Meet Joe Black
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Meet Joe Black gets a lot of guff and most of it is completely undeserved. It isn’t perfect — the film is far too long, some beats are meant to be dramatic that play as pure comedy, and Pitt and Clair Forlani have negative on-screen chemistry — but there’s much better here than bad.
Pitt’s performance (which was eviscerated by critics) is completely appropriate for the character. The wide-eyed naivete of his personification of Death is a flavor of Pitt that we rarely get to see, and he holds his own next to an acting titan in Anthony Hopkins.
Bullet Train
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Looking over the man’s filmography it becomes very clear that while Pitt is many things, he is not an action star. Troy, World War Z and Mr. and Mrs. Smith — Pitt seems almost out of place in the genre.
Bullet Train is the exception. Director David Leitch’s film is supremely underrated, with plenty of fun and creative action sequences and a clever script that balances scenes of witty banter and maximalist insanity perfectly. Pitt taps into his comedy chops here as opposed to his usual action mode of stoic handsome guy and he manages to get some of the biggest laughs in the film.
Twelve Monkeys
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Brad Pitt is a character actor trapped in a leading man’s body. Some of his best performances have come in supporting roles, such as his work in the Ocean films, Burn After Reading, Snatch, or even his extended cameo in The Lost City.
Twelve Monkeys, though, is arguably the best work of Pitt’s career which is why it’s included here despite not being a “Brad Pitt vehicle.” His performance as Jeffrey, a psychiatric patient slash environmental activist, is the right kind of unhinged for the film and it is a shame that Pitt hasn’t had the chance to work with director Terry Gilliam again.
Inglorious Basterds
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Though Christoph Waltz unquestionably delivers the best performance in Inglourious Basterds, it would be criminal to overlook what Pitt does in the role of Lieutenant Aldo Raine. Armed with a fascinating variation of a Smoky Mountain drawl, Pitt rattles off that trademark Tarantino dialogue through a clenched jaw like a backwoods General Patton. He doesn’t necessarily disappear into the role, but he comes at every line in a completely unexpected direction and it almost becomes more fun to watch him work from a technical level than it is to enjoy what’s happening in the film itself. Waltz got all the flowers, but Pitt took a very big swing and knocked it out of the park.
Se7en
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Brad Pitt sure does love movies with numbers in the title…
Along with Interview with a Vampire and Legends of the Fall, Seven was Pitt’s coming out party as a leading man in Hollywood. This moody thriller sees him paired with Morgan Freeman as detectives attempting to solve a series of murders that appear to be inspired by the seven deadly sins. For the most part, Pitt isn’t asked to do much more than play a young hothead opposite Freeman’s more reserved Veteran a few weeks out from retirement.
In the film’s climax, though, Pitt shows what he’s capable of as an actor, and those final moments are devastating. What’s in the box, indeed?
Tree of Life
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The Tree of Life is a difficult film to describe. It has the shape and feel of an evocative poem, and plays out in a way that leaves the film’s themes, meaning and even some parts of the actual story completely open to interpretation. It is beautiful, ponderous, and not easily digestible. There isn’t anything else quite like it and in that way, any fan of cinema must be seen at least once.
Pitt brings a weariness and simmering anger to his performance — here is a father whose stoic demeanor may crack at any moment. It isn’t showy, but it’s perfect for what Malick was going for with his film.
Fight Club
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David Fincher’s 90s classic has a lot in common with The Wolf of Wall Street in that a lot of the worst people got the completely wrong message from the film. If you walk away from Fight Club thinking that that Tyler Durden fella had some good ideas about masculinity and modern society you might need to do some introspection.
But that isn’t Fight Club’s fault, nor Fincher’s or Brad Pitt’s for that matter. In addition to being impossibly shredded, Pitt delivers an iconic performance that is supremely cool and seductive. If you want someone to play an idealized male ID, look no further than late 90s Pitt.
Moneyball
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Directed by Bennett Miller, from a screenplay by Steven Zaillian and Aaron Sorkin, Moneyball pulls off the incredible feat of making baseball statistics and salary structures seem like the most compelling, high-stakes subjects on the planet. Once you settle into the rhythm of the dialogue the film becomes almost hypnotic, sucking you into the drama of building the best baseball team for the least amount of money.
Pitt is wonderful as Billy Beane, the beleaguered general manager and former pro ball player who puts his faith in the numbers over the protests of his small army of aging Luddite scouts. His natural charm does a lot of heavy lifting to get us invested in this story.
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
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While Pitt often does his best work in supporting roles, he is also an expert in using the gravity of his screen presence to have an entire film bend around him. Pitt imbues his Jesse James with such a mythical aura that he dominates scenes he isn’t even in. This is by design as the film is told from the perspective of a young man who idolizes the outlaw, but there are only so many actors who can pull such a trick off.
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford isn’t just one of Brad Pitt’s best films, it’s one of the best films made this century,
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
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Like Leonardo DiCaprio’s Rick Dalton, Pitt’s Cliff Booth instantly entered the pantheon of all-time great characters in film history the moment the credits began to roll.
Booth is equal parts driver, stunt double, and personal errand boy to Dalton, and Pitt plays him with this effortless coolness that is one of the main reasons many call Once Upon a Time in Hollywood the ultimate hangout movie. Despite his sketchy past and capacity for violence, he just seems like a dude you’d want to spend an afternoon with, cruising down the 1960s Sunset Strip with the top down. Let’s hope Tarantino changes his mind and continues to make films so there’s even a chance we can get another few hours to vibe with Cliff and his dog, Brandy.
