 100 Greatest Movie Performances of All Time by Premiere Magazine Part 4 Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 |
 100 Greatest Movie Performances of All Time by Premiere Magazine (part 4, by reverse ranking) |
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Character Name | Played By | Film Title | The Performance |
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Ninotchka | Greta Garbo | Ninotchka (1939) | A severe yet earthy Soviet envoy who falls in love with a French count. |
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Fred C. Dobbs | Humphrey Bogart | The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) | An anxiously-desperate, paranoid gold-lusting prospector. |
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Jeffrey Wigand | Russell Crowe | The Insider (1999) | A stressed-out, distrustful, paunchy, fifty-something tobacco executive-turned-whistleblower. |
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Edward Scissorhands | Johnny Depp | Edward Scissorhands (1990) | A shy, sad, and innocent freak-newcomer to a town. |
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Cabiria | Giulietta Masina | Nights of Cabiria (1957) | A tough-as-nails, yet very human heart-of-gold hooker. |
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Michael Corleone | Al Pacino | The Godfather, Part II (1974) | A holl0w-eyed, evil, and dark successor to the role of gangster Don. |
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Frank Galvin | Paul Newman | The Verdict (1982) | A world-weary alcoholic, ambulance-chasing lawyer who redeems himself by exposing the truth in a medical malpractice suit. |
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Bess McNeill |
Emily Watson | Breaking the Waves (1996) | An expressive, beguiling, wide-eyed, simple-minded woman who believes that her sexual degradation will save her paralyzed husband's life. |
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Malcolm X | Denzel Washington | Malcolm X (1992) | A multi-faceted role: a smooth and ruthless Harlem hustler, a firebrand black nationalist and leading minister in the Nation of Islam, and a contemplative, controlled and convincing leader. |
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T.R. Devlin | Cary Grant | Notorious (1946) | A cruel and pained government agent who subtly assaults the character of a socialite (Ingrid Bergman) that he eventually rescues. |
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Josh Baskin | Tom Hanks | Big (1988) | A young teenage-boy whose dream comes true to be 'big' when he is morphed into the body of a toy-company executive. |
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Mac Sledge | Robert Duvall | Tender Mercies (1983) | A broken-down, ex-country music legend who finds redemption in the love of a widow and her young son. |
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Eleanor of Aquitaine | Katharine Hepburn | The Lion in Winter (1968) | A crafty, scheming and manipulative 12th-century queen. |
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"Badass" Buddusky | Jack Nicholson | The Last Detail (1973) | A rebellious, steely-eyed, anti-authoritarian, combustible Navy man transporting a hapless young grunt (Randy Quaid) to prison. |
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Christy Brown | Daniel Day-Lewis | My Left Foot (1989) | A lusty, complicated, and brilliant writer afflicted with cerebral palsy. |
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Jake La Motta | Robert De Niro | Raging Bull (1980) | A blunt, ferocious, sinewy boxer and puffy-faced, overweight entertainer in his later years. |
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Frederick Frankenstein | Gene Wilder | Young Frankenstein (1974) | A poor, doomed and frantic lunatic doctor - both sophisticated and childish. |
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George Bailey | James Stewart | It's a Wonderful Life (1946) | An Everyman whose dreams slowly fade as his responsibilities preclude his ambitions. |
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"Ratso" Rizzo | Dustin Hoffman | Midnight Cowboy (1969) | A persevering, slumping, filthy, sweaty, rodent-like tubercular street hustler. |
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George M. Cohan | James Cagney | Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) | An exuberant and dazzling song-and-dance performer and 'grand old man'. |
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Margo Channing | Bette Davis | All About Eve (1950) | An aging, threatened grand dame/diva of the theater. |
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Sonny Wortzik | Al Pacino | Dog Day Afternoon (1975) | A strutting, raw, nervously inept bank robber who steals money to pay for his boyfriend's sex-change operation. |
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Sophie Zawistowski | Meryl Streep | Sophie's Choice (1982) | An Auschwitz inmate faced with pure horror - and then a survivor's torment and guilt. |
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Terry Malloy | Marlon Brando | On the Waterfront (1954) | A callow young boxer, a dumb and innocent pawn, who leads a defiant crusade as a stoic iconoclast. |
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T.E. Lawrence | Peter O'Toole | Lawrence of Arabia (1962) | An unfathomable, desert leader legend, alternatingly self-confident, querulous, deeply wounded, or frighteningly vengeful. |
