Alternate Best Actor 1978: Steve McQueen in An Enemy of the People

Steve McQueen did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Dr. Thomas Stockmann in An Enemy of the People.

An Enemy of the People isn't a terrible, but rather a largely inert drama that unfortunately cannot live beyond its allegory.

This role is a major departure for the king of cool at the tail end of his unfortunately all too brief career, given he plays a period role that is alien compared to the majority of his roles. Although we've seen McQueen play period before, typically westerns, this is a very different role for him as there isn't the slightest sense of playing within the idea of cool, but rather attempting to wholly disappear inside a very different role for himself. This evidently was a passion project for McQueen, in a self-described attempt to prove to people that he could act. Well he perhaps should've just referred them to his career best work in Papillon, that which used his presence in part, however showed a far greater emotional range than he had ever showed before. Honestly that is where McQueen excelled as an actor, and perhaps where he should've explored more of as a performer. For example, he was the intended lead for William Friedkin's Sorcerer, where he would've been an ideal lead, in a role that again would've utilized his best qualities as an onscreen while also tasking him to "act", by delivering more within that presence. I bring this up as this role is a somewhat mistaken attempt to wholly erase one's understanding of McQueen as a performer. This is pretty obvious right from the outset as his long hair, beard and glasses, all seem to say "this is not the McQueen you know".

Well in this sense, the performance is not a failure as McQueen does successfully not fall upon his typical presence. He becomes believable enough within the role as this more seasoned intellectual doctor, by not calling upon one ounce of his typical king of cool presence. I'll say I didn't even find it jarring to see McQueen as such, as he wholly gives himself to the performance and clearly gives a devoted turn. The role, despite the dramatic intentions of the piece, is limited. This as we see this doctor who must do what he believes is right, which is call out the town's local water supply that is poisonous, despite the town's top brass, including his brother, wanting to silence this as any removal of the water supply will slow down the progress of the town. So we have the set-up then of the character, of this man with conviction and the family man. The latter element brief as his interactions with any of his family are as to the point as possible. This as even his relationship with Bibi Andersson as the doctor's wife, is barely even touched upon even with the unlikely pairing of performers. The two I'll give credit don't exactly lack chemistry, they just also don't really have the moments to realize any. The same goes for the whole idea of the doctor and the family. We never get a real sense of them as people, before getting into the dramatic situation they are in, making it so they are more figures to voice the message of the story, rather than living as people who also speak the message.

I think the greatest failure in this is in the characters of the doctor and his brother Peter (Charles Durning) who are at opposite ends of one another. We are granted no real history between the two, and you'd never even guess they were brothers. I guess I can take this one from the performers a bit in this instance as neither McQueen or Durning really grant the sense of any sibling familiarity even that of a distant relationship. The screenplay does not help them at all in this regard, as their scenes together are only of an argument of the same points with Peter yelling at the doctor, and the doctor looking solemn. This is much of McQueen's work here honestly, that of just keeping a slightly disturbed, annoyed but still determined expression as others threat and berate him. McQueen to his credit does this with enough of the sense of the state of the doctor but little more than that. The rest of the time McQueen largely is looking dignified as this man of importance, the town's good doctor. Well again, McQueen delivers this with that different presence than was typically expected from him, however I won't say even this makes that much of an impact. McQueen finally gets a bit more to do as the doctor gets to plead his case among the collective people, fighting for his beliefs and against the idea of mob mentality. Well McQueen delivers this speech with a decisive passion and strength of conviction in his voice and eyes. We see the same soon after when the man refuses an offer to join the corruption delivering a earnest rejection of the values with the sense of the weight of the decision on his brow and just exasperation in his voice. McQueen doesn't compeltely fail to reinvent himself here, but this role isn't ideal for that reinvention. It is a limited role that McQueen only can do so much with, and I will say does falter a bit with in certain elements of it, namely the central relationships. I think that it is as much of a problem within the material as McQueen work however, McQueen doesn't overcome it. This performance is not a revelation, but it is a decent curiosity of an attempt by McQueen to expand his repertoire, though sadly at a time in his career where he would not be able to ever make a second attempt later on.