The Independent’s culture team ranks the very best film actors of the century so far
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How do you begin to classify the most productive actors of the 21st century?The world of cinema is so vast and diverse; Trying to assign a definitive numerical price to an actor’s career is, in short, arbitrary and subjective.
Yet that’s precisely what The Independent’s culture team attempted to do. We do this both to pay tribute to some of the actors we admire most, and because it’s the kind of arbitrary, subjective exercise that many film buffs enjoy reading, even (or especially) if they do not vehemently disagree with the decisions. Arrangement
However, to create this list, it was clear that parameters needed to be set. Here are ours: First of all, this list deserves to take into account only movies, not television series or level performances. Secondly, this is worth taking into account only films released after the year 2000. If you are wondering why this or that actor was excluded from the list, the year 2000 cut-off date may well be the reason. (Some of the greatest living actors, such as Meryl Streep, Al Pacino, and Gene Hackman, suffer from this rule. )
There are many points by which an actor is judged (breadth, coherence, depth, role selection), but there is no precise formula. Some of those inclusions and omissions would arguably not please everyone, but they were not done lightly and there was much war of words even among the authors of this article.
With all that said, please enjoy The Independent’s ranking of the 60 greatest actors of 21st-century cinema (so far)…
60. Tom Cruise
As far as acting goes, Tom Cruise’s most productive paintings come from the last century, with arguably his two most productive performances (Eyes Wide Shut and Magnolia) coming in 1999. However, over the last quarter century, Cruise has frozen himself as one of the last full-blooded movie stars, a kind of sacred statesman of cinema itself. In front of the camera, meanwhile, he’s a force of nature, embarking on daring physical stunts with steely zeal. Ethan Hunt from Mission Impossible, his best-known character, Cruise could be “the living manifestation of destiny”: an unprecedented, unknowable and unstoppable actor. Louis Chilton
59. Amy Adams
Amy Adams began this millennium quietly, with bit-parts in teen dramas; in the years since, she’s carved out a reputation as one of Hollywood’s most nuanced actors, reliably delivering lived-in, authentic performances in everything from Junebug to The Master. The word “luminous” gets thrown around a lot when describing actors, especially female ones, but it goes some way to capturing her appeal in six (yes, six) Oscar-nominated roles. Her best work to date is 2016’s Arrival, a gut-punch portrayal of grief wrapped up in what’s ostensibly a sci-fi movie – a performance that sneaks up and leaves you bereft for days. Katie Rosseinsky
58. Stephane Graham
Watch Stephen Graham on screen and you may feel your core rhythm increase. A feeling of discomfort that is increasing. Or maybe you need to wrap it and take care of it. With his breakthrough role in This Is England as a pugilistic National Front skinhead, Graham showed that he can be explosive and terrifying; her vulnerability was exquisite in the one-shot Boiling Point. He’s an intense actor, but also super diverse, whether showing off his comedic chops in Pirates of the Caribbean and Matilda: The Musical or holding his own as an American gangster in Scorsese’s epic The Irishman alongside Robert De Niro and Al Pacino. Ellie Harrison
57. Hugh Grant
Modern appraisal of Hugh Grant tends to focus on his turn to onscreen villainy – the eerie menace of Heretic, the grandiose flamboyance of Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, and the seminal Paddington 2. But there’s been a comic mean streak in Grant’s characters for much of the 21st century, threads of appealing sleaze and pomposity. There were the Bridget Jones films, the marvellous About a Boy; nothing screams Y2K Hugh Grant more than pairing him off as an ageing cad with an exasperated American girl-next-door type. If anything’s changed in the Grant discourse today, it’s that people have woken up to how great he’s always been – even if Grant himself, forever his own harshest critic, may disagree. Adam White
56. Catherine Keener
If you want a wonderful supporting actor, capable of filling the gaps of an opaque supporting character through the sheer force of his presence, turn to Catherine Keener. Her strength on screen, as the vivacious and empathetic Harper Lee in Capote, or as the teacup-wielding family matriarch in Get Out, lies in her ambiguity, that sense of a secretive, secretive user, but rich with inner life. . Filmmaker Nicole Holofcener captured the best of her, giving Keener repeated (and infrequent) starring roles in films like Lovely & Amazing and Friends with Money, occasionally as neurotic, conflicted wives and mothers. and agitated and very slightly delirious. The fact that she works sparingly and interviews infrequently only adds to her mystery: Who is Catherine Keener? And why is it still so good? A. W.
55. Matthew McConaughey
If you had told someone in the mid-2000s that Matthew McConaughey would be on the list of the most productive actors of the century, you would have laughed at the city. But such was the strength of “McConaissance”: the resurgence of the Texas actor’s career in the 2010s, spanning his independent favorites (Mud), an Oscar (Dallas Buyers Club) and a stint as a formidable lead (Interstellar) — that’s now almost a given. It’s no surprise that McConaughey didn’t get the momentum of his initial comeback, but he continued to show his unique value as an actor in projects like Harmony Korine’s cult gem, The Beach Bum. No one loves the laid-back charm of the south too. LC
54. Sally Hawkins
There’s a special position in theater heaven reserved for others who make the transition from trashy British television (Casualty, Doctors, Little Britain) to the hallowed halls of Hollywood. And that’s precisely what Sally Hawkins did. A fruitful relationship with legendary director Mike Leigh culminated in her performance as the cheerful learning driver Poppy in Happy-Go-Lucky in 2008, a role that demonstrated Hawkins’ infectious and endearing presence on screen, leading her to play horny domestic characters in movies. like Paddington and Wonka. But Hawkins is most exciting when she’s allowed to develop her talents: She’s been nominated twice for an Oscar, as the innocent Ginger in Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine, and as the mute, romantic lead in William’s swooning The Shape of Water. Bull. Nick Hilton
53. Ralph Fiennes
With his aquiline features, Ralph Fiennes will be associated for some with his incarnations of evil: the Nazi commander in Schindler’s List in the last century, as well as Lord Voldemort in the Harry Potter films. But in recent years, his remarkable intensity has led to a series of roles that demonstrate his comedic talents: the frustrated assassin Mr. Harry in ÀÀBruges, the tortured director of the Golden Age Laurence Laurentz in Hail Caesar!and the Crazy Concierge Gustave at the Greater Budapest Hotel. I’m working with some of the most productive managers in the industry, and it’s no wonder they want to work with him too. NH
52. Lesley Manville
Manville’s skill may have taken him anywhere. She may have been a soprano, a triple threat in musical theater or even a soap queen (she was in 80 episodes of Emmerdale) before finding her mojo in the late ’70s at the Royal. Court Theatre. This century, however, Manville has established herself as a film actress, earning a reputation as Mike Leigh’s muse because she has given that impression in many of his films. But his role in Phantom Thread (2017) finally earned him more well-deserved recognition. Director Paul Thomas Anderson was so taken aback by her portrayal of the indomitable sister of Daniel Day-Lewis’s highly-strung couturier that he came to an inescapable conclusion: “Put on the got herera Lesley Manville. She can’t do anything wrong; you can just ask her to do it. ” do anything, and she’ll just. Anyone who’s seen the movie will actually see it.
51. Andy Serkis
Andy Serkis’s face is possibly one of the least recognizable on this list, but that doesn’t hurt the British actor’s work. Over the course of more than three decades, Serkis has been an incredibly vital pioneer in the field of motion capture, pushing the generation into uncharted territory. Like Gollum, obsessed with the disheveled jewels of The Lord of the Rings, he redrawn the barriers of what CGI characters can also do; Like Caesar, the indomitable primate from Planet of the Apes, he redesigned them again, managing an intensity and emotional precision that no one would have imagined in a CGI ape. Add to that a diversity of impactful character performances, both in and out of mo-cap (The Adventures of Tin Tin; Sex
50. Olivia Colman
Watching Olivia Colman achieve good fortune in Hollywood over the past few years has been like watching your favorite and little-known band suddenly find good fortune: we’re thrilled for them, obviously, but we don’t remember everyone who’s been a fan since. the beginning. After years as the long-suffering Sophie in Peep Show, Colman had her cinematic breakthrough in Tyrannosaurus (2011) with her heartbreaking role as a woman in an abusive relationship. As with all of his more productive performances, there’s a genuine warmth to his paintings in this indie film, but also an emotional sharpness that’s hard to observe. Director Yorgos Lanthimos obviously saw something special in her, casting her first in his dystopian black comedy The Lobster and then in the revolted-era drama The Favourite as Queen Anne. It was a role that allowed Colman to show his full gamut, comically gruesome one moment, heartbreaking and vulnerable the next. KR
49. Sandra Hüller
In 2024, Sandra Hüller will become the first German woman to be nominated for the Best Actress Oscar since Luise Rainer in 1937, and only the third. It hasn’t been talked about much, perhaps because her performance, as a confused accused of mariticide in the fluffy legal drama Anatomy of a Fall, was so dazzling and brilliant that to some it seemed like an apparent conclusion. But in reality, it probably wouldn’t even be Hüller’s best: it’s a vision of venal evil in the Holocaust drama Zone of Interest (2024), of heartbreaking misfortune in the tragicomic Toni Erdmann, and tough and moving in the role of a user. suffering from epilepsy in Requiem (2006). LC
48. Tom Hanks
Tom Hanks may have peaked in the Nineties, but his post-2000 body of work is nothing to be scoffed at. He’s given tremendous mid- and late-career performances in a slew of films from major directors: Steven Spielberg (Catch Me if You Can; Bridge of Spies), Robert Zemeckis (Cast Away), Clint Eastwood (Sully), Marielle Heller (A Beautiful Day in the Neighbourhood) and Wes Anderson (Asteroid City) among them. If you’re after big, showy swings, he’s surely delivered – look at the assortment of roles he plays in the Wachowskis’ Cloud Atlas. If you’re after something subtler, he’s got that too. The breakdown at the end of naval thriller Captain Phillips may be the finest acting Hanks has ever done. LC
47. Léa Seydoux
While some European actors seem to be directing their careers toward a concerted effort to “make it in Hollywood,” Parisian Léa Seydoux seems to travel between continents on a whim, moving to the United States for films like Inglourious Basterds and Mission: Impossible. – Ghost Protocol, returning to France to praise for her role in the lesbian romance Blue is the Warmest Color, then returning across the Atlantic for supporting roles in the authors’ pet projects. Of course, there’s an explanation for why this turns out this way: Seydoux is an incredibly consistent but malleable actress, able to adapt her taste to action thrillers (Spectre), black comedy (The Lobster), gritty sci-fi (Dune : Part Two), or whatever is thrown at it. No wonder it is available almost everywhere. CL
46. Lupita Nyong’o
One of Hollywood’s greatest recent discoveries, Lupita Nyong’o seemed to emerge fully formed, bringing heart, despair and tragic balance to her first film character: the chained Patsey in 12 Years a Slave. Since winning the Oscar, his possible options have also been playful and experimental, which draws from his theatrical training. She has been a disembodied voice in three Star Wars films, most commonly silent in A Quiet Place: Day One, and played a wolf and robot elsewhere. Make ambitious decisions. We, Jordan Peele’s terrifying stunt double, is perhaps Nyong’o’s best moment yet: it unleashes a tormented force on one part of a pair of double brothers, and a sadism and macabre on the other. A. W.
45. Kate Winslet
There are many stars who would fortunately allow themselves to be pigeonholed after the colossal fate of a blockbuster like Titanic, but Kate Winslet is not one of them. Yes, she’s since donned corsets for period dramas, but she’s also excelled at offbeat sci-fi, betting on a woman who chooses to erase her memories after a failed romance in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless MindArray in a real-life drama. A strain that brings emotional weight to Steve Jobs, and even in a festive romance (would The Holiday be a seasonal staple without it?). There is a lack of vanity in her paintings and no one plays a confused woman who opposes expectations like she does. The Reader probably would have won her an Oscar in 2009, but I’d argue that her other film from that year, Revolutionary Road, is her most successful film work to date, betting on a housewife whose ambitions are constantly shattered.
44. Robert Downey Jr
That Robert Downey Jr will likely go down in cinematic history as Iron Man is unfortunate – not because he’s not good as the silver-tongued superhero (he’s great – and you could easily argue that the entire landscape of modern blockbuster cinema would look different without him), but because the sheer magnitude of that role threatens to obliterate everything else, not least Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. The 2005 LA thriller was Downey Jr’s comeback after years of personal troubles As a small-time crook turned crime-buster, he was totally believable – and watchable, funny and flippant; perfectly at home within Shane Black’s caustic script. Robert Downey Jr’s recent Oscar win for Oppenheimer, meanwhile, was recognition of his heavyweight talents after more than a decade stuck in the Marvel machinery. Annabel Nugent
43. André Garfield
With apologies to Bill Murray and Chris Pratt, there’s only room for one Garfield on this list, and we’re going with Andrew, hands down. The British actor has been a slick and likable presence on screen, ever since his breakthrough in The Social Network, a film that required him to master the complicated speed of an Aaron Sorkin script. What’s impressive is how he continued to push himself, delivering increasingly stronger and more varied performances in films like the neo-noir oddity Under the Silver Lake, Scorsese’s devout epic Silence, and the bittersweet musical Tick, Tick…Boom!. In a different way, Spider-Man: No Way Home sees Garfield being incongruously deeply moving, while 2024’s We Live in Time sees him perform a duet with Florence Pugh, no small feat. CL
42. Tom Hardy
There is no other movie star like Tom Hardy, who embraces masculinity as vehemently as he rejects it. For Christopher Nolan, Hardy played the noble pilot in Dunkirk (2017); the James Bond aspirant with a smile in Inception (2010); and, in The Dark Knight Rises (2012), the burly villain who, after reflection, now bears an uncanny resemblance to the viral video of the Australian’s arrest (“eating a meal. . . A succulent Chinese meal!”) shown in a supermarket tannoy. His accents are natural magic, they come from unexpected places, and he discovers tactics to disturb and weaponize his physique into tactics that few others would dare. He goes wild and almost silent in Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), sophisticated and grounded as a man whose life falls apart during a solo car vacation in Locke (2013), theatrical, violent, and pompous. as the prominent British prisoner Charles Bronson in Bronson (2008). Hardy can do anything, but he will do it his way. Clarisse Loughrey
41. Irfan Khan
It is Irrfan Khan’s dark brown, hooded eyes that will live forever. They gave him the ability to weave magic, to recite poetry without moving his lips. After decades in Bollywood, a term he criticized for linking the Indian film industry to the American one. concepts: Khan made a breakthrough with British director Asif Kapadia’s debut film, The Warrior (2002), as a fighter seeking to make peace with his violent acts. In this he had only stoic courage; this is the intensity he later brought to Maqbool (2003), an adaptation of Macbeth set in suburban Mumbai. And it is tenderness that he discovers as a widower in The Lunchbox (2013). Known to the English-speaking world thanks to his roles in Slumdog Millionaire (2008), Jurassic World (2015) and The Darjeeling Limited (2007), Khan died in 2020 at the age of 53, shocking the world. CL
40. Javier Bardem
Is there an actor more simmering with machismo and raw power than Javier Bardem? I’m not sure. He was a chilling, milk-chugging psychopath in the Coen brothers’ No Country for Old Men, his deep-seated rage and thirst for slaughter all the more terrifying for his calm, icy exterior. And his mercurial artist in Vicky Cristina Barcelona was seductively, unapologetically primal – more panther than man. Stretching out, like a feline in the warmth of the sun, his claws catching on Penelope Cruz and Rebecca Hall. Even his camp, Nordic-baddie style Bond villain, Raoul Silva, had a sinister potency – all smiles and strange stories about cannibalistic rats. When Bardem’s on the screen, he burns rights through it. EH
39. Viola Davis
Viola Davis has less than 10 minutes of screentime in Doubt, the 2008 film set in a Catholic school, but her brief turn as the mother of a boy who may or may not have been abused by his teacher is a masterclass in simmering emotion; even her tears seem somehow controlled and understated, falling drop by drop as she goes toe to toe with Meryl Streep. This short but unforgettable role catapulted her already successful career into the big leagues. Davis is an actor of incredible subtlety; watching her face off in 2016’s Fences with Denzel Washington, one of very few performers on her level, was utterly exhilarating, and she brought impressive nuance to her role as the wife of a career criminal in Steve McQueen’s explosive Widows. KR
38. Viggo Mortensen
What is Viggo Mortensen like? When the American actor accepted the role of Aragorn, the mischievous and heroic king in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy, he seemed poised to become a successful star actor. Of course, he succeeded in the role, giving the character all the required spunk and grace. But then he rejected the call to action, walking away from studio money and turning to more twisted independent projects (including several, generally fantastic, collaborations with David Cronenberg). In an industry of showbiz people, Mortensen has the confidence and determination of a true artist. LC
37. Jason Schwartzman
Few actors master the art of underestimating as much as Jason Schwartzman. Over the course of six post-millennial collaborations with the deadpan Wes Anderson, the American actor has only deepened and evolved as a character actor, culminating in a heartbreaking turn in Asteroid City. But Schwartzman is more than a competent Anderson model. His forays elsewhere: the stinky, neurotic Listen Up Philip; the cult jewel Marie Antoinette – they are quite brilliant; a wonderfully silly twist on the recent Queer (2024) proved that it still had more to reveal. LC
36. Adele Haenel
Watching Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019) through Céline Sciamma is like falling in love with Adèle Haenel. He would probably be betting on an observed woman – the aristocratic subject of a portrait painted by the artist Marianne (Noémie Merlant) – but when he turns his hardened gaze towards us, the corners of his mouth gently drawn downwards in a frowning air, we suddenly realize that he feels scrutinized, unpacked. Array With two C’s in his home France, Haenel brought that same captivating steadfastness to his roles in the queer drama Nymphéas (2007), Sciamma’s deyet, and BPM (Beats consistent with Minute) (2017). In 2022, she announced that she was stepping away from cinema, an industry that continues to protect the “capitalist, patriarchal, racist and sexist global from structural inequalities”. We can only hope that one day, after all, it will become a position worthy of his talent. CL
35. Robert Pattinson
Sure, it’s trite to start a triyet with Robert Pattinson with Twilight, but it’s vital for this initial role when it’s a movie like The Lighthouse. In the latter, arthouse film at its finest, Pattinson takes on heavyweight weirdo Willem Dafoe, showing how far he’s come since he made teenage women swoon as a 104-year-old vampire. Array Sexy, this lighthouse keeper is definitely not. In fact, it turns out that Pattinson constantly flees from the conventional convenience that his traditionally elegant appearance could offer, and instead runs into the arms of administrators like Claire Denis, Christopher Nolan, David Cronenberg and the Safdie brothers, with the same intensity that he instills. in all his films. characters. More than anything, Pattinson runs dangers: take his deliciously French country accessory in The King, his emo boy edit of The Batman, or his Christopher Hitchens-inspired sidekick in Tenet. TO
34. Michael Stuhlbarg
In just a few minutes, near the end of Call Me By Your Name, Michael Stuhlbarg, one of America’s most productive supporting actors, destroyed his audience. “At this moment there is sadness, pain,” the father tells his son, about the first love. “Don’t kill him and with him the joy you felt. “Exquisite writing, to be sure, but it’s Stuhlbarg’s trademark blend of an almost academic poker face and a latent sensibility that makes it tick. His most productive performance, however, is a character in the throes of emotional turmoil: hapless schoolteacher Larry Gopnik in The Coen brothers’ A Serious Man. Released in 2009, it sparked a series of castings (Lincoln, Steve Jobs, The Post, The Shape of Water) that made Stuhlbarg one of Hollywood’s most trusted actors. NEW HAMPSHIRE
33. Marc Ruffalo
There’s something particularly peculiar about Ruffalo’s sensibility, a kind of volatile sweetness that makes him such a curious candidate for roles like the sexed police detective in In the Cut, or the distant sperm donor in The Kids Are All Right. But Ruffalo was right in those areas, as he supposedly is: Zodiac, Shutter Island, Foxcatcher, and Spotlight all received slick and poignant paintings from him; Poor Things saw him thrive in a comedic twist as an arrogant, belligerent and cuckold. Even his series of films like Marvel’s The Incredible Hulk has some engaging touches, especially in the first two Avengers movies. CL
32. Frances McDormand
Frances McDormand might be related to the incredibly pregnant and wonderfully uncool Minnesota police leader from 1996’s Fargo, but the 21st century has seen her become an industry giant. McDormand’s unexpected ability to convey multiple feelings and motivations at once is brilliantly used to its fullest extent. recent roles, whether a vengeful mother (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri) or an overbearing mother (Almaximum Famous). His naturalism and empathy. He discovered another home in Chloe Zhao’s Nomadland, a pinnacle for one of the most productive actors alive today. After all, three Oscars don’t lie. ONE
31. Ryan Gosling
This is the actor who, in Barbie, managed to transform a plastic doll with a smoothed crotch into a truly revealing portrait of a misguided stylish boy and, what’s more, the funniest character in that movie. But Ryan Gosling is rarely just Ken. This feature was the latest in a long line, from The Nice Guys to Lars and the Real Girl to Crazy, Stupid, Love, in which Gosling showed off his weirdness and willingness to look ridiculous. But he is also one of the dramatic film stars who most define his generation: just take a look at his disturbing stoicism in Drive, or the tragic lovers he played in his two collaborations with Derek Cianfrance (Blue Valentine and The Place Beyond the Pins). This guy will pierce your heart. And do it all with a crooked smile. Hey
30. Rachel McAdams
Rachel McAdams, a reluctant 21st-century movie star, plays some of the funniest and most memorable actors you’ll ever see, and then buries herself for years in unknown places. Or, you know, somewhere in your local Canada. Unusually for someone so publicly disconnected, it’s the network that keeps his paintings alive: each and every one of his borderline sociopathic lines on Mean Girls now exist as memes, as does his deadpan cry of “Oh no, he is. “Is there her bizarre romantic drama Disobedience even outdoors in this gif of Rachel Weisz spitting in her mouth?But more than anything, McAdams is just fun to watch on screen: warm and empathetic in films like The Notebook and Are You There God?It’s me, Margaret; Unwavering and self-assured in Spotlight and Red Eye. AW
29. Mahershala Ali
Mahershala Ali possesses the quiet command of Old Hollywood stardom, a sense that no word is wasted, no gesture made without careful intent. His reserve can transform into calculated hostility when he wills it, such as his villainous turn as Cottonmouth in Marvel’s Luke Cage, or into something more graceful, more contemplative, as so beautifully demonstrated in his Oscar-winning performances in Moonlight (2016) and Green Book (2017). These roles catapulted him from a steady, but unassuming place in the industry, into its very heart – as he became the first Muslim actor to win an Oscar and the only Black actor since Denzel Washington to win two. In Moonlight, Ali haunts the screen despite his relatively contracted screen time as Juan, a local drug dealer who takes young Chiron (Alex R Hibbert) under his wing and shows him the gentle nature of the world. CL
28. Saoirse Ronan
She was just 12 in Atonement, but the pre-teen Saoirse Ronan already had the striking intensity that she’d bring to future roles; her turn as Briony, alternately naive and precocious, sets up the film’s moral thorniness. Since then, Ronan has established herself as an industry favourite who values interesting creative choices over blockbuster fame. She seems to have found her dream collaborator in Greta Gerwig, who has directed her in two of her best performances: as the “titular role” in Gerwig’s coming-of-age movie Lady Bird and as Jo March in Little Women, a casting decision that managed to please even the most devoted fans of Louisa May Alcott’s classic. “I hope we get to be old ladies together making movies about old ladies,” Gerwig has said of the star. KR
27. Paul Giamatti
Like Paul Hunham, the moody professor-turned-janitor in Alexander Payne’s The Holdovers, Giamatti reminded audiences that he was a paramount skill in film. Too classified as a “character actor” (a Hollywood euphemism for other people who don’t seem ordinary). pin-ups), Giamatti has expanded its line-up with blockbusters (Planet of the Apes, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, The Hangover Part II), awards (12 years to Slave, Saving Mr Banks, The Ides of March) and major trending TV shows. But it was independent films like Win Win, Private Life, and Barney’s Version that best demonstrated Giamatti’s skill, not to mention his canonical role as wine snob Miles. in 2004’s Sideways, a feature so difficult that it sent sales of California Merlot. NH plummeting
26. Joaquin Phoenix
Being the younger brother of a leading man and a big movie star in the making can’t have been easy for Joaquin Phoenix. But over the years, he has emerged from the shadow of his brother’s legacy (and tragedy) with a series of roles that show how fluidly he moves between risk and vulnerability, an internal clash that has dominated since Gladiator from the year 2000. In some minds, the lead role will be his Oscar-winning role in Joker, however, his performances in films such as Two Lovers, The Master, Her, Inherent Vice and C’mon C’mon are much more interesting. In fact, Phoenix’s filmography is so full of deep and complex performances that it’s hard to pick a favorite: Not only does he almost deliver a multi-layered performance, he wisely selects tantalizing projects. N. H
25. Carey Mulligan
Mulligan was 23 when she earned her first Oscar nomination in 2010, for a role in An Education that nimbly balanced the naivety, seriousness and sophistication of a 16-year-old on the brink. of adulthood. Then came roles that plunged into darkness: a broken wife in Drive, a suicidal singer in Shame, an enraged folk artist in Inside Llewyn Davis. Her second nomination was in 2021 for Promising Young Woman, a film that arrived with the speed and color palette of an explosion in a gum factory. As a woman replaced after her friend’s rape, Mulligan was revenge itself: scheming, ruthless, insatiable, and full of natural pain. His third came in 2024 for his magnificently fragile Felicia Montealegre Cohn in Maestro, the actress and activist wife of composer Leonard Bernstein. So many roles, and to each of them she brings such painful humanity. Hey
24. Jesse Plemons
Who would’ve thought the bowl-cut kid from Like Mike would grow up to be one of the 21st century’s finest actors? From those humble beginnings, Jesse Plemons continues to forge one of the most interesting paths for a character actor to date – traversing prime-time TV (Friday Night Lights; Breaking Bad), spiky arthouse films (Kinds of Kindness; I’m Thinking of Ending Things), Oscar winners (Killers of the Flower Moon; Power of the Dog), and silly comedies (Game Night). The one consistent? Plemons making off with scenes, by virtue of his sheer naturalism. He is the sort of actor who feels as though he’s just stumbled off the street and onto the screen – lending every role (even the bonkers Kinds of Kindness) a rare, coveted believability. AN
23. Penélope Cruz
Cruz entered our lives dressed in red and carrying a suitcase down a dusty road in Jamón Jamón in 1992. The intensity she brought to her first film role at the age of 18 is just a taste of what’s to come in a brilliant film. in its fourth decade. He won an Osautomobile and a Bafta for his role in Woody Allen’s Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008), but Cruz has arguably made his most productive paintings in the films of Pedro Almodóvar, for whom he has been a staple in classics such as Volver (2006). , Broken Embraces (2009) and Parallel Mothers (2021). The director discovers breadth and emotional intensity in the performances of this daughter of a hairdresser and a car mechanic from the outskirts of Madrid, who made the leap from European auteur cinema to Hollywood blockbuster alongside Tom Cruise in Vanilla without any problems. Sky (2001) and Adam Driver. at Ferrari (2023). Cruz takes complex, multifaceted characters and lights them with an inner fire. CH
22. Adam Driver
We have much to thank Lena Dunhan’s Girls for, not least introducing the world to Adam Driver. As the show’s boorish artist boyfriend, he proved himself a fount of untapped talent – every scene a vehicle for his oddball magnetism. On the big screen, he’s all coiled emotion, a six-foot-two loaded spring ready to go off – in which direction is anybody’s guess. Driver is an actor of contradictions. He is kind and cruel, charming and disgusting, loveable and loathsome. He’s also strange, lending each role a certain can’t-look-away eccentricism, no matter if it’s arthouse like Annette or as mainstream as Star Wars. In the words of Lena Dunham: “He’s a freakin’ weirdo.” AN
21. Tony Leung
The sultry king of Hong Kong cinema, Leung, has a kind of magnetism that can cause conflict abroad. The New York Times once called this a “dazzling sadness,” made of parting glances and inscrutable longing, captured most productively through Wong Kar-wai in his majestic romance In the Mood for Love. Then Leung adjusts the game. : an assassin in Zhang Yimou’s Hero, a beaten undercover cop in Infernal Affairs, an inscrutable (yet incredibly handsome, duh) traitor in Ang Lee’s Lust, Few stars burn with charisma so naked and intoxicating. And add it to a rare English-language film, like Marvel’s Shang-Chi, and the scale is almost hilarious: It’s a hydrogen bomb, everyone’s a coughing trunk. A. W.
20. Tilda Swinton
Swinton is one of cinema’s wonderful chameleons, as plausible as a mother who slowly begins to feel horror for her unattainable son in We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011) as she is as the obsessed old widow Madame D in The Grand Budapest. Hotels (2014). It may be easy to associate her regal poise with being the daughter of a Scottish nobleman, but she conveys almost unfathomable depths beneath the cold porcelain exterior she presents to the cameras. There is also warmth and emotion, as in the portrait of a lawyer punishing a covered-up homicide in Michael Clayton (2007), for which he won an Oscar, unlike George Clooney. Swinton is an actor who takes risks and almost never disappoints. CH
19. Kirsten Dunst
Kirsten Dunst, a rare fusion of boundless skill and surely impeccable taste, might be the owner of the most impressive filmography on this list if we rank it by sheer diversity. Look at the material: the teenage madness of Bring It On and Get Over It; the excitement of the Spider-Man comic; the fashionable harvest that is Eternal radiance of a mind without memories. Dunst is highly intelligent in a kind of penetrating and complex sunlight, the kind that masks disappointment, self-loathing, or, as in dark comedies like Bachelorette or the haunted soufflé of a Sofia Coppola film, Marie Antoinette, growing lack of confidence. And it’s surely sensational as women drifting in despair, a pain that fuels their characters in Coppola’s The Beguiled and The Virgin Suicides, Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog, and Lars von Trier’s Melancholia. Kirsten Dunst, the favorite movie star of thinking millennials. He would possibly reign for a long time. A. W.
18. Michelle Williams
From the smartest woman in Dawson’s Creek to the eternal Oscar nominee, Michelle Williams’ career has been marked by slow but steady recognition. It was her portrayal of an ignored and betrayed housewife in 2005’s Brokeback Mountain, her first Oscar-nominated role, that propelled her out of ’90s youthful reminiscence and into the cinematic mainstream. Since then, it has been for performances in films such as Blue Valentine, Manchester. Through the Sea and The Fabelmans, which have shown their strength of quiet anguish, while other roles, such as Emily Tetherow in Meek’s Cutoff and Marilyn Monroe in My Week With Marilyn demonstrated their enormous reach. NEW HAMPSHIRE
17. Leonardo DiCaprio
Sometimes, the desperate desire to win an Academy Award – or even, the perception that such a desire exists – can derail an actor’s promising career, tipping them towards safe, pandering sludge in an effort to please voters. DiCaprio, one of the biggest stars on the planet, was seen to have spent much of the 21st century pining for the Academy’s recognition. Though it finally arrived in 2016 (for the punishing wilderness western The Revenant), this pursuit of Oscar glory only ever pushed DiCaprio into bolder and more daring territory. He is outstanding in his six collaborations with Martin Scorsese (particularly Wolf of Wall Street) but his best work may have come with Quentin Tarantino – as explosive irredeemable slave-owner Calvin Candie in Django Unchained, and washed-up actor Rick Daltonin Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood. The fresh-faced kid from Titanic is long gone – the man who’s replaced him is far more interesting. LC
16. Kristen Stewart
A movie star made in an instant, thanks to the Twilight series, Kristen Stewart has for a long time been treated as caricature in the popular imagination. Lip bite. Hair twirl. Stammer. But her genius as an actor is that, while others clamoured for her to fade away, tics, mannerisms and all, she saw them for what they truly were – a marker of humanity at its most honest. Even when in the act of imitation, carefully replicating the bashful head-tilt and murmured entreaties of Princess Diana in Pablo Larraín’s Spencer (2021), Stewart finds deep and restless parts of herself in these characters. Nothing is suppressed. She is available, entirely, to the camera, inviting in new conditions and perspectives. Then, she allows those emotions to explode outwards like fireworks, in Olivier Assayas’s Personal Shopper (2016), Kelly Reichardt’s Certain Women (2016), David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future (2022), or Rose Glass’s Love Lies Bleeding (2024). To Stewart, there is only truth in cinema. CL
15. Jennifer Lawrence
The speed with which Jennifer Lawrence ascended to maximum sensible in the 2010s is all the more impressive given the impoverished underdogs she plays so well: the reluctant warrior in The Hunger Games, the near-orphan in the woods in Winter’s Bone, the cautious Causeway tramp. There is courage in Lawrence’s most important characters, who possess a strength that only took root because their cases demanded it. Although she fits one of the most famous women on the planet, Lawrence’s possible creative options: the Oscar-winning madness for Silver Linings Playbook; Darren Aronofsky’s Mother’s Hard-to-Watch Chaos! – rarely felt glamorous. His only genuine comedy vehicle, 2023’s No Hard Feelings, is also full of subversion: there’s no nudity in his sexy skinny-dipping scene, but there is a surprising facade when he violently beats up a teenage organization for stealing his clothes at the school. beach. right after. A. W.
14. Christian Balé
One of Britain’s most productive hot actors, Christian Bale is a serious but flexible actor. He has shown himself willing to aesthetically remodel himself for a role: becoming skeletally thin for sections of The Machinist (2004) and gaining 40 pounds (and some prosthetics) to play Dick Cheney in Vice (2018). If there is an air of brilliance or trickery to this type of practice, then there is nothing trick about it. Bale’s real paintings on the screen. He is a full-bodied actor, capable of turning a mediocre character into a colorful spectacle (The Big Short) and, as with American Psycho or The Prestige, extracting greatness from more powerful material. It was thanks to Bale’s artistry that he was able to play Bruce Wayne in a trilogy that many consider the definitive film adaptation of Batman, without letting the role define him. CL
13. Isabelle Huppert
What a fearless actor Huppert is. The great French screen diva is now in her seventies and has trod a thrilling path since her 1972 debut in the romance Faustine et le Bel Été (in which Isabelle Adjani, long considered her rival, also appeared). She’s simply unforgettable in Michel Haneke’s The Piano Teacher (2001) as a sexually repressed woman who acts upon her sadomasochistic fantasies with one of her students – for which she won the Best Actress award at Cannes but went unrecognised at the Oscars. They finally did notice her uncompromising performance in Paul Verhoeven’s controversial rape-fantasy Elle in 2016. Huppert is prepared to take any role right to the edge; there’s no one like her. CH
12. Natalie Portman
Once George Lucas has made you look like a terrible actor in low-quality Star Wars prequels three times, I guess things can only get better. That’s probably what happened to Natalie Portman, who began the 21st century floating through space in a flurry of crazy costumes, before becoming one of Hollywood’s boldest and bravest movie stars. Portman loves big changes and functionality, possible options that seem dangerously close to falling off a cliff in horror: Bavia’s fragile voice in Negro Swan, Jackie’s archaic, old-fashioned register, her loquacious bravado in Vox Lux, the disturbing strangeness of its ruthless television star in May-December. It’s rare these days to find an actor who doesn’t seem interested in naturalism, who understands that one of the most exciting games is when you feel like you’re watching someone throw large, heavy objects against a wall just to see what’s happening. . A. W.
11. Willem Dafoe
Willem Dafoe’s big, nervous face can morph into anything macabre or comical, an eyesore or a beacon of banality. He is strangely eternal as a performer, both in period horror films such as The Lighthouse or Nosferatu and in comic book films (The Green Goblin in Spider-Man!), raw indie films such as The Florida Project or the most traditional advertising films on the market (The Fault in Our Stars). He was a vampire and a vampire hunter; the strangest user you’ve ever met and the most humanly moving. The authors love it. He’ll surely do anything for a salary (Aquaman, anyone?). It is robust, attractive and reliable. How ruthless global it would be without him. AW
10. Florence Pugh
The youngest person on this list, Florence Pugh has already shown herself to be a generationally gifted actor. There were those who almost called it from her breakout role in the dark period drama Lady Macbeth; others only clocked it when she stole every scene in Little Women as the bratty Amy March. She’s got tremendous range – playing a northern wrestler in Fighting with My Family, an American opioid addict in Zach Braff’s A Good Person, and a chef with cancer in We Live in Time – but also great depth. As when she played Jean Tatlock in Oppenheimer, Pugh makes even small roles feel major. LC
9. Colin Farrell
The explanation why other people are complaining about Colin Farrell’s debut highlight reel is essentially because it’s a genius story: an arrogant Irish party boy with a sex tape suddenly becomes an incredibly reputable actor, focused on writers and geniuses, The strength of his superhuman air of mystery is used for the intelligent than for the evil. It’s vital to pay tribute to those who deserve it: Farrell was very smart in the movie star box of the early 2000s, bringing a degree of sweat to characters like Phone. Booth, Miami Vice and Minority Report. But his most productive moment is when we get past his defenses. His works with Yorpasss Lanthimos (The Lobster), Sofia Coppola (The Seduced) and, above all, Martin McDonagh (ÀBrujas). , The Banshees of Inisherin) revolves around his flawed and unfortunate vulnerability, that chink in the armor that makes him so unexpectedly smooth on screen. Seems essentially decent, doesn’t it? A. W.
8. Cate Blanchett
To say the Australian actor has range would be understating things almost to the point of irony. Blanchett has an almost bewildering breadth of talent that allows her to forge one memorable character after another. She’s celestially pure as Galadriel in the Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001-3); implausibly Dylanesque in I’m Not There (2007); deeply romantic in Carol (2015); imperious in Tár (2022); the list goes on. Blanchett is a subtle and intelligent actor, always precise, and blessed with a charisma that allows her to step with ease into blockbuster territory, from her KGB agent Irina Spalko in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) to her Goddess of Death Hela in Thor: Ragnarok (2017). Rumours of retirement sometimes swirl around her; let’s hope they’re not true. CH
7. Kang Ho Song
Western audiences will probably know Song Kang Ho for his role in Parasite, winner of Best Picture of 2020. But it is in his first collaboration with Bong Joon Ho, Memories of Murder (2003), that he finds a single shot that best captures the magnificent irony at the center of his painting: Song, more than anyone else, can express helplessness. with total precision and control. The actor is one of the best-known faces of new Korean cinema, loved by Bong, Park Chan Wook and Kim Jee Woon. In Memories of Murder, he plays a detective in rural South Korea whose attempts to arrest a serial killer are thwarted. He returns, years later, to the crime scene, to be confronted by a witness, a little girl, who can only describe the guy as “normal. ” Song looks at the audience with wild, desperate eyes: the film was animated by a real murderer, who at that time had not yet been arrested. Could he have returned here, in this film, to contemplate his woes? Song’s features obviously demonstrate those fears. CL
6. Daniel Kaluuya
After Steve McQueen cast Daniel Kaluuya in his 2018 thriller Widows, he said of the actor: “He has that gift you don’t see often, a presence even in his stillness. You feel what he is feeling, you see what he is seeing.” In that film, Kaluuya plays the relatively minor part of a mob enforcer but it is his beautiful intensity, his determination to intimidate, his eyes (those eyes!) that are the most memorable thing about it. Those very eyes were the same, wide, tear-spilling pools that made the world wince in Get Out, one of the best and most important films of the 21st century. So much of Kaluuya’s work – from Queen & Slim to Judas and the Black Messiah to Black Panther, to Nope – is deeply humanistic, taking complex Black characters and presenting their experiences undiminished and undimmed. A truly radical star. EH
5. Nicole Kidman
You can’t deny that Nicole Kidman has range. For proof, you only have to rewind to her consecutive Best Actress Oscar nominations at the Academy Awards in 2001 and 2002, which recognised two roles that could hardly be more different: her dazzling all-singing, all-dancing turn as a consumptive showgirl in Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge! and her winning portrayal of Virginia Woolf towards the end of her life in The Hours. She’s not afraid to go to places that other actors might baulk at – playing a woman convinced that her dead husband has been reincarnated as a 10-year-old boy in Birth, for example – and when it comes to her movie work, her filmography is so eclectic that there’s no such thing as a typical “Nicole Kidman role” (although arguably the opposite is true if you look at her TV resumé). No one throws themself into a role quite like Kidman does, whether that’s adopting an outlandish accent, a prosthetic nose or an intriguing wig; on a more serious note, though, her commitment to working with female filmmakers, collaborating with 15 over the past seven years, is admirable. The film industry is a far more interesting place with her in it. KR
4. Denzel Washington
Few actors have as much weight in Hollywood as Denzel Washington: the call itself turns out to puff out his chest and make his chin stick out. Yet this is what you get when you’ve spent the last four decades, like Washington, achieving some of the highs. Indelible performances in recent memory. Washington brought his ’90s stardom into the 21st century with videos like American Gangster and Out of Time. That said, he doesn’t want the high-flying action to shine. You only have to look at his crackling performance in Joel Coen’s The Tragedy of Macbeth for evidence of that. As a tormented general, he is discreet and sharp in his ability to cut through emotions. Between Macbeth, the fiery finale of Training Day, and most recently in Gladiator 2, one thing is for sure: the guy can do a monologue. And who knows? The most productive is possibly yet to come.
3. Daniel Day-Lewis
Since his portrayal of Irish editor and artist Christy Brown, born with cerebral palsy, in My Left Foot (1989), Daniel Day-Lewis has become synonymous with a methodical commitment like no other actor (he is hardly presented with this component today in day). . In this millennium aspect, he took your breath away with his on-screen performances of 19th-century Protestant gangster Bill the Butcher in Scorsese’s Gangs of New York (2002) and the ruthless oilman Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood (2007). Day-Lewis is adept at allowing the natural hatred of his characters to foster; took another direction toward the preaspect of the American Civil War in Spielberg’s Lincoln (2012). He announced that his temperamental, controlling 1950s society fashion designer, Reynolds Woodcock, in Phantom Thread would be his last role (he had spent a year learning how to make a couture dress). The news that he plans to return next year in a film directed by his son Ronan is exciting, to say the least. CH
2. Emma Pierre
Is there a more exhilarating symbol than Emma Stone flailing, pushing and twirling in a Victorian ballroom in Poor Things? Maybe the time he gleefully splashed his love rival on The Favorite, Rachel Weisz, with a dove’s blood. Or when he danced La La Land at dusk. At 36, Stone is one of the youngest actors on this list, but the pathos and joy he invests in his roles recommend a long and rich life. Her transition from devastating roles in romantic comedies like Easy A and Crazy, Stupid, Love to her most recent foray into black comedy and gothic fantasy finds the Oscar winner masterfully subverting her girl-next-door origins. with raw and fearless work. Your possible options are risky, hungry and nutritious. Hey
1. Philippe Seymour Hoffman
It is a testament to the undeniable genius of Philip Seymour Hoffman that this selection for the top position is almost too obvious. But, apparent or not, one cannot exaggerate the paintings of the American actor defeated between 2000 and his death in 2014. He was incredibly adaptable: shrewd and modest in Capote, dominant and fallible in The Master, jaded with the essentials in Most Wanted. When curtains were imperfect, he figured out a way to make them cool, like the window-smashing spy in Charlie Wilson’s War, or the maudlin, unconventional protagonist in God’s Pocket. But when curtains were wonderful (and sometimes they were), Hoffman rose to the occasion. In the headline of his obituary, The New York Times described Hoffman as a “deep actor. “This might seem like a feeble compliment, but it’s also profoundly true. He was an actor of probably unfathomable empathy; Not a moment has passed without you believing it. CL
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