My Favorite Actors

Here are my 17 favorite actors and some of the movies in which I've enjoyed seeing them.

I'll go to see any movie in which Johnny Depp, Viggo Mortenson, Guy Pearce, Sean Penn or Josh Brolin appear because each role is so unique, they inhabit each role so completely, and they play each role with great intelligence. 

Then there's a consummate actor like David Straithairn who hardly seems to act at all and in 

fact, usually blends right into the background. Denzel Washington also makes it look effortless. Who knew he would be a gifted Shakespearean actor in Much Ado About Nothing?

Who's your favorite?

Simon Baker - L.A. Confidential, Devil Wears Prada

Javier Bardem - Goya's Ghosts, No Country for Old Men, Love in the Time of Cholera

Josh Brolin - W, No Country for Old Men, Milk

Johnny Depp - Edward Scissorhands, Ed Wood, Don Juan DeMarco, Nick of Time, Sleepy Hollow, Chocolat, Finding Neverland, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Public Enemies

Philip Seymour Hoffman - Scent of a Woman, Talented Mr Ripley, State and Main, Cold Mountain, Capote, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, Charlie Wilson's War

Damien Lewis - Band of Brothers, Forsyte Saga, Life (TV series)

Viggo Mortenson - Witness, Crimson Tide, G.I. Jane, Lord of the Rings, Eastern Promises, A History of Violence

Jeremy Northam - Emma, Happy TX, An Ideal Husband, The Winslow Boy, Golden Bowl, Gosford Park, Martin and Lewis

Clive Owen - Closer, Elizabeth: The Golden Age, Duplicity, Geenfingers

Guy Pearce - Priscilla Queen of the Desert, Dating the Enemy, L.A. Confidential, Memento, The Proposition, First Snow, Factory Girl, The Hurt Locker

Sean Penn - The Game, Mystic River, 21 Grams, The Interpreter, Milk

Joaquin Phoenix - Gladiator, To Die For, Walk the Line

Tim Roth - Braveheart, Vatel, Rob Roy, Pulp Fiction

Jonathan Rhys Meyers - The Tudors (TV series), Match Point, August Rush, Elvis, Alexander, The Governess, Bend It Like Beckham, Michael Collins

Kevin Spacey - Beyond the Sea, L.A. Confidential, Usual Suspects, Seven

David Strathairn - Eight Men Out, A League of Their Own, The Firm, River Wild, L.A. Confidential, Good Night and Good Luck, Notorious Bette Page, Bourne Ultimatum

Denzel Washington - Mo' Better Blues, Malcolm X, Much Ado About Nothing, Pelican Brief, Crimson Tide, Devil in a Blue Dress, Fallen, Bone Collector, Inside Man, Deja Vu, Great Debaters