Just Curious....what makes an actor a "good actor"

I hope I can communicate my point in question as successfully as I feel it comes across in my own mind.....

I know everyone has their own opinion of what makes an actor ahead of the rest so to speak, but is it his/her body of work, is it one specific performance, is it the ability for him/her to deliver consistently engaging performances, or is it the ability for said actor/tress to make you emote with the character in question.

NOW THIS MIGHT SEEM LIKE AN EASY QUESTION and ANSWER, but let me explain, and really think about it.....

I am going to see the movie "Gravity" tonight, in which I have heard nothing but good things about, so I am pretty excited, because the last movie I dropped money on in the theater (Don Juan), was a major disappointment. So I was thinking about the actors, and it came across my mind, that I like George Clooney as an actor, and I think he has mastered his own craft, and when i say "his own," I mean his own. George can act, but he will pretty much act the same in every movie. He's always the charmer, always slightly ahead of the curve, pent up, bursting emotion, yada, yada yada (for example he's the same character he was in Michael Clayton as the Peacemaker).

So here are some examples, that might incite some polarized conversation-

Is Leonardo DiCaprio a good actor? He seems to always play "Leo" in every movie, don't get me wrong, i think he can act, but his J.Edgar Hoover is the same as his Howard Hughes.

I think Al Pacino is a great actor from his body of work I have seen, but Al plays Al in every movie I have seen, much like Robert DeNiro, no matter what movie you see, Bobby is gonna play Bobby.

I would like to hear some suggestion of actors to contradict what I am saying, I know they are out there,

For example I think Daniel Day Lewis, is an exception, one can argue his Bill the Butcher is very close to his Daniel Plainview, but they are very distant to his Lincoln, Hawkeye and Christy Brown.

As I write this, I guess to me, what makes a an actor good, or ahead of the rest, is his/her ability to take a role, especially one you thought they were unsuited for and totally own it, and make you say wow, I never would have guessed......

Thanks, and looking forward to hearing your responses

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Silencio

The biggest problem problem for high profile actors, like the ones you mentioned, are that they are so famous, that we start to see the actor through the performance. A great actor does such a job, where that doesn't happen.

For Leo, both his roles in Django Unchained and Blood Diamond were brilliant imo. I barely saw him through those movies.

Al Pacino, his Scarface performance was flawless. I only saw Tony Montana throughout the movie.

No actor is perfect, and it does depend on the character itself at times, but great actors are able to make the separation from reality and the character they're trying to be.

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Here, if you have a milkshake, and I have a milkshake, and I have a straw. There it is, that's a straw, you see? You watching?. And my straw reaches acroooooooss the room, and starts to drink your milkshake... I... drink... your... milkshake!
-Daniel, There Will Be Blood

Dedication.

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"Anything less than immortality is a complete waste of time."

I think many actors have acting "chops" that they'll use. IMO the good actors will abandon those for a new set when doing new characters. But there are certain physical limitations actors have (Bill Hickey, at an HB acting class once said, "You can cut your food like someone else, but you can't swallow like someone else"....

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Under-the-radar Movie Awesomeness.
http://earlsmoviepicks.blogspot.com/

Great Point, and thank you for mentioning Django as that Leo was definitely a departure from the norm, and yes Scarface, no one could have played Montana the way Al did

I agree about the "chops" and nice quote, made me chuckle, I also like your blog man, keep it going.

What makes both Chishu Ryu in Late Spring, and Gloria Swanson Sunset Boulevard great? I don't think this is a very easy question to answer.

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Mubi

I think it's as important to have a character who jumps out at the audience in terms of interest. An actor can do wonders with a phenomenal role, but if it's a terrible role in the first place, there's not going to be much to work with.

It's interesting to compare a movie actor to a theatrical actor....one acts in second to minute segments, the other has to sustain a character for several hours over a bunch of identical performances.

Movie actors tend to under-emote whereas theatrical actors are, after all...theatrical.

IMO, the best movie actor can do, in tiny pieces, what a theater actor does over an entire play, which is to lose himself in a role and become someone else. The movie actor has to do it in tiny pieces, over a period of months as the flick is filmed.

I think less of actors who play themselves in different times, places and plots, the archetype of which is John Wayne, who was John Wayne at the Alamo, John Wayne at Iwo Jima, John Wayne in the wild west, etc, etc. The Duke was a great character, but not much of an actor.

Directors have said many times sometimes the camera "likes" the actor. In some cases it's because the performance is stainless, in other cases like Eastwood, Steve Mc Queen, Charles Bronson, Yul Brynner is because they have gravitas. Other people just have handsome or beautiful faces like Kirk Douglas. In others like Max Von Sidow, Schwarzenegger, Charlton Heston they have faces which belong to whatever historical period, faces from times already forgotten and larger than life stature and even enhanced filmed from a low angle. Heston and Liam Neeson for example not only tall but with broken noses which is what happened to Brando who kept it that way after broke his at certain point in his career.
Worn out or ugly faces fit fine in certain roles, think of Robert Mitchum who was handsome but had an air of lack of interest and all knowing or Bogart, Dustin Hoffman.

Not trying to act. Cillian Murphy is a classic example, it just rolls off him.

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“If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.” BLAKE.

It's even beyond the features of the actors and how they look under the camera's eye but the personality. Examples:
James Cagney explained he mimicked some dude he saw in his youth who spent the whole day moving his shoulders and clapping one hand on his other fist. But there's more than that, Cagney knew how to fight and when you watch him punch and kick you notice he did it with all his body and depicting the tip of his tongue in satisfaction. He was cool like Steve Mc Queen waving his hat to draw attention to him rather than Brynner in Magnificent Seven or wearing those black sunglasses in other film. Clint Eastwood before drawing stood quite and relaxed , one foot in a waiting position, while squinting his eyes, with a CONFIDENCE and you knew before hand he'd win'em all.
Bogart tightened his lips or stared with evil eyes, barely held a cigarrete in his lips and you could almost feel the pleasure he had smoking and drinking. Robert Mitchum walking slowly with the determination and confidence of a Transformer. Yul Brynner holding his arms on his hips or crossing his arms with defiance attitude. Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas showing their perfect teeth, Clark Gable his smile. Nicholson his wicked sharp grim and eyebrows.
Some actors after a time start to make caricatures of themselves: Robert De Niro with his idiotic smile, Pacino overacting and yelling in almost every fu... movie, Keanu Reeves performing his spoiled brat kicking and behaviour. But they are recognizable.

Duke is another example of what I am writing. He played nobody. He just was there no matter if he was with a beret on or dressed like a Roman soldier saying "GAAAAD" rather than "this was truly the son of God" in The Greatest Story Ever Told (or was it The Longest Film Ever Shot?) or like a ridiculous Mongol in Gengis Khan.

They have to become there character, so much you really forget who they actually are when watching the film.