Do not go: How Philip Seymour Hoffman taught us to love people
Text: Natalya Serebryakova
Tonight it became known that Philip Seymour Hoffman had died - one of the best actors of his generation, if not the best, and at the same time playing not so many of the foreground roles. They knew about his problems with alcohol and drugs for a long time - and he clearly understood where they would lead him, but he never looked like an asshole. "Capote", "Boogie Nights", "Happiness", "Sinekdokh, New York" and, of course, "Master" by Paul Thomas Anderson - in all these films he convincingly played people with a difficult character or hard fate, not without fear and not without reproach, lost intellectuals, awkward eccentrics, in many ways wrong and so real. “Hoffman lived for the sake of great art, one cannot say that he did not die because of him,” film critic Richard Brody wrote in his column last night. The world was a little better with him, and without him he became worse - first of all because there are fewer people left who can expose human cracks on the screen. In memory of this brilliant actor, we remember the roles of Philip Seymour Hoffman, who showed us unvarnished men and taught us a little life.
Boogie nights
Boogie Nights, 1997
"Fucking idiot ... I'm a fucking idiot," the guy in the red suit cries in a new race car. He was just trying to kiss his friend. In Boogie Nights, Hoffman played an unlucky hidden gay man named Scotty Jay. In this case, in the frame, we see not the orientation of the hero, but his unhappy soul. This is exactly the bitter experience of unrequited love regardless of the sex of the lover.
Happiness
Happiness, 1998
Todd Solondz made Hoffman play the man who calls the star writer home looking for phone sex. In the story, his hero seems to be an unpleasant sweaty pervert, but he himself becomes an eyewitness to an even stranger perversion. As a result, we even feel sorry for this harmless freak.
Almost famous
ALMOST FAMOUS 2000
A music critic (real, by the way, a figure) who shares the most intimate truth of life: what it is like to be a loser. Why being a loser is better than being a macho. And that love pretends to be sex, and sex - love.
Love knocking down
Punch-Drunk Love, 2002
Another memorable way out is Paul Thomas Anderson. This time Hoffman is the boss who must stand up for his subordinate. In a telephone duel with Adam Sandler, we learn how to win conversational battles and defeat an invisible opponent. “Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, fuck it,” shouts Hoffman into the phone. And this moment is a real meme.
Capote
CAPOTE 2005
One of the key main roles of Hoffman is the biopic of Truman Capote's “new journalism” star: a talented, ambitious, unprincipled, mannered and, in general, not too pleasant - but clearly ambiguous, reflective and deeply injured person. In addition to the striking resemblance of Hoffman and his hero, there is another creepy nuance - Capote also prematurely ruined drugs.
Devil Games
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, 2007
In Sydney Lumeta Hoffman played one of the brothers who planned the perfect robbery. Robbery shop own parents. The film begins with a scene of outright sex by Philip Seymour. And this is the beginning of immersion in the world of cynicism and cruelty.
Charlie Wilson's War
Charlie Wilson's War, 2007
The scene in which Hoffman swears with John Slattery. Here he plays a spy, and Slattery is his boss. After a verbal skirmish, an indicative smashing of office windows will follow. Aggression of a man who is self-righteous. On one bare charisma Hoffman leaves almost the entire film, a boring military-political drama.
New York, New York
Synecdoche, New York, 2008
Few people can pull the role of Charlie Kaufman the screenwriter, not that even the director. Hoffman managed to make this film a masterpiece, thanks to a complete transformation into the role of theater director Kayden Kotar. Philip Seymour readily resides the experience of a brilliant, half-lost director. He embraces everything - the pain of loneliness, an abandoned man, an unfulfilled father and an artist.
Master
The Master, 2012
The most prominent role, and again with Paul Thomas Anderson. Hoffman plays the head of the sect - the authoritarian manipulator of Lancaster Dodd, who is also not alien to doubt. This is a man before whom everyone, both women and men, tremble and bow. The animal psychologism of the role played along with Joaquin Phoenix is certainly the peak of Hoffman’s career.
God's pocket
God's Pocket, 2014
The image that we all have only to see. The premiere of this film took place a couple of weeks ago on Sundance. In the debut production of John Slattery, Hoffman plays a poor thief who survives the death of his stepson and must come to terms with reality. In one of his latest interviews, Hoffman says that this role resonated well with his current outlook, because it is about a midlife crisis.