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A new acting animal
In One Hour Photo, Robin Williams again takes the persona we know and successfully twists it into something unsettling.
By STEVE PERSALL, Times Film Critic
© St. Petersburg Times
published September 12, 2002
[Photo: Fox Searchlight Studios]
Robin Williams gives the year’s best performance so far as the obsessed photo developer in One Hour Photo.
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It's the quiet ones you have to worry about, those people who blend into the background until they manage enough courage to not be ignored. The ones remembered as nice neighbors after something nasty occurs. People like Seymour Parrish, the chillingly pathetic time bomb at the center of Mark Romanek's One Hour Photo.
He's just "Sy the photo guy" to Sav Mart customers bringing in their film for processing. He is always helpful, never impolite and has such a cheery smile, if anyone takes time to notice. We do, sitting in a dark theater watching that serene veneer slowly fracture. We're not quite sure what Sy's capable of doing, or where he will direct whatever it is, but it won't be pretty. And the victims won't see it coming.
One Hour Photo requires an unerring actor to convey the psychological erosion of what never was a stable mind-set. Robin Williams, for the second time this year (the first was Insomnia), submerges his impish mania to play the role to perfection. In part, his performance works so well because we know what kind of energy lies beneath, so we hold our breath in anticipation of its release. But there are no laughs here, just nervous titters until nothing's funny anymore.
Sy's favorite customers are the Yorkin family: Nina and Will (Connie Nielsen, Michael Vartan) and their young son, Jakob (Dylan Smith). They've been bringing film to Sav Mart for years, and Sy has traced their history through Kodak moments. He almost feels like an honorary uncle, although the Yorkins have never done anything to suggest he should.
Romanek quickly announces that Sy's obsession will go too far, opening his film with a police interrogation about a vague offense. His challenge, then, is to occupy our imaginations, make us curious rather than clock-watchers. Without spoiling the twists, let's say that Romanek dangles in our faces several instances in which Sy may be exposed or may have chosen a target for his frustration. Fantasy, reality and our worst expectations blend with such precision that even the truth seems off-kilter. (Like me, you may be outside the theater before the depth of Sy's strangeness becomes clear.)
One Hour Photo is 98 minutes of eerily crafted suspense, full of visual dread as it depicts the inordinate orderliness of Sy's workplace and home. Romanek's camera angles keep Sy distanced from everyone else. Nothing is out of sorts except Sy, softly treading through corpse-blue Sav Mart aisles, a dying soul in his mausoleum.
Williams fully complements Romanek's vision. This is a rare case of an actor's reputation enhancing a role opposite of his image. Movie lovers who bristled when I recently suggested that Tom Hanks was miscast as a killer in Road to Perdition should study this performance for its effective variations on familiar tics. We've seen these shy mannerisms from Williams before, playing cute or noble, so the measure of tightness he adds to posture and line readings is immediately discomfiting. Part of the film's terror is watching a clown turn deadly serious.
Yet, there is never a moment when a viewer sits back and notes what a fine job Williams is doing. Sy is bland enough to be overlooked, and Williams is wise to underplay a juicy role so his persona will be, too. The face is familiar, but this is a new acting animal, working from a screenplay that never caters to Williams' popularity. This is the best screen performance so far this year, a good bet for an Oscar nomination. We'll see what develops.
One Hour Photo
- Grade: A
- Director: Mark Romanek
- Cast: Robin Williams, Connie Nielsen, Michael Vartan, Dylan Smith, Gary Cole, Eriq La Salle
- Screenplay: Mark Romanek
- Rating: R; sexual situations, nudity, profanity
- Running time: 98 min.
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