Plus, The Godfather isn't even one of the reasons I've cherished him.
How few James Caan movies have I watched?
Okay not that few. The actual number is 20.
However, probably 15 of those were movies where I had to remind myself after the fact that Caan was in them. Not because Caan was forgettable in them, but because the movies themselves never rose to a particular level of prominence in my own affections.
The two movies I do really love are Elf (#46 on my Flickchart) and Misery (#137 on my Flickchart). The next highest, Bottle Rocket at #277, is one of those where I wouldn't have been able to tell you that Caan was in it. No idea, which obviously means it's been too long since I've seen it. The Godfather does pop up next on my chart at #515 -- sorry, I'm not a huge Godfather lover -- and The Godfather II is one of those I'm counting among the 20, even though he only has a brief uncredited role (and therefore isn't popping up in my filtered list of Caan movies on Flickchart). But after that you have to go all the way outside the top 1,000 to find the next movie -- Middle Men at #1293, which I do like a lot more than its reputation.
I guess it's hard to square, then, why I was so quick to come write this post, only a few hours after hearing about his passing at age 82.
It would have to come down to Elf and Misery, and I suppose it's the character he plays in both films that spoke to me in a way I'll try now to express.
Caan plays a character we end up liking in both films, but he isn't easy to like. As the author Paul Sheldon in Misery, he's an eccentric S.O.B. who has his various rituals -- which include making only a single typewritten copy of his manuscripts and a single smoke and Dom Perignon after completing his work, but which don't include any more than the minimal amount of politeness required of him. He can put on an insincere smile to placate a psycho like Annie Wilkes -- he's quick to calculate the necessity of such a facade -- but genuine kindness and tolerance of tedium are foreign to him. We root for Paul not because we love him, but because the conditions of his unjust imprisonment are so expertly established that we quickly and easily root against his captor. Effectively, we empathize with him -- but there would be something about Caan's performance that invites us to do so.
Neither can Walter Hobbs in Elf suffer fools. He's not imprisoned, and by having all the power, he's quick to dismiss anyone who's wasting his time -- particularly some loony dressed up like an elf who claims he's Walter's son. He gets this priceless "What now?" expression in his eyes that we can all relate to. If we were approached by Buddy the elf, our reaction would probably be to roll our eyes and reveal our consternation as well.
Because he starts out so disagreeable, the fulfilment of our journey with Walter Hobbs is all the more satisfying. Whatever else I love about Elf, I may find nothing more gratifying than the steady thawing of Walter from a man for whom business was more important than anything else, to a father capable of showing his love to both of his sons -- not because he has to, but because he wants to.
As a thriller, Misery requires less of an arc for Paul Sheldon, but by the end, we know Paul has learned not to take his fans for granted. Annie's love was too tough to be an effective delivery method for this lesson, but Paul got something out of it anyway.
I'll miss seeing the guy who always felt like he had to grin and bear whatever was coming to him, even if that grin looked a lot more like he had just sucked a lemon, and in the end ultimately emerged a better person for suffering these fools -- a person we might even start to love.
And oh yeah, he was also Sonny Corleone.
Rest in peace Mr. Caan.
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