July 26, 2010 03:00PM EDT

Best in Show: Tom Hardy

 

Tom Hardy as Eames The Forger in Inception

Christopher Nolan, Hollywood’s hottest director, is just now turning 40. His short but very lucrative career, which includes Memento (2001) and The Dark Knight (2008), suggests that he’s already become that rare thing: a bankable offscreen name. Given the star-laden casts he’s able to attract, though, he won’t need to test the theory. For Inception he chose one huge star (Leonardo DiCaprio), two Oscar winners (Michael Caine, Marion Cotillard), two previous nominees (Pete Postlethwaite, Ken Watanabe), three rising stars (Ellen Page, Cillian Murphy, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt)… and one Tom Hardy.
 
Tom Hardy?
 
Though it’d be misleading to call Hardy an “unknown,” the 33-year-old British actor isn’t quite a “name” either. At least he wasn’t before Inception opened big, despite a concept that isn’t easily digestible in the brief pitches on which movies rely on sell tickets. How exactly do you describe a corporate thriller that’s also an inverse heist caper and a ghost story in 30-second TV spots and movie posters? You don’t. You offer up hints with a glimpse of your most bankable elements (visual effects + DiCaprio) and pray for the best. In the case of Inception, the prayers were answered.
 
Since Inception has an unwieldy sci-fi concept, the movie has to lay groundwork before it can get rolling. Explanatory demonstration scenes precede the A plot. At the half hour mark, Dom Cobb (DiCaprio) finally begins to assemble his team of dream invaders for the title job. Tom Hardy plays Eames, aka “The Forger,” who has mastered shape shifting within dreams.
 

Tom Hardy and Joseph Gordon-Levitt in Inception

Like every cast member, Hardy has to deliver vast amounts of exposition. He’s the character that first tells us why “Inception,” the planting of an idea in dream state, is so difficult. Exposition is often poison for actors, or at least a major obstacle to healthy characterizations; it’s an unnatural way of speaking and reveals only information and plot mechanics, rather than personality and emotional arcs. But Hardy works wonders by moving in the opposite direction of the dialogue. He’ll tell you how difficult something is, but his body language and voice are suggestively casual, as if he’s daring you to ignore the dangerous implications he’s reciting. He also sneaks in dry humor that helps humanize the often machine-like film. Just listen to the way he says the name “Arthur” (Gordon-Levitt), and you don’t even need the follow up sentence—though you’re waiting with delight to hear it—in which he’ll tell you what he thinks of him.
 
We first meet Eames while he’s gambling in Mombasa. A sudden eruption of violence punctuates his introduction. You don’t even need the locale or the chase to realize that he’s a risk taker and a good man in your corner during a dangerous mission. It’s all there in the performance. Hardy jumpstarts Inception just as first-act information fatigue begins to set in, with the film borrowing his own electricity. He all but pops off the screen like he’s the only thing they filmed in 3D.
 

Tom Hardy in Bronson

Hardy’s career began in 2001, with the WW II miniseries Band of Brothers and the action packed Black Hawk Down. He’s had ten years of practice at these manly “team mission” films, and it shows. His recent eccentric star turn in the little seen Bronson, in which he plays a violent British inmate, indicates that he’s confident enough to carry an entire picture, too. He’ll do just that when he takes over Mel Gibson’s signature role in Mad Max: Fury Road (2012). Soon Tom Hardy will be punctuated with an exclamation point rather than a question mark.

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Click the poster to find movie times near you for Inception: