Ten Best Performances: I am usurping this section Feb 24 '07    Write an essay on this topic. Tweet Popular Products in Movies 1776 From $8 Alias - The Complete Fifth Season From $20 The Bottom Line This list of my favourite performances by men in film is meant to be a tribute to the art. Hello everyone, and let my just say it is good to be back. Unfortunately the demands of the world had made it impossible for me to write for a very long time. Being a student with a job and girlfriend doesn’t leave much time for anything else. Through careful scheduling however, I finally have the opportunity to post something. In keeping with the spirit of the Oscar season, I decided to post my top ten performances by a male actor. These performances have either entertained or touched me in such a way that I decided it was necessary to recognize them. Some are from films that most likely everyone has seen before, others might be less well known. Enjoy! 10: George C. Scott in Patton Winning a richly deserved Oscar for his role in this interesting biopic, Scott is probably better remembered now for his refusal to attend the Academy ceremony. It is a shame because his performance is towering. Scott projects with remarkable ease the subtle nuances that made up America’s most famous commander. He also brings a tremendous amount of charisma to the screen; no one whom ever sees the famous pep talk at the beginning of the movie will forget it. 9: Al Pacino in the Godfather Was there really a time when Pacino wasn’t a bonafied scene chewer. Evidently, and nowhere does he display his talent more effectively than in this movie, often the most lauded in history. Pacino wisely underplays his character, which contrasts nicely to Marlon Brando who overplays his father, the Don. It also generates a tremendous amount of sympathy for the young man he plays, which makes his eventual downfall into evil all the more tragic. It is this element of the movie, the gradual descent into darkness that makes the Godfather more than just a mob-movie, and Pacino’s excellent and human performance is what anchors it. And I don’t even like the film that much. 8: Tom Hanks in Castaway Some will be surprised at seeing this, but in Hanks lauded career he was never better. And he had to be, because the movie is essentially him on an island for two hours. Tom Hanks fans were in heaven. But Hanks manages to create a thoroughly likable and remarkably human character. Certainly he has his faults and his failings, but that makes each individual triumph all the greater. And Hanks is so realistic that he manages to make the melodrama in the movie genuinely heartbreaking. Watching him is witnessing a master at his trade, fully knowing when to underplay the character and when to act. No one else could make me blubber about losing a volley ball. It is a testament to his skill that the movie did so well at the box-office despite having no real plot. 7: Anthony Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs Is anyone really surprised this is here? I mean, cmon. The man is only on screen for a few minutes, but he created a nightmarish character that embedded itself in the consciousness of millions. He is so delightfully and entertainingly evil that one finds oneself almost rooting for him. Hopkins completely throws himself into the role, and you can tell he is truly enjoying himself. He brings so much energy to the screen in fact that melodramatic scenes that might have had only camp value in a lesser film become Oscar worthy. But it is the subtleties of the performance that truly make it great, the many levels to the craft that give depth to Lecter. When the audience is first introduced to him, he stands, urbane, quiet and confident amidst the nightmarish scenery and bars around him. One immediately gets two impressions, that something is unbalanced in this world, and more frighteningly, that here is a man who seems to be in his element. While the outside world might scorn Lecter, in this hellish domain he is God. And Hopkins always lets us sense, right before coming right out with it, that the devil lies behind that smile. 6: Robert De-Niro in Raging Bull Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Does anyone really know what happened to De-Niro and why his career has taken such a turn for the mediocre. Just like the icon he plays, De-Niro seems to have become overly content with his success and continues to take role after role in subpar movies that degrade his talent (Hide and seek anyone?) Which is a pity because anyone who sees this movie knows how much talent he does indeed have. De-Niro threw himself heart and soul into the role, even putting on weight to portray the eventual corruption that underwent his youthful hero. De-Niro put the tough guy to shame here, revealing the depths that can exist in even the unlikeliest of men. 5: Kevin Spacey in American Beauty Spacey is a great actor who has sadly decided to turn away from Hollywood in recent years. Never was he better than in this masterpiece of poetic drama. He takes the most iconic of all men, the middle American father and lampoons him to death. But it is really the heart that he gives Lester that makes this a great performance. While he is irresponsible, rather mediocre, and seems by every social critique to be a failure, the tremendous heart and joy that Spacey exudes make us wish the best for him until the very end. Moreover, Spacey is equally up to the task of handling both the comedic and dramatic parts of the role, making us laugh, cry and think in a way only the best artists can. His final death is perhaps one of the greatest moments in movie history, the seemingly absurdly dramatic finale to a mediocre mans life. Lester even acknowledges this in the final narraration, which makes it all the more beautiful and touching when he finally states “I become so grateful for every little moment of my stupid little life.” This stunning portrayal earned Spacey a richly deserved Oscar. 4: Peter O’Toole in Lawrence of Arabia Perhaps the finest debut in film history, O’Toole gives tremendous depth to one of the most intriguing characters in history. His mysterious, often underplayed performance forces us to think ever more deeply about the man, delving ever further into his soul. But O’Toole never lets us truly in, always seeming to hold more layers. This maddeningly frustrating trait is what forces us to watch the movie again and again, always trying to understand a little more about this character who always seems to be charging, one step ahead, into the sun. 3: Ben Kingsley in Gandhi This one-sided and often overlong movie was driven solely on the strength of Kingsley’s amazing performance. While the script does not allow him to focus on some of Gandhi’s darker side, the sympathy and respect he makes us feel is almost overwhelming. Kingsley portrays Gandhi’s saint like quality excellently, and has just a sufficient aura of doubt about him to seem human. Though the film is often melodramatic, Kingsley makes us forget that and want to find out more and more about one of history’s most famous and uplifting men. 2: Willem Dafoe in the Last Temptation of Christ Anyone who knows me knows what I think of this movie, and it’s anchor and its soul all come from Dafoe. Mostly known for excellent portrayals of offbeat characters like the Green Goblin in Spiderman or the crazed detective in the Boondock Saints, Dafoe plays Jesus with a quiet intensity that brings almost unparalleled depth to him. For once, Christ is not just an icon but a man dealing with the paradox of being God, and what that means. The care Dafoe makes us feel for Christ makes his final, triumphant exclamation of “It is Accomplished!” truly the most powerful moment I’ve seen on cinema. 1: Jack Nicholson in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest Nicholson remains always my favorite actor, and some day I will find a way to show him my proper respect. He rightly has several Academy awards, and never gives anything less than stellar performances after Chinatown. He portrays characters whom are both wildly entertaining and fully human, which is why so many of them have become icons. But never was he better than here, for which he won his first Academy award. Nicholson plays the inmate of a mental ward who transforms the lives of the other people around him with his love of freedom and his desire to break social conventions. Nicholson manages to make him both tremendously funny and wildly sympathetic, even when doing things that he should not do. The dramatic weight he gives him is also stunning, giving full depth to the social parable. In the end, once the film is done, his often quiet performance takes a few days to sink in. Once that is done, it is impossible to forget.

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