AVQ&A: Our favorite Sam Neill roles beyond Jurassic Park

Honoring the actor who was Dr. Alan Grant—and so much more.

By The A.V. Club  |  July 13, 2026 | 3:57pm
By Erik Adams, Monica Castillo, Danette Chavez, Will Harris, and Jacob Oller. Screenshots, from top left: The Hunt For Red October, My Brilliant Career, In The Mouth Of Madness, Hunt For The Wilderpeople
Film Features AVQ&A
AVQ&A: Our favorite Sam Neill roles beyond Jurassic Park

New Zealand actor and, by all accounts social media and otherwise, really solid dude Sam Neill has died at the age of 78. Across half a century on stage and on screen, he appeared in horror classics, landmarks of New Zealand and Australian cinema, and, of course, one of the biggest movies ever made. When The A.V. Club began discussing our favorite performances by Neill, we took it as a given that we’d probably all pick his turn as Jurassic Park‘s Dr. Alan Grant. And so, to honor the expansive range of an actor so good, he could convince you the prop gun stuck to his temple was being held by an invisible Chevy Chase, we ask: What’s your favorite Sam Neill role that isn’t Dr. Grant?

Vasily Borodin, The Hunt For Red October

Being eight years old at the time of Jurassic Park’s release meant most of Sam Neill’s pre-Dr. Grant performances were either off-limits or of no interest to me and the rest of my elementary-school peers. Not a ton of mid-’90s birthday parties with a My Brilliant Career theme, you know? And so it’s always a great joy to fire up something from that period and unexpectedly see his name in the credits, like when I finally got around to watching The Hunt For Red October a few years back. Neill’s portrayal of Soviet submarine EO Vasily Borodin is a prime example of splitting the difference between leading man and character actor: He’s an utterly magnetic and distinct presence (those eyes!), while projecting a generous awareness of his role in the narrative and position among the other dramatic heavyweights John McTiernan packed into Red October’s sardine-can sets. And he gets rewarded for that team-player mentality, first with Vasily’s soliloquy about life as a defector in the American West, and then later when a saboteur’s bullet puts an end to that dream, with the pitch-perfect send-off from Neill: “I would like to have seen Montana.” You can see how Steven Spielberg might’ve watched those scenes and thought, “There’s my Alan Grant”—they’re evidence that Neill would be able to command the screen in the early parts of Jurassic Park, before clearing the way for the dinosaurs. [Erik Adams]

“Uncle” Hector, Hunt For The Wilderpeople 

I will also note that Jurassic Park was one of the first movies I saw in theaters, and that it left a dino-sized impression on me as well. I can also see a through-line from Dr. Grant to Hunt For The Wilderpeople‘s Hector Faulkner: The two men are hunted in a vast wilderness by unrelenting predators (or, as Rachel House might put it, Terminators) with only their wits to guide them. They’re both single-minded in their pursuits (for Grant, it’s his research; for Hector, it’s hunting) until they find themselves helping imperiled children and eventually—grudgingly—coming to care about said children. But I don’t see “Uncle” Hector as a riff on Grant so much as a full-circle moment for the late Neill, who imbues the Wilderpeople character with equal parts melancholy and moxie. It’s as if he was acknowledging the impact Jurassic Park had on his life, while also showing the great depths he was still pulling from at that point in his career. If part of your legacy is opening up the world for kids on screen and off, that’s a life well lived. [Danette Chavez]

Emerson Hauser, Alcatraz

The thing about Sam Neill is that he’s so good in everything that it’s hard to narrow down a favorite performance, so I’m going with an outlier in his filmography, one that’s inarguably not the best thing he ever did. It is, however, a classic example of how he elevates everything and everyone around him: Alcatraz, the  J.J. Abrams-produced supernatural drama that ran for one season on Fox in 2012. Okay, fine, I’m partial to it because it’s the program that led to my Random Roles with Neill, and one for which I even did weekly recaps for The A.V. Club, but it’s also a perfect illustration of how he was able to turn a ridiculous premise into something perfectly watchable and frequently quite enjoyable. And make no mistake, it’s Neill who lures you in, thanks to his opening voiceover: “On March 21, 1963, Alcatraz officially closed due to rising costs and decrepit facilities. All the prisoners were transferred off the island. Only that’s not what happened. Not at all.” (Admit it: you read that in his voice, didn’t you?) And as it turns out, it’s rather re-watchable, as I confirmed when I stumbled upon the series on Tubi not long ago. [Will Harris]

John Trent, In The Mouth Of Madness

The same skills that allowed Sam Neill to deliver one of the greatest Spielberg faces ever put to screen in Jurassic Park also bolstered his bona fides as a scream king. Few actors were confronted with so many Lovecraftian horrors over their careers, and fewer still could teeter on the edge of insanity like Neill. As insurance investigator John Trent, Neill not only lets his emotional incredulity drive In The Mouth Of Madness’ story of a missing horror author whose work is bleeding into reality, but it sets up a perfect contrast for when Trent inevitably goes all the way off the deep end by the film’s finale. Confidence crumbles, replaced by chaos—and he’s great at both. Neill’s bulging eyes and corrupted charm are put to perfect use as Trent slowly succumbs to the crazytown of Hobb’s End. But whether he’s covered in crosses in an asylum or chuckling as his own story plays out on a movie screen in front of him, it’s the sincerity with which Neill plays Trent’s escalating mental torment that grounds John Carpenter’s off-the-rails cosmic horror in reality. [Jacob Oller]

Harry Beecham, My Brilliant Career

As a critic, Gillian Armstrong’s 1979 film about a young woman struggling to become a writer in late 1800s Australia will always have a soft spot in my heart. In addition to Judy Davis’ wildly charismatic performance and Armstong’s lush storytelling and direction, part of the appeal of My Brilliant Career also belongs to Sam Neill’s heartbreaking performance as the lead character’s childhood friend-turned-love interest, Harry Beecham. As a couple, Harry and Davis’ Sybylla are equally matched in youthful and flirtatious energy, but Neill carries a certain insecure tenderness in Harry that causes him to act out, driving a tension between the two would-be lovers. Yet, in other moments, Neill pleads with Sybylla to love him back, begging for an answer he knows doesn’t exist. Armstrong and Neill find a flawed sweetheart version of Mr. Darcy, creating quite the conundrum for our heroine. Does she follow her heart or follow her dreams? [Monica Castillo]

 
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