, Rapace and Schoenaerts are all excellent, it's Gandolfini who's the hard heart of the film. As an ex-crime boss reduced to working for the Chechen mobsters that took over his turf, the actor projects a heavy sense of disappointment. He's a picture of a man living a life he never expected: one of mediocrity and subservience. 6) Oliver Reed In Gladiator Oliver Reed lived life decadently, and frequently inebriated. For almost all his adult life he was a heavy drinker, often embarking on marathon binging sessions with friends (he claimed to have drunk 106 pints of beer in two days prior to getting married to his second wife). So, it was no surprise that he died midway through shooting Gladiator, from a heart attack that co-star Omid Djalili claimed was brought on by his partaking in a drinking competition. Reed's few remaining scenes were completed using the magic of CGI, stand-ins and a mannequin, but it doesn't diminish from what is one of his finest performances ever. As Proximo, the gladiator who long ago fought to win his freedom, Reed is tough, debonair and in moments - despite the occasionally ropey work CGI'ing him into the picture - quietly touching. 5) Philip Seymour Hoffman In A Most Wanted Man Philip Seymour Hoffman, simply one of the greatest actors of modern times, was so prolific that four posthumous movies of his were released in the wake of his death (there was also a pilot for a Showtime dramedy, but that remains unaired). The actor never gave a bad performance in his life, but one of his posthumous roles stands out above the others. Anton Corbijn's A Most Wanted Man is, story-wise, an unexceptional post-9/11 spy thriller. What makes it special is the cast, and leading the pack is Hoffman, giving a masterclass in un-showy acting. His Gunther Bachmann is a chain-smoking, sadsack car crash of a human being, but at work as a spymaster he's a ruthlessly driven tactician. This is one of Hoffman's quieter performances, but it's no worse for it. 4) Bruce Lee In Enter the Dragon Like his son Brandon, Bruce Lee was on the verge of huge things when he died. Though he was partway through filming another (unfinished) movie, Lee's final completed project, Enter the Dragon, sent a shockwave through world cinema when it released after Lee's death. And while Lee may not have been a great dramatic actor, his contribution to action cinema in this one movie alone should not be underestimated. Bruce Lee was a crossover star that brought martial arts into the mainstream, displaying in Enter the Dragon a physical presence and casually charismatic fighting style that arguably hasn't been topped since. Without Bruce Lee and the huge success of Enter the Dragon, there may never have been a Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Iko Uwais, Donnie Yen...the list goes on. 3) John Cazale In The Deer Hunter No other actor who's ever walked this Earth had a consistent hit rate quite like John Cazale did. Just look at his filmography - a mere five movies, all of them stone-cold classics: The Godfather, The Conversation, The Godfather Part II, Dog Day Afternoon and, his final film, The Deer Hunter. Deer Hunter director Michael Cimino knew Cazale had terminal lung cancer when he was making the movie, so he got Cazale's scenes out of the way early, completing them just before he died. Cazale's energy in the film betrays his tragic predicament. Here, he steps into the role a small-town man trying too hard to be one of the guys. It's a beautifully played take on an incredibly insecure figure. 2) James Dean In Rebel Without A Cause Amazingly, James Dean never even saw Rebel Without A Cause, the film that shot him to superstardom (along with Giant, another film that Dean would never get to watch). Here was an actor unlike any other, who became a heartthrob, megastar and awards darling all when he was already cold in the ground. Before his two biggest movies were even released, putting him on the path to icon status, Dean was killed in a car accident. There's a reason Dean became an icon, though. His performance in Rebel Without A Cause was unprecedented, and still rings true as a recognizable (if distinctly melodramatic) depiction of teenage growing pains. It's why posters of him are still hanging up on walls today and why actors still try to imitate him: Dean was one of the true Hollywood originals, and he left us way too early. 1) Heath Ledger In The Dark Knight "You've changed things...forever." That's a line spoken by Heath Ledger's Joker in The Dark Knight, and the words arguably ring true about the actor himself. Ledger's Joker has changed how villains are portrayed in cinema; he's forged a path that other actors have inevitably had to follow. And the fact that Ledger has been so influential through just one role makes his passing all the more tragic. Based on what we see in The Dark Knight alone, this could have been an all-time great actor. Unfortunately, Ledger passed aged just 28 due to a prescription drug overdose, before he saw the fruits of his efforts (critical and fan adoration, a Best Supporting Actor Oscar). Still, we'll always have this one movie, and this performance - one of the most iconic, darkly comic turns of all-time.