Donald Sutherland stars as Hawkeye in M*A*S*H and President Snow in The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1.Murray Close/Supplied
If Canada could ever mystically will itself into becoming one single corporeal entity, its citizenry might elect to become Donald Sutherland. With his tall but gentle frame, subtle command of a room and a voice that my colleague Johanna Schneller perfectly described as the purr that a cashmere sweater would make if it could, Sutherland was the picture of dignified, curious, cut-your-heart-and-it-bleeds-maple-syrup Canadian hero. He also seemed to cherish his Hollywood work as much as he did his homegrown performances.
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Here are five of the best, and where to watch them in Canada now:
M*A*S*H
Actors Donald Sutherland, left, and Elliott Gould in Robert Altman's 1970 film M*A*S*H*.Bettmann/Getty Images
(Disney+)
Watching Robert Altman’s 1970 masterpiece today is a trip and a half, acting as much as an essential industry lesson in where and how Hollywood lost its go-for-broke gumption as much as it is a master class in what happens when the commitment of its on-screen performers matches the ambitions and energy of their director. A kind of epic study in tragicomedy, Altman’s Korean War set film places Sutherland’s army surgeon Hawkeye Pierce squarely in the thick of a subversive stew of human and historical error, with the actor fighting his way through the muck of his own and others’ flaws to barely come out the other end with his soul intact.
Don’t Look Now
(Criterion Channel, also available on-demand from Apple TV+, Prime Video, Google Play)
Nicolas Roeg’s thriller, adapted loosely from the 1971 Daphne du Maurier story, has inspired so many filmmakers today on the concepts and rules of ‘trauma’-based drama that one might think its shocks and impact have naturally lessened in the intervening decades. That would be a foolish mistake to make, as encountering Roeg’s film today is just as absorbing and flawless an experience as it must have been originally, with Sutherland and Julie Christie embodying all the million little flaws that we all hope to have hidden deep within ourselves, never to see light. On a trip to Venice following the recent accidental death of their daughter, the parents played by Sutherland and Christie are a couple so torn asunder that their performances are almost painful to endure. Don’t Look Now is such a rich film, though, that the hurt all adds up to a once-in-a-lifetime work of cinema worth any emotional injuries.
Ordinary People
Donald Sutherland and Mary Tyler Moore star as a couple trying to pick up the pieces of their shattered life after a major tragedy by planning a holiday trip to London in Ordinary People.Bettmann/Getty Images
(on-demand, including Apple TV+, Prime Video, Google Play)
It is a true shame that Robert Redford has stepped back from all on-screen duties, as his expertly directed 1980 tearjerker serves as the platonic ideal of the melodrama. Following the careful, slow, devastating downfall of a well-to-do family in suburban Illinois after a series of tragedies, the film not only stays very carefully within the bounds of territory that could feel manipulative and exploitative, but it also gives its extraordinary cast so much emotional weight to lift that it feels as if the whole thing is a daring feat of strength. Sutherland does the heaviest work as the patriarch, but his performance might seem somewhat isolating if it weren’t so delicately supported by Mary Tyler Moore as his equally emotionally destroyed wife and Timothy Hutton as their haunted son.
JFK
Kevin Costner, left, and Donald Sutherland in JFK in 1991.Warner Bros Inc.
(on-demand, including Apple TV+, Prime Video, Google Play)
Growing up, I’m not sure there was another young adult in all of Canada more obsessed with Oliver Stone’s JFK than me. I can’t recall exactly how I was introduced to the 1991 film — I had the habit of going to my local Blockbuster and grabbing any release whose length required two VHS tapes — but very quickly I fell down Stone’s rabbit hole. So much so that I coerced my father to drive me to a JFK conspiracy theorist talk at the local Chapters, and even shell out for two tickets to hear Stone himself give a guest lecture at the University of Toronto. And I cannot help but think so much of my attraction to Stone’s film was in part owing to Sutherland’s masterful appearance mid-film, in which the actor, playing “Mr. X,” is asked by his director to deliver a 10-minute-plus monologue detailing the entire history of the U.S. military-industrial complex. It is such a ridiculously paranoid role of conspiratorial fever dreams, but through his usual poise and dignified presence, Sutherland sells it with the slick confidence of a master manipulator.
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2
(Crave)
Sutherland managed to reach into the nightmares of an entirely new generation with his performance as the cruel fascist manipulating The Hunger Games. While his deliciously evil villain President Snow was more of a background presence than a real player in the first three films, he really came to the fore in the fourth and final entry, casting such a magnificent shadow over Panem that it was pretty obvious how the country fell into such a dystopia.
