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Iolanthe's Quotable Viggo
31 March 2018 15:58:20 Found By: Iolanthe
I watched Appaloosa again recently and kept thinking that while I regret that there was never an Eastern Promises 2, I regret even more that Cole and Hitch never rode out together again for the last two of the Appaloosa books that I enjoyed reading so much. Viggo makes one heck of a cowboy. As one critic said recently, nobody moseys like Viggo Mortensen. Heck, he's even related to Buffalo Bill...
"I found out a while back that I'm related to Buffalo Bill - distantly, on my mother's mother's side of the family," he says. "It's true: I went to the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody, Wyoming, and saw the records that prove the connection." Mortensen finds J.K. Simmons' performance as Buffalo Bill "terrific" - and it gave him an interesting opportunity to play in scenes with a distant relative.
Viggo Mortensen: The Straight-Shooting Star of the New Western
By Joe Leydon
Cowboys & Indians
April 2004
Indeed Mortensen, one of the few Danes who can get away with a cowboy hat (in Leatherface: Texas Chainsaw Massacre III and Hidalgo), looks so much like a man from the Golden West, it's a wonder he isn't attached to remakes of everything from High Noon to Carry On Cowboy.
A History of Violence is David Cronenberg's Western
Kim Newman
Empire Magazine
March 2006
'The cowboy 'ethic' has as much in common ideally with the Medieval Knight or Lakota warrior or Samurai warrior in that you can be an individual, be independent minded and allow other people to have their individual experience too! It can be that way.'
Viggo Mortensen
An Interview with Viggo
by Lise Balk King and Frank J King
Native Voice
January 2004
When there's action to be had, Mortensen looks like a real pro. He's got the cowboy drawl down pat; shoots a Colt .45 with confidence; delivers sharp one-liners like a kinder, gentler Clint Eastwood; and has a great seat on a horse. Even when the movie gets a little slow--and it does, a 3000-mile desert race will do that to a movie--Mortensen's onscreen appeal saves the day.
Hidalgo
Leigh Johnson
Hollywood.com
It's not as if we haven't seen movies like "Hidalgo" before -- the cowboy, the horse, the hat -- and yet there's something fresh about it all the same. Part of it comes from Viggo Mortensen, an actor who has the measured pace and steady gaze of a Cooper or a Stewart.
Wild West to wild Mideast
Mortensen saddles up as former cowboy racing across desert
Mick LaSalle
Chronicle, 5 March 2004
While [Hidalgo] can waver from itself, Mortensen is steadfast like a throw back to the old school smoldering actors that paraded about the prairies, years ago; sexy and very iconic American cowboy.
Hidalgo review
Emily Blunt
The Blunt Review
2004
Not only did Rex Peterson serve as trainer, but also adviser to Mortensen on cowboy attitudes - to the point that a joke on the set called Viggo "Rex, Jr".
Hidalgo - Production Notes
Touchstone Pictures
2004
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
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
"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. 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 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
Mortensen comes off best. Not only does he seem like a genuine artifact of the late 19th Century, his plain-spoken charisma is well-suited to the western genre. ….But with or without that fantastic mustache, Mortensen should certainly do another western, soon. Preferably he should do one with a real sense of danger to go along with all the neat, tidy, highfalutin' honor and decency.
Michael Phillips
Chicago Tribune
2 October 2008
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© Viggo-Works/Iolanthe. Images © New Line Cinema/Warner Brothers.