Max Von Sydow has died
bbc.co.ukPity they didn't mention Dune. Not the best film, nor a big role for him, but for young me it was still a wonderful experience to watch this. He replaced the imagined book version of Kynes forever in my head. Peace.
First saw him in Three Days of the Condor, which I loved as a kid.
One of the most chilling monologues he gave at the end of that movie.
Sydow absolutely crushed that role. In the opening scene, part of the way the massacre, he's calmly trying to get his lighter lit. Creepy and awesome.
I don't know why, but the movie is available via the Internet Archive:
Does anyone know why it is available at the Internet Archive? I would not assume that the copyright had expired yet.
Great find, thanks!
EDIT: The scene I referenced is 13 minutes and 43 seconds in. Also, I had forgotten that there were two shooters in the beginning. I only remembered 'the mailman'.
"Bless the maker and his water, bless the coming and going of him, may his passing cleanse the world."
Dune is a great movie. It's just not completed. The first part, up to the meeting with the fremen,is great. Set, costume design, music are all top notch, and actors are all great. But it would be 6 hours long to fit all the book, and the producers didn't know they can split movies in two parts like "It" or "Kill Bill"
Wow I didn't know he played Kynes in the movie. In my head I pictured him for the role the whole time I was listening to the audiobook.
Oh yes, he played a great Liet Kynes. Appropriately regal and expressive.
I recently watched Flash Gordon for the first time since the 1980s, and Max Von Sydow's performance was a definite highlight.
Casting a `proper' actor as the villain in a silly movie is always a great idea. (See, for example, Basil Rathbone in The Court Jester.)
In a similar role, he played Judge Dredd's mentor/father-figure in the 1995 Sylvester Stallone movie.
Don't forget Strange Brew!
He was also a good serious villain in Minority Report.
He was awesome in that role, eh!
(refering to Strange Brew)
Another example: Frank Langella as Skeletor in Masters of the Universe. According to the actor himself, one of his favorite roles.
I love that movie. There was a time, back during HS, that I could recite every word while it played. I still randomly quote lines from it.
Klytus, I'm booooored. What plaything do you have for me today?
> Casting a `proper' actor as the villain in a silly movie is always a great idea.
Kenneth Branagh in Wild Wild West. (Not sure if that example supports or refutes your claim.)
Love that one, with the Queen soundtrack.
Raul Julia in Street Fighter.
Didn't Raul Julia do that because one of his grandchildren loved Street Fighter?
Jeremy Irons in Eragon?
Stellar performance as the weary knight in "The Seventh Seal", a film more than 60 years old. Well worth seeing today and to some - with the elements of a plague in the background - of particular contemporary relevance.
Reviews of the film tend to focus on the serious themes, which creates an impression of worthy dullness but it's actually very entertaining and von Sydow is brilliant. Sad news, but he had a great run.
Yeah, I had to look out his filmography to realize he played the main character in like every Bergman movie I've watched.
Max played a critical role in what I think is an under-rated science fiction movie called “Until the End of the World.” He comes into the story pretty late, and is crucial to a tricky transition from a “road” movie to something far more dramatic.
That seemed to be a popular role for him later in life—a sort of super character actor who could come in and punch up the gravitas of any scene with just a few lines. I think that says a lot about his abilities as an actor.
The new criterion restoration is amazing! The cover art is great.
To Americans with Scandinavian/Swedish ancestors (there sure are a lot of you), I really recommend watching these two movies starring Max von Sydow and Liv Ullman:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emigrants_(film)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Land
They are based on a series of novels (1949 and onwards) by Vilhelm Moberg chronicling the fate of a family who decides to migrate from famine/poverty-stricken Sweden to the US in the mid 1800s. A full 25% of the Swedish population ended up migrating to the US.
These two movies made Max iconic and so beloved to pretty much everyone in Sweden. They are also fantastic movies; I find myself rewatching them once every 5 years or so.
One of my favourite performances of his was in another Jan Troell film, Hamsun (1996) [1], which was masterfully co-written by the great novelist Per Olov Enquist.
In it, von Sydow plays the Norwegian author Knut Hamsun, who, after WW2, was accused of having collaborated with the Nazis. His portrayal of Hamsun is one of the most nuanced, moving performances I've seen on the screen. It's a superb film. He didn't play many main characters in his life, certainly not in his American movies, but he should have.
(An interesting fact that will elude most non-Nordic viewers is that the cast is made up of a blend Norwegian, Swedish and Danish actors, and they all speak their own native language; von Sydow performs the role in Swedish, for example, even though Hamsun was Norwegian. The film is so well made that it doesn't make any difference at all.)
This and Jan Troell's other films used to be on Criterion's streaming service, but they're not there anymore. Hamsun is only available through Kanopy, I believe, which requires a library card from one of their supported libraries. The Emigrants can be rented on Amazon Prime Video and Vudu, and the The New Land is on iTunes/Apple TV. But it's often difficult to find these masterpieces.
Great movies, well researched all round, painting a true believable picture of the people, clothes, ideas and vernacular of the day. Love them too.
They are great and considering the topic should be quite interesting for Europeans and Americans alike.
Thanks! Moberg is very well known in the area where I grew up, I'll have to have a look.
Antonius Block: I met Death today. We are playing chess
Out of all the roles he played I remember him best as the knight from The Seventh Seal. Somehow his looks, demeanor and way of talking perfectly fit that of a stereotypical medieval knight.
RIP Max Von Sydow, a great artist.
He's forever in the canon as the protagonist in The Seventh Seal, of course.
Every film buff will have something in particular that stands out in their memory about Max Von Sydow. For me, that would be the as the mad scientist, Dr Farber, in "Until the End of the World"-- a sprawling train-wreck of a film that I will always remember fondly, I don't care what the pro-critics think!
My favourite roll of his was in Strange Brew. Such a powerful actor in such a silly roll.
This was our 'repeat rental' growing up. My whole family loved watching this together.
I love this one.
He was perfect as Leland Gaunt in Needful Things. And his little turn as Joubert in Three Days of the Condor makes the life of a professional assassin seem almost reasonable.
He has but a scene in Conan the Barbarian, but what a scene! "What daring! What outrageousness! What insolence! What arrogance! ... I salute you."
What an amazing actor, he had so many fine performances during his career. I loved him in Dune, and also this cameo as King Osric in Conan the Barbarian: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVTOag1lQHc
He was also in the Bob abd Doug MacKenzie movie 'Srrange Brew'.
Max is/was one of my favorites. Rest well, Max. His Shutter Island performance was one that sticks with me, though you could rattle off any of them.
The Magician, Wild Strawberries, Through a glass darkly, The Virgin Spring and the Seventh Seal. These films are 50 years old! Being in these films alone would be enough to qualify as a cinema legend and he still had nearly 50 years to go! Extraordinary!!!
Not a major role in Wild Strawberries, though? Agree with you nonetheless!
He was the gas station attendant, if I remember right. A small role, but played excellently.
Watch "Three Days of the Condor" if only for the scenes with DEC PDP hardware. That's the way we used to do it kids.
Max was also great in this movie - I would not want that guy coming after me. RIP after an exceptional career in films.
I was almost offended when Facebook popped me an article named "The Game Of Thrones and Judge Dredd star died", and none of the hundreds of comments ever mentioned anything but the three-eyed raven. Sad.
His exorcism scene in The Exorcist is one of the most powerful and terrifying scenes of all time:
I quite liked him in The Black Hole, which is a weird Scifi flick Disney put out in the 80's. Quite dark for a Disney flick.
That was Maximilian Schell.
His film I've watched was an old Danish one, Pelle Erobreren (Pelle the Conqueror) from director Bille August.
First movie I saw him in was an Australian film called ‘Father’. Great film, and he won an acting award for his performance in it, too.
Good god, I just finished watching Shutter Island and then read this. May he rest in peace.
I remember him more from things like 3 days of condor or Lynch's Dune. But 7th seal is a true classic in any and all possible ways. An unmistakable actor.
Respect for his work and achievements.
His performance in Three Days of the Condor was masterful. He portrayed a nondescript, unnoticeable man who was nevertheless the leader of a deadly group of assassins, operating in the shadows.
At the time, people were mumbling about Robert Redford, the star. But von Sydow owned every scene he was in.
My favorite performance of Max Von Sydow was Frederick, in Hannah and Her Sisters. His critique of television and contemporary values becomes truer every year.
Guess you can only turn the chessboard on Death so many times.
I think he was great in The Emigrants and The New Land.
Favorite role: Hannah and her sisters. he had a great role - some humor, some sadness (when his heart is broken). This guy could totally act.
He also did Esbern's voice in Skyrim. RIP
That was a big moment for me. It went from "Hey this is a pretty good game" to "Holy shit they got Max von Sydow!"
I'm sad. He was one of my favorite actors:
Flash Gordon
The Emigrants
The Flight of the Eagle
Heidi
Hawaii
I always thought he was one of the greatest actors ever to grace the screen. Truly a shock to see the headline.
Ming is dead.
That was a pretty amazing death scene.
The End?
No one has mentioned him in The Exorcist yet, so I do
They finally finished that game ... RIP
And Flash won, of course.
Oh, not that film?
His best work was Judge Dredd
I would like to heal this schism by asking that we all agree:
All of his work was his best work.