Stephen Rea Movies
Exhibiting perpetual intensity and the dark, hangdog looks of someone who has been run over by life one too many times, Stephen Rea is one of Ireland's most popular and well-respected actors. Although he has acted in films in diverse genres, Rea is most closely associated with his collaborations with director Neil Jordan, particularly The Crying Game, for which he earned Oscar and BAFTA nominations.Born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, in 1943, Rea was brought up in a working-class Protestant family. After training at the Abbey Theatre School, he began acting on the stage, screen, and television, making his film debut in the 1970 thriller Cry of the Banshee. He first collaborated with Jordan in 1982 on Angel, a crime drama in which he played a saxophonist who witnesses a number of brutal murders. The two again collaborated in 1984 on The Company of Wolves, a modern retelling of the Little Red Riding Hood fairy tale. That same year, Rea worked with Mike Leigh on Four Days in July; he would later work with him on Leigh's celebrated Life is Sweet (1991). In addition to his work on the screen, Rea formed the Field Day Theatre Company with playwrights Brian Friel and Seamus Heaney, bringing theatre to rural communities across Ireland.
In 1992, Rea was introduced to international audiences with his role as an IRA "volunteer" in The Crying Game. Thanks to the film's great success and the praise surrounding his performance, Rea went on to appear in a number of high profile films, including Jordan's adaptation of Interview with the Vampire and Robert Altman's Ready to Wear, in which he gave a delightful portrayal of an egotistical fashion photographer. In addition to further collaborations with Jordan (1996's Michael Collins, 1997's The Butcher Boy), Rea continued to do solid work in films ranging from dramas (This is My Father, 1998) to comedy spoofs (Still Crazy, also 1998). In 1999 alone, Rea could be seen in no less than four divergent films. Following a turn as a psychiatrist in the big-budget thriller In Dreams, he starred as a bohemian photographer with a predilection for young, deeply insecure women in Audrey Wells' celebrated Guinevere. Later that year, he returned to Ireland for I Could Read the Sky and then starred alongside Julianne Moore and Ralph Fiennes in the adaptation of Graham Greene's The End of the Affair. Over the next several years, Rea would prove to be a consistent presence on screen, appearing in movies like The Good Shepherd, Control, V for Vendetta, and Underworld: Awakening. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, Rovi
Kate Beckinsale returns to the Underworld film series for the fourth installment, which finds fierce vampire Selene (Beckinsale) escaping captivity and taking up arms against humans after mankind discovers the existence of vampires and lycans, and launches a massive war aimed at wiping out the creatures of the night. Stephen Rea and Michael Ealy co-star. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Kate Beckinsale, Stephen Rea, (more)
Longtime screenwriter Mateo Gil (Open Your Eyes, The Sea Inside) returns to the director's chair for his second feature, a continuation of the Butch Cassidy saga that finds the famed outlaw embarking on one last adventure in the quest to meet his son for the very first time. Twenty years after he presumably perished in a violent gun fight, Butch (Sam Shepard) learns that he has a son in the U.S. Returning home to meet his boy won't be easy, though, because a quick-draw cowboy (Eduardo Noriega) is about to take Butch on the ride of his life. Meanwhile, an obsessive ex-railroad employee (Stephen Rea) is closing in on Butch, and preparing to pull the trigger. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Sam Shepard, Eduardo Noriega, (more)
- 2009
Vincent Regan stars in this French-language paranoia thriller as Peter Burton, a diabolically brilliant young man. In lieu of pursuing a formal education and a 9-to-5 office job, Peter ankled the standard route to success and now makes his living as a serial thief, lifting the valuables of patrons at an airport where he's nominally employed as a baggage handler. His life takes an astonishing turn when one of his colleagues, Gerard, pries open the suitcase of a Syrian diplomat and is promptly blown up by a terrorist bomb; the DST (Directorate of Territorial Surveillance) then approaches Peter, acknowledges that it knows all about his criminal activities, and offers him an ultimatum: it will arrange immunity for all of the pickpocketing if the thief helps the agency track down the parties responsible for the bomb plant. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi
- Starring:
- Vincent Regan, Stephen Rea, (more)
- 2009
Stephen Rea stars as 20th Century writer Patrick MacGill in this hybrid documentary\biopic that draws on the itinerant Irish laborer's novels, letters, and stories to tell his remarkable tale. A man who witnessed the Labor Movement, fought in World War I, and endured the Great Depression, MacGill's earned the nickname "The Navvy Poet" thanks to his early work as a navigator, and penned such celebrated novels as Children of the Deadend and The Rat Pit. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Stephen Rea
London enforcer "Boots" Mason (Gary Stretch) discovers that he's got a bounty on his head after getting caught in the crosshairs of rogue cop Dunn (Vinnie Jones), and seek vengeance against his estranged family as his brother (Adrian Paul) rises to power in the world of politics. Stephen Rea, Jean Marsh, and Christopher Lee co-star. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Gary Stretch, Stephen Rea, (more)
A man makes a startling discovery that may or may not be magical in this drama from writer and director Neil Jordan. Syracuse (Colin Farrell) is a fisherman who lives in a small town on the Southern coast of Ireland. Syracuse is an alcoholic, and though he's been sober for two years, most of his neighbors still remember him as a embarrassing drunk, while his ex-wife now lives with another man. Syracuse tries to scratch out a living from the ocean and help support his young daughter, Annie (Alison Barry), who suffers from a serious kidney ailment, but good luck is rarely with him until one day, when he pulls up his nets and finds what appears to be a woman caught in them. To Syracuse's surprise, the woman is alive, and he brings her to shore. The woman is a mysterious and secretive type who doesn't want to tell Syracuse anything about herself or be seen by anyone; Annie proposes that she's a selkie, a mythic creature of the sea that can take human form when it falls in love with the right person. Syracuse almost believes that Annie is right, especially after good luck and good fishing begins coming his way after discovering her, but unfortunately the woman Syracuse has named Ondine (Alicja Bachleda) has certain concerns more pressing than the good fortune of her benefactor. Ondine was an official selection at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Colin Farrell, Alicja Bachleda, (more)
- 2009
- NR
A young female drifter and an older widower living alone in Irish Connemara strike up a deal that she will work for him in exchange for food, but they will have no personal contact during their interactions. Sage and ironic, Martin (Stephen Rea) is a self-sufficient outdoorsman who has chosen a solitary life. Refusing to give her name, the Dutch wanderer (Lotte Verbeek) doesn't care to share her stories, and isn't interested in hearing about the lives of others. In time, Martin offers the girl a room to sleep in. She accepts, and their relationship gradually begins to evolve. It's only a matter of time before one of them breaks the deal, but who will it be, and why will they do it? ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Lotte Verbeek, Stephen Rea, (more)
Her faith shaken by a family tragedy from which she was never quite able to fully recover, a professor of theology from Louisiana State University moonlighting as a debunker of unexplained religious phenomena finds herself faced with an apocalyptic series of events that seem to reflect the ten plagues of Exodus in director Stephen Hopkins' Southern gothic chiller. The terrified citizens of Haven, LA, have been beset by swarms of locusts and watched as rivers turned to blood. As if that wasn't enough to put the fear of God into any Bible-reading Christian, ominous rumors of a local swamp cult have left many of the small-town citizens turning to prayer for fear that the end is finally nigh. Enter Katherine Winter (Hilary Swank), a skeptical myth-buster and renowned theology scholar with a special knack for spotting religious trickery. Though at first exceedingly confident that she will uncover a human component behind the otherworldly occurrences, Katherine quickly learns that just because one doesn't believe in the supernatural doesn't necessarily mean that it doesn't exist. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Hilary Swank, David Morrissey, (more)
Upon awakening from a deep coma, a troubled police detective sets out to rescue his wife and seek vengeance against the men who nearly took his life. Anthony Stowe (Jean-Claude Van Damme) is a heroin-addicted detective attempting to take down the city's most powerful drug lord. His life is in shambles, his wife is pregnant with another man's child, and when the bust goes awry, two of his fellow officers end up dead as Lowe lies in a hospital bed hovering between life and death. Miraculously, Lowe eventually wakes up from his trauma-induced repose. While he once thought his life couldn't get any worse, however, the ailing detective is shattered to learn that the very same men he had nearly died attempting to apprehend have kidnapped his wife. Now left with nothing to lose and every reason to live, the same man who had once written his own life off determines to rescue his wife and ensure that justice is served no matter what the cost. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Jean-Claude Van Damme, Stephen Rea, (more)
Family Portraits: A Trilogy of America director Douglas Buck follows that gruesome collection of three short films with this feature-length reimaging of cinema auteur Brian De Palma's 1973 horror film concerning a pair of mysterious siblings and the curious reporter who stumbles upon their deadly secret. Grace (Chloë Sevigny) is an ambitious young journalist conducting an investigation of a controversial psychiatrist (Stephen Rea) who is currently maintaining a questionable relationship with disturbed patient Angelique (Lou Doillon). As the investigation continues, Grace soon stumbles into an ongoing conspiracy populated by human experimentation, strange deaths, and a controversial operation. As the probing reporter delves ever deeper into the profoundly unsettling details and witnesses a brutal murder thanks to the unintended assistance of Angelique's latest love interest, Dr. Dylan Wallace, her fragile mental state is quickly shattered by the spiraling violence and unspeakable revelations to which she is now inextricably bound. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Lou Doillon, Stephen Rea, (more)
A family discovers that their new apartment houses a sinister secret in director Melanie Orr's low-budget frightener. Upon discovering a newly renovated apartment in a beautiful Connecticut home, young parents Beth and Matt Winters were overjoyed. It seemed like the perfect place to start a family; their new downstairs neighbor Tyler Grant (Stephen Rea) has a young niece that's just about the same age as their six year old son Calvin, and the surroundings were nothing less than picture perfect. But things soon begin to look grim when Calvin grows restless and claims that monsters dwell in this home. At first, Beth writes off her son's stories as a mere figment of his overactive imagination. Later, when the evidence becomes too powerful to deny, the frightened parents must struggle to keep their family together while fighting against forces beyond human comprehension. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Stephen Rea, Hannah Lochner, (more)
Re-Animator director Stuart Gordon takes the helm for this disturbing tale of a compassionate retirement-home caregiver whose life is turned upside down after a gruesome hit-and-run accident leaves a severely injured homeless man lodged helplessly in her shattered windshield. Despite her repeated promises to take her ailing victim to the hospital, the realization that the accident could destroy both her career and her future finds her uncharacteristically deciding to let the man die a slow death in her garage while conspiring with her boyfriend to dispose of the body. A fictionalized account of actual events, Stuck was co-scripted by director Gordon and frequent Tales from the Darkside contributor John Strysik. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Mena Suvari, Stephen Rea, (more)
A 12-year-old Jewish boy teetering on the cusp of manhood finds his eagerly anticipated Bar Mitzvah threatened by a lethal combination of World Cup fever, the loss of the family business, and the shenanigans of a mischievous elder sibling in a coming-of-age comedy directed by Paul Weiland and starring Helena Bonham Carter, Stephen Rea, and Gregg Sulkin. The year is 1966, and Bernie Rubens (Sulkin) is about to become a man. As the date of his Bar Mitzvah draws nearer, however, it seems like the stars have aligned to prevent it from being the blow-out bash he has always dreamt of. Not only is his wayward older brother drawing away all the attention in the family, but his father's business is slowly going down the drain as well. To make matters worse, England has finally fought their way to the World Cup Final, and the big game is scheduled for the very same day as Bernie's Bar Mitzvah. Will Bernie's friends and family be able to resist World Cup fever and make it to the celebration he has gleefully anticipated his entire childhood, or will the mania that has overtaken all of England pull a red card on the day that was supposed to be a clean-shot goal? ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Gregg Sulkin, Helena Bonham Carter, (more)
Based on the graphic novel by Alan Moore, V for Vendetta takes place in an alternate vision of Britain in which a corrupt and abusive totalitarian government has risen to complete power. During a threatening run in with the secret police, an unassuming young woman named Evey (Natalie Portman) is rescued by a vigilante named V (Hugo Weaving) -- a caped figure both articulate and skilled in combat. V embodies the principles of rebellion from an authoritarian state, donning a mask of vilified would-be terrorist of British history Guy Fawkes and leading a revolution sparked by assassination and destruction. Evey becomes his unlikely ally, newly aware of the cruelty of her own society and her role in it. ~ Cammila Collar, Rovi
- Starring:
- Natalie Portman, Hugo Weaving, (more)
A woman who has come to a strange land is torn between the life she knows and the new life around her in this epic-scale historical drama. In 1854, New Zealand's indigenous Maori tribes were engaged in an ongoing battle to drive away European settlers eager to establish colonies in the nation's wilderness, which the Maori saw as a threat to their way of life. However, some outsiders had made a home in New Zealand with the cooperation of the Maori, and an Irish settlement had been established, with Francis (Stephen Rea), the colony's doctor, bringing his daughter Sarah (Samantha Morton) with him to this new land. Sarah becomes acquainted with the son of one of the Maori leaders, and in time their friendship grows into something deeper. When Sarah discovers she's pregnant with the chief's son's child, the father has been called off to fight against the Europeans, and by the time her son is born, his father is dead. Sarah raises her child, whom she simply calls "Boy," but when Boy reaches the age of six, he's abducted by his father's family, who believes he should grow up among the Maori. Fearing further reprisals, Francis returns to Ireland, but Sarah stays behind to care for the sick and look for her son. Years later, while in search of Boy, Sarah encounters Wiremu (Cliff Curtis), a Maori warrior whose father Te Kai Po (Temuera Morrison) is ill. When Wiremu learns that Sarah is well versed in medicine, he makes an offer -- if she will treat Te Kai Po and return him to health, he will find Boy. Sarah is able to cure Te Kai Po's ailment, and Wiremu returns the now-teenaged Boy (David Rawiri Pene) to his mother. Boy is not eager to leave behind the Maori people who have become his family, and he and Sarah stay with Te Kai Po's tribe for a while, but in time she is drawn back to the Irish colony, where she finds herself torn between Doyle (Kiefer Sutherland), the soldier who loves her and wishes to protect her, and Wiremu, who she has grown to love. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Samantha Morton
Andie MacDowell, Olivia Williams, and Stephen Rae star in this bittersweet tale of two grieving women connected by an accidental phone call. Connecticut mother Marilyn Vine (MacDowell) has always lived a charmed life, so when her adolescent son Dale suddenly dies while celebrating his fifteenth birthday the tragedy of her loss is almost too powerful to bear. 3000 miles away in Dublin, Ireland, Ria Lynch (Olivia Williams) finds her marriage to longtime husband Danny (Iain Glen) coming to an unexpected in when Danny reveals that he is divorcing her to set up home with his pregnant mistress Bernadette (Heike Makatsch). When fate delivers the telephone call that connects these two women, both at a crucial turning point in their lives, Marilyn and Ria both agree to a two-month house exchange that could provide them with the space and down time to move beyond the pain that threatens to consume them. As both women grow increasingly accustomed to their new environments, the kindness of strangers and opportunity for reflection provides them both with the courage to face their changed lives with a newfound sense of hope. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Andie MacDowell, Olivia Williams, (more)
A priest caught in the middle of a deadly murder investigation must risk his life to prove the innocence of a fellow clergyman in a tense, religious-themed thriller directed by Lewin Webb and starring Christian Slater. Daniel Clemens (Slater) is a fallen priest who has lost his faith. Now a loyal but troubled public-relations representative for the Catholic Church, Clemens is disturbed to learn that a man he knows does not possess capacity for murder has been accused of a crime beyond comprehension. Despite direct orders from the church to cease his investigation, Clemens enlists the aid of a dedicated reporter (Molly Parker) and a truth-seeking church lawyer (Stephen Rea) in uncovering a scandal with the power to shake his faith to the very core. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Christian Slater, Molly Parker, (more)
The inspirational tale of the USS Mason comes to the screen in a dramatic account of the perils faced by the all-African-American-crewed World War II sea vessel, and the brave souls who cheated death to overcome the cancerous racism eroding the very shores they fought for. From the very onset of their mission, the men aboard the USS Mason knew they had little chance of returning from their mission alive. Return they did, though, and after a harrowing journey through some of the most treacherous international waters of the war years, the remarkable crew of the USS Mason proved without question that they could stand tall and fight fiercely alongside soldiers of all races and backgrounds. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Stephen Rea, Ossie Davis, (more)
An Irish boy becomes an emotional and sexual outcast as the 1960s fade into the 1970s in this period drama from director Neil Jordan. When he was just a baby in the early '60s, Patrick Braden (Conor McEvoy) was abandoned by his mother and left on the doorstep of a church overseen by Father Bernard (Liam Neeson). Placed in a foster home, sensitive Patrick doesn't much care for the emotionally chilly attitude of his new "family," and psychologically buffers himself against the world by writing stories that make fun of Father Bernard and the other authority figures in his life. As he grows into adulthood, Patrick (played as an adult by Cillian Murphy) also discovers that he enjoys dressing in women's clothes and prefers the company of men, and as a teenager he falls into an affair with Billy Hatchet (Gavin Friday), a nightclub performer who also runs guns for the Irish Republican Army. In the early '70s, Patrick -- who has since taken on the drag name "Kitten" -- makes his way to London, where he becomes involved with Bertie (Stephen Rea), a small-time nightclub magician who gives the young man a place to say, a sense of security, and a job as his on-stage assistant. However, Patrick's idyllic life with Bertie proves short-lived when his old friends come to town on IRA "business." Breakfast on Pluto also features a supporting performance from former Roxy Music frontman Bryan Ferry. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Cillian Murphy, Stephen Rea, (more)
Roland Suso Richter's psychological thriller The I Inside stars Ryan Phillippe as a man who, as the film opens, becomes involved in a terrifying accident that leaves him unable to remember the last two years of his life. As if the protagonist being unable to recognize his wife (Piper Perabo), and learning that his brother (Robert Sean Leonard) has died, were not bad enough, dreams of a woman (Sarah Polley) he once loved come to him regularly. The hero must negotiate the terrain between fact and fiction in order to figure out what happened to his life. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi
- Starring:
- Ryan Phillippe, Sarah Polley, (more)
First-time Irish writer/director Sean Walsh spent ten years making Bl,.m (Bloom), an adaptation of James Joyce's infamously difficult 1922 epic Ulysses. Set in Dublin on the day of June 16, 1904, the film attempts to make a visual reconstruction of Joyce's stream-of-consciousness style. Following all the major themes of the original novel, it's bookended by the internal monologue given by the sexually driven Molly (Angeline Ball). Stephen Rea plays her husband, the introspective Jewish-Irishman Leopold Bloom. Hugh O'Conor plays the philosophical young writer Stephen Dedalus. Bloom premiered at the 2003 Taormina Film Festival. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi
- Starring:
- Stephen Rea, Angeline Ball, (more)
Terror is lurking online in this thriller directed by William Malone, who also helmed the 1999 remake of House on Haunted Hill. Mike Reilly (Stephen Dorff) is a NYPD detective who has been assigned to look into a string of murders which have taken place in Manhattan, with Terry Houston (Natascha McElhone), a researcher from the city Department of Health, lending her assistance whether Reilly likes it or not. Reilly discovers that all four victims have one thing in common -- they were all men who logged on to the same Internet website exactly 48 hours before they were killed. It seems the website features a sexy woman offering kinky fun to those who enter her domain, but clicking the wrong icon takes users on a journey into fear. Reilly decides the only way to find out the truth is to head into the website and find out what follows for the next two days -- if he can make it out alive. Fear dot com also stars Stephen Rea, Jeffrey Combs, and Udo Kier. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Stephen Dorff, Natascha McElhone, (more)
One man takes on the Irish family law system and the Catholic Church in a bid to be reunited with his children in this drama, based on a true story. In 1953, Desmond Doyle (Pierce Brosnan) was a house painter and decorator who, despite a strong work ethic, had a hard time holding on to steady work. Desmond's wife had grown tired of her marriage and her husband's financial problems, and one day walked away from her home, leaving Desmond to raise their three children on his own. While Desmond struggles to keep body and soul together for his children, his sporadic employment eventually attracts the attention of the law, and a court order sends his two sons and young daughter to separate Catholic orphanages until Desmond can prove he's capable of properly supporting them. However, Desmond discovers merely getting work is not enough to bring his children back to him, and when he learns that his daughter, Evelyn (Sophie Vavasseur), is having a rough time of it at the hands of several stern nuns, he becomes determined to win their custody in a court of law. Through Bernadette (Julianna Margulies), a barmaid who has caught his eye, Desmond meets Michael Beattie (Stephen Rea), a lawyer and Bernadette's brother. While Michael doesn't believe Desmond's case can be won in an Irish court, his partner Nick Barron (Aidan Quinn), an expatriate American who lost custody of his own children in a divorce proceeding, is eager to help, and they agree to take the case. However, they both realize they're fighting an uphill battle, and so they persuade Thomas Connolly (Alan Bates), a former football star who became one of Ireland's most respected barristers, to lend his knowledge and prestige to the case. Leading man Bronson also served a co-producer for Evelyn; Bruce Beresford directed, who previously collaborated with Pierce Brosnan on Mister Johnson. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Pierce Brosnan, Aidan Quinn, (more)
Adapted from the Tony award-winning play by Michael Frayn, Copenhagen is set in the titular Denmark capitol in the year 1941. According to existing records, it was in that city and year that German physicist Werner Heisenberg and his Danish mentor Neils Bohr met together on the brink of WWII. It will never be known what these two men, so politically divergent yet so much alike in their scientific goals, discussed during that fateful meeting (several attempts to reconstruct their conversation from memory proved both futile and bitterly divisive), though it is a matter of record that both men had discovered the methodology for splitting the atom -- which, of course, was the foundation for the atomic bomb. Frayn's play offers a fanciful yet utterly believable and incredibly witty and charming speculation on the words that might have passed between the idealistic Bohr (played by Stephen Rea) and the pragmatic Heisenberg (Daniel Craig) -- as recalled decades later by the principal characters from the vantage point of the Afterlife. Co-produced by Britain's BBC and U.S. public-TV outlet KCET, Copenhagen was first broadcast as an episode of the PBS Hollywood Presents anthology. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Stephen Rea, Daniel Craig, (more)
A teenager finds himself reaching out to others as he tries to heal his emotional wounds in this drama. Jonathan (Cillian Murphy) is a young man who is having a difficult time coming to terms with the recent death of his father; after falling into a deep depression, he attempts to commit suicide by driving a car off an embankment. Jonathan survives the accident and is sent to a mental institution for treatment. While in the hospital, Jonathan becomes friendly with a disturbed youngster named Toby (Jonathan Jackson), and falls in love with Rachel (Tricia Vessey), another patient at the facility. Also featuring Stephen Rea, On the Edge was the third feature from Irish director John Carney and the first to be backed by a major American studio. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Cillian Murphy
Rating Systems
Blockbuster
BLOCKBUSTER name, design and related marks are trademarks of Blockbuster L.L.C.
2013 Blockbuster L.L.C. All rights reserved.
Portions of Content Provided by Rovi Corporation. 2013 Rovi Corporation.