How much is the role/actor, how much is WHEN you saw it? I grew up with Ford being Solo, I can't picture anyone else doing it. (though I have no problem separating Solo from Jones) As well, when and WHY the movie was made adds to it. I of course see the Solo move as just a money grab from something 40+ years ago that should have been left alone.

Same with Mel Gibson as Max Rockatansky. Grew up with one, then decades later you throw someone else at me with something that looks like a money grab rehash? Yeah, that one is a little different, as they wanted and tried to make it years before with Gibson, but couldn't for various reasons. For my "mental image", I'm glad it was Tom Hardy and not Gibson, because it was a hot awful mess. I can at least dissociate it from the three movies I like. Unlike the last Indiana Jones movie, it's too bad they didn't get someone else for that.

quote:

Originally posted by tigereye313:
A lot of people think of Anthony Hopkins only as Hannibal Lecter. Watch The World's Fastest Indian. Two seconds into his first line you forget that Hopkins was Lecter.

Peter Sellers was another. A lot of people see him only as Cloiseau. He pulled it off in a single movie as both Mandrake and Strangelove.

There aren't many who can take on other personas fully. Hopkins can, DeNiro, Daniel Day Lewis, Robert Duvall, Gary Oldman. Streep is very good.

Tom Cruise does play to type a lot, although does have a broader range. But I can never seen beyond his weird, illogical belief in Scientology and see him in a role. I don't like DeNiro personally, but I can set it aside with his parts. I can't do it with Cruise.

Concur about Oldman and Duvall as well.

Nicholson as Melvin Udall in As Good As It Gets was an incredible acting job.

Laura Linney in Ozark. Good writing and her acting made me totally hate her character. We've all seen actors play the bad guy, but everything about her made me want to throw stuff at the screen at her

Val Kilmer in Tombstone. There is no one else, and frankly I’m doubtful if anyone else could have. Bill Paxton was Bill Paxton (going to die by the end of the movie). Sam Elliott,well, yeah. Kurt Russell could have been “Tango and Cash” in the Wild West.

But, Val Kilmer......he crushed it.

Sonny Crockett <<==>> Don Johnson

While I thought the Miami Vice movie wasn't bad watching it for the first time a couple of years ago, Colin Farrell (I had to look his name up, because I seriously didn't know it) couldn't convince me that he was a proper Sonny. MV the series was only around, for what, 4 years? But Johnson owned that character when it was a thing.

Most of the time, I can separate the character from the actor or the actor from past characters they played. I guess there are a couple of characters that they couldn't switch actors for me. One would be Dirty Harry. That can only be Clint Eastwood. Going the other way, Jeremy Davies will always be Corporal Upham for me after Saving Private Ryan. I think he's a good actor, but whatever I watch him in, I always think of him as Upham and can't get past that.

Speaking of Solo, why was Woody from Cheers in it? Yes, I have problems separating Woody Harrelson from Woodrow Tiberius Boyd, aka Woody from Cheers.