The Best and Worst of Nick Nolte

“The Best and Worst of” series chronicles the career highlights and lowlights of an actor starring in one of the week's new theatrical releases. This week, I take a look at the filmography of “Angel Has Fallen” star Nick Nolte.

Films starring Nick Nolte that I've seen:
The Thin Red Line
Hulk
Hotel Rwanda
Tropic Thunder
Arthur
Zookeeper
Warrior
Gangster Squad
Parker
Noah
Run All Night

Best Performance: Warrior (2011)
As a recovering alcoholic trying to reestablish a relationship with his long estranged son (Hardy) in this tremendous sports drama, Nolte delivers a sincere, vulnerable performance that beautifully captures the struggle of a remorseful yet cold person trying to atone for the sins they committed in the past.    

Worst Performance: Hulk (2003)
Miscalculated overacting from a talented actor is easily my favorite hallmark of bad superhero movies. Nolte's unintentionally hilarious turn as the crazed, mutant poodle-handling father of Bruce Banner may be the most memorable part of this aggressively bad adaptation, but it's pretty terrible nonetheless.

Best Film: Warrior (2011)
With the end of the 2010's within sight, I can say confidently that Warrior is among my favorite movies released during this decade. On the surface, Warrior is a conventional inspirational sports underdog drama about a 30-something father (Joel Edgerton) who squares off against his estranged brother (Tom Hardy) in an MMA tournament. As prominent as the fighting elements are to the story, it's more of a family drama about addiction, abandonment and the long road to forgiveness/redemption at its core. The script skillfully handles its heavy themes without ever descending into sappy melodramatic territory while also providing excellent character development and all of the primary actors (Edgerton, Hardy, Nolte, Jennifer Morrison) give raw, moving performances that allow the unsurprisingly happy ending to become a beautiful moment of well-earned catharsis.

Worst Film: Hulk (2003)
The early stages of the superhero movie boom certainly wasn't the genre's finest hour. In fact, you could argue that the many failures (Daredevil, Fantastic Four, Ghost Rider) that stemmed from this era helped contribute to the formation of the well-oiled machine that is the MCU. Of the notorious, oft-mocked projects released from 2000-07, Hulk stands alone atop the trash heap. I'm all for giving a director complete creative freedom, but what Ang Lee did here could be why Marvel Studios meddles so much with the content and tone of their projects. This movie tries to combine grounded, arthouse-style storytelling with blockbuster spectacle, which results in a confused, absurd and boring mess that fails miserably as both a superhero origin story and a human drama.  

Thank you for reading this week's edition of “The Best and Worst of”. The next victim of my praise and ire will be “Don't Let Go” star David Oyelowo.