Billy Bob Thornton

Billy Bob Thornton plays Jacob in Sam Raimi's A Simple Plan, a man whose emotional grasp is as sharp as anyone's but who keeps taking a wrong step because of his mental limits. The month's lead review finds that portrait finely tuned and sets it above his similar part in Sling Blade, which he directed himself: it writes that the work is more moving this time because he never falls into the sentimentality that tinged the earlier playing. A second piece in the archive finds him enjoyable while dispensing cheap wisdom, but says the character is only a backdrop to the lead. Sling Blade, from 1996, took the first feature category at the 1997 Independent Spirit ceremony; in that category the award goes to the film's director.