Harrison Ford’s deep admiration for Michelle Pfeiffer: “She’s extremely talented and has a lot of great ideas”
When Harrison Ford first set out to make his name in the world of acting, he couldn’t have imagined just how synonymous he’d become with the concept of on-screen heroism.
Even though the actor has claimed that he doesn’t go out of his way to play good guys with any sort of deliberate intent, it’s hardly an accident that he’s maintained his spot in the upper reaches of the A-list by doing exactly that.
Whether it’s his iconic turns as Star Wars favourite Han Solo or his status as the figurehead of the Indiana Jones franchise, it’s hard for Ford to deny he ever wanted to be a hero when he’s played two of the most iconic in the entire history of cinema.
That’s without even mentioning his two-film stint as Jack Ryan, his desperate quest to find out who really killed his wife in The Fugitive, his ass-kicking president who single-handedly thwarted a terrorist attack in Air Force One or his role in a 1977 drama that was quite literally titled Heroes.
Of course, he’s been known to explore the darker side of the human condition on the odd occasion. Ford is particularly fond of his against-type turn in The Mosquito Coast, which saw him play a character who has good intentions on the surface before it’s revealed they have their own agenda.
Another came when he embraced outright villainy in Robert Zemeckis’ psychological horror thriller What Lies Beneath, which only came about when the director decided the best way to use his downtime while Tom Hanks lost a drastic amount of weight for Cast Away was to shoot an entirely different feature in the meantime.
Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer play what appears to be an idyllic suburban married couple with a life so perfect there’s no way everything is as it appears. Funnily enough, that turns out to be the case when Pfeiffer’s Claire Spencer begins experiencing haunting visions in their home, with the other half of the central duo having been a long-time fan of his co-star.
“I had never met her before, but always admired her work,” he told the BBC. “The first day of shooting involved intimate scenes of the husband and wife, and I found her very clever in being able to create behaviour that would reflect a long relationship, so it was very easy to work with her. She’s extremely talented and has a lot of great ideas.”
What Lies Beneath features performances from both Ford and Pfeiffer that rank among the finest and most underappreciated of their respective careers, and the ideas being suggested by the latter ensured the former’s first time collaborating with someone he’d long been following from a far comfortably lived up to expectations.
