Bill Paxton: 5 Awesome Performances (And Five That Sucked)

by Danny Meegan

1. Ray O'Malley - Boxing Helena (1993)

Boxing Helena 1993 Film Bill Paxton
Orion Pictures

If there's one thing Bill Paxton usually always does, it's stick to his guns. His performance in Spy Kids was bad, but at least it was consistently bad, the actor choosing a direction and sticking to it firmly.

Well, here's one example where that's not the case.

Boxing Helena is a sombre, horrific tale about a woman who has all her limbs amputated by a surgeon who holds her captive in his house, and yet, Paxton does a parody of every self-centred, pretentious jock from every high-school movie ever, the actor seemingly caught between going full-on funny, and full on a-hole.

The result is a performance you're neither laughing at or feeling threatened by. If Paxton had fully committed to either angle, things may have worked out a bit better - at least then his intent would have been clear - but as it stands, we don't have a clue what on Earth he was trying to pull off here.

What are your favourite and least favourite Bill Paxton performances? Leave your picks in the comments section!

Advertisement

20 2000s Movies That Could Never Be Made Today

20 Awesome 90s Movies That Deserve More Love

20 Awesome 90s Movies The World Forgot

Contributor
Contributor

Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!