Hurt's career as leading victim of the British cinema was established
with a brilliant characterisation of Timothy Evans, hanged in 1944 for
crimes he did not commit, in Richard Fleischer's 10
Rillington' Place (1970). Hurt's image projects pain and vulnerability,
and his distinctive voice quavers with sensitivity. Regularly cast for
type, his performances have a strength which his characters may lack.
He won a British Academy Best Supporting Actor award for his role in
Alan Parker's Midnight Express (1978)
and a Best Actor award for his unsentimental performance in the title
role of David Lynch's The
Elephant Man (1980).
One of his most distinctive achievements was on television in The Naked
Civil Servant (1975), where his Quentin Crisp responds to his victimisation
with flamboyant eccentricity. His appearance in Alien (1979) is brief,
but to the point; he gives a near definitive performance as Winston
Smith in Mike Radford's Nineteen
Eighty-Four (1984); and his performance in The Field (1990) is as
grotesque and excessive as the character demands. More recently he has
had supporting roles in Chris Menges'
Second Best (1993), Gus Van Saut's Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (1993),
and as the very wicked Tim Roth's moderately
wicked patron in Rob Roy (1995).
