Richard Farnsworth in this role was the oldest person ever to be nominated for Best Actor. He was diagnosed with terminal cancer and killed himself with a shotgun just a year after this movie came out.He had been a stunt man for 40 years before becoming an actor. He despised cursing, and he told Roger Ebert that the thing he was most proud of in his career was that he never had to say a bad word.
How much of his performance in this film do you think was acting, and how much of it was just Farnsworth being himself? Was Farnsworth perhaps a lot like Alvin Straight? What does Farnsworth’s death say about aging and how does that align with what Straight had to say about aging?
5 comments:
I don't know that much about him, but I think it's possible that Farnsworth was a lot like Straight. His performance felt completely natural to me, which I assume is why he got the Oscar nomination.
Farnsworth's death is very sad. But some people just aren't cut out for a slow, painful decline. Alvin Straight didn't take the suicide route, (he died of a heart attack about three years after his trip), but he did have the desire to struggle against his physical deterioration, to keep doing what he wanted to do however he could.
From the information you had about Farnsworth feeling proud about his profanity-free career, I would say he might share some of Straight's moral convictions. And if at his age his own mortality was beginning to stare him in the face, I'd guess it was a role with which he could identify.
I'm with Erin on Farnsworth's death. I think there are quality-of-life issues for people after a certain point (working four years at a nursing home convinced me of that), and I respect his decision though it saddens me.
When Farnsworth was shooting the film, he was partially paralyzed and in tremendous pain from bone cancer. The pain grew and grew and he shot himself on a day when his pain was at its worst, according to his fiancee. You can read more about his death here.
I think it's impossible to know what leads to a suicide, even if there are signs, even if there's a note.
I really liked this actor in this role. As Erin said, his performance felt completely natural.
I liked how he seemed to be constantly thinking, reflecting, pondering. You could see it on his face. It's like his mind was in high gear now that his body couldn't move so well anymore.
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