Sci-Fi Bulletin: Exploring the Universes of SF, Fantasy, Horror and Spy-fi!

James Earl Jones was an absolute giant in his field. An extraordinarily prolific and talented actor, his long career included at least two all-time iconic roles. He was never less than impressive, always brought warmth, wit and humour to his work and elevated everything he was in. Everyone has a favourite James Earl Jones role. Odds are some people have more than one. Alasdair Stuart presents some of his.

Doctor Strangelove

Stanley Kubrick’s classic apocalypso is one of the best movies ever made, following an intentionally constructed third world war and the men on both sides of trying to stop it. This is the sort of movie that’s delicious however you cut it and it’s Jones’ FIRST.ONSCREEN.ROLE. The core of the movie is Peter Sellers’ best, multiple, roles, Slim Pickens as TJ ‘King’ Kong and Sterling Hayden as Brigadier Jack D. Ripper, paranoid base commander and the architect of the third world war. But as the splendidly named Lt. Luther Zogg, Jones has a small but vital role as the bombardier aboard Kong’s plane. He’s playing it very, very straight in  a movie where no one else is and helps ground the human based, terrifying mistake at the heart of the movie.

Field of Dreams

Based on Shoeless Joe by W.P. Kinsella, Field of Dreams is extraordinary and plays a lot like an American riff on the ideas at the heart of Powell and Pressburger’s extraordinary A Matter of Life and Death. Following an Iowa farmer, Ray (Kevin Costner Costner) and his wife Annie (Amy Madigan) as they’re compelled to make a baseball field in their corn crop, it unfolds with the careful, gentle logic of a lucid dream. The movie is remembered for the central turns by Kevin Costner, Amy Madigan and Ray Liotta as ’20s baseball star Shoeless Joe Jackson. But dig deeper and you find more treasures at its core. A stunning performance from Burt Lancaster and Frank Whaley in the same role is a highlight but the heart of the movie is Jones as Terence Mann, an activist writer and lover of baseball who slowly but surely is won over by the mystical power of the field, the game and what’s unfolding on the field. I defy you to get to the end of this without crying your eyes out and Jones’ final scene, and the way it marries the exhausted idealism of Mann’s activism with the love of the game is a big reason why.

The Ambulance

Josh Baker (Eric Roberts) is a comic artist who helps a young woman named Cheryl (Janine Turner) when she collapses. But Cheryl never arrives at the hospital and the ambulance that picked her up isn’t on any records…

A horror comedy from legendary B-movie monarch Larry Cohen, this has a ton of fun people in it. Josh works at Marvel, there’s a Stan Lee cameo and the main cast includes a future incarnation of the Master, one of the leads of classic cult series Northern Exposure and, of course, James Earl Jones. Jones has enormous fun as the cop, tremendously reluctantly getting caught up in the case and the movie is just immense, nasty fun. Larry Cohen, who wrote and directed this, is one of the all-time greats and if you’ve not seen them, then watch very nearly anything he wrote with this as a killer double bill. Or, triple bill this, Phonebooth and a very new Jason Statham and Chris Evans in Cellular.

The Hunt for Red October, Patriot Games & Clear and Present Danger

Jones was an anchor for the first, and arguably most successful, version of the Jack Ryan franchise. As Admiral James Greer, Jones is the avuncular anchor to Jack Ryan’s descent (or is that ascent?) into the moral fog of counter-terrorism. Greer’s a great role played by an all-time great. Earnest, playful and ruthlessly efficient when he needs to be. Of the three, Red October is by far the strongest but Jones’ work is excellent throughout.