Sorry for the delay in part 2 of this post. I'm sure that all of my faithful readers have just been dying from the suspense. Quick addendum to part 1, by the way - yes, as I forgot to mention but my brother pointed out, Michael Caine did indeed miss out on his opportunity to be at the Oscars to accept his first win because of filming obligations to make Jaws 4.
Anyway, Caine's second win for Best Supporting Actor was for 1999's The Cider House Rules. The film also won for Best Adapted Screenplay (John Irving's adaptation of his own novel), and was nominated for Best Picture and Best Director (Lasse Hallstrom).
The film tells the story of Homer Wells (Tobey Maguire), a young man who tries to set off on his own after growing up in an orphanage in Maine. Caine plays Wilbur Larch, the doctor who runs the orphanage, secretly performs illegal abortions, and gives Homer an apprenticeship until he decides to leave. Homer sets out full of vigor and enthusiasm, but soon finds 1940s Maine to be disillusioning, beset with racism, dishonesty, and betrayal. Before long, he learns that the ethical issues that he thought were so clear-cut from the orphanage are much more ambiguous in the outside world.
The film is full of wonderful characters. Maguire is exceptional in one of his earliest starring roles, and Charlize Theron gives a great, complex performance as the woman who takes Wells in, falls in love with him, but then must choose whether to stay with him or to abandon him when her fiancee is paralyzed during the war. Delroy Lindo is very convincing in the challenging role of a morally confused apple-picking coworker of Wells, as is Erykah Badu in the equally challenging role of his daughter. Even the child actors, Wells' fellow orphans (including Kieran Culkin and Erik Per Sullivan, better known as youngest brother Dewey from the sitcom Malcolm in the Middle), are very impressive.
Even in the midst of this cast, though, Caine is a stand-out in his performance. Even aside from his accent (which is a perfect Maine accent, a rare departure from Caine's natural British accent), Caine is very impressive in this role. His Dr. Larch is kind, caring, and generous, but he is also flawed. He cares very much for his wards, Homer included, but he stubbornly cuts Homer out of his life when the boy sets out on his own, insisting that he should stay on at the orphanage and eventually take over for Dr Larch, effectively cutting himself off from the outside world. Larch performs illegal abortions for fear of the safety of the women who would otherwise have to go to a less experienced abortionist, but his moral objections to what he is doing force him to drug himself with ether in order to sleep at night.
Movie trivia question: In what many people believe to be the biggest snub in Oscar history, the subject of my last review, Audrey Hepburn, failed to receive even a nomination for the one role that seriously challenges Breakfast at Tiffany's for the title of Hepburn's most iconic role. For what film did Audrey Hepburn get snubbed, and why?
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