Any attempt to narrow down a decade’s worth of performances to a finite number is a task fraught with anguish.
The 2010s have seen a spate of incredible performances by intelligent, committed and gifted actors; performances that elicited laughter, tears and everything in between.
There is no empirical way to approach an exercise of this nature. In the end, individuals gravitate to performances that best spoke to them; the ones that left an imprint deep in the recesses of their head, heart and soul.
In keeping with that spirit, here are some performances from the 2010s that will linger long in my memory:
Honourable Mentions: JK Simmons (Whiplash), Joaquin Phoenix (The Master), Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine), Ryan Gosling (The Nice Guys), Brie Larson (Room), Brad Pitt (Moneyball)
3. Amy Adams – Arrival
The ever-reliable Amy Adams, who operates almost exclusively between ‘great’ and ‘transcendent,’ is the beating heart at the centre of Denis Villeneuve’s cerebral and unforgettable Sci-Fi drama, Arrival.
On first glance, this isn’t a performance that screams ‘greatness,’ but the genius of Adams’s performance manifests once Arrival plays all its cards in the final third.
Her performance is a high-wire act; the much-vaunted twist would have fallen flat had it not been for her remarkable ability to somehow play heartbreak and aloofness at the same time.
To delve deeper into the specifics of her performance would require spoiling Arrival, and that is a sin I can’t bring myself to commit.
What I can say is that her work in Arrival shows her stunning command over her craft, and is one that demands multiple viewings.
2. Jake Gyllenhaal – Nightcrawler
As Lou Bloom, a freelance videographer with an absent moral compass, Gyllenhaal brings a manic yet deeply unsettling energy to proceedings.
Gyllenhaal ran 15 miles every day and maintained a diet of kale salads and chewing gum to lose 30 pounds to play the character. While that commitment is admirable, it’s not the physical transformation that stays with you.
Rather, it’s his ability to channel his deeply troubled character’s frustrations and anguish while simultaneously maintaining a veneer of charisma that astounds you. This is a scary performance, in the best way possible.
The 2010s was the decade that let audiences know that Gyllenhaal’s ceiling is incredibly high, and his work in Nightcrawler is a testament to how far he has come as an actor.
Gyllenhaal is channelling electricity in Nightcrawler, and it’s a sight to behold.
1. Casey Affleck - Manchester By The Sea
So often, awards and plaudits are reserved for the ‘most acting’ and not the ‘best acting.’ It’s a delicate line and one that the truly great actors (Think Daniel Day-Lewis in There Will Be Blood) have mastered.
Casey Affleck hasn’t mastered that line. It’s hard for me to picture him in a performance that screams ‘most acting.’ There is a stillness to him, a melancholy that resides deep in his being.
And it is that subdued approach that makes his character in Manchester by the Sea, Kenneth Lonergan’s haunting meditation on loss and guilt, such an incredibly compelling one.
Affleck’s Lee Chandler is a man ravaged by guilt. He is utterly and completely consumed by it, to the point of debilitation. He is mired in a sea of self-loathing, and there is no lifeboat in sight, perhaps there never will be.
Affleck offers an absolute clinic in restraint, by hiding that guilt behind walls of self-loathing and pain. We can’t see a lot of it, but Affleck makes us feel all of it. Nowhere more so than in a climactic confrontation with his ex-wife (Michelle Williams).
That scene, surely one of the finest this decade, takes a part of you away. It shatters you in a way that so very few cinematic moments can. And Casey Affleck, without resorting to histrionics, absolutely destroys you.
It is a sort of performance that doesn’t come around often. It shook me to my core.
Casey Affleck took something out of me with his performance, and I will never not be in awe of what he accomplished in this movie.
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