Top 5 – Leonardo DiCaprio Performances

Leonardo DiCaprio is one of the best actors working today.  He continues to push himself with every performance, giving us a wide range of unique, brilliant performances.  With his latest film, The Revenant coming out this weekend (read my review RIGHT HERE), let’s look at the best of the best from one of the greats.

5 – ARNIE GRAPE IN WHAT’S EATING GILBERT GRAPE? (1993)

This is a performance that gets overlooked on the DiCaprio filmography, but is simply brilliant.  DiCaprio is truly remarkable in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape?.  He is so sweet, and funny, and heartbreaking as the mentally handicapped brother of Johnny Depp’s tortured Gilbert.  He’s so good, if you did not know it was DiCaprio, you would think they hired an actual handicapped actor for the part.  In a performance that could have been a gimmick or offensive, DiCaprio is just perfect and rightly earned him his first Oscar nomination.

4 – BILLY COSTIGAN IN THE DEPARTED (2006)

Plagued with his boyish looks for almost a decade, The Departed was the movie where DiCaprio really grew up and further solidified himself as a legitimate, great actor.  In Martin Scorsese’s gangster epic, DiCaprio expertly conveys the mental instability of Costigan, as he starts off as a cop, but becomes immersed in the gangster life and loses his identity along the way.  It is a gritty, edgy performance that stands out among an all-star cast.

3 – HOWARD HUGHES IN THE AVIATOR (2004)

These top three performances were tough to place, as you can argue each to be number one.  As Howard Hughes in Martin Scorsese’s bio-pic, this was the first DiCaprio performance where I went, “Wow.  That guy can really act.”  He showed a range that he never had before and played such an eccentric character, it could have ended up campy if done by a lesser actor.  But DiCaprio knocks it out of the park, becoming the wildly ambitious Howard Hughes and showing his brilliance, insanity, and then descent into madness later on in his life.  It is a charismatic and captivating performance and one of the best of 2000’s.

2 – CALVIN CANDIE IN DJANGO UNCHAINED (2012)

This is a performance that DiCaprio had never done before.  Always the protagonist in his films, he plays the villain in Quentin Tarantino’s Western, and the worst kind at that.  Calvin Candie is a character with no redeemable feature to him.  He is a blood thirsty, despicable slave owner who is the definition of evil.  Yet, DiCaprio makes him amazingly compelling and a blast to watch on screen.  This performance was criminally overlooked by all award circles and stands as the best performance from any Quentin Tarantino movie.

1 – JORDAN BELFORT IN THE WOLF OF WALL STREET (2013)

This is the definition of a towering performance.  Martin Scorsese’s sex-filled, drug-fueled masterpiece hinges on the performance of DiCaprio and he kills it.  It is a powerhouse performance that is funny, jaw-dropping, and utterly insane.  DiCaprio becomes the drugged up, sex-loving Wall Street tycoon so much so, that during his motivational speeches to his crew, I wanted to pick up the phone and sell Steve Madden stock.  This is a bold, rousing, masterful performance and the best of Leonardo DiCaprio’s career.

What did you think of this list?  Did I miss any?  What are you favorite Leonardo DiCaprio performances?  Comment below, or hit me up on Twitter @kevflix or on the Facebook page, Kevflix.