Tom Hanks

Tom Hanks is one of the best actor in the business today. He has starred in some of the best movies out there, Forrest Gump, Castaway, Road to Perdition, Terminal, just to name a few. Tom Hanks had a ruff childhood, according to movies.yahoo.com Tom Hanks was "Born July 9, 1956, in Concord, CA. Hanks spent much of his childhood moving about with his father, an itinerant cook, and continually attempting to cope with constantly changing schools, religions, and stepmothers. Tom Hanks landed his first major movie role with He Knows You're Alone which was a low budget movie, that was filmed in 1980 (movies.yahoo.com). He was able to "land a co-starring role in the TV sitcom Bosom Buddies; he also worked occasionally in other TV series such as Taxi and Family Ties, as well as in the TV movie Mazes and Monsters" (movies.yahoo.com).

I believe that Tom Hanks is one of the best actors out there today. I say that for a couple of reasons but the biggest one is that he is does not just act in movie. He lets the movie role consume him and he lives the part. You see I believe that he becomes the person that he portrays in the movie. Here are a few examples.

"The story follows the life of low I.Q. Forrest Gump (Tom Hanks) and his meeting with the love of his life Jenny. The film chronicles his accidental experiences with some of the most important people and events in America from the late 1950's through the 1970's including a meeting with Elvis Presley, JFK, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, fighting in Vietnam, etc. The problem is, he's too stupid to realize the significance of his actions. Forrest becomes representative of the baby boomer generation having walked through life blindly." (imdb.com)

Through out the movie Tom Hanks does a great job portraying a slow person. It is very hard to portray a slow person because there are many things that they do differently, the way they walk, the way they talk it is all different. Even their facial expressions are very different then people of the normal intelligence. For Tom Hanks to be able to do this goes to show, how good of an actor he is and it goes to show how well he is able to become that role.

One seen that sticks in my mind would bee when he is meeting the President and he tells him that he has to go pee. The body movement and langue is exactly how I thought it should be. Another seen that really sticks in my mind is when he meets his child for the first time. He doesn't really know what to do, and if you look at his face, you can see that he is happy but lost at the same time. These are the things that I am talking about when I say that he becomes the role. I say that because it is all of the small details that make him a great actor.

"Viktor Navorski, a man from an Eastern European country arrives in New York but after he left his country; war broke out and because of that Navorski is a man without a country that the U.S. can recognize, thus he is denied entrance to the U.S. However, he also can't be deported so he is told by the Security Manager that he has to remain in the airport until his status can be fixed. And also Navorski doesn't speak English well, so no one can talk to him and he can't talk to anyone. But he somehow adapts and sets up residence in the airport, which makes the man who placed him there unhappy because, it seems he is line for a promotion but Navroski's presence might complicate that. So he tries to get Navorski to leave but Navorski remains where he is. Navorski makes friends with some of the people who work in the airport and is attracted to a flight attendant he runs into whenever she comes in." (www.imdb)

In this movie Tom Hanks plays the role of a man that does not speak very much English. Once again I believe this is a very hard role to portray because there is a particular way people that are in the position that his character is put in would act. Being a foreigner in the U.S. speaking very little English it seems that you know how they would act, and that is the way that he portrays it in the movie. They way he talks, acts, and especially the facial expressions he has.

In this movie there are also a seen that seem to stick out in my mind. There is a seen where they bring Tom Hank's character in to be a translator. When he speaks it sounds like he had spoken that langue all of his life, but when he spoke in English it sounded like he had only spoken it for a few year because he knew only a limited amount of words. It is just the facial expression are what they look like when a Mexican immigrant has when they are trying to explain something to you but doesn't know the correct words to use. ( you see where I work I have a lot of the immigrants coming in so I know what the facial expressions look like) To me theses are the type of things that make a good actor great.

Now that you know more about Tom Hanks I hope that you see him as the same great actor that I see him as. With all of the little things that he does extra to make his character seem real and not just a actor portraying parts. After all, the little things people do add up. With Tom Hanks they add up to be a great actor.