It's hard to say what makes a perfect movie appearance, but some roles are indisputably impressive. From iconic characters to underappreciated gems, there's no denying that these performances are the best of the best.
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00:00It's hard to say what makes a perfect movie appearance, but some roles are indisputably
00:05impressive.
00:06From iconic characters to underappreciated gems, there's no denying that these performances
00:11are the best of the best.
00:13There's very little to say about pop fiction that hasn't already been said.
00:16Quentin Tarantino's non-chronological classic is arguably the most quotable movie of a generation,
00:21with a hefty percentage of those quotes spoken with righteous vigor by Samuel L. Jackson's
00:26Jules Winfield.
00:27Jackson, a frequent collaborator of Tarantino's, plays the religious hitman with poise and
00:31confidence.
00:32He's a joy to watch, whether he's waxing poetic or bantering with John Travolta's Vincent
00:37Vega.
00:38If my answers frighten you, Vincent, then you should cease asking scary questions.
00:41Calm, controlled, and calculated, Jules always has the upper hand.
00:46His shakedown of Brett and his buddies is perhaps his most popular moment, but his interaction
00:50with two petty criminals at an L.A. diner is unparalleled.
00:54In a film filled with memorable characters and performances, Jackson stands out as a
00:58definitive performance.
01:00There are numerous Philip Seymour Hoffman performances worthy of being labeled as all-time
01:04great.
01:05His outings in The Master, Synecdoche, New York, Punch-Drunk Love, Capote, and plenty
01:10of others are all contenders for the top of the heap.
01:12That said, his work in the somewhat underappreciated Before the Devil Knows You're Dead has an
01:16intangible X-factor that helps it rise ever so slightly above the rest.
01:21Before the Devil Knows You're Dead follows a pair of brothers, played by Hoffman and
01:24Ethan Hawke, as they deal with the fallout of their failed attempt to rob their parents'
01:28jewelry store.
01:29As they dig themselves into increasingly painful predicaments, Hoffman delivers the most manic,
01:34desperate, and intense performance of his infinitely impressive filmography.
01:38Who knows how many more of the best performances of all time Hoffman would have given if not
01:48for his untimely passing at the age of 46.
01:51Robert De Niro is one of the finest actors of his generation, or any other for that matter.
01:56His performances in recent years are still Oscar-worthy, but he was in his absolute prime
02:00in the 70s and early 80s when he made movies like The Godfather Part II, The Deer Hunter,
02:05Raging Bull, The King of Comedy, and, of course, Taxi Driver.
02:08You talking to me?
02:09Then who the hell else are you talking to?
02:14You talking to me?
02:15As the dangerous driver turned deranged vigilante Travis Bickle, De Niro captivated audiences
02:20with a magnetic performance that spoke perfectly to the times while also becoming timeless.
02:25This complex character demanded an intense physical transformation from De Niro as well
02:29as nuanced psychological work from the actor that rewards repeat viewings.
02:33De Niro earned his first lead actor Oscar nomination for the role, securing Travis Bickle
02:37a place in the pantheon of unforgettable movie characters.
02:40The Hunter is a Danish film from 2012 that deals with some heavy topics, but only a lead
02:45actor as talented as Mads Mikkelsen could have managed to pull it off with such grace.
02:49Mikkelsen plays Lucas, a kind-hearted kindergarten teacher who's on the brink of losing everything
02:54after a student tells a lie about him that spirals out of control.
02:58The Hunt was nominated for the Palme d'Or at Cannes, with Mikkelsen taking home the
03:01Best Actor accolade from the prestigious film festival.
03:04While American audiences will be more familiar with Mikkelsen for his frequent villain roles
03:08in English-language projects like Casino Royale, Doctor Strange, and The Hannibal TV Show,
03:13The Hunt shows him in a much more vulnerable state.
03:15Few film performances this century are more heartbreaking than this one.
03:19As the first international film to ever win Best Picture at the Oscars, Parasite helped
03:23South Korean director Bong Joon-ho and his talented cast gain popularity in America.
03:28While actor Song Kang-ho had collaborated with the acclaimed director multiple times
03:33before, his role as the patriarch of the impoverished Kim family elevated him to a new level of
03:37fame.
03:38Along with his wife and children, Kim Kotech connives his way into the graces and payroll
03:42of the well-off Park family.
03:44As something of a chameleon actor, Song Kang-ho fully disappears into each and every role
03:48he plays, so playing someone who's trying to blend in himself has an interesting element
03:53to his already layered performance.
03:55The entire ensemble of Parasite shines, but Song Kang-ho is a standout among standouts.
04:00As one of the biggest stars of the new Hollywood movement, few actors can ever hope to be as
04:04influential as Jack Nicholson.
04:06After getting his start in the old Hollywood studio system in the days of the Hays Code,
04:10Nicholson emerged as a force to be reckoned with as he helped usher in a time of momentous
04:14cultural and cinematic change.
04:16His participation in this movement began with his supporting role in 1969's Easy Rider,
04:21but it was his lead role in the following year's Five Easy Pieces that turned him into
04:25a full-fledged star.
04:26Don't sit there pointing at her.
04:29I beg your pardon?
04:30I said don't point at her, you creep.
04:32Nicholson's performance as a blue-collar working man who fled a privileged upbringing made
04:36him a counter-culture icon.
04:38With a callous exterior and tragically relatable interior, Nicholson brought a complex character
04:42to life in a way that set the tone for American cinema of the 1970s.
04:46He earned his first Lead Actor Oscar nomination for the role.
04:50Brad Dourif is an underrated actor who never received the level of respect and acclaim
04:54that he was due.
04:55These days, he's best known as the voice of Chucky, the killer doll from the Child's Play
04:58series.
04:59But Dourif's closest brush with mainstream stardom actually arrived with his very first
05:03role.
05:04In the best picture-winning One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Dourif played Billy Bibbit,
05:07a young mental hospital patient with a stutter and a whole lot of demons.
05:11With bright-eyed innocence on the surface but insurmountable turmoil below, Dourif's
05:15performance is the heart of a film packed with phenomenal performances.
05:19While Jack Nicholson and Louise Fletcher both won Academy Awards for their performances,
05:23Dourif still managed to score his only Oscar nomination to date for Best Supporting Actor.
05:27He's given many other excellent performances over the years in projects like Deadwood,
05:32The Exorcist 3, and Mississippi Burning, but none have stacked up to the accolades of his
05:36first outing.
05:37Set during the Japanese occupation of Korea, 2016's The Handmaiden is a critically beloved
05:42drama from Park Chan-wook of Oldboy fame.
05:45The whole cast turns in excellent performances, but Kim Tae-ri and Kim Min-hee stand above
05:50as a romantic coupling at the core of the story.
05:52Both keep audiences guessing throughout the film's twisty narrative, but if we had to
05:56pick one, it would be Kim Min-hee as Lady Hidiko.
05:59Pulling off the difficult feat of appearing both fragile and powerful, Kim Min-hee's tightrope
06:04walk of a performance has to be seen to be believed.
06:06Her efforts embodying the abused heiress stunned judges at the Blue Dragon Awards,
06:10the Director's Cut Awards, and the Cine21 Awards, three of South Korea's biggest film
06:14awards programs.
06:16With only five features in his filmography, every single one of which was nominated for
06:20an Oscar, John Cazale has the greatest batting average of any actor in history.
06:24Two of the masterpieces he appeared in were Francis Ford Coppola's first pair of Godfather
06:28films, in which Cazale played the pivotal but often overlooked role of Fredo Corleone.
06:33Just as Fredo was the black sheep of the family and the weak link in the criminal
06:36organization, the role was similarly underappreciated in the first of the two movies.
06:41That all changed with a sequel, as Coppola and Mario Puzo greatly expanded the character's
06:45role in the story for The Godfather Part II.
06:48In a series filled with too many iconic moments and incredible performances to count, Fredo's
06:52outburst toward Michael is a true highlight.
06:54I'm your older brother, Mike, and I was stepped over!
06:57That's the way Pop wanted it.
06:59It ain't the way I wanted it!
07:01With his death from lung cancer at the age of 42, Cazale never had the chance to ascend
07:05to the heights of stardom enjoyed by his Godfather co-stars.
07:08But his legacy lives on through his five flawless performances.
07:12Meryl Streep is one of the most highly lauded actors to ever live.
07:15Although the record for most Oscar wins remains with Katharine Hepburn, Streep holds the record
07:19for the most Academy Award nominations accrued by any individual, with 21.
07:24With so many exceptional roles to her name, picking a top Streep performance is an extremely
07:28tough choice.
07:29It only makes sense that her greatest performance of all is a woman who must make an impossible
07:33decision herself.
07:34Sophie's Choice is a 1982 drama that uses a non-chronological structure to jump back
07:39and forth between the title character's troubled romance in New York City and her devastating
07:43experiences in a concentration camp in which she can only save one of her two children.
07:48Streep earned her second Oscar win for her heartbreaking performance and cemented herself
07:52as one of the all-time greatest sesbians just five years into her feature filmmaking career.
07:57Paul Newman spent half a century as a Hollywood star, turning in dozens of unforgettable performances
08:02over the years.
08:03That said, the role that just might be the most heartfelt and meaningful of his career
08:06is as the leading man in Cool Hand Luke.
08:09Cool Hand Luke hit theaters in 1967, in the same year that game-changing hits like The
08:13Graduates and Bonnie and Clyde kick-started what would become the New Hollywood movement.
08:18Cool Hand Luke still has a foot in both worlds, and feels like one last hurrah of everything
08:22that worked so well about old-school Hollywood while still embodying the rebellious spirit
08:26of the changing times.
08:27Newman taps into the effortless charm that was typical of his screen roles, digging into
08:31a deeper emotional truth within a familiar archetype, and earning Golden Globe and Oscar
08:35nominations in the process.
08:37"...what we got here is a failure to communicate."
08:41Chiwetel Ejiofor is a standout character actor with supporting roles in everything from Doctor
08:45Strange to Children of Men, but rarely does he get the opportunity to take the lead on
08:49a project.
08:50The biggest exception is Steve McQueen's historical drama 12 Years a Slave, in which Ejiofor took
08:55top billing as the real-life figure Solomon Northup.
08:58Taking on the role of a free man kidnapped and sold into slavery in the antebellum South,
09:02Ejiofor rose to the challenges of the part and delivered a deeply emotional and devastating
09:07performance.
09:08This tragic true story finally provided Ejiofor with a monumental character arc and allowed
09:12him to show off the full extent of his range.
09:1412 Years a Slave took home three Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and earned Ejiofor
09:19his first, and so far, only, Oscar nomination.
09:23While Steve McQueen is the name of the 12 Years a Slave director, a different Steve
09:26McQueen had a reputation as Hollywood's King of Cool in the 1960s and 70s.
09:31Nowhere was this clearer than with his turn as Captain Virgil Hiltz, also known as the
09:35Cooler King in The Great Escape.
09:37Released in 1963 by director John Sturges, The Great Escape tells a mostly true story
09:42of a massive escape attempt by captive soldiers from a prisoner-of-war camp in Nazi-occupied
09:47Poland during World War II.
09:48As one of three Americans held captive, Hiltz must work with his allies both from home and
09:53from across the pond in order to secure their freedom.
09:55I haven't seen Berlin yet, from the ground or from the air, and I plan on doing both
09:58before the war is over."
10:00The Great Escape utilizes an ensemble cast of stars like James Garner, Charles Bronson,
10:05Donald Pleasence, Richard Attenborough, and James Coburn, but McQueen outshines all of
10:09them with his effortless charm and incomparable charisma.
10:13Years before Olivia Colman became a beloved international sensation and Oscars darling,
10:17she first got her start in television and movies in the United Kingdom.
10:20Colman served as a cast member on several comedy shows, but her more dramatic efforts
10:24were no less captivating.
10:26One of her earlier successes was in the extremely bleak drama Tyrannosaur in 2011, directed
10:31by fellow British actor Paddy Considine.
10:33Tyrannosaur is about the cycles of destruction that ruin the lives of those who can't break
10:37free from them.
10:38Colman plays the proprietor of a second-hand shop who tries to see the good in people while
10:42trapped in a marriage with an abusive husband.
10:44With her sympathetic yet complex character, Colman turns in a tour-de-force performance
10:48that still stands out even as she racks up Oscar noms.
10:52For her 2016 film Fences, Viola Davis was at the top of her game and even managed the
10:56impressive feat of outshining Denzel Washington.
10:59Though both stars did phenomenal work, Davis walked away as the film's sole Oscar winner
11:03for her performance in the Supporting Actress category.
11:05Fences is a heavy drama set in the 1950s and is mostly contained to the familial conflicts
11:10unfolding in a simple backyard.
11:12With a grounded and character-driven plot, it's packed with wall-to-wall dialogue that
11:16allows the performances to take priority.
11:18The bulk of the film's dialogue is between Washington and those in its orbit, while Davis'
11:22character has a tendency to fade into the background, but that just makes her big, showstopper
11:27moments even more effective.
11:29Davis and Washington had previously performed their roles in Fences on Broadway before bringing
11:32the story to the big screen.
11:34Davis won a Tony Award for the play, but she always felt like there was a part of the role
11:38she didn't quite crack on the stage.
11:39She viewed the film as a second chance to get it right, refining her already acclaimed
11:43performance to a point of perfection.
11:45I took all my feelings, my wants and needs and dreams, and I buried them inside you."
11:52In the first full decade of his career, the 1970s, Al Pacino had already secured his legacy
11:57as one of the top dogs of his generation.
11:59The two Godfather films alone turned him into one of the world's biggest movie stars, but
12:03that was far from being all he had on his plate throughout the decade.
12:05While Pacino was unforgettable as Michael Corleone, the best performance of his career
12:09may have actually been in his direct follow-up to The Godfather Part II, 1975's Dog Days.
12:16Pacino plays Sonny Wazik, a first-time criminal whose attempted robbery of a Brooklyn bank
12:20becomes a media circus, especially once his motive is revealed.
12:23His manic demeanor makes for one of the most intense and unconventional heist movies of
12:28the era, and critics noticed.
12:29Pacino earned an Oscar nomination, and Dog Day Afternoon forever became a highlight of
12:33his long and illustrious career.
12:36A Separation is an Iranian film from internationally renowned writer and director Asghar Farhadi
12:41that took home the Best International Film Oscar in 2011.
12:44As one might guess from the title, the movie follows a troubled couple undergoing a separation.
12:48While they deal with all the messiness that a disintegrating marriage with a child in
12:52the mix entails, they must also navigate the troubles of an elderly parent with Alzheimer's,
12:56a caretaker with a terrible secret, and the potential theft of a monetary sum from the
13:00family home.
13:01Leila Hartami and Sarah Bayat deliver stellar performances, but it is Peyman Mardi who stands
13:06out the most as a family patriarch, being pulled apart at the seams by everyone else
13:10in his life.
13:11The character's frantic search for answers and desire to resolve massive interpersonal
13:15conflicts without compromising on his own values leads to plenty of juicy, dramatic
13:20scenes.
13:22Mike Lee isn't quite a household name in the States, but fans of the English filmmaker
13:25appreciate his naturalistic directorial process that places an emphasis on improvisation.
13:30Lee's technique frequently brings career-best performances out of his actors, and Imelda
13:34Staunton joined the club with the 2004 drama Vera Drake.
13:38Although she wasn't credited as a co-writer, Staunton was intrinsically involved in the
13:41creation of her character, an unassuming housewife who secretly performs back-alley abortions
13:46in a time when the practice was outlawed in the U.K.
13:48She worked alongside Lee to devise the entire story of her life leading up to the start
13:52of the film and improvised all of her lines.
13:54They need help.
13:55What else are they gonna turn to?
13:57They got no one.
13:58I help them out.
13:59As a reward for her standout performance, Staunton was nominated for the Best Actress
14:03Oscar and won the BAFTA.
14:05Together, Paul Newman and Robert Redford became one of the most iconic screen duos of all
14:09time when they played the title roles of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
14:13The two reunited with director George Roy Hill for another future classic a few years
14:17later with The Sting, but their first coupling could never be outdone.
14:20The film is a grand adventure that tells the true story of the bank and train-robbing outlaws.
14:25Newman excels as Butch Cassidy, the charismatic face of the operation, while Redford impresses
14:29with quiet intensity as the Sundance Kid, the lethal half of the legendary duo.
14:33Their through-the-roof chemistry elevates an already perfect screenplay from William
14:37Goldman.
14:38Though he is now known as one of the biggest Hollywood icons to ever live, Redford wasn't
14:41yet a big name at the time he landed this star-making role.
14:44This career-defining character later lent his name to Redford's Sundance Film Festival,
14:49one of the most prestigious festivals in the world.