Russell Crowe. Its 3 most important literary characters.

Es Russell Crowe, my passion of cinematographic passions, and us it's his birthday. This actor, born kiwi in Wellington, New Zealand, and raised Australian koala (now he has become a huge one), has done EVERYTHING in the cinema, the best and the worst, and of course, has a few literary characters to his credit. So today is this very personal article where my two passions, literature and cinema, coincide at their peak.

Although there are some more in his career, these three literary characters are the most relevant. Bud white (which gave him his first international success and recognition), Jack Aubrey y Javert, created by three very different writers. I review them. That the doubles, matt, and that I see them. Koala or whatever it takes.

Russell Crowe

With Crowe there is no middle ground. They are almost 20 years behind his life and miracles and I have met ALL kinds of staunch fans or angry detractors of his career or his person. I have anecdotes everywhere and I have fought real battles where all imaginable virtual blood has been spilled. Anyone who knows the fan world knows it well.

But regardless of the loves and hates for this actor in any of his facets, if there is something that characterizes his career in film, it is his ability to disappear into the characters you play. Also regardless of personal preferences for one or another of his more than 30 films or their greater or lesser quality or achieved success, that capacity is maintained in all of them. If she is also accompanied by her physical transformations on several occasions, you have simply only seen the character.

The point is that actually, who have we had in front of more than once to this man, we have given him his hand and we have exchanged a word with him, we can attest that this capacity is a outer projection of an inner energy almost palpable. That energy that fills and crosses a screen and does not need words to express any emotion. As a person and as a character. And that gallery of characters is very long, but now we are going with these 3 genuinely literary ones.

Bud White - LA Confidential (1997)

I would need a dozen items to be able to describe, tell or express what this character means in my film, literary and personal life, so I'm going to have to stick to the concrete. On my fairly long list of characters who have managed to fill my soul to the brim with emotions, Agent (later Sergeant) Wendell "Bud" White is the first by far and on a par with another more contemporary Nordic colleague of his.

Created by James Ellroy, White is one of the members of the Holy Trinity of policemen who star in the novel that the Mad Dog gave birth in 1990. Much of my love for the black genre I owe to Crowe's performance in the spectacular adaptation signed by Curtis Hanson seven years later. It was the one that led me to the novel. From there to devour all of Ellroy and accept once and for all that the antiheroes and masculine literary characters, dark, tormented and as wild as deeply human are my weakness.

My obsession was such that I even wrote my own story as a continuation on the emotional residue that film and novel left me. And I have no hesitation in considering Bud as the best job of Crowe's entire career.

Jack Aubrey - Master and Commander (2003)

You could say the same for Captain Jack Aubrey. Because when I found out that Crowe would play it, I also went straight to get all the nautical novel series written Patrick O'Brian. With a fondness since childhood for the genre of adventure and, specifically, of those that pass at sea and on sailing ships, I had them pending and the filming of the movie was a perfect excuse. I read them in a row.

From the front page of that musical evening in Mahón when Aubrey and Stephen Maturin met, I knew that Crowe would do it again. Naturally I finished reading the series long after watching the movie. So it was. The loud, music lover, bold, excessive, reckless but also almost innocent Royal Navy Captain Jack Aubrey could only be embodied in someone like Crowe.

But there was also his compatriot Peter weir directing the function. And whoever knows the cinema of this prestigious director knows about his exquisite taste and better do in creating images. If you add a cast of British actors all born to the roles they play, the result is exceptional. Of course, to read the novels you need to like the genre. If not, they may be too technical due to their language.

Javert - Los Miserables (2012)

The film adaptation of mythical musical created by the french Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil he was less lucky. Based on one of the classics of classics of literature not only gala but worldwide signed by Victor Hugo, the musical is possibly the most memorable of how many have been made. And without a doubt the most successful, so much so that it is probably better known and preferred than the novel itself.

So seems very risky company get closer in pictures to the magnificent staging both for setting and of course for the live sound of its unforgettable music and lyrics. And apart is the endless list of singers who have converted and given extraordinary voices to characters such as Jean Valjean, Javert, Fantine, Eponine or Cosette.

The british director Tom Hooper he dared a few years ago and wanted to have, at least, forceful presences and voices that at least complied. Half got it in the most visual aspects, but it lagged further behind in the musical question. The cast wanted to meet Hugh Jackman or Samantha Banks, with more professional musical experience. Or one Anne Hathaway who took the Oscar for best supporting actress for an exciting Fantine and a more than decent Eddie Redmayne like Marius. 

And my dear Russell just had to put the saber and the uniform to give the packaging and character necessary and sufficient to that dark and obsessive Javert. Enough to supply her limited voice, which does work in other genres more his personal than in a musical with such colossal characteristics as Los Miserables. But, once again, who hasn't been blinded by love, right? Well that.

• To learn more: Russell Crowe. In technicolor, sir ...