Who are the best actors of all time?

Charles Martel

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Post the names of the actors you regard as the 5 to 10 best of all time.

For me:

Gary Cooper
Errol Flynn
James Stewart
Anthony Hopkins
Robert DeNiro
Marlon Brando
Charles Laughton
Lawrence Olivier
Michael Caine
Stewart Granger
 

Zeus

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Mate, you always find the best boxing photos.......So Lucian for the win tomorrow?

Here's my personal top 20 in no specific order :
Liam Neeson
Daniel Day-Lewis
Javier Bardem
Daniel Auteuil
Marlon Brando
Al Pacino
Elias Koteas
Antony Hopkins
Ed Harris
Mel Gibson
Charlton Heston (only because he's pro white and not ashamed of it)
Romain Duris
Nikos Kourkoulos
Leonardo Di Caprio
Brad Pitt
Max Von Sydow
Antonio Banderas
Rutger Hauer (Roy Batty in Blade Runner, all time classic)
Mark Wahlberg
Christopher Lambert
 

Zeus

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Oh you said 5 to 10...........sorry man

My top 5 would be :

Daniel Auteuil
Mel Gibson
Antony Hopkins
Liam Neeson
Nikos Kourkoulos
 

Charles Martel

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Oh you said 5 to 10...........sorry man

My top 5 would be :

Daniel Auteuil
Mel Gibson
Antony Hopkins
Liam Neeson
Nikos Kourkoulos
Mel Gibson was in a very good suspense thriller a couple of years ago called Edge of Darkness.

Anthony Hopkins was great in The Bounty and starred in a brilliant film called Elephant Man (everyone should see this one which is based on actual events).

Liam Neeson has starred in several excellent movies such as Les Miserables, Kingdom of Heaven and Taken.
 

dwid

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Oh you said 5 to 10...........sorry man

My top 5 would be :

Daniel Auteuil
Mel Gibson
Antony Hopkins
Liam Neeson
Nikos Kourkoulos

I personally like
Matt Damon (he has been a variety of movies and great actor, hard to realize that its him, which makes him a great imo, you don't think its so and so playing so and so, makes the characters believable)
Mark Wahlberg (Good actor but not as much variety, still good in movies like Shooter, Contraband, Fighter etc)
Matthew Mcconaughey
(not the best actor but like his films like Two for the Money. Fool's Gold and Sahara were great to watch with the wife, action/romantic comedies where he beats up non Whites, he was pretty good in Lincoln Lawyer, so he has shown progression)
 

Carolina Speed

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Paul Newman, probably the best actor of all time!

Humphrey Bogart

Robert Duvall,

John Wayne,

George C. Scott,

Gene Hackman
 
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DixieDestroyer

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The best?? IMO....

John Wayne
Bogey
Jimmy Stewart
Brando
Cary Grant
Henry Fonda
Gary Cooper
Robert Mitchum
Clark Gable
Orson Wells
DeNiro (early)

My favorites include Eastwood, Kurt Russell, Stallone, Kris Kristofferson, Don Johnson & Chuck Norris.

The best actress' IMO =

Audrey Hepburn
Betty Davis
Grace Kelly
Katherine Hepburn
Lillian Gish
Shirley Temple
Maureen O'Hara
Ingrid Bergman
Vivian Leigh
Barbara Stanwyck

***- Some of my favorites actresses are Frances McDormand, Sissy Spacek and Reba McEntire.
 
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whiteathlete33

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Mate, you always find the best boxing photos.......So Lucian for the win tomorrow?

Here's my personal top 20 in no specific order :
Liam Neeson
Daniel Day-Lewis
Javier Bardem
Daniel Auteuil
Marlon Brando
Al Pacino
Elias Koteas
Antony Hopkins
Ed Harris
Mel Gibson
Charlton Heston (only because he's pro white and not ashamed of it)
Romain Duris
Nikos Kourkoulos
Leonardo Di Caprio
Brad Pitt
Max Von Sydow
Antonio Banderas
Rutger Hauer (Roy Batty in Blade Runner, all time classic)
Mark Wahlberg
Christopher Lambert

DeNiro, hands down! Watch Taxi Driver. I have never seen better acting in my life.
 

Highlander

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Too many to name, but here goes, in no particular order:

Richard Burton (The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf, Becket, Where Eagles Dare)
Paul Newman (The Verdict, The Hustler, and the "Basement Scene" in CHTR)
Gene Hackman
Robert Deniro (older stuff)
Al Pacino
Gregory Peck
Charlton Heston
Anthony Hopkins
Marlon Brando
Peter O'Toole
Rutger Hauer
Gary Oldman
Sean Connery
Burt Lancaster
Laurence Harvey (The Manchurian Candidate)
George C. Scott
Kirk Douglas (Lust for Life, Paths of Glory)
John Wayne
Clint Eastwood
Jack Nicholson
Charles Bronson
Burt Reynolds (Deliverance - Burt was fantastic in that. Gotta include him just for that performance.)
Christopher Walken
Daniel Day-Lewis
Jeff Bridges
Nick Nolte
Jeremy Irons
Geoffrey Rush
Robin Williams
Willem Dafoe
Tom Wilkinson
Val Kilmer (Tombstone, The Doors)
Benicio Del Toro
Eric Bana (Troy, Munich)
Tom Hiddleston
 

Quiet Speed

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My favorite actor of all time is Bob Saget. Remember him from the sitcom Full House? Say what you will, but the man can act. j/k :icon_grin:

Highlander mentioned Jeff Bridges. I have only taken notice of his work in the last couple of years. He’s a very good actor.
 

Don Wassall

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Jeff Bridges
Edward Norton
Gene Hackman
Anthony Hopkins
Mel Gibson

Vanessa Angel (great in the classic comedy Kingpin :laugh:)
 

Matra2

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In English-speaking cinema I'd go with Robert Mitchum, Trevor Howard, and James Mason. For women probably Barbara Stanwyck. I think it all went down hill with method acting (Brando in particular) though Paul Newman was good.

I rarely watch anything out of Hollywood unless it is more than 40 years old. They still make a lot of good films in France and Eastern Europe.
 

frederic38

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I rarely watch anything out of Hollywood unless it is more than 40 years old. They still make a lot of good films in France and Eastern Europe.


do you have an example of a recent french movie that was good?
 
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do you have an example of a recent french movie that was good?

In fact even if the film was overrated and isn't really a "french" movie, The Artist was pretty good.

The rest of the french production is catastrophic. Hollywood make lot of good films these days like in the past even if they are sadly promoting racial diversity.
 

Zeus

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This is as good of a suspense thriller as you'll ever see:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0362225/

Another good French movie:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0344510/

Man thumbs up, Ne le dis à personne (Tell No one) is one of the best movies in the last 10 years in my opinion. I completely disagree with the dude who says that French movies are not good, here's a good list for him to change his mind:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0411270/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0796335/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0390808/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116581/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0920470/ (my favorite)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0228786/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0337103/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0237534/

French cinema is a top 3 in the world right now, not because I am part French, I am just being realistic.
 

whiteathlete33

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I'm going to say Deniro. When he was younger I really liked his movies. The stuff today is complete nonsense. I also like Harrison Ford alot.
 

frederic38

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Matra2

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This is as good of a suspense thriller as you'll ever see:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0362225/

Another good French movie:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0344510/

Tell No One was a decent, though overrated, film but the subplot involving a man from the banlieues helping the doctor (Francois Cluzet) out was completely unbelievable. The film is based on an American novel. I'm guessing in the novel that it's a noble black thug from the projects helping the doctor.:icon_rolleyes:

I mostly like older French films. Even in the last decade some of my favourite movies were made by Eric Rohmer (a right winger) and Claude Chabrol (self-proclaimed communist but old friend of Jean-Marie Le Pen). Both of them died in 2010.

Admittedly I can't think of too many good recent (ie last couple of years)) French films:

- Crime d'amour/Love Crimes by Alain Corneau (another veteran who died in 2010). A great movie about the soulless rootless corporate world which would go well with an even better French film on that subject Demonlover (Olivier Assayas)

- Un balcon sur la mer from 2010 by pied noir Nicole Garcia. Not great, and there's some Algeria-related political correctness, but it also portrays pied noirs as actual human beings rather than racist caricatures.

- Une vie de chat/A Cat in Paris:cheesy:

- I hear that L'affaire Farewell (same director as Tell No One) is really good but I haven't seen it yet.

If you go back a few more years I could name lots - Triple Agent, The Lady and the Duke (Rohmer), He Loves Me...He loves me Not (Laetitia Colombani), The Girl From Paris (Christian Carion), and many more.

I don't like French comedies. Then again, those of us raised in the UK and Ireland tend to think all other countries are humour deprived compared to us! We believe our humour is more subtle and intelligent than anyone else's so when we watch foreign comedies, including most American (ie Jewish) stuff we tend to laugh AT them for being so lame rather than WITH them for being funny. I saw Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis (one of the most popular in French history) a couple of months ago just before travelling to France and southern Belgium, so I was in the mood for it, but, although it had some funny moments, I thought it was too "slapstick" to really enjoy.
 

frederic38

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I don't like French comedies. Then again, those of us raised in the UK and Ireland tend to think all other countries are humour deprived compared to us! We believe our humour is more subtle and intelligent than anyone else's so when we watch foreign comedies, including most American (ie Jewish) stuff we tend to laugh AT them for being so lame rather than WITH them for being funny. I saw Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis (one of the most popular in French history) a couple of months ago just before travelling to France and southern Belgium, so I was in the mood for it, but, although it had some funny moments, I thought it was too "slapstick" to really enjoy.

i watched 1 english comedy, in english class, it was by the monty pythons i think
it was really special :icon_lol:
i think that only english people can find it funny, and only french people can like french comedies

bienvenue chez les ch'tis was such an annoying thing
it was so big at the time that i was almost forced to watch it
i didn't want to watch it because the main actor (danny boon) was part-arab and he converted to judaism before marrying his jewish wife
i saw it with friends but i was drunk so i don't remember the movie
my brother watched it with headphones on so he couldn't hear the movie

it sounds strange but sometimes you are almost forced to watch some movies with friends or with girlfriends
my brother watched a movie with a black leading actor (dwain johnson i think) with his girl-friend
he watched it with sunglasses on instead of 3d glasses so that he couldn't see the movie and acted like he was watching it :icon_smile:
these sunglasses look like the 3d glasses we have here: http://www.go-optic.com/SUNGLASSES/images/rayban_RB4105_601.jpg


the movie with dwain johson was this one: http://collider.com/wp-content/uplo...sa-hudgens-dwayne-johnson-josh-hutcherson.jpg
 

frederic38

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my favourites french comedies are from the 80's
here are 2 legendary french actors: pierre richard and depardieu:

http://youtu.be/SNHWm-EjGwE

a masterpiece with pierre richard:

[video=youtube_share;YA4aoV-VEfw]http://youtu.be/YA4aoV-VEfw[/video]

this is the definition of a french comedy

honestly i feel sorry for the ones who are not french for that reason :icon_lol:
especially since most of the french comedies that are re-made in the US look so bland
for example this movie with antonio banderas: http://www.imdb.fr/title/tt0118001/ which is a remake of a french comedy from the 80's with pierre richard, "le jumeau"
jumeau-1984-01-g.jpg



3 men and a baby, "3 hommes et un couffin" in french http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094137/
3_hommes_et_1_couffin.jpg


a remake that was funny was "true lies" with schwarzenegger, the french movie was named "la totale"
 

Bronk

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My problem with many of the names listed here is that they weren't really actors but personalities. I love John Wayne and Paul Newman, but they essentially created personas that they replicated in film after film.

Someone mentioned Anthony Hopkins in The Elephant Man, an excellent example of a great actor. Chart the arc of Hopkins from Elephant Man to his most famous character, Hannibal Lecter and there you have an actor.

I would add in Lee Marvin and George C. Scott. Scott's portrayal of Patton is, in my opinion, one of the greatest film performances in history. It obliterates the script and the intentions of the makers of the film, which was to heap abuse upon Patton. That is a GREAT actor.
 

Charles Martel

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Some great performances:

Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter
Marlon Brando as Mark Antony
Lawrence Olivier as Hamlet
Robert de Niro as Travis Bickle
Robert Mitchum as Max Cady
Charles Laughton as Quasimodo
 
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