The movie Denzel Washington is “most proud of” might also be his most overlooked
Over the past four decades, Denzel Washington has established himself as one of the world’s most celebrated and versatile acting talents. Following his formative years in off-Broadway theatre, he broke into the movie business, eventually becoming a two-time Academy Award winner for his supporting role in 1989’s Glory and later, his central role in Training Day.
Modelling his career on that of the late acting legend Sidney Poitier, whom he eventually befriended, Washington has taken on several culturally and politically significant roles. Like Washington, Poitier excelled with several movies closely connected to the struggle for civil rights in the US, including 1958’s The Defiant Ones, for which he became the first African American to win the ‘Best Actor’ Academy Award.
Washington’s most famous and successful movie to address the Civil Rights Movement was Spike Lee’s Malcolm X. The 1992 production stars Washington in the titular role and follows the militant activist’s real-life struggle through the mid-20th century up to his assassination in 1965.
While Washington holds this role in high regard, he feels his role in The Hurricane is often unfairly overlooked. The movie was based on the book The Sixteenth Round, a non-fictional account of boxer Rubin Carter and his infamous murder conviction. As detailed in the movie and Bob Dylan’s famous song ‘Hurricane’, Carter was wrongly convicted due to racial discrimination and deliberate perversion of justice.
“John Ketcham, one of the producers of the film, brought the book, The Sixteenth Round, to my attention. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I just thought it was a fascinating and – in the case of this film – an incomplete book,” Washington once told The Guardian.
After reading the book, Washington decided to meet with Carter. “I met this sweet, little guy who will tell you to this day that he wouldn’t change a thing; that everything that has happened to him has made him a better person and made him the person that he is today,” Washington revealed.
“I spent a lot of time just talking with Rubin, and he walked me through his past and how those agencies and individuals affected him in his life,” he continued. “So I just related to the experiences I had and draw from the experiences he told me about to try and shape the character.”
Despite retrospective reverence from critics and an Academy Award nomination for Washington’s portrayal of Carter, Norman Jewison’s The Hurricane failed to reach a wide audience and turned surprisingly modest profits at the box office.
Washington blames the movie’s underwhelming response on the studio’s marketing campaign. “The studio didn’t release it properly, and it got buried,” he explained. “They were trying too hard to position it for the Oscars, and they wound up hurting the movie. But I think it’s one of those films whose reputation will gain over time. It’s the one I’m most proud of, right up there with Malcolm X.”
A biopic is usually simple fodder for an Oscars team looking for real stories upon which to hang a gold statuette around their neck. But, for some reason, the movie didn’t find the comfortable landing many assumed it would. It has since fallen down the pecking order of Washington’s best roles, despite showcasing the actor at his potent best.
The performance might not be his greatest; that honour was given to Alonzo Harris. “It’s a huge honour and privilege to play real-life heroes,” he insisted, “but there is a different kind of excitement and reward for an actor in playing a villain. I have to admit I had a lot of fun playing Harris in Training Day.” But the movie he is most proud of is about as wonderful an accolade as one is likely to receive fro such an esteemed actor.
