Picture it. You're 12 years old. It's a friday night. You're parents have hit the hay and you've been left to your own devices. There's a film starting. Some chap is driving through the desert. It's the fella from Red Dawn. He picks up a hitch-hiker. Hmmm. You've heard your Da mention on numerous occasions never to pick up a hitch-hiker. You never knew why. 97 minutes later you know why. The film was The Hitcher and Rutger Hauer has just made a huge impression on your blown little mind.
The news of Rutger Hauer's passing emerged today. He was 75 and had died after a career spanning 50 years. Cinema will be a lot less interesting with him gone. He was an actor with an immense presence, one that brought a sense of foreboding and doom to every role he ever played, even his heroic ones. He was just so interesting and so different and intense. The sinister accent, the shock of blonde hair. Even if he was just sitting there you couldn't take your eyes away as he gave off the weirdest vibe and I mean that in the best possible way. In a landscape of musclebound 80's heroes he was a different kettle of fish altogether. His was a face you were always pleased to see appear onscreen. He meant that no matter how bad the film got it would at least have one memorable performance.
Interesting film choices made him one to keep an eye on. Roy the android who died so beautifully in Blade Runner. The slightly unhinged wildlife conservationalist of A Breed Apart, the sightless samurai of Blind Fury, the "hero" of Flesh & Blood, the big bad of Buffy The Vampire Slayer (the movie). Even his conventional action fare like Surviving The Game, Split Second and Wanted : Dead Or Alive was raised out of the DTV mire by his arresting performances. He should have been huge but for some reason Hollywood never used him properly. Was it the hard to pronounce name? The accent? The lack of a Schwarzeneggar-esque physique at a time when it was en vogue. Those Guinness ads? Who knows? Probably all those reasons together but it never stopped him. Even when his career took a downturn in the 90's he kept going and it was immensely pleasing to see him pop up in the 1-2 punch of Sin City and Batman Begins in 2005. His career never hit those heights again but he never seemed to be too far away, always turning up regularly in films and TV
I've two vivid film memories involving him. One was me and friends trying to work up the courage to rent out one of his early films, a Paul Verhoeven (his most frequent collaborator) directed film called Turkish Delight that had been packaged as an "erotic movie". When we finally got to watch it we were sorely disappointed by our first introduction to European art house cinema but it clued us into a whole other world of movies he'd made before he hit America. The other I've mentioned earlier. The Hitcher. A film about a bad guy for the ages. The diner scene. The fingers. The constant smirk.The shotgun. Poor Jennifer Jason Leigh tied between 2 lorries. A movie that would scar itself into your retina's. Made so memorable by Mr Hauer.
Now to misquote a great actor who will be sorely missed. I hope those memories aren't lost like tears in rain.
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