Alternate Best Actor 1990: Jason Patric in After Dark, My Sweet

Jason Patric did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Kevin "Kid" Collins in After Dark, My Sweet. 

After Dark, My Sweet follows a noir style plot as an ex-boxer gets involved with a widow and a kidnapping plot. 

Jason Patric is not an actor I’ve taken too much note of in the past. He’s good in some things, fine in others, less fine in others as well. His performance here however is the type that instantly changes one’s perspective on the level of potential an individual actor has. Patric is going for broke from really the first scene as we enter in on his Kid Collins in a live wire of a performance. A performance that’s interesting because where the common evocation of an actor towards the old usually is Marlon Brando, Patric here truly feels like Montgomery Clift and I mean that as the highest compliment. There’s that kind of burden of life within his intensity that is so remarkable by how much ease Patric brings within it despite technically being a mannered performance. There is no buy into Patric though as he simply is Collins from this first scene where the Kid meets an attractive widow Fay (Rachel Ward) at a dingy bar. Patric’s physical manner of this semi-shyness combined with the specific slightly rattled delivery instantly conveys the state of a man who had recently been in a mental institute. There’s an immediate vulnerability in his delivery but also a “hat in hand” modesty of someone who is actively trying not to offend. I especially love his uneasy way of trying to ask to stay in the bar after the rough bartender tells him to get out. Patric’s meekness is so sincere and conveys the experience of someone who has been pushed out by most, brushed off by many and is filled with doubt for himself. 

The widow takes enough interest with him to allow Kid to stick around a bit longer and even get an invite from the widow to work for her. An invite that is more than a little suspicious to the point even the aimless Kid doubts it. Patric conveys so effectively the sense of the Kid’s state of being lost to the point of convincing one why he’d even consider such a shady proposition, as in his eyes there’s an innate exhaustion and even more so the need for some kind of connection in his life. A connection that Patric manages to make this center of anxiety in his performance that is captivating to watch because he makes it such a penetrating state succeeding in realizing as an unlikely but compelling lead to watch as he gets pulled in by Fay who gives him some mixed signals yet still pulls him by indicating her need for him. Patric’s performance shows within his reactions just how much any notice means towards the troubled mind of the Kid, where he so naturally presents the waves of anxiety within the Kid’s damaged state that would compel him to one minute go deeper into Fay’s sway, then pull back the next. The nature of Fay’s needs though immediately becomes even darker with the appearance of a former lawman and co-conspirator Uncle Bud (played by the rarely trustworthy Bruce Dern). The two together seemingly being quite obvious in their request for a patsy as they speak of a plan to kidnap the sickly son of a wealthy family. 

An idea that seems even obvious to Kid’s rattled mind that he attempts to leave at one point only running into an imperious yet seemingly caring Doctor (George Dickerson) who quickly diagnoses him and makes his own determinations for the kid. Patric is consistently great in the way he manages to pull you into the Kid’s state even in the scenes where the doctor is very much dictating the commands towards what the Kid should do, frequently leaving the Kid only to react in silence. Patric never wastes a moment of silence though as you see the weariness pierce within the man’s mind and the sense of a dread around the doctor’s suggestions, despite the doc seemingly trying to help the Kid. Patric conveying the unease of the man as the patient trapped within this state, which we see was likely caused by his injuries as a once somewhat successful boxer, that he convinces you entirely that the kid would run from the doc’s help back to the strange scheme of Bud and Fay. Where in this relationship Patric presents this initial attempted spark of the man attempting to literally find his mental bearings and there is something so powerful in Patric’s performance by so viscerally bringing the sense of that struggle to life. When he initially speaks a little more coherently and directly to Fay, Patrick brings to reality each fidget as the barrier, and the pain the man is going through just to even attempt to confidently speak for even a moment at first. 

Once the Kid becomes entrenched in the strange scheme Patric’s performance becomes the enigma that anchors the film. A challenging prospect in itself as keeping a mystery within your lead character so overtly yet still finding reason to invest within him. In Patric’s often mystifying stare he does just that where there ends up being a captivating lead to follow through his mind as much as the plot. Patric achieves one of the trickiest of ideas within a performance which is creating internal logic within a character who is mentally bent. Patric never seems lost or vague, even when technically the Kid’s behaviors are of a lost man and could be described as vague to those trying to understand. As we see him go along with the plot yet even within that the Kid takes a strange purposeful detour as he initially kidnaps the wrong kid, even having a strange on the same level dialogue with that kid before kidnapping the correct target. Patric’s performance is odd by dynamic in that oddness where you see the Kid going within this strange flow of existence where in the moment he knows what he’s doing is what he needs to do, as we see in this peculiar conviction in his eyes even as he purposefully bungles the plot before eventually going along with it that Patric manages to make sense of the jumbled nature of the man. 

There is a progression, as curious as it is, where Patric presents a growing control of the situation by the Kid even as he keeps Fay and Bud guessing. Such as his delivery of questioning Bud’s motivations and just where he’ll be willing to go by speaking this monologue on a devious scenario. Patric manages to be direct just as he’s wavering where you could take it as the ramblings of a man just speaking whatever comes to mind, or the very precise recitation of an idea in order to gauge exactly who Bud is. We see this progression of the Kid where Patric manages to bring this greater sense of control yet in his physical manner and his eyes especially there is still an unquestionable unpredictability. The scenes where he kind of takes charge and has sex with Fay, Patric’s performance is fascinating in the way even as he becomes more direct in the intensity as he takes hold of her quite literally while taking hold of the situation, there’s still this messiness about it, where the Kid is finding a path but he’s in no way altogether controlled. An element all the more obvious when the doctor comes to visit, seeing the kidnapped kid, leading the Kid to fatally punch the doctor. Patric’s amazing in the moment because you see the command loosen towards sudden sparking viciousness of the mentally broken man lashing out. It doesn’t feel like a regression rather just part of the overall raw nerve that the Kid never loses. 

The finale becomes a series of mostly unfortunate events and one fortunate event. Patric’s performance fashioned almost a presentation of a man playing the role of the noir lead as the Kid goes through these motions, less with an overt determination and more so with the manner of the man who sees no other choice in the moment. All goes to hell but The Kid, Fay and the child escape via an unexpected fortunate moment of a cop letting the Kid go due to recognizing him from his old boxing days. Nonetheless the respite still leaves the Kid into a corner as he is still named as the primary suspect and essentially with nowhere to go. We get the Kid though making one clear decision to find a way for Fay to escape by essentially presenting himself as the villain. A sequence where Patric is simply outstanding as the Kid gets enough of a hold of himself to portray himself as a sinister genius who fakes his mental illness in order to escape judgement and has been going along with one crime after another. Patric’s fantastic because he can even convince you of this in the moment where every word flows with an eerie conviction and suddenly the Kid seems assured as he speaks with such vile sincerity. Patric’s as wonderful in telling the truth where just in his facial reactions you see the moment of the lost man come back as he sets himself up, and you see the truth again of the man just trying to find some kind of purpose in the end albeit in a way that would only make sense entirely to him. Patric delivers a truly great performance here because within his own work he is captivating in that mystery, and as much as there is still ambiguity within it, there is a deft touch and connection that brings us into this fascinating mess of a mind all the same.