12 Actors Who Were Brilliant In Utterly Sh*t Movies
2. Willem Dafoe - Speed 2: Cruise Control
It neatly sums up Hollywood that some coked out studio executive watched Speed and thought: It was cool on a bus but it would be even cooler on a boat. The entirety of Speed 2 was clearly written down five minutes before the actors arrived on set; aside from the fact that its impossible to make a large ocean liner appear to move fast, the whole plot is a hilarious mess.
The only truly entertaining aspect of the movie is Willem Dafoes out-and-out lunatic performance as antagonist John Geiger. His motivation for causing havoc aboard a cruise ship is to enact revenge against the cruise line because they fired him after he became ill from copper poisoning. Certainly up there as one of the worst villain origin stories ever, Dafoe doesnt let that get in the way of a masterclass in acting insane.
With such boring protagonists (sentient wooden plank Jason Patric and Sandra Bullock sleepwalking through a terrible script), the only reason to watch Speed 2 is to marvel at the effort Dafoe is putting into such a car crash. Apparently taking on the role as he wanted to be a villain in a big movie, nobody could claim he didnt give it his all, the manic smile alone must have left his face aching for months after the shoot.