The rececnt demise of John Ritter got me thinking about this. There was a fair bit of talk about the show he was working on at the time. I don't know much about that, but it reminded me of some other actors who were still working at the end, and a few whose final films were not quite up to their earlier standards.
Bela Lugosi is an obvious one, finishing his career (and his life) working in Ed Wood pictures, and finally appearing posthumously in Plan 9.
John Candy had his ups and downs, but it hardly seems fair that he signed off with Wagons East. He was better than that.
Orson Welles' career took him all the way from Citizen Kane to a final performance in Transformers: The Movie. Being a big fan of the Transformers in the 80s, I thought that was pretty cool.
Other examples? I know there are lots.
As a rule of thumb, all actors go out on a bad note. Boris Karloff, for instance, went out with four terrible movies. (Not that he ever knew; they finished the movies after he had died.)
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Raul Julia's last movie was STREET FIGHTER.
street fighter was sad, bad movie.
Veronica Lake in 'Flesh Feast"
Lon Chaney Jr. and J. Carroll Naish in Al Adamson's "Dracula Vs. Frankenstein"
River Phoenix in "Silent Tongue"
Yul Brenner in "Death Rage"
Walter Matthau in "Hanging Up"
Those four Mexican horror cheapies Boris Karloff shot footage for back to back shortly before he died.
Although he is not a comedic genius, he followed Belushi's career to a T. and that person is Chris Farley..
John Belushi had a meteoric fall after SNL and Saturday Night Life, his career ended with a voice role in Tarzoon, la honte de la jungle (1975) and in one of Spielburg's commercial bombs 1941 (1979).
Farley also began with Tommy Boys (I dont like it, but it is a classic) and Wayne's World and exited with
Beverley Hills Ninja and the abysmal Matthew Perry movie, Almost Heroes (1998).
How could I have forgotten Raul Julia? He's the best example of all.
Cullen makes a good point, that many actors do some crappy movies in their old age, although Karloff was a b-movie actor throughout his career. The same is true of Lugosi, although he had bigger problems.
I think the ones I'm most interested in are not the has-beens, or the ones, like Farley, who never really had a chance to develop much of a resume, but rather the respected actors who happened to have the bad luck of choosing a bill-paying role at the wrong time. That, and movie legends we would never dream of seeing in such a role.
Post Edited (09-22-03 11:19)
Many "serious" critics will think that "Dagon" was a sad farewell for Paco Rabal, a spanish actor who became known in the 60s for his works with Luis Buñuel. I disagree, his work, despite his awful english, is very good, and nobody could have portrayed better the drunken sailor he plays. Plus he probably was happy to be there, because it seems that he was a die hard Lovecraft fan.
i must be the only one here who enjoyed street fighter. dear me...
sure it could've been better, but raul julia did a pretty good job playing bison, though i understand why it would be considered a low point in his career.
just watching kylie minogue try and act and put on a british accent is funny as hell.
Ray Milland comes to mind. He won an Oscar for THE LOST WEEKEND, and ended his career with a string of B-movies like THE THING WITH TWO HEADS and THE ATTIC.
Russ Tamblyn (although, I believe he's still alive), had early success in respectable movies like WEST SIDE STORY and the original THE HAUNTING, but ended up in a bunch of Al Adamson's trashy movies.
The same goes for Tommy Kirk, who was a big Disney star in the 1950s, but ended up making movies like BLOOD OF GHASTLY HORROR.
George Kennedy will go down in history as a fine actor who ended up acting in crappy movies. He was brilliant in movies like COOL HAND LUKE and THUNDERBOLT & LIGHTFOOT, but he later sank into B-movie infamy.
Rod Steiger went from great actor (IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT and THE PAWNBROKER, for instance), to some bad direct-to-video releases.
Farley Granger (STRANGERS ON A TRAIN and ROPE) ended up in movies like THE PROWLER.