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The New Yorker just published a piece “The Best Movie Performances of the Century so far”
Like we always do when a piece like this comes out from major publication, let’s discuss
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-front-row/the-best-movie-performances-of-the-century-so-far
TOP 30
30. Shakib Ben Omar, “You All Are Captains”
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29. Samantha Robinson, “The Love Witch”
28. Jesse Eisenberg, “The Social Network”
27. Jafar Panahi, “Taxi”
26. Kristen Wiig, “Welcome to Me”
25. Kim Min-hee, “On the Beach at Night Alone”
24. Tiffany Haddish, “Girls Trip”
23. Sandi Tan, “Shirkers”
22. Bill Murray, “Lost in Translation”
21. Agnès Varda, “The Beaches of Agnès”
20. Jennifer Aniston, “The Break-Up”
19. Delroy Lindo, “Da 5 Bloods”
18. Oscar Isaac, “Inside Llewyn Davis”
17. Eddie Murphy, “Norbit”
16. Elisabeth Moss, “Her Smell”
15. Dore Mann, “Frownland”
14. Lupita Nyong’o, “Us”
13. Daniel Kaluuya, “Get Out”
12. Natalie Portman, “Black Swan”
11. Lindsay Lohan, “Mean Girls”
10. Joe Pesci, “The Irishman”
9. Adam Sandler, “Uncut Gems”
8. Anna Paquin, “Margaret”
7. Mahershala Ali, “Moonlight”
6. Miranda July, “The Future”
5. Adam Driver, “Girls,” (Season 1)
4. Denis Lavant, “Holy Motors”
3. Greta Gerwig, “Hannah Takes the Stairs”
2. Helena Howard, “Madeline’s Madeline”
1. Leonardo DiCaprio, “The Wolf of Wall Street”This list really made me laugh. Great to see Lupita and Elisabeth on it, but yikes otherwise. Adam Driver, Girls (Season 1) — ?????????????? I had no idea that show was a movie. I can’t.
Yeah I’m also firmly on the ‘Adam Driver should have an Emmy for Girls‘ train and think that performance is genuinely great but the rationale for including it on a list of movie performances is poor – especially given that he could have just used one of his movies!
ReplyCopy URLI’m all for prestige publications giving visibility to forgotten and offbeat movies and performances, and this article deserves credit for just that.
Also on the plus side, DiCaprio’s performance in TWOWS is a miracle and deserves the number one spot. I also couldn’t agree more with the inclusions of Nyongo and Kaluuya.
That said, the writer is clearly drunk on being an enfant terrible who goes his own way – you can practically smell his self-indulgence while compiling the list thinking “I shall raise eyebrows for the sake of it and include Jennifer Aniston in The Break-Up while leaving out milestones like Cate Blanchett in Blue Jasmine – or Cate Blanchett in anything; and why not, for the fuck of it, throw in Adam Driver in a tv series instead of one of his widely acclaimed big screen turns – that’s just how controversial I am”.
Last but not least, there’s something he and I need to have a word on…
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I actually like quite a lot of the picks on this list, and it’s good to see when these lists forego some of the more obvious choices to foreground some more hidden or under-discussed gems like Helena Howard, Anna Paquin, Kim Min-hee, Denis Lavant and Oscar Isaac.
That being said, it definitely suffers from one or two too many ‘look at this list’ picks. The obvious ones are Aniston and Murphy, but I think the Driver one is the most egregious. Would’ve been better to just select one of his other performances (Paterson, Marriage Story) and give credit to his Girls performance in there.
It’s a shame, too, because those picks kind of discredit what is an otherwise pretty interesting list; people aren’t going to think more highly of Delroy Lindo in Da 5 Bloods if you put him lower than Norbit.
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This post was found to be inappropriate by the moderators and has been removed.This is certainly a fascinating dive into one critic’s mind and sensibilities, even if some of his choices seem somewhat questionable on the surface. If nothing else, it’s the first time I’ve been influenced to want to seek out Norbit! I’m also glad to see people like Lindo, Isaac, Nyong’o, Sandler and Lavant here.
People are so distracted for the obvious reasons in this movie, unpopular opinion but I thought his performance as the Norbit character was pretty good.
ReplyCopy URLFYC 2023:
Zar Amir Ebrahimi - Shayda (Best Actress)
Helen Mirren - Golda (Best Actress)
Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt - Oppenheimer (Best Actor/Actress)
This post was found to be inappropriate by the moderators and has been removed.
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