Few actors have played such a wide range of roles as Hilary Swank. Since her debut appearances in sitcoms and teenage dramas in the 1990s, Swank has tried her hand at historical epics, science fiction, supernatural horror, courtroom dramas, and Westerns among others. Here are 10 of the two-time Academy Award winner’s finest performances.
10. The Core
The forgotten 2003 sci-fi film The Core failed to break even at the box office, but despite its many failings, there are a few enjoyable moments in it – indeed, Roger Ebert confessed to a perverse liking for it, and given her committed performance, it is a pity that Swank has (with one or two exceptions) stayed away from SF since its release. When Earth’s core is discovered to have stopped rotating, a team of scientists and NASA pilots – including Major “Beck” Childs (Swank) – team up to fly a craft through Earth’s mantle and into the core, armed with lasers that will get it turning again before the planet’s magnetic field shuts down and billions of people die from radiation. The concept is crazy, the peril contrived, and the technobabble comes thick and fast, but between them, Swank and co-stars Aaron Eckhart, Delroy Lindo, and Stanley Tucci, just about manage to play it straight.
9. Camp Wilder
The blink-and-you’ll-miss-it sitcom lasted less than six months before ABC canceled it in early 1993. Ricky Wilder, a twenty-something single mother, finds the teenaged friends of her younger brother and sister using her house as an impromptu hangout, with romantic intrigues and misunderstandings to match. Rightfully forgotten for its by-the-numbers premise, the sitcom is chiefly notable today for the extraordinary success the series regulars enjoyed later in their careers. Aside from Swank’s turn as Danielle, there was her character’s love interest, a biker called Dexter, played by a then-unknown Jared Leto; Jerry O’Connell, who would shortly enjoy stardom as the lead in hit 90s scifi series Sliders; and a six-year-old Tina Majorino, who less than three years later would turn in a remarkably mature performance alongside Kevin Costner and Jeanne Tripplehorn in Waterworld. Swank bagged a Young Artist Award nomination for her efforts; fortunately, better roles soon beckoned.
8. The Resident
A run-of-the-mill horror from legendary production company Hammer Films is elevated by some deft acting by Swank in the lead role of Juliet, a New Yorker in a love triangle with estranged husband Jack and landlord Max. What she doesn’t realize is that Max is stalking her, not only spying on her through one-way mirrors, but also entering her apartment. The action is far too broad to be compelling, but Swank does solid work opposite Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Lee Pace as Max and Jack respectively. Watch out too for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine star Nana Visitor, and also for Christopher Lee, for whom this was his final major horror role before his death in 2015.
7. Amelia
Like the sinking of the Titanic and the Hindenburg disaster, the fate of Amelia Earhart, whose airplane ran out of fuel and disappeared somewhere over the Pacific Ocean during her 1937 attempt at circumnavigating the world, is one early 20th Century story that filmmakers can’t seem to stay away from. Swank’s interest in the story was so great that she was an executive producer for the movie, and in the lead role of Earhart, one of the most famous aviation pioneers of the 1930s, she exudes the self-confidence and likability for which Earhart was well known. For her ill-fated round-the-world plane trip, she was accompanied by Fred Noonan, played here by Christopher Eccleston, then on a career high after his triumphant 2005 performances in Doctor Who turned the decades-old BBC property into a juggernaut global brand. Although the film suffers from slow pacing and a lack of tension – after all, we know exactly what’s going to happen – Swank’s uncanny performance as Earhart stands out as the work of an actor throwing herself into the role of playing a person she clearly admires.
6. The Affair of the Necklace
This overlooked 2001 period piece saw Swank on top form as Jeanne de Saint-Rémy de Valois, a real-life jewel thief in 18th Century France whose illicit schemes unwittingly had a hand in causing the French Revolution. The action concerns the French queen Marie Antoinette, who in the film (as in real life) ordered a fabulously expensive diamond necklace from one of Paris’s most famous jewelers, only to refuse to buy it when the necklace was complete. De Valois, a woman descended from aristocracy with pretensions of entering high society, wrote letters purporting to be from the queen in an attempt to procure the necklace, and was eventually discovered and imprisoned. Starring opposite Academy Award nominee Jonathan Pryce as the gullible Cardinal Louis de Rohan, and with strong support from Christopher Walken and Joely Richardson, it repays a rewatch, with Swank playing de Valois as dignified, determined, and quietly desperate.
5. The Homesman
This 2014 drama saw Swank make her first foray into the Western genre. For his fourth feature as director, Tommy Lee Jones assembled a highly impressive cast that included Meryl Streep, John Lithgow, and James Spader, but it is Swank’s performance that catches the eye. The action is set in 1850s Nebraska, with single woman Mary looking to make her way on the frontier; but when three women require transportation across the prairie, Mary is saddled with the job. She comes across George (Jones), a “claim jumper” whose racket is to usurp the land rights of others, and the pair make the journey together, encountering hardships and difficult moral choices along the way. The Homesman sunk without trace at the box office, but met with considerable critical success in large part because of Swank’s winning performance as a frontierswoman who pushes her independence to the limit, and beyond.
4. I Am Mother
Swank’s first outing in science fiction for almost 20 years was well worth the wait. Netflix’s I Am Mother asked troubling questions about the nature of parenthood, the growth of AI, and the future of humankind. Raised in a hi-tech bunker, Daughter (Clara Rugaard) reaches adolescence and begins to ask questions about the nature of the ruined world outside. Her only source of information is Mother (Rose Byrne as the voice and Luke Hawker as the body), a humanoid robot who is less than forthcoming on the subject. One day a Stranger (Swank) gains entry to the facility, and takes Daughter away in search of other humans. The small-scale setup, the closed environment in which much of the action takes place, and the theme of hope in the midst of post-apocalyptic dread is powerfully redolent of 1970s classics such as Silent Running, and Swank’s studied performance as the jaded, weary Stranger was favorably reviewed.
3. Red Dust
Tom Hooper’s debut feature barely moved the needle on its release in 2004, but it ranks alongside The King’s Speech and Les Misérables as one of the British director’s best films. Swank stars as Sarah Barcant, an American lawyer who was brought up in apartheid-era South Africa. Her former acquaintance, Alex Mpondo (played by Chiwetel Ejiofor in only his second star billing), is now a prominent politician who was tortured for his anti-apartheid sympathies. Having implicated another man while under duress, Alex is wracked by guilt for the man’s death, and appears in front of a Truth and Reconciliation Committee, hoping to uncover what happened. Swank delivers a confident, dignified performance as Barcant, who battles against sexism and hostility from former agents of the apartheid regime to assist Alex in his pursuit of justice.
2. Million Dollar Baby
The trope of an old, grizzled boxing trainer helping an up-and-coming novice to achieve their potential is as old as the hills, but this 2004 drama made Swank the novice, and Clint Eastwood the trainer. With Eastwood also helming the movie, Swank underwent a rigorous training program in preparation for the role, work that paid off: her transition from promising newcomer to tough-as-nails fighter is smooth, believable, and expertly handled. Audiences thought so too – Million Dollar Baby grossed almost a quarter of a billion dollars at the box office, and brought Swank her second Academy Award, as well as an Oscar for co-star Morgan Freeman at the fourth attempt.
1. Boys Don’t Cry
Swank received the first of her two Academy Award wins for Best Actress for this moving 1999 movie. Based on a true story, Boys Don’t Cry tells the story of Brandon Teena, a transgender man who was raped and murdered in 1993 by two transphobic men. At a time when acceptance – or even understanding – of what it meant to be transgender was decidedly thin on the ground in Hollywood, most A-list actors shunned the role for fear of stigmatization, but Swank won the part of Teena by turning up for the audition dressed as a man. Her electrifying performance brought her to the attention of the critics, and bagged a slew of awards for her work.