Val Kilmer Movies
Chicago Sun-Times critic Roger Ebert's recollection of Val Kilmer's performance in the 1992 Thunderheart provides a fitting introduction to this intuitively gifted yet oft-underappreciated actor, by zeroing in on the strength at the core of Kilmer work. "Only... twenty minutes into the movie," Ebert writes, "...did I recognize... I had been watching Kilmer all along... [His] anonymity was not a trick of makeup or lighting... [there] is something inside Kilmer that seems to conceal him; he is this straight-arrow, conservative, by-the-numbers FBI agent [in Thunderheart], just as in The Doors he was the Dionysian rock druggie Morrison... [and] there is no common reference between the two characters. He is so inside the one... you cannot get a glimpse of the other. If there is an award for the most unsung leading man of his generation, Kilmer should get it. In movies as different as Real Genius, Top Gun, Top Secret!, and Billy the Kid, he has shown a range of characters so convincing that it's likely most people, even now, don't realize they were looking at the same actor."Indeed. Kilmer's chameleon-like ability to plunge fully and breathlessly into his characters represents both the gift that catapulted him to fame in the mid eighties, and that which - by its very nature of anonymity - held him back from megastardom for some time. (Compare it with the work of his Hollywood mentors from earlier generations, such as Paul Newman, Jack Nicholson and Clint Eastwood, who developed trademark personae onscreen and can be instantly recognized in almost any role). Such an ability - doubtless, the result of exhaustive, heavily-disciplined training and rehearsal - also explains Kilmer's alleged on-set reputation as a perfectionist (which caused a number of major directors to supposedly tag him as 'difficult'), but the results are typically so electric that Kilmer's influx of assignments has never stopped. He is also extraordinarily selective about projects. Trying valiantly to maintain a firm hold on his career, he turned down offers for box office blockbusters including Blue Velvet, Dirty Dancing, and Indecent Proposal for personal and artistic reasons.
A Los Angeles native, Kilmer acted in high school with friend Kevin Spacey before attending the Hollywood Professional School and Juilliard. He appeared on the New York stage and in Shakespeare festivals before his cinematic debut as the rock idol Nick Rivers in the Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker spy spoof Top Secret! (1984). An absurd role which Kilmer plays with complete sincerity; it reveals genuine musical talent and Kilmer achieves complete credibility as a rock star. Throughout the eighties, Kilmer played as diverse an assortment of roles as could be found: he was the goofy, playfully sarcastic, egghead roommate and mentor to Gabe Jarrett in Martha Coolidge's Real Genius, the cocky "Ice Man" in Top Gun, and warrior Madmartigan in the Ron Howard/George Lucas fantasy Willow (1988).
Kilmer's cinematic breakthrough arrived in 1991, for his portrayal of rock icon Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's The Doors; some speculated that Stone hired Kilmer solely on the basis of the musical gifts showcased seven years prior in Top Secret!. As the philosophical, death-obsessed rocker (and druggie) Morrison, Kilmer performed a number of the Doors songs on the soundtrack, sans dubbing. He played other American icons in his next two films - gunslinger Doc Holliday in Tombstone and the spirit of Elvis in True Romance; both did remarkable business at the box office. Due to his persistent need for an on-set dialogue with his directors, Kilmer clashed with Michael Apted on the set of Thunderheart (1992) and Joel Schumacher on the set of Batman Forever. He openly refused to repeat the Bruce Wayne role for Batman and Robin (1997) (which would have re-united him with Schumacher) and thus broke his superhero contract.
Instead, Kilmer headlined Michael Mann's 1995 Heat with two legends, Robert De Niro and Al Pacino. This time around, he met with a more accommodating (or at least more tolerant) director, Michael Mann. Working with another acting veteran, he co-starred with Michael Douglas for the hunting adventure The Ghost and the Darkness. Unfortunately, his next few films were disappointments, particularly The Saint and The Island of Dr. Moreau. He switched gears a few times with little success, turning to romantic drama in At First Sight and to science fiction in Red Planet, but neither fit his dramatic intensity. He was especially ill-suited for the role as the drunken dad in Joe the King.
After lending his booming voice to the part of Moses in the Dreamworks animated film The Prince of Egypt (1998), Kilmer appeared in The Salton Sea (1991) as a tormented drug addict. In 2003, he lined up quite a few projects, including the crime thriller Mindhunters and the drama Blind Horizon. In the same year he earned a starring role as another aggressive American icon, John Holmes ("the John Wayne of porn"), for the thriller Wonderland (2003). That project (inspired by Holmes's autobiography Porn King and other accounts of the actor's sordid life) had rolled around Hollywood for many a year; it recounts the drug-related Wonderland murders in which Holmes was implicated, but does so Rashomon-style, from numerous vantage points. Dreary, unspeakably depressing, and confusing as well, the picture alienated all but the least discerning of viewers. The Washington Post's Stephen Hunter asked, "Why does this film exist? Sometimes there is no why, there's only a how. This is how: overblown, overheated, overdirected, overacted, overlong and over here, in the local bijoux. "
That same fall, Kilmer re-teamed with Ron Howard for the director's lackluster Searchers retread, The Missing (2003). He also re-collaborated with Oliver Stone (for the first occasion since The Doors) in the director's disappointing historical epic Alexander (2004), opposite Angelina Jolie, Anthony Hopkins, and Colin Farrell. He returned to form (and a leading role) in 2005, with the comedy-thriller Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang. Kilmer (per his trademark ability) once again cut way against type, this time as a flagrantly (and aptly named) homosexual detective, Gay Perry, who lives and works in Tinseltown. When it opened in October 2005, the picture drew an avid response from critics and lay viewers alike, and brought in solid box office returns.
The actor packed in an astonishingly full schedule throughout 2006, with no less than six onscreen appearances through the end of that year, in large and small-scaled productions - all extremely unique. He returned to his 1998 Dreamworks part with the lead role of Moses in Robert Iscove's stage musical The Ten Commandments, mounted at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. Then, in a most unusual move that recalled Richard Gere's work for Akira Kurosawa and Burt Lancaster's work for Luchino Visconti, Kilmer went cross-cultural, by joining the cast of Polish director Piotr Uklanski's Summer Love (2006), screened at the Venice International Film Festival. It marks the first "Polish spaghetti western" and gracefully sends up the genre; Kilmer appears as "The Wanted Man." The Disney studios sci-fi-action thriller Deja Vu teams Kilmer and Denzel Washington (under the aegis of Kilmer's former Top Gun cohorts, Tony Scott and Jerry Bruckheimer) as feds who travel back in time to stop a terrorist's (Jim Caviezel) attempt to blow up a ferry. He also voiced the character of Bogardus in Marc F. Adler and Jason Maurer's family-friendly animated adventure Delgo.
In 2008, NBC revived the classic series Knight Rider, and needed a distinct voice to play the super-intelligent car. Kilmer stepped in to play the iconic role, but he also signed on for numerous other simultaneous projects. He signed on to appear in The Dirt and The Steam Experiment, as well as Werner Herzog's remake of Bad Lieutenant.
Kilmer met British actress Joanne Whalley on the set of Willow in 1987; they married the following year and teamed up onscreen in John Dahl's Kill Me Again (1989). The couple had two children before the marriage ended in 1996.
~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
Ridiculed and dismissed by his contemporaries due to his outrageous warnings about the dangers of Global Warming, a once-respected professor and academic hatches a deadly experiment designed to prove his theories in this thriller starring Val Kilmer and Armand Assante. James Pettis is a man on the brink. After publishing a pair of alarmist books claiming that Global Warming would hasten the collapse of humanity and bring about the end of the world as we know it, Pettis the laughing stock of the academic community. But even after losing everything, Pettis remained convinced that his theories were sound. Then, one day, Pettis bursts into the Tampa Tribune claiming that he can prove his hypothesis in no uncertain terms. In a bit to regain his status in the Global Warming community, Pettis has set up an experiment: six unsuspecting people have been lured into a "Steam Room" where the temperature will gradually rise, providing undeniable proof of Pettis' theory that rising temperatures on the planet's surface would send humanity spiraling into chaos. Should the Tampa Tribune fail to print his theories on the front page of their next edition, Pettis' unwitting lab rats will die a slow and excruciating death. Now it's up to Detective Jack Mancini to figure out whether Pettis is bluffing, or if he actually put the lives of innocent civilians in danger in a mad bid to prove his point about the dangers of Global Warming. But Detective Mancini has only two hours to discern whether the "Steam Room" is indeed real, or the manipulative creation of a delusional psychopath: does his risk his life and the lives of others to rescue people who may only exist in Pettis' mind, or does he take the madman at his word and do everything in his power to appease him? The clock is ticking, and the only way out of this deadly maze is for Detective Mancini to engage in an intellectual game of cat-and-mouse against an opponent who truly has nothing left to lose. Eric Roberts and Patrick Muldoon co-star. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer, Armand Assante, (more)
A team of ecology students led by a famous environmental advocate discovers that some secrets are better left buried when they unearth the perfectly preserved remains of a frozen wooly mammoth and discover that an ancient parasite has been incubating inside the beast for centuries. Dr. David Krupien (Val Kilmer) is examining a melting ice cap in the Arctic when he unearths a prehistoric specimen the likes of which researchers have never seen. Elated by the possibilities of such a remarkable find, Dr. Krupien hastily summons four of his brightest students to the base to take part in the excavation. But something isn't right; soon after extracting the massive prehistoric creature from the ice, the students are besieged by a swarm of unidentified insects that burrow deep into the flesh, and lay eggs in their host to reproduce. With each new infection, the prospect of containing the parasitic bane decreases. Now, stranded in the Arctic with their numbers quickly dwindling, the desperate students realize that their only hope of preventing the parasite from reaching the general population is to quarantine the base, even if it costs them their lives. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer
A thief seeks to get back together with his ex-wife while working to keep a young boy out of harm's way in this action thriller starring Val Kilmer. John Cologne (Kilmer) has just pulled off the heist of a lifetime, and now he's got exactly one hour to make the ultimate deal. He's convinced that he can win back his ex-wife now that he's soon-to-be rich, but after meeting a young boy in the park the deal starts to unravel. With time running out, John must protect his young friend, outsmart the police, and avoid the wrath of a seriously unhinged gangster while finding a way to meet up with his family in Florida. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer
This epic western starring Val Kilmer, Steve Zahn, Linda Cardellini, and Rachel Griffiths was adapted from Larry McMurtry's sprawling novel of the same name, and actually constitutes a prequel to Lonesome Dove. Texas Rangers Woodrow Call and Agustus McCrae may be getting up there in years, but their determination to capture Comanche war chief Buffalo Hunt, Comanche horse thief Kicking Wolf, and an elusive Mexican bandit king certainly hasn't faded with age. Now, as Gus attempts to resolve his personal issues with longtime love Clara Forsythe and Call comes to terms with his feelings for local prostitute Maggie Tilton, fellow Texas Rangers Deets, Jake Spoon, and Pea Eye Parker do their best to safeguard the advancing western frontier from the legions of Comanches who have vowed to defend their land to the death. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer, Steve Zahn, (more)
- 2008
Based on the 1980's series starring David Hasselhoff, Knight Rider follows the adventures of Mike Traceur (Justin Bruening), the estranged son of the original series' main character Michael Knight. After inadvertently becoming involved in the top secret work of his father - whom he never knew - Mike finds that his tremendous expertise as a soldier just happens to make him the perfect candidate to become the new Knight Rider: the driver of a super enhanced car with tremendous intelligence known as KITT (voiced by Val Kilmer). Now, tasked with tracking down mercenaries, busting top secret drug rings, and tracking down powerful people, Mike finds himself behind the wheel of a life he never even knew existed though his biggest challenge might be reigning in his cowboy attitude. ~ Cammila Albertson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Justin Bruening, Deanna Russo, (more)
Filmmaker Justin Hunt leads viewers on a cross-country journey straight into the heart of the American methamphetamine epidemic in this illuminating documentary narrated by actor Val Kilmer. Troubled by the proliferation of methamphetamine addiction in recent years, Hunt traveled from the arid planes of New Mexico to the inner-city squalor of Portland in order to explore the toll that the drug has taken on American families and show that it's never too late to try and rescue a loved one. The voyage takes a decidedly personal turn as Hunt visits with meth addicted parents James and Holly, whose four children speak candidly about the effect their parent's addiction has had on their upbringing. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer
- 2006
Director Piotr Uklanski breaks new ground in the realm of Polish cinema with this symbolic Western that can be viewed as either contemporary art or simple entertainment. The first Polish Western in the history of cinema, Summer Love opens as the nameless stranger (Karel Roden) gallops into town toting the corpse of a wanted man (Val Kilmer). Subsequently entering into an affair with the local barmaid (Katarzyna Figura), the stranger soon becomes embroiled in a sordid love triangle between the pretty drink slinger and the booze-guzzling sheriff (Boguslaw Linda). ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Boguslaw Linda, Karel Roden, (more)
When a Russian anthropologist disappears beneath the city of Moscow, the rescue team assigned the task of tracking him down makes a most unusual discovery in this subterranean thriller starring Vincent Gallo and Val Kilmer. Deep beneath the city of Moscow dwells a group of people who have grown tired of life on the surface. They exist in a complex, multilevel system of caves and catacombs. When a rescue team descends beneath the city in search of a missing anthropologist, they are shocked to discover the underground city, and come face to face with the man who serves as their leader (Kilmer). ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Vincent Gallo, Val Kilmer, (more)
- 2006
- Add The Ten Commandments: The Musical to QueueAdd The Ten Commandments: The Musical to top of Queue
Experience one of the most compelling stories of The Bible in a whole new light as Val Kilmer steps into the sandals of famed prophet Moses for a compelling stage musical directed by Robert Iscove and composed by Patrick Leonard. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer, Kevin Earley, (more)
- 2004
Vince romances a vegan with ties to a Los Angeles sherpa; Eric is enthusiastic about a script that's set in Queens; Drama is concerned about his friends' new relationships. ~ Joe Friedrich, All Movie Guide
In this action-adventure story, Thomas Taylor (Christian Slater) is a master thief who was caught red-handed during a robbery and ended up in prison. Convinced he was pushing his luck, Taylor began pursuing a new career on the other side of the law as a paramedic when he's approached by one of his old partners and brought in on a robbery that could earn them a million dollars in cash. However, after Taylor and his cohorts pull the job, they discover the cash has been marked, and they find themselves at the mercy of Mark Cornell (Val Kilmer), an FBI agent gone bad. Produced under the title In God We Trust and shown on television as Run for the Money, Hard Cash also features Daryl Hannah, Bokeem Woodbine, and Balthazar Getty. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer, Christian Slater, (more)
- 2000
This 2000 episode of Saturday Night Live is hosted by Val Kilmer and features musical guest U2. ~ Skyler Miller, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer, U2, (more)
- 1995
This was billed as the first dramatic feature to be shot in IMAX 3D. It was first shown at Sony's new IMAX 3D Theater in New York on an eight-story high screen. The story is based on the true-life tale of two French aviators, Jean Mermoz and Antoine de St Exupery, who in 1930 formed the first company to fly mail between South America and France. In those days it was a dangerous journey and the pilots needed a special kind of courage to make the trip. One of their new pilots, Henri Guillaumet flies the dangerous route between Santiago and Buenos Aires. During one trip, he crashes in the Andes during a fearsome storm. Later Exupery flies a rescue plane overhead, but is unable to see Henri, who decides to walk out on his own. Meanwhile, Henri's patient wife Noel and her beloved little dog anxiously hope that he will survive. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1989
Gore Vidal's 1955 TV play and 1958 film The Left-Handed Gun discreetly explored the hitherto untapped homosexual subtext in the saga of gunslinger Billy the Kid. Vidal's 1989 reworking of the same material, the made-for-cable Gore Vidal's Billy the Kid, is just as discreet, but no less top-heavy with 20th-century psychoanalysis. In relating the tale of New Mexico Territory outlaw William H. Bonney, Vidal once again postulates that Billy (described as a "homicidal moron" by one less sentimentally inclined historian) was a misunderstood kid who fell in with bad company. Val Kilmer, on the verge of bigger things, stars as Billy, while Duncan Regehr portrays sheriff Pat Garrett, the Kid's onetime crony and ultimate executioner. Gore Vidal himself shows up in a bit as a minister. "Pursued by his enemies, betrayed by his friends, ruled by his passions" read the ad copy when Gore Vidal's Billy the Kid premiered over the TNT Cable Channel on May 10, 1989. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1987
This made-for-cable outing is a loose remake of the Paul Muni film I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang. Val Kilmer inhabits the Muni role of World War I vet Robert Elliot Burns, whose exploits following his escape from a Southern work camp are detailed in episodic fashion. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer, Charles Durning, (more)
Edgar Allan Poe's classic 1841 detective story Murders in the Rue Morgue was adapted for television by David Epstein. Two women--a mother and a daughter--are brutally killed in their tiny Paris apartment. There are no eyewitnesses, and the earwitnesses are wildly contradictory. The evidence points to a man of superhuman strength: perhaps it was the girl's jealous fiance. Enter consulting detective C. Auguste Dupin (George C. Scott), who with a methodical application of logic solves the mystery. The younger of the two unfortunate ladies was played by Rebecca De Mornay, still in her ingenue phase. Murders in the Rue Morgue was originally telecast December 7, 1986. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1985
A stellar cast distinguishes this chillingly cautionary ABC Afterschool Special about the perils of drunk driving. Told in flashback, this is the tale of two couples: sensible Beth (Mare Winningham) and Tim (Lance Guest), and footloose Annie (Michelle Pfeiffer) and Eric (Val Kilmer). The latter duo drink champagne on their first date, and continue imbibing at a dangerous rate during their subsequent double dates with Beth and Tim. Finally, Beth confronts Eric about his liquor problem, but he angrily blows her off -- with tragic results. Filmed several years before its network-TV debut in 1985, One Too Many has since become a staple of driver's-education classes throughout America. ~ All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mare Winningham, Lance Guest, (more)
Six months after one of the worst natural disaster in U.S. history, crime and corruption sink to new levels of depravity as a pair of New Orleans cops work to clean up the streets. New Orleans has been ravaged by Hurricane Katrina, opening the floodgates for a sea of criminals seeking to assert their control over the city's seedy underworld. But when the stakes are this high, there's sure to be corruption within the ranks of the local police force, too. When a veteran detective with a violent history (Val Kilmer) is assigned a new partner with a dark secret (Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson), the perceptive police psychiatrist (Sharon Stone) suspects that the officers may have become morally compromised by the chaos that threatens to consume the city that's already synonymous with vice and decadence. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer, Michael Biehn, (more)
- 2009
- R
Stephen Dorff, Val Kilmer, Jessica Gilsig, and Stephen McHattie star in this two-part mini-series inspired by the 1984 comic book series of the same name (which was later adapted into a popular video game by Ubisoft Entertainment). A young man with no recollection of the past is discovered in a forest, the only clue to his past being a tattoo that reads "XIII." Subsequently accused of assassinating the president, the man embarks on a desperate quest to discover his true identity and expose the conspirators attempting to use him as a scapegoat for a crime he didn't commit. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stephen Dorff, Val Kilmer, (more)
Abel Ferrara's cult crime drama Bad Lieutenant is given a sister film with this Werner Herzog-helmed production that takes its inspiration from the original, but focuses on new characters and plotlines. Nicolas Cage steps into Harvey Keitel's mold of a corrupt and drug-addled police officer, with the scummy setting moving from New York City to New Orleans. Eva Mendes, Val Kilmer, and Xzibit co-star in the Nu Image/Millennium Films picture. ~ Jeremy Wheeler, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Nicolas Cage, Eva Mendes, (more)
A loving husband and father finds his promising future transformed into a waking nightmare when he's convicted of involuntary manslaughter after accidentally killing the burglar who broke into his home in this gritty prison drama starring Stephen Dorff and Val Kilmer. Wade Porter (Dorff) would have done anything to protect his family, and when they were threatened he did what any caring family man would have done. But somehow everything went wrong, and now Wade has been sentenced to spend three years in a maximum-security prison. It's a place where the rules of society have been all but forgotten, and in addition to sharing a cell with a notorious mass murderer (Kilmer), Wade somehow incurs the wrath of the sadistic head prison guard (Harold Perrineau). Now, in order to survive the series of vicious beatings orchestrated for the amusement of the guards, Wade realizes that in order to survive the block and get back to his family he will have to become the toughest felon of them all. But even if Wade does manage to live through this harrowing ordeal, what will be left of that loving family man once he's finally released back into civilized society? ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stephen Dorff, Val Kilmer, (more)
