The Hit List: Donald Sutherland

   According to the Internet Movie Database, when Donald Sutherland signed on to play the pot-smoking literature professor in "Animal House", he was offered a choice: $75,000 guaranteed, or a percentage of the profits. Figuring the picture wouldn't make a dime, Sutherland went for the sure money. If he'd taken the points instead, he would've made millions. 
    I'm pretty sure Sutherland has made millions anyway. He's been acting in films for 50 years, and it's hard to think of anybody else in that time who's had a more prolific and enduring career. Michael Caine. Christopher Lee. Redford and Clint and Woody, I guess. It's not a long list. 
    Sutherland hasn't just made a lot of movies, he's made all kinds of them, and his characters defy categorization. Priests, artists, killers, thieves, soldiers, scholars, spies, leads and supporting roles, a whole film vault full of rogues and dreamers and misfits and crazies (and even a few honest men) that few other actors could match. 
    Here's a tiny selection of films that suggest Sutherland's range:

"The Dirty Dozen" 
(1967/Robert Aldrich)
In a famous gallery of psychos and weirdos, Sutherland's Vernon Pinkley stands out as a case study in what it means to be functionally deranged.
"M*A*S*H" 
(1970/Robert Altman)
The original Hawkeye Pierce.
"Kelly's Heroes" 
(1970/Brian G. Huttton)
Sutherland plays a character named Oddball, and there's that spaghetti-style showdown with a German tank. Who knew there were hippies during World War Two?
"Don't Look Now" 
(1973/Nicolas Roeg)
There's Venice, which is creepy, and that love scene with Sutherland and Julie Christie, which is hot.
"1900" 
(1976/Bernardo Bertolucci)
Sutherland plays a fascist in Bertolucci's epic about Italy in the 20th century. 
"Invasion of the Body Snatchers" 
(1978/Philip Kaufman)
Sutherland plays a restaurant inspector on the run from the pod people in Kaufman's tense remake of the 1956 Don Siegel film.
"Bear Island" 
(1979/Don Sharp)
Adventure in the Arctic, with a diverse international cast. Watch it and see if you don't think Sutherland's doing a Canadian John Wayne.
"Wolf At the Door" 
(1987/Henning Carlsen)
Sutherland as Gauguin.
"Citizen X" 
(1995/Chris Gerolmo)
Sutherland won an Emmy in a murder mystery about a Soviet army officer locked in a long cat-and-mouse game with a dogged investigator played by Stephen Rea.
"Space Cowboys" 
(2000/Clint Eastwood)
Sutherland's having a ball as the resident Lothario in Eastwood's gang of ancient astronauts.

    Sutherland's in his late 70s now. His hair, which can change dramatically from one role to the next, long ago turned white. Younger viewers would probably recognize him as President Snow in the "Hunger Games" films. For the rest of us, there will always be the firebug in "Backdraft", the assassin in "Eye of the Needle", Oddball, John Klute and Hawkeye Pierce. A hundred characters at least, in a hundred eclectic movies, and if you don't mention that he once appeared in a dreary waste of time and film called "Revolution", neither will I.