Greatest Film Performance of All Time?

Peter O'Toole in Lawrence of Arabia

F. Murray Abraham in Amadeus

Lauren Bacall in the High Point Coffee Commercials

Sidney Poitier in In the Heat of the Night

Angela Lansbury in The Manchurian Candidate

Gregory Peck in To Kill a Mockingbird

Toni Collette in Hereditary

Beethoven - Beethoven

The point is for everyone to share, and we like each individual comment. There are far too many to list in a poll.

Gloria Swanson, "Sunset Boulevard"

But the OP is rather familiar in tone.

Bette Davis in Now, Voyager

Vivien Leigh in GWTW

Derek Jacobi in I Claudius

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Naomi Watts in Mulholland Drive.

Liv Ullmann in Face to Face

Judy Garland - “A Star is Born”

Mia Farrow - “Rosemary’s Baby”

Heath Ledger in "Brokeback Mountain."

Faye Dunaway, Mommie Dearest.

Marc Short in Dawson's 50 Load Weekend, Part 2

Falconetti in Joan of Arc

Another vote for Gloria Swanson.

DeNiro in Taxi Driver

Cate Blanchett in Blue Jasmine

Olivier in Hamlet

DeNiro, Raging Bull

MISS Barbra StreiSAND in Funny Girl!!!

Maximillian Schell in Judgment at Nuremberg

Vivien Leigh, Streetcar Named Desire

Omar Sharif in Lawrence of Arabia

Omar Sharif in Doctor Zhivago

Greta Garbo in Camille

Maggie Smith in The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie

she was a ham, that maggie

Madam Meryl Streep in Sophie’s Choice

Rod Steiger In the Heat of the Night

Spencer Tracy in Judgment at Nuremberg

Katherine Hepburn in The Lion in Winter.

And an honourary mention, Helen Lawson in the WWII musical, Babes on the Front Lines.

Charlize Theron In Monster.

Ingrid Bergman in Gaslight

Sophia Loren: "Two Women."

Unforgettable. Wrenching. Real.

Falconetti in "The Passion of Joan of Arc"

Vivien Leigh in “A Streetcar Named Desire”.

Bette Davis in Now, Voyager

Ronald Colman in "A Tale of Two Cities."

Geez, that's true, Colman was great.

Fernanda Montenegro in “Central Station”

Gary Oldman in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Anna Magnani in Rome, Open City

Sissy Spacek, Coal Miner’s Daughter

R40? There was a woman I knew from my gay AA meeting "up home" whose mannerisms, movements, and voice were almost identical to Theron's in Monster She'd moved to FL years before I did -- probably late 80s, early 90s. The resemblance was so uncanny I often wondered if Charlize had run into this woman at some gay bar while doing research for the part.

It really creeped me out.

Of course, the woman I knew never killed anyone.

Giulietta Massina in La Strada.

Jack Lemmon in Some Like it Hot.

Bette Davis in The Little Foxes

Ann-Margret in “Kitten with a Whip”.

Joan Crawford - “Mildred Pierce”

Spencer Tracey, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner

Gene Tierney in "Leave Her to Heaven".

Burt Lancaster in The Sweet Smell of Success

Evelyn Keyes in Around The World in 80 Days.

Jane Fonda in Klute

Ellen Burstyn .. "Requiem For a Dream"

Bette Davis in "All About Eve"

Geraldine Page in "The Trip to Bountiful"

Fiona Shaw in The Black Dahlia

Zara Cully as Mother Jefferson on The Jeffersons.

Jill Clayburgh as Erica in An Unmarried Woman.

Update- Angela Lansbury for The Manchurian Candidate is winning

Javier Bardem in No Country for Old Men

Michael Keaton in My Life.

Helen Lawson in “Tomorrow and Forever”.

It’s too bad The Manchurian Candidate didn’t come out a year later. Angela may have not been able to beat Patty Duke, but she would have probably won the next year, which had a very weak showing of Supporting Actresses.

Oh my God, who cares about Angela Lansbury and her fucking non-Oscar-winning performance? She wasn't another Great Garbo or Bette Davis. Get over it, people.

She was another Jean Stapleton though. There is that.

I can't decide between Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson in "A few Good Men".

^Both performances hammy.

Faye in Mommy Dearest

Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard.

Henry Fonda in The Grapes of Wrath

Geez you guys are OLD !! Hardly any of these are less than a couple decades old and performances in THIS century are considered way, way more complex and critically acclaimed.

Vivian Leigh “Gone with the Wind”. She had to live up to the hype, surpassed it and carried a four hour picture on her back as a virtual unknown in the U.S. I admire that performance tremendously. Scarlett is such a rotten, selfish belle, but Vivian makes her gloriously captivating.

Oh, okay, R81 you can have Yoda or Gollum.

R81 So have you named any?

Sandrine Bonnaire in Vagabond

Kathy Bates in Misery.

She hits the fine line between perfection and being over the top.

She was fantastic r85.

R81, Sez you. SOME of us aren't myopic like YOU. SOME of us recognize that movies have, you know, like, HISTORY.

Or do you refer to, like, Zendaya? Ryan Reynolds? The Marvel "Universe"?

Is"current" also your metric for judging greatness in art? Dance? Architecture? Music? I mean, I realize that Beethoven wasn't as rich as Tay-Tay, but......

Tori Spelling, Mother May I Sleep With Danger?

Olivia Newton John as Kira, roller disco muse in Xanadu.

Vicky Krieps, Corsage

Mark Ruffalo, You Can Count on Me

Julianne Moore, Safe

Cloris Leachman, The Last Picture Show

Dustin Hoffman, Midnight Cowboy

Ellen Burstyn, Resurrection

The only Vivian I know is Vance and I didn't know she played Scarlett in GWTW. God she could do anything.

R74 still a sock in it

Al Pacino, The Godfather 1 and 2. A masterclass in understatement when he was young and hot.

Forever scratching my head over the screechy, scenery chewing performances that came later.

gaawdamm

Olivia de Havilland in "The Heiress"/Joan Fontaine in "Rebecca."

Julie Andrews leaps of the screen in TSOM. Judy in Oz. Julia in Pretty Woman is something special. Bette in Ruthless People. Doris Day I love me or leave me. Ewen Mcgregor in Moulis Rouge. ONJ in Grease. Kate in Titanic. Brad in Thelma and Louise.

Another vote for Olivia in The Heiress.

Patricia Neal, in Hud, or A Face in the Crowd.

Delphine Seyrig in JEANNE DIELMAN, 23, QUAI DU COMMERCE, 1080 BRUXELLES.

Sharon Stone - Casino

Isadora Burnwood in The Many Loves of Catherine The Great.

Lillian Gish in The Birth of a Nation

Jeff Stryker, Powertool

r9 Unclench

Meryl Steep - Sophie's Choice

Rosalind Russell, The Women.

Helen Mirren, The Queen

[quote] Julie Andrews leaps of the screen in TSOM

I know, I had to get out of the way.

It was the 3-D version.

No votes for us?

Leonardo DiCaprio, The Revenant.

Gary Oldman for 'Darkest Hour'

Anthony Hopkins in “The Silence of the Lambs”

John Wayne in The Searchers

Toni Collette, in Muriel’s Wedding. A very complex performance, where the character gradually grows, emotionally and intellectually, from beginning to end. Sometimes you can’t stand her, other times you understand her, and at the end you just love her.

Oh gosh how about Peter sellers in Dr Strangelove. He plays 3 of the characters by himself. George C. Scott is incredible too. This movie is a tour de force of cinema and as relevant today as the day it was made.

R!20 John wayne only played himself. He wasn't acting in that respect.

Whatever you think of John Wayne his personality was nothing like Ethan Edwards in The Searchers.

Bruce the Shark from JAWS!

DDL in My Left Foot

Charles Laughton in Witness for the Prosecution. Most enjoyable, anyway.

Kristen Stewart- Twilight

Digression:

R99, In the Limited Series "The Offer" (starring Miles Teller), about the making of "The Godfather," Anthony Ippolito is superb as the young Al Pacino, soft-spoken to the point of reluctance to take on Michael Corleone.

R116 thinks he's funny, but he instead unwittingly shows the paucity of his and many other posts.

No-one before or since, e.g., had Lon Chaney's intensity of dedication to a role.

Read and learn, r116.

Meryl and Cher in Silkwood

R128 as with all opinion threads about entertainment, we get the top 20 out the way soon enough then people just post random shit

R130 I didn't think I was being funny. I was pointing out that nobody mentioned those three actors. I've seen plenty of Chaney and read about him. He was brilliant. Thanks for the condescension.

Lillian Gish- “ The Wind”

Richard Burton - “ Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?”

Another list thread

I wonder why The Wind (an MGM movie) is not available from Warner Archive?

Meryl's best performance was in A Cry In The Dark

I apologize, r133. I thought you were piling on the "ageism" of another's post.

Jean Arthur in Shane. A master class in subtlety.