Fragility and strength. Those are the seemingly contradictory qualities that in combination, we notice we’ve really responded to this year. Perhaps it’s because the times we live in have us all feeling a bit fragile, yet despite that, fuck it, look at us, we’re resilient, we’re strong, we’re still here! But whether it’s charismatic, even bombastic portrayals of pettiness, or intricate renderings of the faultlines that undermine greatness, the 2018 performances that have really stuck with us have tended to encompass both ends of that spectrum. And with it being such a particularly strong year at the movies, there has been an embarrassment of vehicles that have supplied adventurous actors with just such roles.
READ MORE: The 25 Best Films Of 2018
And so as much nonsense as it is to divide performances along the binary of winners and losers, which will be the work of the coming months for various awards bodies, pitting them against each other in a long list and weighing their relative merits like there were some objective standard is certifiably insane, so please take the following rankings with a hefty pinch of salt. There is not one performance mentioned here (or on our Breakout Performances list, which you should also check out and consider an addendum to this one) which we do not wholeheartedly endorse and recommend, even on the few occasions where we’re less in love with the film or show it’s in. Here are the 40 top performances that made our 2018 at the movies feel so strong, despite the fragile state of the nation, the world, and our collective mental health.
READ MORE: The 100 Most Anticipated Films Of 2019
Click here for our complete coverage of the best and worst of 2018.
40. Rami Malek – “Bohemian Rhapsody” [Review]
There are really only two reasons to give this so-so Bryan Singer film your time. One of them is the music, and you can watch the Queen Live Aid set that bookends the film on YouTube whenever you’d like. But there’s no way to experience Rami Malek’s performance without watching the film. What could have easily been yet another “wigs and teeth” role (granted wigs and teeth are prominently featured) is elevated by the commitment from the “Mr. Robot” star — maybe not the obvious choice to play one of rock’s most charismatic frontmen. But from the first moment, and all through the 2+ hour running time, he is Freddie Mercury, with all the charm, humor, talent, and bravado that made the singer a legend. “Bohemian Rhapsody” isn’t a great film, but Malek’s lead performance is so great, he almost solely wills the film into awards consideration. – Charles Barfield
39. Natalie Portman – “Vox Lux” [Review]
This is a controversial inclusion (!) but our pro-“Vox Lux” lobby won out partly because everyone liked Portman’s other 2018 film, Alex Garland’s “Annihilation.” But for those of us who got with Brady Corbet’s defiantly weird, po-mo parable about pop stardom in the age of mass killings, Portman’s go-for-broke, DGAF excess — in accent, costuming, even the jerky, neurotic way she gestures — is sort of the point. She has in the past often been such a mannered, careful actor that it’s fun to watch her be free to make wild, divisive choices. And boy, she does she make all the choices.
38. Maya Rudolph – “Forever” TV [Review]
One of the very unHappytimes we had recently was revisiting “The Happytime Murders” for inclusion on our Worst of the Year list, but one positive offshoot was it reminds us just how amazing Maya Rudolph is — somehow even in one of the grimmest misfires of the year, she manages to retain some cred. “Forever” is far from perfect (though even further from ‘Happytime,’ thankfully) but it is such a welcome excuse to spend time with a gloriously hangdog, off-kilter Rudolph that we forgive the weirdly-patterned afterlife comedy all its unevenness.
https://youtu.be/Wlap8fPZLtg
37. Bill Hader – “Barry” TV [Review]
The path from “Regular ‘SNL’ Performer” to “Movie Star With Surprising Dramatic Chops” is so well-worn that maybe they should just pave it and put in an Arby’s every few miles. So we should credit Bill Hader for getting a few milestones under his belt (“Trainwreck”; “The Skeleton Twins“) and then veering off that highway to write, occasionally direct, and star in his compellingly offbeat TV show, “Barry.” The gently meta, dark-hearted story of a Midwestern hitman who comes to LA and starts an acting class does make us see him in a whole new light: Only a really good actor can play a bad actor so well.
36. Nicolas Cage – “Mandy” [Review]
For a film that quickly gained the reputation for showcasing “Nic Cage at his most INSANE!!!” Panos Cosmatos’ “Mandy” sure does take its time getting to the chainsaw fight and the tiger. But that gives Cage the opportunity to remind us that, when the occasion demands, he can be as low-key as he can be a ravenous scenery-chewer. The wilfully slow first half has him restrained and even soulful, while the orgiastic excess of the second is basically Cage playing Eddie, the Iron Maiden mascot. In one two-hour span, we are reminded that there’s more to Cage than Rage, but also, that no one Rages quite like Cage.
https://youtu.be/nV4cEbUW3v0
35. Michael B. Jordan – “Black Panther” [Review]
To be honest, we’d been reserving this slot ever since the trailer for “Black Panther” first dropped, and national hormone levels palpably rose in response to that one shot of Michael B Jordan getting out of the back of a truck. But there is more to him in Ryan Coogler’s Marvel movie than an exceptionally pretty face and ridiculously ripped body (which was also showcased in decent sequel “Creed II“). Jordan’s charisma is key to making Killmonger such an attracti-pulsive, complex and therefore compelling villain, something comic book movies tend to lack in abundance.
34. John C. Reilly – “The Sisters Brothers” [Review]
Perhaps because his early dramatic roles were mostly in ensembles, or because his comedies number among the most rewatchable, quotable, and delightful of recent years (oh “Step Brothers,” we’ll never not love you), it feels like John C Reilly‘s immense range has never been as widely acknowledged as it ought. But Jacques Audiard‘s offbeat, droll western gives him the opportunity to play to both ends of his talents, and it’s a melancholic, slightly heartsore pleasure from beginning to end. We’re hard pushed to think of anyone else who could have made that bit of business with the tooth-powder into such a beautifully defining and charming character moment.
33. Julia Roberts – “Homecoming” [Review]
The mark of a great movie star is the ability to keep surprising you, and Julia Roberts did exactly that in Sam Esmail’s gripping Amazon series “Homecoming.” Not so much because she was in a TV series — every A-lister has one these days. But more by turning into a slippery, shimmering dual performance that was unlike really anything she’s done in the thirty years of her career so far. In a role originated by the great Catherine Keener in the podcast of the same name (and it’s a mark of how good Roberts is that she stands distinct from that turn), Roberts is a washed-out waitress in the present day aware that something’s missing but not sure what, and a warm, empathetic caseworker in the past. Her duets with Stephan James and her phone conversations with Bobby Cannavale both feel like watching an opera singer at the peak of their game. — Oli Lyttelton
32. Ben Foster – “Leave No Trace” [Review]
With exceptional co-star Thomasin McKenzie riding high on our Breakouts list, of course, we have to voice our admiration for the other half of Debra Granik‘s quietly sublime two-hander, “Leave No Trace.” While we’ve come to expect a borderline superhuman level of commitment from Ben Foster, here, as effectively as though he were camouflaged, he truly disappears into his role as the PTSD-afflicted veteran living off the grid with his daughter, in a performance that is eloquent despite how little he says, and that summons immense, troubled depths beneath a brittle surface of controlled calm.
31. Lakeith Stanfield – “Sorry To Bother You” [Review]
Losing ground to “Atlanta” co-star Brian Tyree Henry (see below) by only appearing in 3 feature films as well as Donald Glover‘s increasingly seminal TV show, by anybody else’s standard, Lakeith Stanfield had an amazing 2018. Though wasted in “The Girl In The Spider’s Web,” he was outstanding in Joshua Marston‘s underseen “Come Sunday,” alongside Chiwetel Ejiofor. But he made his biggest splash in Boots Riley‘s anarchic, somewhat messy but hugely energetic “Sorry to Bother You,” in which it is Stanfield’s ability to flip the switch from serious to comic, and from silly to soulful, that is the film’s most impressive asset.
https://youtu.be/Bo3VRcpGfo8
