MC Wednesday Inventory #12: Your Favorite Actor's Three Best Performances

[dreamdead]

So this was influenced by my rather fulsome remembrance of Emily Watson's career.

Who is your favorite actor and what is his/her three best performances?

[Kurosawa Fan]

Three names popped into my head when I read this thread. The other two were Paul Newman and Barbara Stanwyck. I went with...

Toshiro Mifune
1. Red Beard
2. Yojimbo
3. Chushingura

[Skitch]

I don't really have a favorite actor, so in order to reply to the thread I'm breaking the rules and naming the first three things that popped in my head. Sorry. You're questions are great, I'm just terrible at this.

James Mason in Journey To The Center Of The Earth and Lolita
Robert Redford in Sneakers and The Sting
Edward Norton in Fight Club and The 25th Hour

[B-side]

This would be easier if we split it between actor and actress, for the sake of my sanity having to choose. So... yeah, I'm gonna break the rules and go for one of each:

Actor: Jimmy Stewart
Harvey (Henry Koster, 1950)
Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock, 1958)
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (John Ford, 1962)

Actress: Barbara Stanwyck
The Bitter Tea of General Yen (Frank Capra, 1933)
The Furies (Anthony Mann, 1950)
Forty Guns (Sam Fuller, 1957)

It just as easily could have been Henry Fonda and Juliette Binoche. Marlon Brando and Joan Crawford. Randolph Scott and Liv Ullmann. Charlie Chaplin and Isabelle Huppert. Max von Sydow and Cate Blanchett. Edward G. Robinson and Anna Karina, etc.

[Spinal]

Sorry, this response isn't going to be very original.

Daniel Day-Lewis

1. There Will Be Blood
2. Gangs of New York
3. Lincoln

[MadMan]

I'll go with John Wayne:

1. The Searchers
2. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
3. Rio Bravo

PS: I will admit I still need to see his Calvary trilogy and Red River, but I still have a firm grasp on what his best is due to having viewed a ton of his films.

[Gizmo]

Not saying she's the best, but she's the one I have most readily watched the last 20ish years now:

Natalie Portman
1. Black Swan
2. Closer
3. V for Vendetta

[Russ]

3. The Penalty

http://i536.photobucket.com/albums/ff324/astrojester/lonchaneypenalty_zps94d54ba4.j pg


2. West of Zanzibar

http://i536.photobucket.com/albums/ff324/astrojester/lonchaneywest_zps1d059018.jpg


1. The Unknown

http://i536.photobucket.com/albums/ff324/astrojester/lonchaneyunknown_zpsf3539991.j pg


LON CHANEY

http://i536.photobucket.com/albums/ff324/astrojester/LonChaneyTower_zpse135778d.jpg

[Irish]

I'm going with Judi Dench. Mostly for her energy and intelligence, but also that kind of terrifying authority she can lend to a role. I haven't seen her in "MacBeth," but I imagine that would be a psychically scarring experience.

1. Notes on a Scandal
2. Mrs Brown
3. Shakespeare in Love

Hon. Mention: As Time Goes By (series)

[Spinal]

2. Mrs Brown

Great choice.

[transmogrifier]

Is it weird I don't have a favorite actor or actress? I don't really get all that attached to the performers.

[MadMan]

Is it weird I don't have a favorite actor or actress? I don't really get all that attached to the performers.I don't really have a favorite in either category either, so I just went with whoever I like the most at the moment.

[Skitch]

Is it weird I don't have a favorite actor or actress? I don't really get all that attached to the performers.

I don't think its weird. Every time I try to pin one down I'm reminded of ten other equal or greater actors...

[Irish]

Is it weird I don't have a favorite actor or actress?

No, it just means you're dead inside.

[dreamdead]

Sorry, this response isn't going to be very original.

Daniel Day-Lewis


Where would his work in My Left Foot fall for you? Ahead of stuff like Age of Innocence?

Juliette Binoche:
1. Three Colors: Blue
2. Certified Copy
3. The Lovers on the Bridge

[Watashi]

Is it weird I don't have a favorite actor or actress? I don't really get all that attached to the performers.

I just pick the hottest ones.

[D_Davis]

I don't have a favorite, but I'll go with one that I really love:

Anthony Wong
http://i2.listal.com/image/1628139/600full-anthony-wong-chau--sang.jpg


1. Beast Cops
2. The Untold Story
3. Exiled

[dreamdead]

If I was do list a male performer, I'd go with either Robert Duvall:

1. Apocalypse Now
2. The Godfather
3. Tender Mercies

or Tony Leung Chiu-Wai
1. In the Mood for Love
2. Happy Together
3. Cyclo

[amberlita]

Yeah I don't much have a favorite either, but I love me some Morgan Freeman:

1. The Shawshank Redemption
2. Lean on Me
3. Street Smart

[amberlita]

Not even close to my favorite actor, but ya know, I don't think Anthony Michael Hall ever got the credit (or the consistent work) he deserved for being as good as he was. I was watching Six Degrees of Separation the other day and that thought occurred to me. He was in the movie for all of about 8 minutes total screen time, if that, but he was the best character in it. The Breakfast Club, Pirates of Silicon Valley...anyway, I thought he was great.

[Bandy Greensacks]

"Favorite actor" is kind of a silly thing to think about, honestly. I could choose at least 10 or 20, but it'd be based on their bodies of work more than the strength of the actual performances.

I suppose it comes down to Chaplin and Keaton for me, with Keaton gaining a slight edge because of his stunt work.

1. Sherlock Jr.
2. Seven Chances
3. The General

[MadMan]

No, it just means you're dead inside.That's the best thing about trans.

[Derek]

Not sure if he's my favorite actor, but Jimmy Stewart's been taken so I'll go with Robert Ryan, who kills it just about every time he's on screen:

1) On Dangerous Ground
2) Day of the Outlaw
3) Men in War

[megladon8]

Gene Hackman

1.) The Conversation
2.) The Royal Tenenbaums
3.) Night Moves

[B-side]

I'll go with Robert Ryan, who kills it just about every time he's on screen:

Have you seen Act of Violence? He's fantastic in that. Best I've ever seen from him.

[Lucky]

Naomi Watts

1) Mulholland Drive
2) 21 Grams
3) The Painted Veil

[Sycophant]

I don't really have a favorite actor? But I went with the first one I know I really like off the top of my head:

Nakadai Tetsuya:
1) The Human Condition (series)
2) Kagemusha
3) Hara-kiri

[Raiders]

Henry Fonda could be pretty damn amazing when he had to be. I have never thought of him as a "favorite" of mine, but when I pool together his most notable performances, the result is pretty awesome.

1. Young Mr. Lincoln
2. Daisy Kenyon
3. The Grapes of Wrath

Shit though, that barely seems correct. What about 12 Angry Men, Lady Eve, Advise & Consent or his villainous turn in Leone's Once Upon a Time in the West, his stoicism in The Wrong Man, or even his very nuanced approach in Fort Apache?

Also, though I have only seen a handful, and am not the biggest Ozu fan, Setsuko Hara is a legend for good reason. She is also, amazingly, still alive.

1. Late Spring
2. No Regrets for Our Youth
3. Tokyo Story

[bac0n]

I'm gonna reply with another actor closely associated with Akira Kurosawa: Takashi Shimura. So many great films to choose from.

1. Rashomon
2. Ikiru
3. Stray Dog
4. Gojira
5. Seven Samurai

[D_Davis]

or Tony Leung Chiu-Wai
1. In the Mood for Love
2. Happy Together
3. Cyclo

He was my second choice.

But I would have gone with:

1. Hero
2. Infernal Affairs
3. Hardboiled


Although I have to wonder....with those of choosing actors who don't speak our own native languages, how well can we really judge a performance? There is also the fact that many times these HK actors have different people dubbing their own lines in their films, simply because they work too much to do all the post-sound. How can I really tell that Anthony Wong or Tony Leung is a great actor?

[bac0n]

Although I have to wonder....with those of choosing actors who don't speak our own native languages, how well can we really judge a performance? There is also the fact that many times these HK actors have different people dubbing their own lines in their films, simply because they work too much to do all the post-sound. How can I really tell that Anthony Wong or Tony Leung is a great actor?

I guess in my case, I used to speak conversational Japanese to a certain extent, and I still know enough about the cadence of the language to, I feel, get a good feel for the effectiveness of the delivery. And Shimura and Mifune were pretty damned good from my observations.

[Raiders]

He was my second choice.

But I would have gone with:

1. Hero
2. Infernal Affairs
3. Hardboiled


Although I have to wonder....with those of choosing actors who don't speak our own native languages, how well can we really judge a performance? There is also the fact that many times these HK actors have different people dubbing their own lines in their films, simply because they work too much to do all the post-sound. How can I really tell that Anthony Wong or Tony Leung is a great actor?

Are you referring to the fact that I have to read what Tony Leung is saying? Expressions and body language (in other words, exhibited feeling and emotion) and even a lot of vocal inflection are not necessarily inhibited by language barriers.

[D_Davis]

As an example...I thought that Chow Yun Fat's and Michelle Yeoh's performances in Crouching Tiger were great. I had no idea that they were speaking the dialect completely wrong, and they were lambasted for it by Chinese critics. It would like an American southerner speaking the Queen's English all wrong.

Another example - in HK films, many times they hire voice actors to dub the lines of the actors, because the actors work so much that they don't have the time to do their own post voice work, also, in HK films are seen as largely disposable entertainment, so there isn't a lot of artistic concern over this practice. Tsui Hark does it all the time in his films, so much so that the term "lip rape" was coined for him - he would change the script after the film was done, and would have voice actors come in and redo dialog for the actors to reflect the changes.

To this day it is believe that it is not Tony Leung's voice used in Hero, but it is instead another voice actor who is often hired to do Leung's voice work in post. However, I still think it's a strong performance.

But, can I really judge these performances knowing all of this? I don't know.

[Kurosawa Fan]

Henry Fonda could be pretty damn amazing when he had to be. I have never thought of him as a "favorite" of mine, but when I pool together his most notable performances, the result is pretty awesome.

1. Young Mr. Lincoln
2. Daisy Kenyon
3. The Grapes of Wrath

Shit though, that barely seems correct. What about 12 Angry Men, Lady Eve, Advise & Consent or his villainous turn in Leone's Once Upon a Time in the West, his stoicism in The Wrong Man, or even his very nuanced approach in Fort Apache?


All of this and you forgot The Ox-Bow Incident.

[Boner M]

Gene Hackman

1. The Conversation
2. The French Connection II
3. The Royal Tenenbaums

Could just as easily have subbed #3 for Night Moves/Unforgiven.

[Ezee E]

He may not have the best performances, but I pretty much see anything he does.

Leonardo DiCaprio's best performances:
1)The Departed
2)Inception
3)Catch Me If You Can

[Dukefrukem]

He may not have the best performances, but I pretty much see anything he does.

Leonardo DiCaprio's best performances:
1)The Departed
2)Inception
3)Catch Me If You Can

I'll just echo this.

For the first part of Leo's career, I hated him. But I have enjoyed everything he's done since Catch Me if You Can.

[ContinentalOp]

Willem Dafoe

1. Animal Factory
2. The Last Temptation of Christ
3. The Hunter

Tempted to include Wild at Heart but didn't like the movie all that much and his role was too small. He stole that movie though.

[Dukefrukem]

What about Antichrist?

[ContinentalOp]

What about Antichrist?
Haven't seen it. I think my distaste for Lars Von Trier and all this I hear aboutgenital mutilation have kept me from watching it.

[baby doll]

Charles Chaplin:

1. Monsieur Verdoux (1947)
2. City Lights (1931)
3. The Great Dictator (1940)

[baby doll]

For the first part of Leo's career, I hated him. But I have enjoyed everything he's done since Catch Me if You Can.Aside from The Aviator, I can't think of anything that I've liked him in anything since Catch Me if You Can. He can be incredibly charismatic, but in most of his recent films, he seems to be trying really hard to be taken seriously as an actor by glowering his way through some of the silliest scripts of recent years, the back-to-back nonsense of Shutter Island and Inception probably being the nadir of his career to date.

[B-side]

Haven't seen it. I think my distaste for Lars Von Trier and all this I hear aboutgenital mutilation have kept me from watching it.

You would avoid a great movie because of a short sequence of violence? That's incredibly silly.

[transmogrifier]

You would avoid a great movie because of a short sequence of violence? That's incredibly silly.

Not nearly as silly as ignoring the first half of a sentence in order to start an argument.

[transmogrifier]

Aside from The Aviator, I can't think of anything that I've liked him in anything since Catch Me if You Can. He can be incredibly charismatic, but in most of his recent films, he seems to be trying really hard to be taken seriously as an actor by glowering his way through some of the silliest scripts of recent years, the back-to-back nonsense of Shutter Island and Inception probably being the nadir of his career to date.

For me, I think DiCaprio's most human, sympathetic and well-rounded performance was in The Departed, of all things.

[B-side]

Not nearly as silly as ignoring the first half of a sentence in order to start an argument.

I didn't ignore it. I singled out the other part he used as justification for avoiding it. But you're free to try and bring me down a peg or two again, if you'd like.

[transmogrifier]

I didn't ignore it. I singled out the other part he used as justification for avoiding it. But you're free to try and bring me down a peg or two again, if you'd like.

Nah, I'm good.

[baby doll]

For me, I think DiCaprio's most human, sympathetic and well-rounded performance was in The Departed, of all things.My God Albert Brooks is a hairy man.

[Sycophant]

Charles Chaplin:

1. Monsieur Verdoux (1947)
2. City Lights (1931)
3. The Great Dictator (1940)

This is a quality post and a quality list.

[Yxklyx]

Robert Ryan is always great - love him in The Setup

I love Steve Buscemi

1. Fargo
2. Ghost World
3. Trees Lounge

[Dukefrukem]

Aside from The Aviator, I can't think of anything that I've liked him in anything since Catch Me if You Can. He can be incredibly charismatic, but in most of his recent films, he seems to be trying really hard to be taken seriously as an actor by glowering his way through some of the silliest scripts of recent years, the back-to-back nonsense of Shutter Island and Inception probably being the nadir of his career to date.

Funny because I despised him in the Aviator.

[Raiders]

Funny because I despised him in the Aviator.

So is that an exception to the "enjoyed everything since Catch Me if You Can?"

I find that a strange reaction as it would likely also be my favorite from him. He played obsessive and paranoid pretty well. He was also really good in The Departed. Outside of Scorsese, and obviously Tarantino, too often these last 10-12 years he seems to be trying to play Important Serious Actor a bit too much, which I can never accept him in.

[Ezee E]

So is that an exception to the "enjoyed everything since Catch Me if You Can?"

I find that a strange reaction as it would likely also be my favorite from him. He played obsessive and paranoid pretty well. He was also really good in The Departed. Outside of Scorsese, and obviously Tarantino, too often these last 10-12 years he seems to be trying to play Important Serious Actor a bit too much, which I can never accept him in.

Saying "outside of Scorsese" is kind of strange though, because it almost takes out half of his filmography. Maybe even more.

[Raiders]

Saying "outside of Scorsese" is kind of strange though, because it almost takes out half of his filmography. Maybe even more.

I didn't say I disliked most of his roles, just that I wouldn't consider him a favorite since he has quite a few performances I don't much like.

[Dukefrukem]

So is that an exception to the "enjoyed everything since Catch Me if You Can?"

I find that a strange reaction as it would likely also be my favorite from him. He played obsessive and paranoid pretty well. He was also really good in The Departed. Outside of Scorsese, and obviously Tarantino, too often these last 10-12 years he seems to be trying to play Important Serious Actor a bit too much, which I can never accept him in.

Yes.

[chrisnu]

This is hard. I'll go with:

Jack Lemmon

1. Glengarry Glen Ross
2. The Apartment
3. Some Like It Hot

This reminds me that I must see Days of Wine and Roses.

[Izzy Black]

Ingrid Bergman in Autumn Sonata, Notorious, and Casablanca.