Oliver Reed

Acting

Oliver Reed

Born 1938-02-13 · Wimbledon, London, England, UK

Robert Oliver Reed (February 13, 1938 – May 2, 1999) was an English actor known for his "hellraiser" lifestyle. After making his first significant screen appearances in Hammer Horror films in the early 1960s, his notable films include The Trap (1966), playing Bill Sikes in the 1968 Best Picture Oscar winner Oliver! (a film directed by his uncle Carol Reed), Women in Love (1969), Hannibal Brooks (1969), The Devils (1971), portraying Athos in The Three Musketeers (1973) and The Four Musketeers (1974); the lover and stepfather in Tommy (1975), Funny Bones (1995) and Gladiator (2000). For playing Antonius Proximo, the old, gruff gladiator trainer in Ridley Scott's Gladiator, in what was his final film, Reed was posthumously nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role in 2000. At the peak of his career, in 1971, British exhibitors voted Reed fifth most popular star at the box office. The British Film Institute (BFI) stated that "partnerships with Michael Winner and Ken Russell in the mid-60s saw Reed become an emblematic Brit-flick icon", but from the mid-1970s his alcoholism began affecting his career, with the BFI adding "Reed had assumed Robert Newton's mantle as Britain's thirstiest thespian".

Acting credits

Gladiator poster
8.2

After the death of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, his devious son takes power and demotes Maximus, one of Rome's most capable generals who Marcus preferred. Eventually, Maximus is forced to become a gladiator and battle to the death against other men for the amusement of paying audiences.

Gladiator

2000

The Hunting Party poster
6.2

A ruthless rancher, and his gang, use extremely long range rifles to kill the men who kidnapped his wife.

The Hunting Party

1971

The Adventures of Baron Munchausen poster
7.0

An account of Baron Munchausen's supposed travels and fantastical experiences with his band of misfits.

The Adventures of Baron Munchausen

1988

The Brood poster
6.7

A man tries to uncover an unconventional psychologist's therapy techniques on his institutionalised wife, amidst a series of brutal murders.

The Brood

1979

The Devils poster
7.4

In 1634 France, charismatic Father Urbain Grandier becomes the target of a sexually obsessed nun’s witchcraft accusations, which corrupt church and state officials are all too happy to exploit.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

The Devils

1971

Spasms poster
4.6

A gigantic serpent is captured on a remote island and shipped to an American college for experimentation.

Spasms

1983

Tommy poster
6.5

After a series of traumatic childhood events, a psychosomatically deaf, dumb and blind boy becomes a master pinball player and the object of a religious cult.

Tommy

1975

Treasure Island poster
6.7

Young Jim Hawkins, while running the Benbow Inn with his mother, meets Captain Billy Bones, who dies at the inn while it is beseiged by buccaneers led by Blind Pew. Jim and his mother fight off the attackers and discover Billy Bones' treasure map for which the buccaneers had come. Jim agrees to sail on the S.S. Hispaniola with Squire Trelawney and Dr. Livesey to find the treasure on a mysterious island. Upon arriving at the island, ship's cook and scallywag Long John Silver leads a mutiny of crew members who want the treasure for themselves. Jim helps the Squire and Hispaniola officers to survive the mutiny and fight back against Silver's men, who have taken over the ship.

Treasure Island

1990

Women in Love poster
6.6

Growing up in the sheltered confines of a 1920s English coal-mining community, free-spirited sisters Gudrun and Ursula explore erotic love with a wealthy playboy and a philosophical educator, with cataclysmic results for all four.

Women in Love

1969

The Assassination Bureau poster
6.7

In 1908 London, a women's rights campaigner discovers the Assassination Bureau Limited, an organization that kills for justice. When its motives are called into question, she commissions the assassination of its chairman. Knowing that his colleagues have recently become more motivated by greed than morality, he turns the situation into a challenge for his board members: kill him or be killed.

The Assassination Bureau

1969

The Three Musketeers poster
6.7

In 17th century France, young D'Artagnan wants to join the King's Musketeers, but instead befriends three legendary musketeers—Athos, Porthos, and Aramis—and together, they become embroiled in the political intrigue surrounding King Louis XIII and his adversaries, particularly the powerful Cardinal Richelieu.

The Three Musketeers

1973

The Pit and the Pendulum poster
5.8

Set during the height of Spanish Inquisition. The beautiful and kind-hearted Maria is arrested as a witch when she inadvertently cries out in horror at the public whipping of a child. As Maria’s husband Antonio tries to save her, Torquemada, the Grand Inquisitor, determines to punish Maria with torture for the desire she inflames in him. Loosely based on Edgar Allen Poe's classic short story.

The Pit and the Pendulum

1991

Oliver! poster
7.0

Musical adaptation of Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist, a classic tale of an orphan who runs away from the workhouse and joins up with a group of boys headed by the Artful Dodger and trained to be pickpockets by master thief Fagin.

Oliver!

1968

Celebrity Naked Ambition poster
5.3

Documentary looking at how nudity has been used in the movies, sometimes shrewdly and other times without thought.

Celebrity Naked Ambition

2003

Lion of the Desert poster
7.3

Resistance leader Omar Mukhtar opposes Italian colonization before World War II. The brutal guerrilla war against Italian General Rodolfo Graziani and the Fascist forces of Benito Mussolini highlights the struggle for Libyan independence and the harsh tactics utilised by the colonisers.

Lion of the Desert

1981

The Big Sleep poster
5.8

Private eye Philip Marlowe investigates a case of blackmail involving the two wild daughters of a rich general, a pornographer and a gangster.

The Big Sleep

1978

Burnt Offerings poster
6.5

A family moves into a large old mansion in the countryside which seems to have a mysterious and sinister power over its new residents.

Burnt Offerings

1976

The Four Musketeers poster
6.5

The Four Musketeers defend the queen and her dressmaker from Cardinal Richelieu and Milady de Winter.

The Four Musketeers

1974

The Prince and the Pauper poster
6.1

Tom Canty is a poor English boy who bears a remarkable resemblance to Edward, Prince of Wales and son of King Henry VIII. The two boys meet and decide to play a joke on the court by dressing in each other's clothes, but the plan goes awry when they're separated and each must live the other's life.

The Prince and the Pauper

1977

Revolver poster
6.8

An Italian prison official's wife is kidnapped, and the kidnappers demand that a notorious prisoner be released in order for the man to get his wife back. He gets the man released - but then kidnaps him himself, in order to ensure that the man's colleagues don't kill his wife. Enraged, the gang sets out to free their compatriot and kill the man who took him.

Revolver

1973

Funny Bones poster
6.6

Tommy Fawkes wants to be a successful comedian. After his Las Vegas debut is a failure, he returns to Blackpool where his father—also a comedian—started, and where he spent the summers of his childhood.

Funny Bones

1995

The Curse of the Werewolf poster
6.5

A child conceived by a mute servant girl transforms from an innocent youth to a killer beast at night with uncontrollable urges.

The Curse of the Werewolf

1961

Gor poster
3.8

American professor Tarl Cabot is transported via a magical ring to planet Gor, where he must help an oppressed country overthrow its evil king and his barbarian henchmen.

Gor

1987

The Misfit Brigade poster
5.7

War story of the 27th Panzers, Hitler's heavy-duty combat regiment composed of prisoners.

The Misfit Brigade

1987