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Long before Sam Neill was hugging a Triceratops or helping King Arthur find Excalibur, he was taking on leading roles throughout the horror genre. Having such a sweet demeanor and voice, you would never think that the guy who hangs out with ducks and has piano jams with Jeff Goldblum would have played the son of Satan. In fact, Neill’s first lead role in a feature film was in horror. We highlight Sam Neill’s contributions to horror, as he’s not just been a side note, but has brought some extremely unique classics to the genre.
Sam Neill’s first role in horror, and his first leading role in a feature film, was in The Omen III: The Final Contact (1981). In this film, Neill plays the role of an adult Damien Thorn, now appointed to U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain, the occupation that Gregory Peck held in The Omen. Neill plays the part wickedly as his mission is to shape the destiny of the Earth and halt the second coming of Christ. It’s not exactly a great film, but it definitely turns the series in an interesting direction. In the same year, he had the lead role in Possession, as a man who starts to deal with violent outbursts from his wife, and suspects her of cheating, only to find out that she’s been possessed by a strange creature. There are some truly wild moments in this film, and the ending is just as chaotic and crazy as the rest of it. It’s in the very early 80’s, so it feels more like that brooding 70’s horror than the flashy 80’s stuff, but still worth the watch.
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After taking a break from horror for about six years, Neill returned with Dead Calm (1989). This is a great film! He and Nicole Kidman take a getaway on their sailboat after the death of their child. While out to sea, they come upon a marooned Billy Zane, who tricks Neill into leaving the boat, and captures Kidman. Neill is the hero in this one, and we get the full psychopathic, murdering Zaniac. In 1995, Neill was cast in arguably John Carpenter’s last great film, In The Mouth of Madness. Carpenter and Neill had previously worked together on Memoirs of an Invisible Man and Carpenter thought he’d be perfect for the leading role of horror writer Sutter Cane. In my opinion, this is one of the best horror films of the 90’s. It’s a truly great psychological horror, has amazing effects, a rocking soundtrack, and Neill is fantastic as he circles the drain of insanity throughout the film. It’s clear he uses this film as experience to pave his role in the next film of his career.
Neill put the bad guy cap back on for Event Horizon (1997) when he portrayed Dr. William Weir, possessed by the evil on his spaceship that traveled through a wormhole and made a pit stop in hell. The film is a little dated feeling now, but Neill is absolutely nightmare-inducing as the villain, while cutting open people and hanging them from the ceilings to let their insides fall out, and uttering the famous words, “Where we’re going…we don’t need eyes to see!”.
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Along with Event Horizon, in 1997, Neill played Snow White’s father, and husband to the Evil Queen (Sigourney Weaver) in the surprisingly good Showtime movie Snow White: A Tale of Terror. The film follows the more traditional spooky Grim Fairytale story, putting it right in that fantasy-horror genre that doesn’t get enough love. Neill took a long break from horror to do a plethora of dramas and miniseries, but returned to the genre in Daybreakers (2009), a futuristic film in which almost the entire world’s population has turned to vampires. Neill portrays a greedy pharmaceutical tycoon whose company holds not only the majority of human blood left in the world but are also trying to develop a suitable blood substitute for the vampire population. After another horror hiatus, he returned in 2015 with the underrated psychological ghost movie, Backtrack, trying to convince Adrien Brody that his visions and hallucinations are from psychotic breaks, not visits from the paranormal.
Although Neill’s returns to horror are fewer and further between as he’s gotten older, his contributions should be acknowledged and appreciated. He seems to jump back into things every five or six years, and he is involved with an upcoming War of the Worlds-inspired series, Invasion, so maybe we’ll get something there.
If you haven’t seen Sam Neill’s horror work, I recommend checking some of it out, and if you have, what’s your favorite movie or role of his?
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