10. Adam Driver – “Paterson”
Mighty in his silence, Adam Driver delivers his best performance to date in Jim Jarmusch’s “Paterson.” A meditative look at a week in the life of a New Jersey bus driver, his escape into poetry and his wife (played by the illuminating Golshifteh Farahani) and their comfortable love, the film brings out a soulful, introspective performance from Driver. Anyone used to his either comedic chops in “Girls” or “While We’re Young,” or his theatrics in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” will be pleasantly surprised by how internally his plays his latest role. There’s nothing obvious about his performance, but it’s also far from being atypical. His biggest strength, and what makes him so utterly captivating, is his ability to convey the life his character Paterson has lived before we meet up with him and acquaint ourselves with his quiet aspirations and adoration for his wife. Despite being told little, we’re familiar with him by the film’s end, and convinced of his warmth, generosity and artistry. He does this with little dialogue, few big “ah-ha” moments, and a relative, relatable energy.
9. Viola Davis – “Fences”
That Viola Davis quietly steals “Fences” from Denzel Washington doing a force-of-nature performance at the highest register is a testament to what we already know: Davis is one of the greatest performers of a generation. Washington, for his part, and as the director of the film, seems more than happy to let her steal it, too. The two each earned Tonys for these roles for the Broadway revival of the August Wilson play in 2010, so the performances feel comfortable, lived-in, the reams of dialogue well-known and eased into. But Davis, playing Rose, the wife of the larger-than-life, embittered raconteur Troy, emerges from the shadow of her husband to unleash a raw vulnerability not seen too often on screen. Her emotional breakdown that serves as a turning point in the film is clearly a standout moment, but it’s her inhabitation of the woman in the parts around the breakdown that make it so affecting. As her no-nonsense attitude and quiet determination are stripped away by a betrayal, her breakdown is existential more than anything else, leading her to question her purpose in a life built around someone else. Having seen this woman at her lowest, the ultimate reconciliation of her life is that much more poignant, and no one but Davis could have pulled that off with such deep, visceral intensity.
8. Rebecca Hall – “Christine”
Reporter Christine Chubbuck is remembered for her untimely death; Rebecca Hall’s quietly compelling performance in “Christine,” however, boldly examined her unseen life. Beautifully awkward and impeccably subdued, Hall gives her best performance to date as the intensely insecure, immensely troubled Florida TV personality that took her life in the most public way possible: on the air. Meticulous in its vulnerability, yet astounding in its restraint, where this year’s “Kate Plays Christine” opted to explore the aftermath of her tragedy, Hall uses Antonio Campos’ fragile, intimate biopic to instead shed a light on her passionate devotion for her work, her complicated relationship with her mother and her budding feelings for news anchor George Ryan (Michael C. Hall) in a stunningly personal, heartbreakingly realistic exploration of mental illness, social anxiety and bubbling insecurities — all of which lead, in part, to the incident that cemented Chubbuck’s name in journalism history. Considerate, contemplative and compassionately cringe-worthy, Hall’s performance is a haunting, unshakeable work of confident instability, the kind that demands your utmost attention, and one that captures agonizing sorrow without ever glorifying or glamorizing Chubbuck’s life and actions, but rather showing them as human as possible. Chubbuck’s death will likely always garner morbid interest. Thankfully, Hall finally gives her life the respect and attention it deserves.
7. Riz Ahmed – “The Night Of”
In another year of peak TV, it’s no surprise that HBO’s phenomenal limited series “The Night Of” has somewhat faded from the year-end conversation (though it did pop up on our best TV of 2016 list). Never did it stoop to the sort of easy surprise material that makes for good water-cooler fodder; instead, it zeroed in on rich, uncomfortably honest substance, and deeply textured, unexpectedly candid characters. The latter were propelled by a handful of beautifully nuanced performances, all centered around a star-making turn from a previously undervalued Riz Ahmed (who is currently having a moment as Bodhi in “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story”). Ahmed’s Naz is the sort of dynamic character that demands an actor who can literally grow from a caterpillar to a butterfly on screen — only in Richard Price and Steven Zaillian’s bruising show, Naz doesn’t quite grow wings, or at least the sort we hope for. Over the course of eight hours, we watch Naz transform from the innocent college kid who we’re certain couldn’t have murdered a fly into a creature of circumstance and necessity who forces us to rethink everything. None of that would have worked without Ahmed’s impossibly expressive eyes and his evocative gait, and all the fear and sorrow and power and rage he can convey without a single word.
6. Natalie Portman – “Jackie”
In Pablo Larraín’s unconventional and deeply human biopic, Natalie Portman is given the hard task of developing both the public persona and the heartbreaking private anguish of Jackie Kennedy around the time of her husband’s shocking death. These two personalities come out of the same public figure, but they are galaxies apart. The robotic Stepford Wife, desperate to be loved and respected by the masses as she puts on a show for the TV cameras, could have easily come across as a stiff Oscar-bait biopic caricature of such a modern “royal” persona, yet Portman intricately lays an undercurrent of anxiety and insecurity to her performance. All of these pretentions come crashing down after the assassination, which exposes the lost, angry, and ultimately frail human being that was previously hidden under the façade of unapologetic elegance. Larraín’s film manages to upend the clichés of the genre by prioritizing the relatable grief of the character above a bland portrait found in a run-of-the-mill biopic. Portman helps him achieve that mission by having us commoners deeply identify with Jackie Kennedy, of all people.