Collection: Impressive Performances

Submitted by 1922 on Sun, 02/13/2005 - 11:35
Tags: 
  • Delicious
  • Digg
  • StumbleUpon
  • Facebook
  • Google
  • Technorati
  1. Margaret Avery (The Color Purple, 1985)
  2. Lew Ayres (All Quiet on the Western Front, 1930)
  3. Kathy Bates (Misery, 1990)
  4. Kathy Bates (About Schmidt, 2002)
  5. Roberto Benigni (La vita è bella, 1997)
  6. Juliette Binoche (Trois couleurs: Bleu, 1993)
  7. Juliette Binoche (Chocolat, 2000)
  8. Cate Blanchett (The Aviator, 2004)
  9. Humphrey Bogart (Casablanca, 1942)
  10. Marlon Brando (The Godfather, 1972)
  11. Adrien Brody (The Pianist, 2002)
  12. Ellen Burstyn (Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, 1974)
  13. Ellen Burstyn (Requiem for a Dream, 2000)
  14. Richard Burton (Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, 1966)
  15. James Caan (The Rain People, 1969)
  16. James Caan (Misery, 1990)
  17. Michael Caine (Sleuth, 1972)
  18. Michael Caine (Muppets Christmas Carol, 1992)
  19. Jim Carrey (The Truman Show, 1998)
  20. Charles Chaplin (The Gold Rush, 1925)
  21. Thomas Haden Church (Sideways, 2004)
  22. John Cleese (A Fish Called Wanda, 1988)
  23. Sean Connery (The Untouchables, 1987)
  24. Sean Connery (Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, 1989)
  25. Gary Cooper (High Noon, 1952)
  26. Kevin Costner (Dances with Wolves, 1990)
  27. Billy Crystal (When Harry Met Sally, 1988)
  28. James Dean (East of Eden, 1955)
  29. James Dean (Rebel without a Cause, 1955)
  30. James Dean (Giant, 1956)
  31. Robert De Niro (Taxi Driver, 1976)
  32. Robert De Niro (Raging Bull, 1980)
  33. Robert De Niro (Once Upon a Time in America, 1984)
  34. Judi Dench (Shakespeare in Love, 1998)
  35. Judi Dench (Chocolat, 2000)
  36. Johnny Depp (Ed Wood, 1994)
  37. Johnny Depp (Pirates of the Caribbean, 2003)
  38. Leonardo DiCaprio (The Aviator, 2004)
  39. Marlene Dietrich (Witness for the Prosecution, 1957)
  40. Marlene Dietrich (Judgment at Nuremberg, 1961)
  41. Michael Douglas (Fatal Attraction, 1987)
  42. Michael Douglas (The War of the Roses, 1989)
  43. Michael Douglas (Falling Down, 1993)
  44. Faye Dunaway (Bonnie and Clyde, 1967)
  45. Faye Dunaway (Network, 1976)
  46. Griffin Dunne (After Hours, 1985)
  47. Robert Duvall (The Godfather, 1972)
  48. Robert Duvall (Network, 1976)
  49. Robert Duvall (Falling Down, 1993)
  50. Clint Eastwood (Million Dollar Baby, 2004)
  51. Mia Farrow (Rosemary's Baby, 1968)
  52. Joseph Fiennes (Shakespeare in Love, 1998)
  53. Peter Finch (Network, 1976)
  54. Louise Fletcher (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, 1975)
  55. Henry Fonda (12 Angry Men, 1957)
  56. Henry Fonda (Once Upon a Time in the West, 1968)
  57. Morgan Freeman (Glory, 1989)
  58. Morgan Freeman (The Shawshank Redemption, 1994)
  59. Morgan Freeman (Se7en, 1995)
  60. Morgan Freeman (Million Dollar Baby, 2004)
  61. Bruno Ganz (Der Untergang, 2004)
  62. Paul Giamatti (Sideways, 2004)
  63. Whoopi Goldberg (The Color Purple, 1985)
  64. Whoopi Goldberg (Ghost, 1990)
  65. Ruth Gordon (Harold and Maude, 1971)
  66. Alec Guinness (The Bridge on the River Kwai, 1957)
  67. Alec Guinness (Lawrence of Arabia, 1962)
  68. Alec Guinness (Murder by Death, 1976)
  69. Alec Guinness (Star Wars, 1977)
  70. Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump, 1994)
  71. Tom Hanks (Cast Away, 2000)
  72. Katharine Hepburn (Bringing Up Baby, 1938)
  73. Dustin Hoffman (The Graduate, 1967)
  74. Dustin Hoffman (Marathon Man, 1976)
  75. William Holden (Network, 1976)
  76. Anthony Hopkins (The Elephant Man, 1980)
  77. John Hurt (The Elephant Man, 1980)
  78. Burl Ives (Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, 1958)
  79. Gene Kelly (Singin' in the Rain, 1952)
  80. Ben Kingsley (Gandhi, 1982)
  81. Ben Kingsley (The Death and the Maiden, 1994)
  82. Kevin Kline (A Fish Called Wanda, 1988)
  83. Kevin Kline (The Ice Storm, 1997)
  84. Martin Landau (Ed Wood, 1994)
  85. Angela Lansbury (The Company of Wolves, 1984)
  86. Christopher Lee (The Fellowship of the Ring, 2001)
  87. Jack Lemmon (The Apartment, 1960)
  88. Jack Lemmon (The Odd Couple 2, 1998)
  89. Shirley MacLaine (The Apartment, 1960)
  90. Shirley MacLaine (Terms of Endearment, 1983)
  91. Virginia Madsen (Sideways, 2004)
  92. Steve Martin (Father of the Bride, 1991)
  93. Walter Matthau (The Odd Couple 2, 1998)
  94. Ulrich Matthes (Der Neunte Tag, 2004)
  95. Ian McKellen (The Fellowship of the Ring, 2001)
  96. Sal Mineo (Rebel without a Cause, 1955)
  97. Liza Minnelli (New York, New York, 1977)
  98. Robert Mitchum (The Night of the Hunter, 1955)
  99. Fernanda Montenegro (Central do Brasil, 1998)
  100. Rob Morrow (Quiz Show, 1994)
  101. Bill Murray (Groundhog Day, 1993)
  102. Paul Newman (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, 1969)
  103. Paul Newman (The Color of Money, 1987)
  104. Jack Nicholson (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, 1975)
  105. Jack Nicholson (The Shining, 1980)
  106. Jack Nicholson (Terms of Endearment, 1983)
  107. Jack Nicholson (Batman, 1989)
  108. Jack Nicholson (As Good As It Gets, 1997)
  109. Jack Nicholson (The Pledge, 2001)
  110. Jack Nicholson (About Schmidt, 2002)
  111. Philippe Noiret (Il Postino, 1994)
  112. Sandra Oh (Sideways, 2004)
  113. Vinícius de Oliveira (Central do Brasil, 1998)
  114. Laurence Olivier (Sleuth, 1972)
  115. Laurence Olivier (Marathon Man, 1976)
  116. Peter O'Toole (Lawrence of Arabia, 1962)
  117. Al Pacino (The Godfather, 1972)
  118. Al Pacino (The Godfather, Part II, 1974)
  119. Al Pacino (Dog Day Afternoon, 1975)
  120. Al Pacino (Scent of a Woman, 1992)
  121. Al Pacino (Insomnia, 2002)
  122. Gregory Peck (To Kill a Mockingbird, 1962)
  123. Sean Penn (Dead Man Walking, 1995)
  124. Sean Penn (Mystic River, 2003)
  125. River Phoenix (Stand By Me, 1986)
  126. Brad Pitt (Se7en, 1995)
  127. Sidney Poitier (In the Heat of the Night, 1967)
  128. Claude Rains (Casablanca, 1942)
  129. Fernando Rey (The French Connection, 1971)
  130. Tim Robbins (The Shawshank Redemption, 1994)
  131. Tim Robbins (Mystic River, 2003)
  132. Susan Sarandon (Thelma & Louise, 1990)
  133. Susan Sarandon (Dead Man Walking, 1995)
  134. Maximilian Schell (Judgment at Nuremberg, 1961)
  135. Peter Sellers (The Pink Panther, 1964)
  136. Peter Sellers (The Return of the Pink Panther, 1974)
  137. Peter Sellers (Murder by Death, 1976)
  138. Omar Sharif (Monsieur Ibrahim et les Fleurs du Coran, 2001)
  139. Charlie Sheen (Platoon, 1986)
  140. Victor Sjöström (Wild Strawberries, 1957)
  141. Kevin Spacey (The Usual Suspects, 1995)
  142. Kevin Spacey (American Beauty, 1999)
  143. James Stewart (It's a Wonderful Life, 1946)
  144. James Stewart (Rear Window, 1954)
  145. Donald Sutherland (Don't Look Now, 1973)
  146. Hilary Swank (Million Dollar Baby, 2004)
  147. Elizabeth Taylor (Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, 1966)
  148. Spencer Tracy (Judgment at Nuremberg, 1961)
  149. Jean-Louis Trintignant (Trois couleurs: Rouge, 1994)
  150. Kathleen Turner (Peggy Sue Got Married, 1986)
  151. Kathleen Turner (The War of the Roses, 1989)
  152. Denzel Washington (Glory, 1989)
  153. Sigourney Weaver (Alien, 1979)
  154. Sigourney Weaver (The Death and the Maiden, 1994)
  155. Sigourney Weaver (Copycat, 1995)
  156. Robin Williams (Dead Poets Society, 1989)
  157. Robin Williams (Mrs. Doubtfire, 1993)
  158. Robin Williams (Insomnia, 2002)
  159. Stuart Wilson (The Death and the Maiden, 1994)
  160. Oprah Winfrey (The Color Purple, 1985)
  161. Debra Winger (Terms of Endearment, 1983)
Author Comments: 

underrated
Oscar role
Probably more to come, as I think of them...

Rushmore04/16/2005

Nice list here. Clone time Me Thinks.. :-)

River Phoenix (Stand By Me, 1986) Agreed! what a great film

192204/17/2005

Me Thinks that's fine.

Rushmore04/23/2005

hey.
you seem to like the tradtional actors more than the more recent ones. i may be wrong in that statement and please do say so, but are there any recent actors that have caught your attention?

192204/23/2005

Interesting question. It is certainly true that I prefer the "older" actors to the more recent ones. Just have a look at the classics. What great actors: James Stewart, Humphrey Bogart, Laurence Olivier, Gary Cooper, Marlene Dietrich, Alec Guinness, Katharine Hepburn, James Dean, Ingrid Bergman, Henry Fonda, etc. Unfortunately all of these are dead, and will never star in a film again. Nowadays you can hardly find actors of their format and talent. OK, there are Pacino, Hoffman, De Niro, Newman, Nicholson, Dunaway, Weaver, Streep, and so on. They are great too, but IMO just not as brilliant as the previous generations. Apart from that, I think that these actors are no longer at the top of their careers (for these, it would have been the 70s, the 80s and the early 90s). Have just a look at the films De Niro makes today: Meet the Fockers, Analyze That, Hide and Seek. Compare the general opinions about these movies to those about Taxi Driver or Raging Bull. Ditto for the average quality of the films in general. I really feel (and it is quite probable that I am wrong) that it has gone down, and it is still getting worse. Of course, there are some exceptions (fortunately), but it is just not enough. On the other hand, I'm sure that it cannot go on like that. A kind of "revolution" will come (like in the late 60s), and a new era of films will begin, with better films (not all of them great, but at least generally better).
Of the less "traditional" actors, I like some of them, in nearly all of their roles: Kevin Spacey, Johnny Depp, Tim Robbins, Liv Tyler, Gwyneth Paltrow. Others sometimes manage to surprise me positively: Brad Pitt, Elijah Wood, Colin Farrell, Leonardo Di Caprio, Jared Leto, etc. In some roles, they show that they have got a lot of talent. Unfortunately they choose often (too often) the wrong movies to star in (and here again I want to precise that not every movie with James Stewart f.ex. was great, but even today we still remember most of them. Probably in 25 or 30 years I'll think back to our period (today) and consider it as quite a good time for movies.) For the moment, I'm looking forward to seeing more movies with the most interesting of the recent actors/actresses, such as Johnny Depp, Hilary Swank and Colin Farrell.

Rushmore04/24/2005

hhhmmm interesting. one thing i noticed is when you sperated the generations of "Greats" i really only know the second tier (De Niro, Pacino, Streep) maybe i should check out the earlier ones. I totally agree that De Niro's choice of films are poor. let me go back to a phrase i used with Stooky's article many moons ago: "no De Niro...put the script down"

Great answer 1922, thx. now after your recommendation of the early actors hope to see more movies featuring them.

192204/24/2005

For some of the above mentioned actors and actresses, I'd suggest the following films:

James Stewart
Vertigo (another great Hitchcock)
It's a Wonderful Life (heartwarming, and I'm sure that you have seen this movie. I can hardly imagine anyone who hasn't seen it.)
The Man who Shot Liberty Valance (excellent western)

Humphrey Bogart
Casablanca (oh see this. WONDERFUL! ALMOST PERFECT)
The Maltese Falcon (great film noir)
The Big Sleep (see #2)

Laurence Olivier
Sleuth
Rebecca (there we are with another Hitch)
Spartacus (not brilliant, but quite good)

Alec Guinness
Lawrence of Arabia (of course)
Murder by Death (great comedy)
The Bridge on the River Kwai (another classic)

Katharine Hepburn
Bringing Up Baby (better than The Philadelphia Story and incredibly funny)
African Queen (haven't seen it, but after all I heard it must be great)

James Dean
East of Eden
Rebel without a Cause
Giant
--> I'm pretty sure James Dean is an actor who will fascinate you. Only three major roles, but three times perfect.

Ingrid Bergman
Casablanca
Notorious (Hitchcock)
Murder on the Orient Express (a huge cast)

Henry Fonda
12 Angry Men (perfect)
Once Upon a Time in the West (epic masterpiece)
My Darling Clementine (western)