Color me amazed that I have not written on this film before. I was sure there was a Fathom Event where I had commented on the movie, but I can find no trace of it on my site. I feel a little like Deputy Gerard, I don't have any clues as to where to look, and my memory is escaping. The film on the other hand has not escaped my memory, this is a movie that I have seen dozens of times over the years and it has had an indelible impact on me for some personal reasons that I will mention at the end of this post. I have used the phrase "Black Hole Film" in the past, to describe a movie which has a gravitational pull on me that I cannot resist. "The Fugitive" is one of those films. If I happen across it, my eyes and ears lock on and I am captured for the time remaining in the movie.
There are so many things about this film that deserve attention, I can't really get to all of them and keep this post at a reasonable length. That said, let me pick out four or five elements that are worth drawing your attention to and highlighting. First of all are the two lead performances by Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones. Both men add credibility to the story, but they also engage us with small moments and line delivery. Ford has the most screen time but maybe the lesser amount of dialogue, at least until the exposition dump at the end. In the scene where he is being interviewed by the cops after the death of his wife, he conveys the frustration that a distraught man is likely to have. I may have written about it somewhere else, but Harrison Ford has his crutches as an actor and the two biggest are his hands. He gestures in small, self contained moments that draw our attention to him. The way he shakes his fingers or twists them around to underline a point are common. He also does a lot of pointing. In this film it is all fitting. Look at the way he holds his notes in the telephone booth as he is making calls to the one armed men on his list of subjects. It is distinctive, and a way to get us to focus on him rather than the background. When he gives up the gun on the reservoir waterfall, his hands don't simply shoot up in response to Gerard's command, they show hesitation and thought and desperation. Ford has always been a physical actor more than a vocal artist, and this film is a perfect display of those talents.
Meanwhile, his counterpart, Tommy Lee Jones as Marshall Gerard, is full of flummoxed emotional moments, controlled and calculating facial expressions, and a vocal range that reflects someone, unlike Dr. Kimble, who is trying to stay below the radar, is in fact trying to dominate every interaction he has. Jones won his Academy Award for this role and those who like to engage in revisionism have suggested that it was not maybe a correct choice, they are wrong. This character is a success because of the actor who embodied him. With a commanding voice and sardonic sense of humor, Jones steals every scene he is in. It helps that he has all the best lines in the film and he is surrounded by a cast of characters that feed his character's personality. He can get snarky with his underlings, and get away with it because they all respect him. When he and Joe Pantoliano are verbally jousting with Jeroen Krabbé as Dr. Nichols, they both smile and say they are smart guys too, and we can see how in tune the team is with the Big Dog. Jones has the punctuating speech where he instructs the searchers as to their task and finishes with..."Go get him". Later, Gerard has the famous comeback when Dr. Kimble confronts him and declares his innocence, Gerard spits back, "I don't care". The script and the supporting players all made Jones performance one for the ages.
I will leave all of the other characters and the script to another time, I sure hope to see this again on a big screen, so there should be another opportunity. The personal note that I mentioned earlier is one of the reasons this film means so much to me. It was the last movie my best friend and I saw together. My friend from High School, Art Franz was dying of cancer in 1993. He lasted a while longer than doctors thought because he had a positive attitude, in spite of the ordained fate. In that last year, I took every opportunity I could to go with him to the movies. He and I were both huge James Bond Fans and he worked at a movie theater when we were back in High School. We saw this movie a little over a month before he finally succumbed, and we had both loved it. Exiting this world with this as the last theatrical experience of your life is pretty good. Miss you buddy.
