Alan Rickman: 5 Awesome Performances And 5 That Sucked

4. Metatron - Dogma

One of Rickman's greatest strengths was his openness to taking risks, and it's fair to say it might have been deemed a risky move for a respected big name actor to take a supporting role in a satirical fantasy from a writer-director best known for ultra lo-fi indie comedies. And that's to say nothing of how controversial the subject matter proved to be.

1999's Dogma was Kevin Smith's fourth film, and 15 years on it remains one of his strangest (although man-walrus horror Tusk has surely pushed it back into second place). Drawing heavily on Smith's Catholic upbringing, it casts Rickman as the angel Metatron, who comes to Earth to charge Linda Fiorentino's Bethany with a holy crusade to stop Ben Affleck and Matt Damon's exiled angels from re-entering Heaven.

In many respects, Rickman's casting is yet another instance of an American movie casting a British actor to deliver all the exposition, because those limeys always seem so good at it. Happily, this being a Smith film, Rickman is given plenty to have fun with, with a fair quota of ribaldry mixed in among the Biblical portends. And considering that Metatron's official title is 'the voice of God,' it's very pleasing indeed that Rickman opted to bring him to life with vocal mannerisms highly reminscent of British comedy legend Frankie Howerd.