Joaquin Phoenix biography

A child actor who began in the shadow of his famous older brother, Joaquin Phoenix matured into an unconventionally handsome adult performer with an impressive range who first won notice for his lead role in Gus Van Sant’s critically acclaimed satire, "To Die For" (1995). With his scrawny frame, lank hair and slight harelip, he lacked the drop-dead good looks of his older sibling the late River Phoenix. Nonetheless, he brought both poignancy and intensity to his portrayal of a love-struck but dim-witted lower-class teen seduced into murder. After a migrant childhood traveling with his missionary parents and siblings in Puerto Rico, Venezuela and Mexico, Phoenix broke into show business around the age of eight with a bit part on "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers", a CBS TV series on which River was a regular. A year or two earlier, he had changed his given first name to 'Leaf,’ in part because people continually mispronounced Joaquin. As Phoenix explained to Details magazine (November 1995), "My dad was raking up all these leaves and it was some weird thing I conjured up. Then as I got older I thought it was stupid, so I went back to the original." All of his credits prior "To Die For" were as Leaf Phoenix.

Phoenix's TV guest shots include appearances on "Hill Street Blues,” "The Fall Guy" and "Murder, She Wrote.” He was a regular on "Morningstar/Eveningstar" (CBS, 1986), a short-lived dramatic series in which the residents of a retirement home take in the residents of an orphanage that has burned down. Phoenix entered features inauspiciously as an adorable moppet who befriends an even cuter robot in "SpaceCamp" (1986). He offered a wooden rendition of a gung-ho kid who comes upon a beached Soviet sailor in the well-meaning "Russkies" (1987) but fared better as the troublesome teenage son of Dianne Wiest in Ron Howard's "Parenthood" (1989).

Following a hiatus from performance capped by the revelation of his return in "To Die For", Joaquin Phoenix resumed his career, co-starring in "Inventing the Abbotts" (1997), a drama about two brothers who discover a secret connection between their family and that of three beautiful sisters to whom they are attracted. The hot young cast included Billy Crudup, Joanna Going and Liv Tyler—with whom he began a highly publicized off-screen relationship. Later that same year, he was the hot-headed young husband of Claire Danes in Oliver Stone's comic noir failure, "U-Turn". 1998 saw him twice paired with Vince Vaughn: In "Return to Paradise", Phoenix was an American jailed in Malaysia for possession of drugs that belonged to Vaughn while the black comedy "Clay Pigeons" saw him as a dupe to Vaughn's smooth-talking serial killer.

Continuing his ascendant star track, Phoenix played a streetwise punk who helps detective Nicolas Cage in his search for the truth behind what appears to be a snuff film in "8mm" (1999), directed by Joel Schumacher. 2000, however, proved a banner year for the actor. He garnered attention as the slick aide to a corrupt businessman in "The Yards" before nearly stealing "Gladiator" from star Russell Crowe with his malevolently operatic take on the young emperor Commodus. Phoenix demonstrated his range by underplaying his next high profile part, the Abbe Coulmier who oversees the madhouse at Charenton where the Marquis de Sade has been confined in "Quills." Skillfully delineating a man of the cloth torn by his duty and his desires, the actor offered a fine performance that was both a capper for a prolific year and a harbinger of richer work to come.

In 2002, Phoenix appeared with Mel Gibson as his son in the thriller "Signs." The M. Night Shyamalan directed film told the story of a family on a farm who discover mysterious crop circles on their land, with Phoenix playing Gibson's amusingly wide-eyed and naive younger brother. Phoenix next starred with Claire Danes in the little-seen romantic drama "It's All About Love" (2003), the story of two lovers and their attempts to save their relationship in a near-future world on the brink of cosmic collapse. The actor also provided the voice of Kenai, an Inuit hunter whose vengeful slaying of the bear who killed his brother results in his transformation into the bear guardian of the talkative cub Koda in Disney's animated "Brother Bear" (2003).

In 2004, Phoenix graduated to full-fledged leading man with headlining roles in three films. First, he reunited with Shyamalan for the writer-director's tension-filled thriller "The Village," playing a bold young member of an isolated 19th Century village whose desire to see the outside world threatens to break the community’s pact with the mysterious creatures who live in the surrounding forest. Phoenix also took the lead in the firefighter drama "Ladder 49" (2004), playing a firefighter who reflects on his live, loves and career while awaiting rescue from a blaze, one of his most understated and relatable roles to date. Next Phoenix earned high praise for his turn as a cynical journalist witnessing the horrific 1994 genocide in “Hotel Rwanda” (2004), co-starring an excellent Don Cheadle as the manager of a luxury hotel where fleeing Tutsis go to seek refuge.

In the James Mangold biopic "Walk the Line" (2005) the actor played country music legend Johnny Cash. Amid the actor's convincing and compelling performance—which included doing his own surprisingly effective singing and playing of Cash's tunes—were frequent reports of unusual behavior, including stories that he experienced a breakdown on the set of the "Walk the Line" and repeatedly banged his head against a bedpost during a drug withdrawal scene in which Cash recalled the death of his older brother. Though it was an intriguing parallel to his own life, Phoenix insisted that he was merely acting deeply in character, having done his research and attempting to mirror Cash's emotional state. "It’s slightly exploitative," the actor countered. "Suggesting that I would use this personal part of my life for a f—ing movie…it kind of makes me sick.” Weirdness and media exploitation aside, Phoenix’s performance was stellar, earning him a Golden Globe award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy. He also garnered an Oscar nomination for Best Actor at the 78th Annual Academy Awards.

Source Hollywood.com

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