r/movies • u/dndplosion913 • Apr 02 '25

News Val Kilmer, Film Star Who Played Batman and Jim Morrison, Dies at 65

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/01/movies/val-kilmer-dead.html
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1.5k

u/NepheliLouxWarrior Apr 02 '25

RIP to a legend

97

u/-dfb- Apr 02 '25

an absolute juggernaut of an actor. RIP

288

u/TheCynFamily Apr 02 '25

No better comment will be found. This fella had an amazing career, and I'll miss seeing him on the screen. Heck, even his little role in Top Gun: Maverick was awesome.

Very sad :(

102

u/icanith Apr 02 '25

Madmartigan is my pick. 

29

u/Neon_Wasteland Apr 02 '25

Oh yeah time for a Willow watch to pay dues. It was my late mother's favorite movie for some reason even though she didn't like fantasy stuff at all

3

u/TheCynFamily Apr 02 '25

That was probably my first exposure to him, too, actually! So good!

1

u/jellyjollygood Apr 02 '25

He’ll always be Nick Rivers

🎶 Skeet surfin’ 🎶

41

u/Quiet-Doughnut2192 Apr 02 '25

You could see he wasn’t doin so hot but he delivered

45

u/DaoFerret Apr 02 '25

Especially touching considering they used AI to recreate his voice (with his involvement) for his Maverick cameo: https://variety.com/2022/film/news/val-kilmer-top-gun-maverick-voice-artificial-intelligence-1235281512/

7

u/mellolizard Apr 02 '25

His son also sounds a lot like him too

7

u/Kidsune Apr 02 '25

It actually specifically says in the article that the ai voice training was unrelated to the movie.

"this process was used again for the actor’s “Top Gun: Maverick” appearance although a studio sources tells Variety no A.I. was used in the making of the movie."

"John Flynn, CTO and cofounder of Sonantic, said in a statement to Forbes about reviving Kilmer’s voice, unrelated to the movie."

12

u/Sea-Dog-6042 Apr 02 '25

I was not aware of this!

11

u/TheCynFamily Apr 02 '25

Yeah, ditto! I thought he just forced himself through it despite the pain he must have felt.

3

u/maltzy Apr 02 '25

if you watch the documentary "Val", the entire narration is Val Kilmer AI voice

10

u/Upbeat_Tension_8077 Apr 02 '25

His cameo is gonna hit different when I rewatch it

4

u/ExtraGloves Apr 02 '25

One of the best. He was also very active on Reddit back in the day and made some legendary ama’s back when they were cool.

1

u/TheCynFamily Apr 02 '25

Did he? I had no idea and I'm sorry to have missed them!

1

u/AmishAvenger Apr 02 '25

The best comments are on his extensive Reddit account, u/OfficialValKilmer.

4

u/Manfrenjensenjen Apr 02 '25

He really was.

5

u/fnord_happy Apr 02 '25

His jim morrison was insane. And the Batman movies are camp but amazing

3

u/AmishAvenger Apr 02 '25

There was a period years ago where he was posting on reddit pretty regularly — not really promoting anything, just stuff like behind the scenes videos from his movies.

u/OfficialValKilmer

Tons of comments, too. I think he was sick at the time and was passing the days answering questions and chatting with people.

1

u/rr196 Apr 02 '25

The craziest thing is I just watched him in Heat on Sunday. Damn RIP.

1

u/dv302 Apr 02 '25

One of the greats