He didn’t have a lead role inGone in 60 Seconds, butTimothy Olyphantwas front and center for a good portion of the movie. The action heist movie from 2000 was a loose remake of the 1974 flick of the same name and starredNicolas Cage,Angelina Jolie, Giovanni Ribisi, Robert Duvall,and a diverse ensemble cast.
Cage played Randal “Memphis” Raines, a reformed car thief who gets pulled back an auto-theft ring to save his brother, Kip (Ribisi), after he was kidnapped. As Memphis returns to boosting cars, the appearances of his former love interest, Sara “Sway” Wayland (Jolie), Sphinx (Vinnie Jones), and Otto Halliwell(Duvall) as well as the Detectives Castlebeck and Drycoff (Delroy Lindo and Olyphant) both complicate and help him in his efforts.
Gone in 60 Seconds
Gone in 60 Secondshas become a cult classic, albeit one the critics did not like. With its lackluster Rotten Tomatoes score and negative reviews aside,Gone in 60 Secondsis a fun ride with plenty of eye candy for car lovers and Cage and Olyphant, too.
When ‘Gone In 60 Seconds’ Was Made, Timothy Olyphant Was a Rising Star While Nicolas Cage Was at the Height of His Popularity
Nicolas Cage madeGone in 60 Secondson theheels of some of the biggest successes in his career.This includes 995’sLeaving Las Vegas(and his Academy Award for Best Actor), 1997’sCon AirandFace/Off, andCity of AngelsandSnake Eyesfrom 1998. Elvis Mitchell fromThe New York Timesdescribed Cage as an actorwho started off making low-budget movies and worked their way up to “big-budget movies that have less narrative than a Gap ad.” He continued,
“Nicolas Cage, whose hammy intensity and baleful, unpredictable presence was a godsend for directors looking to bring power and presence to their films, is just one of those actors.”
Mitchell made it clear Angelina Jolie and Robert Duvall were in the same category.
Timothy Olyphant, for his part, had dabbled in independent films having madeGo!the previous year.Olyphant had already made an impression in movies likeThe First Wives Club(1996) andScream 2(1997),attesting to his range.Gone in 60 Secondshelped pave the way for future roles, including moreportrayals of lawmen inDeadwood(2004-2006),Justified(2010-2015), andThe Mandalorian(2020).
Interestingly enough, Olyphant turned down a role in another movie about stealing cars.As Olyphant explainedto Andy Cohen onWatch What Happens Live with Andy Cohenin 2018:
“I just thought, well, this will just be stupid, and I thought no one is gonna wanna see this movie eight or nine different times. I mean, by the third or fourth sequel, people are gonna definitely get bored of it. Right?”
Olyphant has no regrets because, as he put it, “No. It’s not my thing.”
Nicolas Cage’s Horror Action Movie With 90% on Rotten Tomatoes Is Now Streaming Free
It’s easily one of the Oscar-winning actor’s best performances.
‘Gone in 60 Seconds’ Was Panned by Critics and Under-Performed at the Box Office
Dozens of cars were stolen throughoutGone in 60 Seconds,with Ferraris, Porsches, Jaguars, and Mustangs among the mix. The 1967 Shelby Mustang GT500 called “Eleanor” by Randal “Memphis” Raines (Nicolas Cage)has been described as,
The epitome of American muscle… [an] iconic beauty becomes a symbol of power, speed, and the pursuit of automotive perfection.
There were no real complaints about the cars, just the characters. According to Roger Ebert,Gone in 60 Secondswas “the kind of movie that ends up playing on the TV set over the bar in a better movie.“His opinion of the movie was pretty consistent with the rest of the critics, who were highly critical of its ability to entertain.Varietywas perhaps the most concise:
Film flops on every level: Attempt to populate the story with human characters and emotional motivation (utterly absent from the original) is lame and programmatic… [the] lensing is muddily sulfurous and the insistently chaotic score mechanically uses the beginning of nearly every scene for a music cue.
The budget forGone in 60 Secondsreflected the fleet of cars featured in the movie.The $90 million price tag forGone in 60 Secondswas supposed to be offset by the presence of Nic Cage and Angelina Jolie,two of the biggest names in Hollywood.
Unfortunately, the characters, described as “thin and less endearing than their creators think” by Philip French fromThe Observer, failed to deliver.Gone in 60 Secondsearneda dismal $25 millionin its opening weekend,although it did ultimately earn just over $237 million worldwide. Dinsey reported the movie lost theproduction company more than $200 million.
3 Timothy Olyphant Movies and Shows You Can Stream Right Now on Netflix
If you’re looking to get your Timothy Olyphant fix, Netflix is streaming these 3 movies and shows right now.
Nicolas Cage and Timothy Olyphant Were Also in ‘Snowden’ Together in 2016
After makingGone in 60 Seconds Togethermore than 15 years earlier,Nicolas Cage and Timothy Olyphant appeared in Oliver Stone’sSnowden.Thelatter movie is a far cry from a flick about stealing cars with adrenaline rushes galore, however.The biographical thriller about Edward Snowden, the government employee who leaked classified information from the National Security Agency was much more cerebral.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt headed the movie in the titular role whileCage played Hank Forrester and Olyphant played CIA Agent Geneva.There was no interaction between Cage and Olyphant on screen and, as Bryan BishopofThe Vergeexplained, Gordon-Levitt as Snowden,
meets a dusty old professor named Hank Forrester, who seems to exist in the film for no other reason thansomebodyneeded to spell out that Sometimes The Government Does Things That Are Bad.
Snowdenwas somewhat more successful with critics who praised Gordon-Levitt’s performance and found Stone’s presentation of the story to be fairly satisfying. The Rotten Tomatoes score forSnowden, to compare, is 61%.
