Dustin Hoffman describes why he loves the film: Next came director Barry Levinson's "Rain Man" (1988), where Hoffman starred as an autistic savant, opposite Tom Cruise. Levinson, Hoffman and Cruise worked for two years on the film, and Hoffman's performance gained him his second Academy Award. Behind Hoffman's motivation for doing the film, he has said, "Deep inside, "Rain Man" is about how autistic we all are." In preparation for the part, Hoffman spent two years befriending autistic people, which included taking them bowling and to fast food restaurants. "It fed my obsession," he has stated. Hoffman worked at the New York
Philip Seymour Hoffman and precision," but the film earned little at the box office. Hoffman's second 2003 appearance was a small role in Anthony Minghella's successful Civil War epic "Cold Mountain". He played an immoral preacher, a complex character that Hoffman described as a "mass of contradictions". The same year, from April to August, he appeared with Vanessa Redgrave in a Broadway revival of Eugene O'Neill's "Long Day's Journey into Night". Director Robert Falls later commented on the dedication and experience that Hoffman brought to his role of alcoholic Jamie Tyrone: "Every night he ripped it up to an extent that he couldn't