Bill Pullman makes apparently ordinary men worth watching, particularly when their composure comes under strain. We rate his ability to take a foolish film seriously, though the reliable suitor roles have sometimes asked too little of him.
Fi1m perspective
With aliens invading in Independence Day (1996), Bill Pullman behaves as though being president remains a job worth doing properly. His Thomas J. Whitmore gives Roland Emmerich’s film someone who takes the emergency seriously while the audience enjoys the destruction. We warmed to him because that earnestness gives us a person to care about in a screenplay mostly supplying types. Pullman is useful here precisely because he does not treat the material as beneath him.
Spaceballs (1987) gave him an early lead as Lone Starr for Mel Brooks, before the romantic comedies made his dependability familiar. His Walter in Sleepless in Seattle (1993) belongs to the run of reliable suitors that helped fix an unduly narrow idea of what he could do. There is a drawback to such casting: an actor employed to seem ordinary can end up being overlooked. We would not mistake that familiarity for a lack of ability, but those parts can leave too much of the work to his basic likeability.
In Independence Day, the contrast with Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum matters. Smith’s Captain Steven Hiller supplies ease, while Goldblum makes David Levinson individual enough for us to forgive some of the dialogue. Pullman has the less immediately rewarding job, since solemnity is difficult to sell in a film this cheerfully foolish. He helps keep the ensemble worth following, but he cannot give Whitmore depth the script has not supplied. The cast earns the film a good deal of patience from us.
David Lynch makes a different use of that conventional appearance in Lost Highway (1997), casting Pullman as Fred Madison and finding something darker beneath it. The possibility of rage makes the familiar face unsettling, and this is the turn in his work that interests us most. Later, his Detective Harry Ambrose in The Sinner (2017–2021) gives him sustained work at the centre of a television drama. Start with Independence Day for the steadiness, then try Lost Highway before deciding that steadiness is all he offers.
Biography
Bill Pullman is an American actor. Born in Hornell, New York, he earned a Master of Fine Arts degree in theatre from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He served as an adjunct professor at Montana State University before beginning his professional acting career.
Pullman made his film debut in Ruthless People (1986). He appeared as Walter in Sleepless in Seattle (1993) and as President Thomas J. Whitmore in Independence Day (1996). Other film roles include Spaceballs (1987), Casper (1995), While You Were Sleeping (1995) and Lost Highway (1997). He has also worked in television, with regular roles in 1600 Penn (2012–13) and The Sinner (2017–2021).
Pullman maintains a stage career and has appeared on Broadway, including in Edward Albee's The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? (2002).
