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Iolanthe's Quotable Viggo
12 August 2017 14:17:41 Found By: Iolanthe
Ah, Appaloosa. Viggo with his goatee and dapper clothes, the big honking gun, Ed Harris and his big black hat, and so much strong silent stuff the West has never been so… well… west. Heck, Viggo even rode off into the sunset. A film hugely short-changed at the box-office despite two of the best actors in the business getting together and riding the hell out of the Western genre. How is that even possible given these fantastic reviews?
While many might not appreciate this slow and slightly revisionist western, I'm going to put it up there with "Open Range" and "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly" as one of best. Go to see Ed Harris kick tail, but stay for one of Viggo Mortensen's best performances.
Coop Cooper
The Small Town Critic
1 October 2008
Everett says very little and spends a lot of time just watching the other characters, so Mortensen's performance resides almost entirely in his eyes, which register tiny, unmistakable nuances of surprise, suspicion and amusement.
These are what make the movie worth watching
A O Scott
International Herald Tribune
18 September 2008
Viggo steals the picture. His always fresh and relaxed expressions, with dark subtexts dancing just below the surface, never cease to astound me.
Rex Reed
The New York Observer
17 September 2008
...Holding one's body still in front of a movie camera while also giving the sense of a mind in motion is a specialized art, one with few masters. Paul Newman comes to mind, notably in his later career, as does Robert Duvall, a perennial movie cowboy who will surely wish that Appaloosa had come his way. And now, it would seem, there is Mortensen, who steals this film by doing nothing much more than lean against doorways and bar counters. Like Harris, Mortensen is a great listener, and good listeners—in life and in movies—barely move. That quality is just right for the role of Hitch, whose life hangs on Cole's next word and slightest gesture. It's an old truth, and not just about westerns: When the talking stops, the dying begins.
Chuck Wilson
Village Voice
17 Septmeber 2008
But while the story is compelling, and the scenes lush, none of that compares to the performance given by Mortensen. He is, simply, Hitch. There is not one moment that seems like acting, or where he seems like anything other than his character. Mortensen's performance is flawless – so real that the film seems more like a look into the past, rather than a fictional slice of entertainment. You can see his power, his strength, and his intelligence as easy as you can see the all-prevalent dusty wind.
Monika Bartyzel
collider.com
8 September 2008
Early Films
Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen, two of my favorite actors today, had the on-screen chemistry that every filmmaker dreams of. Rugged, badass and tough lawman who just flat out kicked ass through the whole film.
Troy
Moviewiseguys.com
6 September 2008
…if you want to know what the film's "about," above and beyond the story (which is a deliberate but well-constructed yarn in its own right), it's "about" the relationships that certain men build, where they form a partnership that supercedes everything else, a code that exists that is more binding than law. It's about the way that code changes everything else they do. And when you're making a movie about that, and it stars Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen, and Harris is directing which means that there's all the room in the world for these two to just act the shit out of every unspoken silence, every action beat unfolding as a duet between these two serious badasses. This film is all about the soul behind the gunslinger, and it's verrrrry subtle stuff.
Moriarty
Ain't it Cool news
5 October 2008
Are there two more stronger, silenter types in modern movies than Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen? Each of these actors are a throw back to the days when cowboy stars were manly men who mean what they say and only say what they mean and nothing else.
Richard Crouse
CTV.ca
6 September 2008
Their bond is easily one of the best portrayed in the entire Western canon. Viggo Mortensen's Hitch outdoes Val Kilmer's role as Doc Holliday, something I wouldn't have thought possible. And the interactions between these two extremely efficient killers and decent men is movie-making magic.
Crimecritics.com
9 January 2009
….a perfect, dryly comic Viggo Mortensen.
Tom Hall
The Back Row Manifesto
6 September 2008
With his chiseled, windburned, mustachioed face, Mortensen is a dead ringer for men you'd see in an actual frontier photo. Because Hitch is the archetypal man of few words, Mortensen delivers a wonderfully nuanced, subtle performance; one sad glance speaks volumes more about Hitch's devotion to Cole than any soliloquy could.
Jim Vejvoda
IGN
18 September 2008
"Mortensen is wonderful. He's one of the best actors at not doing anything and making you watch him all the more."
Ty Burr
Boston Globe: Take 2
October 2008
Viggo Mortensen only gets better and better each time you see him, and as Everett Hitch there isn't a complaint to be had.
Brad Brevet
Rope of Silicon
2 October 2008
Harris and (especially) Mortensen are the magic that makes this movie work so well, film fans can only hope, based on their chemistry here and in "A History of Violence," they are given many more opportunities to work together. They're right up there with DeNiro and Pesci as one of the screen's best team.
Edward Havens
Filmjerk
23 September 2008
You will find all previous Quotables here.
© Viggo-Works/Iolanthe. Images © New Line Cinema/Warner Brothers.
Iolanthe's Quotable Viggo
4 June 2016 22:39:14 Found By: Iolanthe
This week I thought I'd take us out West to a film that never got the audience attention it deserved when it came out – Appaloosa. I really love this film. We not only get Viggo sporting the best goatee ever but also another of my favourite actors, Ed Harris. As critic Richard Crouse said 'Are there two more stronger, silenter types in modern movies?'. Nope. All that and horses too...
Are there two more stronger, silenter types in modern movies than Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen? Each of these actors are a throw back to the days when cowboy stars were manly men who mean what they say and only say what they mean and nothing else.
Richard Crouse
CTV.ca
6 September 2008
"Not only do I have a great respect for [Viggo] as an actor but as a human being. He's a really decent guy. He's great on the set, treats everybody really respectfully. I just thought he'd be perfect. These were two guys who had to communicate a lot about being who they were and the knowledge of each other without really talking about it ... If Viggo couldn't have done it, I don't know if I would've made the movie"
Ed Harris
Viggo is one straight shooter
By Kevin Williamson
Toronto Sun
6th September 2008
"One of the many things I love about Viggo is that he's a man of his word. Even though he was busy up until two days before we started filming, he came prepared, ready to work. He really knew what he wanted to do and who this guy was that he wanted to play. And he did it. I'm really proud of him."
Ed Harris
Appaloosa
By Joe Leydon
Cowboys and Indians magazine
October 2008
"I like characters who find themselves at the brink of change. Everett is in the centre of the transition from anarchy to civil law in America. My characters always stand for crossing a ford. Years ago, Everett studied at West Point but I love imagining him as the black sheep of the family because he has gone West, looking for adventure and he has found it. In the book he says: I'd been in West Point, like my father, but I found it boring. While the hairstyle, gun, saddlebag, riding positions are based on the photos of that period; it was me who added the dandy touches to him; the gilet, the Victorian manners, formalistic as well as brutal, he can't erase them."
Viggo Mortensen
Appaloosa - 5 Questions For Viggo Mortensen
By Antonella Catena - translated by Ewa
Max
16 January 2009
"I think Cole trusts Hitch more than anyone else in the world, specifically because Hitch is very honest with him, even when it's difficult to bring certain things to Cole's attention," says the actor. "That is my definition of a good friend: somebody who is brave enough to tell you the truth even when it's not what you want to hear."
Viggo Mortensen
Emmanuel Levy
Emmanuellevy.com
August 2008
"I can't lie to you, I had a lot of fun riding around on horseback…"
Viggo Mortensen
CBS News Interview
8 September 2008
"Wow, that was nice," said Renée Zellweger, who plays Cole's love interest, Allison French. "Look at that man ride!"
Watching Viggo ride off at the end of the film.
Ed Harris ramrods unconventional western 'Appaloosa'
By John Horn
Los Angeles Times
7 September 2008
Viggo Mortensen follows a classic cowboy code in the Western "Appaloosa": Speak softly and carry a big honkin' gun.
Mortensen Packs a Big Gun
By David Germain
Associated Press
17 September 2008
"When I first had it, I said, `Do you really need it to be an eight-gauge, Ed? It's not that manageable, it's not going to be accurate at much distance. I said, `I'm not going to shoot that thing off a horse, because I'd get blown off the horse, realistically.'"
Mortensen Packs a Big Gun
By David Germain
Associated Press
17 September 2008
Each time the tracks in the street were swept away rapidly by the crew including Dennis 'the horseman'. All of a sudden Viggo Mortensen apppeared, grabbed a big broom and started sweeping vigorously alongside the crew Now that was different. Viggo Mortensen is definitely not afraid of hard work and dirt.........
Blogengeezer
daflikkers.blogspot.com
24 October 2007
"There's rarely a day he doesn't show up bearing gifts of some sort from his different weekend jaunts," says his Appaloosa costar Renée Zellweger, "where he'll go find some really obscure village behind Taos somewhere and visit an artists' colony and bring back some wares to share. And there was never a day that he wasn't plying us with dark chocolate. It was ridiculous. Bags full. Bags full! Bacon–covered truffles. Where was he getting it? He was the chocolate crack dealer."
Renée Zellweger
The Great Dane
Men's Vogue
By Phoebe Eaton
March 2008
" ….I like [Appaloosa] because it's told in a leisurely pace. I enjoyed being in it because Ed didn't try to reinvent the genre or appeal to younger audiences. He said, 'This is how these stories are told, and I'm going to respect the genre.'"
Viggo Mortensen
Play It As It Lays
By Philip Berk
Filmink
April 2009
"There are film buffs and story buffs who like the apparent simplicity [of a Western]. Although in a movie like this you can see that, yes, there is silence and there's an easy pace at times punctuated by dramatic tension, but in that silence, if it is well acted, and it is a good Western, which I think this is, then that silence is full of complicated things and a lot of subtext."
Viggo Mortensen Talks 'Appaloosa'
Premier Magazine
By Karl Rozemeyer
19 September 2008
...Holding one's body still in front of a movie camera while also giving the sense of a mind in motion is a specialized art, one with few masters. Paul Newman comes to mind, notably in his later career, as does Robert Duvall, a perennial movie cowboy who will surely wish that Appaloosa had come his way. And now, it would seem, there is Mortensen, who steals this film by doing nothing much more than lean against doorways and bar counters.
Chuck Wilson
Village Voice
17 September 2008
Mortensen said he was hooked by the dynamics between the two men. They love each other, said Harris, even if they might never say those exact words. It's a deep, complex friendship, though don't expect it to unravel like the one between the cowboys in Brokeback Mountain.
Said Mortensen: "They cut those scenes."
Appaloosa: TIFF press conference diaries
by Mark Medley
National Post
September 05, 2008
'This may surprise you but the film I had most pleasure shooting remains Appaloos'.
Viggo Mortensen: "I love the darkness and immorality of The Two Faces of January"
By Thomas Agnelli – translated by Celine
Premiere (France
June 2014
You will find all previous Quotables here.
© Viggo-Works/Iolanthe. Images © New Line Cinema/Warner Brothers.
The 25 Greatest Westerns in the Last 25 Years
13 November 2015 08:57:20Source: EW
Categories: Appaloosa
Quote:
15. Appaloosa
Directed by Ed Harris
Sometimes, just being a great old fashioned Western is enough. Appaloosa isn't revisionist in the slightest; it's a throwback to what has worked for 100 years, with a specific emphasis on the good, the bad and the ugly. Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen star as Cole and Hitch, two for-hire lawmen who may as well be named Wyatt and Doc. Jeremy Irons is the twisted rancher who runs the unruly New Mexico town, and Renee Zellweger is the girl who gets in the middle. Mortensen couldn't be cooler, and the shoot 'em up ends as it has to - - with a bad guy dead in the street and the hero riding off toward the horizon. - - Jeff Labrecque
© EW. Images © New Line Cinema.
Iolanthe's Quotable Viggo
1 February 2015 09:01:17Categories: Alatriste
Appaloosa
Loin des Hommes
Media
Movies
On The Road
Quotable Viggo
The Lord of the Rings
The Road
The Two Faces of January
Viggo has appeared in rather a lot of literary adaptions (not surprising for a man who reads and reads and reads...) – A Portrait of a Lady, The Lord of the Rings, Alatriste, Appaloosa, The Road, On the Road, Two Faces of January and Loin Des Hommes - and it's always clear how important the text is to him and that the script honours the book and the author's vision. Sometimes the book has been familiar to him for a long time, sometimes the script has introduced him to the book. Either way it's important that it's a good adaption and you can bet that in every case a copy of the book is always with him, sprouting post-it notes from nearly every page.
Loin des Hommes
Q. Was the Camus story a strong influence on how you conceived of your character?
A. Both David and I referenced the story as much as possible. I have always admired Camus and thought he didn't get a fair deal from the left in France. History has proven him right; he spoke truth to power and paid a heavy price for it. He thought people should find a way to live together, whatever their differences of skin color or language. I think the character in the story in many ways represents who Camus might have become if he had stayed in Algeria.
Q&A: Viggo Mortensen and David Oelhoffen on 'Loin Des Hommes'
By Roslyn Silcas
New York Times
26 August 2014
Two Faces of January
Mortensen appears to be a fine connoisseur of the novelist and her work. He admitted he liked her short stories "even the ones that are a page and a quarter and you go 'oh come on' like the collection 'Little Tales of Misogyny'".
The American Friend, Strangers on a Train and The Talented Mr. Ripley also made the cut but he prefers the approach in The Two Faces of January, a "more graceful" one.
Berlin: Viggo Mortensen knows his Patricia Highsmith
By Tara Karajica
Screen Daily.
12 February 2014
On the Road
"...in the '70s, when I was 17-18 years old and living in America, on the border with Canada. On the Road was an initiation book for many adolescents of my generation, even for me. Much later, I discovered other writers such as Allen Ginsberg, Céline, Rimbaud, Camus ... But I find that Burroughs was the most original, an outsider, a pioneer of the language."
Viggo talking about 'On the Road'
Viggo Mortensen: "Do I look sexy?"
By Simona Coppa - translated by Ollie
Grazia
9 October 2012
I read this novel for the first time as a teenager, and since then three times as a whole and often in parts. I've read everything that was published by Kerouac, Burroughs and Ginsberg. In preparation of the movie, I listened to all available voice recordings of Burroughs... among them were also talks between him and Cronenberg concerning the filming of Naked Lunch.
Viggo talking about 'On the Road'
Viggo Mortensen
"Nostalgia strikes me as being dangerous"
By Dieter Oßwald - translated by Athelin
Frankfurter Neue Presse
1 October 2012
For many people, this novel was deemed unfit for filming. Did you ever have similar qualms?
Viggo: I never thought this novel unfit for filming, yet it was obviously no easy task. But after reading the script, my concerns were easily resolved. The movie takes over the novel's best elements, stays true to the characters and besides focuses on the women, which for me is a true improvement compared to the original.
Viggo talking about 'On the Road'
"Nostalgia strikes me as being dangerous"
By Dieter Oßwald - translated by Athelin
Frankfurter Neue Presse
1 October 2012
The Road
Viggo did you come to the film from reading the book or the actual script?
I'm a big fan of Cormac McCarthy, I had read all of his books except The Road. The Road came out with great fanfare and went on to become his most far reaching universally appealing work because it's more straight ahead, it's easily understood, the dilemmas are understood by any culture. I hadn't gotten around to reading it just out of shear stubbornness because everyone kept telling me how great it was. I was meaning to read it. I had seen it wherever I went, in airports and so forth and I just hadn't read it. But then I read the script which I thought was a great script, a great story. I realised it was quite an honour to be offered this role. After reading the script I ran to the store to buy The Road and read it all
Viggo Mortensen at the BFI London Film Festival
Flicks and Bits
30 October 2009
What did you learn from your discussion with the book's author, Cormac McCarthy?
I talked to him one long time before shooting on the phone. We basically talked about his kid and my kid and being dads. I had tons of notes and questions to ask him. I was ready to pick his brain. At the end of the conversation, he asked me, "Do you have any specific questions about the book?" I had 50,000 post-it notes in the book and not one but two pens in case it ran out of ink. I mean I was ready. But I said "Nah, I don't really" because I realized the conversation we had was all I need to get going. His book and his words are so heartfelt and so free of any gimmickry. He just transcends cultures and languages.
Viggo on The Road
By Cindy Pearlman
Chicago Sun Times
22 November 2009
"…the book was my constant companion. It's pretty well-worn. The interior life of the characters are so beautifully written, so poetic that it was what I kept going back to. But this movie is about man's humanity, this flower that blooms in a desert between two people."
After "The Road" Viggo Mortensen Looks on the Bright Side: "You Could Always Be Dead"
By Jeffrey Podolsky
Wall Street Journal
17 November 2009
After the movie, Viggo came back up on the stage and answered a few questions. When put on the spot to add on a final word he thought for a second then dug into his bag and brought out his personal copy of THE ROAD. There were what looked like a hundred stick-it notes marking different pages and the spine was cracked and worn. It's obviously seen a lot of use.
To close the event he read a bit from McCarthy's description of the sea-area landscape. That was pretty cool…
Quint at the Telluride Viggo Mortensen tribute
Ain't it Cool News
8 September 2008
Appaloosa
Ed Harris read Appaloosa while you guys were still working on A History of Violence. Then you read the book after that, right?
Mortensen: When A History Of Violence was presented here at the Toronto Film Festival, he was here to do interviews, just like I was for that movie. He handed me this book and in his kind of quiet way said, "Here's this book. You might like it. It could make a good movie." He wasn't very forward about it but that was sort of a big step, I thought. It must mean something, being that he's such a good actor. And he did a great job directing Appaloosa. I thought that it was intriguing. I knew that was what he was driving at - that he wanted to direct this movie.
So you kind of committed to him based on the book?
Mortensen: The book, yeah. He hadn't written [the screenplay] yet.
Interview With Appaloosa Star Viggo Mortensen
Reelz Channel
3 October 2008
Alatriste
While the texts that this film is adapted from are widely known in the Hispanic world, in the United States they haven't had such a similar recognition. Assuming that fact, how did the opportunity to take part in this production fall into your hands?
I didn't know Arturo Pérez-Reverte's novels. Long ago, I had worked in Spain with Ray Loriga, in My Brother's Gun. One day, Ray told me he was going to be in Berlin, where I was promoting Peter Jackson's The Return of the King. Loriga went with a friend, Tano (Agustín Díaz Yanes), who brought a script that he gave me to read. I liked the plot as a tale, as a story. And it captivated me. So I decided to do it, against everyone and against everything.
The Filming of Alatriste - Viggo Mortensen Interview
By Jesús Martin - translated by Paddy
Acción
July 2006
'When I read the books which the movie is based on, I liked them so much: they told me an interesting and complicated story. The character too is more complicated than my previous ones. For this reason the movie can even catch the viewers unprepared: they expect a lot of action in imperial Spain, and they find themselves deeply lost in events full of shadows.'
Viggo, a movie star forced to fight - "Heroism? It's only propaganda..."
By Claudia Morgoglione - translated by Cindalea
Repubblica
18 June 2007
Lord of the Rings
Basically, I got a call: "Do you want to go to New Zealand for fourteen months to film The Lord of the Rings?" Just, you know, this famous epic trilogy! And my first reaction was "No!" Obviously I'd heard of Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings, but I hadn't read the book, and I certainly hadn't read the script; I usually like to have a lot more time to prepare for a major role; and I really didn't want to be away from my family for that long. I have to say, it didn't sound like a very wise move to me at all!
My son said I was crazy and that I had to do it, even if I was going to be gone a long time. So there I am on the plane for New Zealand, reading that enormous, telephone directory-sized book and then the scripts, and a couple of days later I'm filming. I continued to feel unprepared, but at least I didn't have much time to get nervous, which was probably good!
Viggo Mortensen
Official Movie Guide
Were you a J.R.R. Tolkien fan before the film "The Fellowship of the Ring?"
VIGGO: No. I'd heard of Tolkien and Hobbits and "Lord of the Rings." But I didn't know much about it. l assumed it was about elves and dwarves, maybe fairy tales. When I got the job, I started reading the book immediately so I knew what we were dealing with on film. ... I recognized themes from lots of other cultures, Samurai, Native American myths, not just European fairy tale -- the idea of a heroic journey, characters being tested.
Viggo on locusts, life and kissing Liv Tyler
By Molly Woulfe
Northwest Indiana Times thetimesonline.com
3 August 2004
"While Peter obviously cares a great deal for Tolkien's writing-otherwise he wouldn't have given so much of his life to it-what seems to have drawn him most as a filmmaker was the pure adventure aspect of the tale. The heroic sacrifice of individuals for the common good. All the breathtaking sequences-he really poured himself into those. The more I explored Tolkien, the more I felt I had two bosses: Tolkien and Peter Jackson. I tried my best to be loyal to both of them."
Viggo Mortensen
We Were All On an Epic Journey
by Jeff Giles
Newsweek magazine, 2001
You will find all previous Quotables here.
© Viggo-Works/Iolanthe. Images © MK2 Productions.
Last edited: 31 May 2023 15:42:13