by Gene Siskel

(TV Guide, February 13, 1999)

    If you ask the big-name stars in Hollywood to pick their favorite actors, Morgan Freeman would  appear at the top of most lists. His star really began to rise when he received an Academy Award  nomination for Best Supporting Actor for the role of Fast Black, a savvy, dangerously charismatic pimp  in "Street Smart" (1987). That's a long way to travel for an actor who first came to national attention for  his work on The Electric Company.

    What I think Freeman brings to the screen is an absolutely sober, confident presentation of every line  of dialogue. There is no artifice, no uncertainty, no indecision. His delivery of his lines reminds me most  of Harrison Ford, whose performances are always confident and clean.

    Freeman also brings a certain maturity to his roles with that wonderfully weathered face. No matter  what he's confronting in a scene, I always get the sense that he has dealt with the obstacle before. That  includes his performance in Steven Spielberg's 1997 epic "Amistad," which makes its premium-channel  premiere Saturday, February 13, on HBO. The film chronicles a slave revolt on the spanish ship La  Amistad in 1839. The Africans who took command of the ship were ultimately judged by the court  system of the United States, where lawyers debated vigorously whether the slaves were freemen or  merely property.

    Freeman plays an abolitionist in the film, and even when he's arguing with former U.S. president  John Quincy Adams (Anthony Hopkins), he comes across as the senior statesman. You get the feeling  Freeman could steal any scene from any actor with his quiet resolve if he chose to do so.

  His talent is also on view on Showtime February 13 with the premium-channel debut of "Hard Rain." This 1998 action-adventure is one part heist film, one part disaster flick -- the work of the writer-producer team behind "Speed" and "Broken Arrow." Here, Freeman plays a career thief who is pitted against armored-car courier Christian Slater. They are engaged in a tug-of-war over a $3 million shipment of cash. In true Hollywood fashion,their struggle takes place as rising flood waters consume a small Midwestern town.

  It is clear that Freeman has senior status in this film, and he effortlessly guides Slater's every move. What a comfort it must have been for co-producer Slater to work alongside Freeman. Any actor must sense that a false move would be covered with his brotherly -- even fatherly -- compassion. Given these two examples -- "Amistad" and "Hard Rain" -- perhaps we should anoint Morgan Freeman as the day's reigning supporting actor. He's the wind beneath the wings of every one of his lucky costars.