The four performances Will Smith would put in a “time capsule”
In recent years, Will Smith has been embroiled in controversy, particularly after delivering an almighty wallop to host Chris Rock at the 2022 Oscars. This incident overshadowed a significant achievement: Smith winning the ‘Best Actor’ Academy Award for his portrayal of Richard Williams in the biographical sports film King Richard.
Playing the demanding father of tennis legends Serena and Venus Williams had served as the crowning achievement of a career that had occasionally shown moments of brilliance but had also been dominated by admittedly poor movies with some rather dodgy performances from Smith himself.
Still, there is indeed some quality among Smith’s back catalogue that led to his Oscar win in 2022, even if it was overshadowed by his big slapping hand. For instance, he once played Muhammad Ali in 2001’s Ali, which also earned recognition at the Academy Awards, while Seven Pounds was also a decent effort from the Philly-born actor.
At the top of Smith’s on-screen achievements, though, are a series of movies that the actor himself would like to preserve in a “time capsule”, keeping them safe until the moment that they were discovered by aliens. If said aliens wanted to know who the actor Will Smith was, he’d like them to watch those four films rather than his other efforts like Hancock, After Earth, or Concussion.
When appearing on Hot Ones, Smith admitted that 2006’s The Pursuit of Happyness – in which he played Chris Gardner, a homeless salesman who tries in earnest to provide for himself and his son, while the actor’s son Jaden also played Gardner’s son – was “the individual best movie that I’ve ever made”, so that film went straight in the time capsule.
Going back some, Smith also placed the 1997 science fiction action comedy Men in Black in with The Pursuit of Happyness. The first film in the franchise saw Smith play Agent J, an NYPD officer who is brought into the world of intergalactic policing as the protégée of Tommy Lee Jones’ Agent K to investigate a series of extra-terrestrial crimes.
Slotting in comfortably with the aforementioned two films is 2007’s post-apocalyptic action thriller I Am Legend, loosely based on Richard Matheson’s 1954 novel of the same name, the third adaptation following 1964’s The Last Man on Earth and 1971’s The Omega Man. Smith plays the last human in New York City following a humankind-wiping virus, who works tirelessly to develop a cure while trying to survive from dangerous mutants.
Finally, King Richard completes Smith’s time capsule. Also starring Aunjanue Ellis and Sanitta Sidney, the biographical sport drama saw both Venus and Serena Williams serve as executive producers and the film explored the great lengths that their father went to in order to encourage and ensure their success in the sport of tennis. Not only did Smith win the ‘Best Actor’ award for his effort, but King Richard was also nominated for ‘Best Picture’ at the Oscars in 2022.
Will Smith’s time capsule movies provide a showing of the actor’s versatile qualities. While it’s easy to think of the comedy action offerings he has delivered in the likes of Bad Boys and Men in Black, it’s equally true that he has given several dramatic moments too, most notably in The Pursuit of Happyness, I Am Legend and King Richard.
