My Favorite Dustin Hoffman Performances

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A wonderfully gifted, intelligent actor who seems to live to challenge himself as an actor. After the role that made him a star, Hoffman could have easily established a career as a pretty boy sex symbol (which he certainly is not), but instead he sought out roles that were the polar opposite and because of his desire to be an actor and not just a movie star, the man has never been typecast and can effortlessly slip into all kinds of movie characters. These are my favorite Dustin Hoffman performances:



20.

Bernie LaPlante, Hero (1992)



I love this performance because Hoffman chose a character that really is not a very nice person. Bernie is a divorced thief and all-around bum who ends up saving the lives of several people in a plane crash but because he is wanted by the police, he allows someone else (Andy Garcia) to take credit for it. Hoffman completely invests in an unsympathetic character and makes this film seem a lot better than it really is.



I think Stephen Frears' Hero (aka Accidental Hero) is very underrated, and it may well be Hoffman's best performance of the 1990s.

See also THIS THREAD for more Dusty.
__________________
"Film is a disease. When it infects your bloodstream it takes over as the number one hormone. It bosses the enzymes, directs the pineal gland, plays Iago to your psyche. As with heroin, the antidote to Film is more Film." - Frank Capra



19.

Professor Jules Hilbert, Stranger Than Fiction (2006)



Hoffman is absolutely delightful as a college professor who is helping an IRS accountant named Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) find out who the woman is who has been narrating his life and is now planning his death. I love this performance because Hoffman really seems to be enjoying himself as a slightly dotty but smarter than he looks on the surface professor who jumps into help in an outrageous situation without any hesitation or thought about what's in it for him.



18.

Captain Hook, Hook (1991)



Though Steven Spielberg's re-thinking of the Peter Pan legend is considered by many to be a misstep in Spielberg's career, it doesn't change the fact that Hoffman is terrific as the villain of the piece.



17.

Jack Crabb, Little Big Man (1970)



While George C. Scott was slapping soldiers and Jack Nicholson was hassling waitresses, Hoffman decided to tackle a character who ages to 121. Yes, the makeup department was crucial to this performance, but Hoffman gave this character its heart.



16.

Bernie Focker, Meet the Fockers (2004)



Hoffman appears to be having a ball here as the stay-at-home dad married to a sexual therapist (Barbra Streisand) who adores his son (Ben Stiller) and works his butt off to broker peace between his son and his new father-in-law (Robert De Niro). It's not easy stealing a film from the likes of De Niro, Stiller, and Streisand, but Hoffman does exact;y that.



15.

Willy Loman, Death of a Salesman(1985)



Hoffman silenced all naysayers when he announced he was going to revive Arthur Miller's classic play on Broadway back in 1984 with himself playing the lead. The revival was a smash and was filmed for television a year later. Hoffman is warm and heartbreaking as the traveling salesman in denial about the stalemate that his career and his relationship with his two sons (John Malkovich, Stephen Lang).



14.

Stanley Motss, Wag the Dog (1997)



Hoffman gives a razor-sharp performance that earned him an Oscar nomination as a public relations expert who actually creates a fictional war at the white house to cover up a presidential sex scandal...Hoffman has rarely been so slick onscreen.



12.

Raymond Babbitt in Rain Man (1988)



Hoffman has rarely lost himself inside a character the way he did here, resulting in his 2nd lead actor Oscar. Hoffman plays an institutionalized autistic named Raymond who is "kidnapped" by his younger brother, Charlie (Tom Cruise) when Charlie learns their deceased father left all his money to Raymond. This performance was almost frightening in its realism and those personally involved in the production have often claimed that Hoffman had a hard time leaving this character on the set at the end of the day.



10.

Ted Kramer, Kramer VS Kramer (1979)



Hoffman won his first Oscar playing a busy advertising executive who is rocked when his wife of eight years (Meryl Streep) walks out on him and their son (Justin Henry). Hoffman gets to run the gamut of emotions in this performance and nails every single one of them.



You can't make a rainbow without a little rain.
10.

Ted Kramer, Kramer VS Kramer (1979)



Hoffman won his first Oscar playing a busy advertising executive who is rocked when his wife of eight years (Meryl Streep) walks out on him and their son (Justin Henry). Hoffman gets to run the gamut of emotions in this performance and nails every single one of them.

I expected Kramer vs. Kramer to be higher on your list. It makes me very curious about what's coming up.



9.

Benjamin Braddock, The Graduate (1967)



He made a couple of films prior to this one, but this is the movie that officially made Hoffman a movie star and earned him his first Oscar nomination. Hoffman hit all the right notes as a recent college graduate who returns home and has an affair with one of his parents' married friends (Anne Bancroft) but actually falls in love with her daughter (Katherine Ross). Hoffman is warm and vulnerable here but brought a substance to the role that wasn't in Buck Henry's screenplay. Hoffman was already showing promise here that he was going to be more than a Hollywood pretty-boy. Speaking of which, I read recently that Robert Redford wanted this role very badly but director Mike Nichols decided that Redford was too "pretty."



8.

Babe, Marathon Man (1976)



One of Hoffman's most underrated performances in one of the most underrated films of the 1970's. Hoffman plays a graduate student who, because of his brother (Roy Scheider), becomes involved with a former Nazi war criminal (Laurence Olivier) who is after a cache of diamonds. Hoffman brings a powerful intensity to this physically and emotionally demanding role and holds his own against Lord Olivier...Olivier's Oscar-nominated performance here is so dazzling that you almost don't notice how good Hoffman is but nobody steals a film from Hoffman and this one is no exception.