A very good year this year for this category – with
great performances coming from all sorts of films. Some fine work that didn’t
make my top 10 include: Christian Bale
in Vice is brilliant as Dick Cheney – pretty much saving the movie from its
smug core. Steve Buscemi in The Death of
Stalin who did his best film work in years, playing a smart, conniving
hilarious, profane, Brooklyn Khrushchev.
Jacob Cedergren in The Guilty is pretty much the only face we see for the
entire runtime of the film, and he anchors this intense thriller brilliantly. John Cho in Searching does an excellent
job anchoring this film this thriller in a real emotional reality. Daveed Diggs in Blindspotting anchors
the film with a fine performance, and gets to show off his verbal dexterity to
boot. Dogu Demirkol in The Wild Pear
Tree is excellent as the angry, young asshole who is so confident at the
beginning of the film, and becomes slowly disillusioned. Clint Eastwood in The Mule is both having a blast, and digs a
little deeper into that famed persona in what well could be his acting
swansong. Paul Giamatti in Private Life plays
what is undeniably the “Paul Giamatti” role here – but he does it so well, you
don’t care. Daniel Gimenez Cacho in Zama
had a very difficult job, anchoring Martel’s very difficult film, and
making a real character out of the title role. Ryan Gosling in First Man was so quiet and understated, he almost
appears to be sleeping at times, but that’s all to better understand Armstrong. Lucas Hedges in Ben is Back is in top
form, helping to elevate the movie, as a teenager struggling with addiction. John Huston in The Other Side of the Wind gives
a performance like only he could – perhaps he’s playing a version of Orson
Welles, but he makes it his own. Stephan
James in If Beale Street Could Talk is wonderful as both the romantic lead,
and the tragic figure of injustice. Charlie
Plummer in Lean on Pete has the central role, and has to be the emotional
anchor, in Haigh’s American road movie – and does so wonderfully well. Robert Redford in The Old Man and the Gun coasts
on that old Redford charm – but what charm, and a perfect swan song for a
legend.
10.
Willem Dafoe in At Eternity’s Gate
So, yes, the 60-year-old Willem Dafoe is about 25
years too old to play Vincent Van Gogh, who died in his mid-30s, but it pretty
much becomes a non-issue immediately in Julian Schnabel’s film about the last
months of Van Gogh’s life. Dafoe is brilliant as the man who was confident in
his art, and how to pursue it, and an absolute mess in every other aspect of
his life – having troubled relationships with everyone around him, and
struggling with his own mental illness that no one – not even himself – truly
understood. Dafoe has gone through a renaissance in the last few years – he
should have won an Oscar for The Florida Project last year, and this is another
performance that reaches close to his career highs of Platoon, The Last
Temptation of Christ and Shadow of the Vampire.
9.
Lakeith Stanfield in Sorry to Bother You
Sorry to Bother You is such a strange movie, one
where every frame is full of visual jokes, and the dialogue just keeps flying
at you, often with multiple meanings in each line. It truly is a crazed, crazy
film. Which is why Stanfield is so great in the film, because no matter what
writer/director Boots Riley is up to on a scene to scene basis, Stanfield is
keeping the film grounded and relatable. His character is basically a sellout –
a man who will do anything to get ahead, and yet he makes the character so
real, that he is also the audience surrogate into the craziness going on around
him. He gets what he deserves to a certain extent – his character isn’t a hero
– but because we relate to him so much, it hurts when it gets there. That’s the
genius of this performance.
8.
Nicolas Cage in Mandy
Nicolas Cage really has no one but himself to blame
that he has become a punchline to many. His financial problems have pretty much
made it mandatory that he take on any and every role he can get, and when
directors cast him now, they want the BIG Nicolas Cage, that is so instantly
meme-able. It can sometimes be easy to not remember just how damn good Cage can
be in the right movie – even when he goes over the top. Mandy begins at
over-the-top and then just keeps going and going and going – I cannot think of
another actor other than Cage who could possibly keep up with this movie,
constantly deliver how big the gets – and still make you feel this character’s
pain and torment. Cage is a legend – and Mandy is another reason why. Make fun of
him if you want – no one else can do what he does (for better or worse).
7.
Daveed Diggs in Blindspotting
Hamilton breakout star Daveed Diggs, shows just how
multitalented he is, co-writing and starring in Blindspotting, and giving one
of the most memorable performances of the year. As an Oakland man, trying to
rebuild his life after getting out of jail – and serving the final days of his
probation – Diggs has to confront a rapidly gentrifying Oakland, and keep his
white friend in check, all while dealing with the underlying, subtle racism
that surrounds him. His entire performance is great – the screenplay gives him
a lot of language to deal with, which he does brilliantly – but it’s the
unconventional end of the film that really allows Diggs an opportunity to show
just how great he is. Diggs is making the best of his shot.
6.
John David Washington in BlackKklansman
John David Washington is sneakily quite good in
BlacKkKlansman – so much so, that I don’t think I truly appreciated what he did
the first time through the movie, despite how much I loved the movie as a
whole. He is charming and funny throughout the film – he codeswitches
effortlessly throughout as well. He allows the anger inside of him to slowly
build, and come out only at the best times. And best of all, like his father,
he has that brilliant smile – and he holds it back throughout the whole film,
just to unleash it at precisely the right time. There is a lot more subtly to
this performance than I realized the first time through – the second time
through, I was blown away.
5.
Bradley Cooper in A Star is Born
To be fair, Cooper stacks the deck for himself in
this movie as a director and screenwriter, as more than the other versions of
this story, his character is the most complex character in the movie, not the
younger woman he falls for. But Cooper, who has become one of the best actors
working, still had to deliver – and he does so here. This is a movie star
performance – one where his charisma pours out in every frame, and that is
necessary to keep you with him throughout the film, and understand why everyone
else stays as well. It also allows him to devastate you down the stretch when
he needs to. Cooper has always been a movie star who can act – and here, he
delivers the best of both of those worlds into what may be his finest
performance.
4.
Ben Foster in Leave No Trace
Ben Foster has always been an intense actor – often
brilliantly, but often he seemed to chew the scenery as much as act. In the
past few years, he has grown as an actor, channeling that intensity into subtler,
interior performances – none better than his work in Leave No Trace. Here, he
plays a military vet, haunted by his service, and who just wants to be left
alone. The only problem is he is also a single dad, raising a teenage daughter
– in the forest, off the grid. When he is dragged back to society, he barely
says anything, he shrinks into himself, and only allows himself to be seen by
his daughter – that bond driving the whole movie. Foster is brilliant here,
particularly as he plays a man who will do anything for his daughter – except
the only thing she truly needs from him. It is a quiet, heartbreaking
performance.
3.
Ah-In Yoo in Burning
Ah-In Yoo is in every scene of Burning – the whole
movie being from his point-of-view – and it is a brilliant performance. In the
beginning, he’s playing a guy smitten by the new girl in his life, but never
really understanding who she is. Then, he becomes jealous and jilted, when she
shows up with a new guy – and becomes a petty man. Finally, he becomes a
detective of sorts, trying so hard to figure out what happened, and never
understanding – the more he examines, the less clearly he sees things. Ah-In
Yoo is smart enough to let the other principles in the movie take over
occasionally – although it’s clear we aren’t seeing them as they are, but how
he sees them. In the end, he has destroyed whoever he once was, and still
doesn’t really know the truth. He is one of the great, tragic character of the
year – and Ah-In Yoo’s performance is one of the very best of the year.
2.
Joaquin Phoenix in You Were Never Really Here
Lynne Ramsay’s You Were Never Really Here is a director’s
tour-de-force, a film stripped to the bone in terms of plot mechanics and even
dialogue. As such, she relies heavily on Phoenix, giving one of his very best
performances, to do the heavy lifting to explain who Joe is – without ever
really explaining it at all. It is a largely silent performance, with Phoenix
diving into deeper and darker aspects of his psyche as the movie goes along – a
man whose life has been one violent incident after another after another, for
the entire time – until he decides to hit back. He is playing a version of
Travis Bickle – but without the explanatory interior monologues. Phoenix has always
been a risk taking actor – and in the past decade he has turned himself into
perhaps our best working actor going right now (assuming Daniel Day-Lewis
really is retired). That his performance here is as good as it is – and is
still not as good as his work in The Master (and maybe even Inherent Vice) –
tells you something.
1.
Ethan Hawke in First Reformed
The best performance of the year, in any category,
was Ethan Hawke’s career best work in Paul Schrader’s First Reformed – and as
many great performances as there were, this wasn’t even close. Playing a
Priest, already reeling from loss in his own, pre-ordained life – who has been
going through the motions at what is essentially a tourist church – not one he
has to do much but give tours, he is knocked for a loop when he is actually
called upon to do some counselling. His conversation with the man about global
warming – and the morality of bringing a child into this world – would normally
be the highlight of the film – but here, it just keeps going even more intense
places. Hawke, trying his best to both keep it together, and do what is moral,
is a classic Schrader protagonist (this is the man who wrote Taxi Driver and
The Last Temptation of Christ for Scorsese, and a host of similar roles for his
own directing efforts) – and Hawke makes it his own. It is a challenging
performance, and one that marks the best work yet of Hawke’s increasing great
career. Really, one of the very best performances of the decade.
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