
Let me just put this right out there: aside from Tom Cruise, Harrison Ford is my favorite actor of all time. Boom. Between his roles as Indiana Jones, Han Solo, and — shucks — even President James Marshall (“GET OFF MY PLANE!”), there was no greater movie hero during my childhood. Heck, even in adulthood, looking back and watching Ford’s sideways smirk and headstrong bravado, it’s still very hard to dissuade my total reverence of him as an actor. And yet…we all know what happened to Harrison Ford’s career post-1999. Many amazing things occurred in the new millennium. Harrison Ford’s career was not one of them. So when did Ford’s career start to shift? Well, ironically enough, once Ford decided to go “all villain” for the first time in Robert Zemeckis’ vastly underrated horror film, What Lies Beneath (2000), his career followed that of his status at the end of the flick: dead and gone. And no, loyal fan boys, as much as I defend Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) while people are still throwing stones at its silliness (honestly, is an extraterrestrial encounter more far-fetched than the quests for the Fountain of Youth and the cursed Ark of the Covenant?), that fourth entry in the beloved franchise is nothing but a career cheat, a gimme if you will. Every film Ford has participated in after What Lies Beneath, besides the aforementioned Indy flick, has been either a commercial flop or critical disappointment — in most cases, both. So by killing Harrison Ford in What Lies Beneath, and turning him into a villain for the first time, did Zemeckis inadvertently “kill off” Ford’s career altogether? Find out the truth that lies beneath in this week’s Did You Know?
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Categories: Article Tags:
Did You Know?,
Ender's Game,
Gavin Hood,
Han Solo,
Harrison Ford,
Indiana Jones,
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,
Peter Weir,
Robert Zemeckis,
The Mosquito Coast,
What Lies Beneath