Planet Sad At The Movies: Five Completely Unmemorable James Spader Films

Now, at Planet Sad if there's one thing we like it's a bit of James Spader. He's quite possibly our second favourite weirdly-chinned person of all time, after Ben Fogle's pal and bloke last seen being an utter brick at the North Pole, Dr Chinny. We loved Spader as the nerdy but cute archaeologist in Stargate (even if it would have been much funnier if the spurious ailment that plagued him on his galaxy-spanning trip to a desert planet was an allergy to sand), we loved him as the uptight yuppie in White Palace and we loved him as the uptight yuppie in - well, every other film where he's played an uptight yuppie. He even managed to spend most of the late Eighties looking cool in one of Princess Di's old haircuts.

See what we mean?

However, it can't be denied that if you flick through the late-night movie channel schedules, you'll find a number of Spader movies you may well have watched before - if only you could remember. They may once have been hip, edgy or vaguely controversial, but twenty minutes of any of these films is a better cure for insomnia than a cheeky brandy and Night Nurse. Set your Sky Plus next time any of these is on TCM if you absolutely must - but don't say we didn't warn you...

Driftwood
A weird psychological thriller from 1997, starring Spader as 'The Man'. Washed ashore after an unspecified accident (we're thinking it may have an ill-fated attempt to pedalo round Morecambe Bay after a night on the lash), he's looked after by Sarah (Anne Brochet), who somehow convinces him they're alone on a remote island when civilisation is really just down the road. What follows is lots of inner torment and angsty sex, in a scenario that seems to have been designed for the female equivalent of those Japanese fetishists who get off on pictures of women in traction. If we remember rightly, The Man tries to escape on a home-made balsa wood raft, only to fall into the clutches of Harry Enfield's Lovely Wobbly Randy Old Ladies.

Never let a spider high on caffeine offer to ink your tattoos...

2 Days In The Valley
Dating back to the era when every other film seemed to be written and directed by a pound shop Quentin Tarantino, 2 Days In The Valley is a tale of intersecting lives in LA, where all the characters are indirectly involved in some crime or other and everyone's dialogue is so sharp that, frankly, it'll probably cut itself. Instead of Samuel L. Jackson and his eff-off sideburns, filling the role of stone-cold hired killer is wee James, which is about as convincing as it sounds. Although it's not his fault - it's hard to look menacing when the haircut and specs you've been given make you look like Gok Wan's stunt double...

It's all about the confidence

Storyville
A tale of blackmail and political intrigue - or so we think, because we gave up on this one halfway through in favour of a repeat of Dale's Supermarket Sweep on Challenge +1. Honestly, if we'd had any pants on at the time, it would have bored them off us. Spader has one of those names you only ever get in fiction, Cray Fowler, and is an aspiring senator, except someone's got incriminating footage of him with martial arts expert Charlotte Lewis - footage which may well explain why her career was all downhill after The Golden Child. Joanne Whalley-Kilmer's in there somewhere, too, and the New Orleans accents are so thick you could probably chew them, but don't ask us who was blackmailing James or why. At a stab, we reckon it was Colonel Plum, in the library, with the lead piping...

If we knew judo lessons were like this, we'd have signed up years ago

True Colors
Another stab at exposing the seamy underbelly of politics, or something, only this time it's John Cusack who wants to get into Congress and will do whatever it takes to get there, Spader as the best friend he dumps on repeatedly from a great height and Imogen Stubbs in the Whalley-Kilmer role as the underwritten love interest with the wandering accent. Our interest picked up a bit when we spotted Captain Brass out of CSI sporting one of the worst mullets in the history of film, but apart from that, you can file this one under 'seen it all before'. Please, file it there, otherwise we might watch it again by accident.

Maybe we should kiss, just to break the tension...

Dream Lover
This load of old tut sees Spader playing a character called Ray Reardon. That fact is the best thing about the film. He's a divorcee who embarks on a steamy affair with the mysterious Lena (Madchen Amick) and marries her in double-quick time, only to realise he has no idea who she really is. Cue lots of surreal dream sequences, mostly involving clowns, and this all-time classic line of dialogue: 'People are like onions. Layers within layers'. And we thought it was because they make you cry and they're sometimes seen hanging round the necks of Frenchmen on bikes. Someone lent us a copy of the video, because he knew how much we like James Spader. We don't talk to him any more...

Look, they couldn't afford the dwarf, okay?