The Ten Best Performances of 2023

December 29, 2023 by Matt Oakes Posted in Lists, Most Popular Tagged All of Us Strangers, American Fiction, Andrew Scott, Barry Keoghan, Emma Stone, Jeffrey Wright, Margaret Qualley, Mark Ruffalo, Molly Gordon, Paul Giamatti, Poor Things, Rosamund Pike, Saltburn, Theater Camp 2 Comments

It has already begun: the long march towards coronating a new quartet of actors whose performances are deemed the finest of 2023. And while the Oscars, Globes, and flurry of other guild awards tend to recognize the same handful of actors over and over again, here at Silver Screen Riot, we have our own version of who offered the best performances of 2023. So now that we’ve already gotten our way through the Ten Best TV Shows of 2023, and the Ten Best Movies of 2023, it’s time to move onto the Ten Best Performances of 2023.

Though it should go without saying, by “best”, I mean entirely my favorites so no need to send over an Excel sheet proving me why my preferences are wrong. From a year teeming with standout performances, several noteworthy ones made the greatest impact, though I could probably double this list and be more happy with it. But time is finite (mine and yours) and so here they are: Read More

Fiery ‘SALTBURN’ Glows With Psychosexual Heat, Palace Intrigue

November 13, 2023 by Matt Oakes Posted in Most Popular, Out in Theaters Tagged Alison Oliver, Archie Madekwe, Barry Keoghan, Carey Mulligan, Emerald Fennell, Jacob Elordi, Linus Sandgren, Richard E. Grant, Rosamund Pike, Saltburn, Sophie Canale, Suzie Davies 2 Comments

In her second feature, writer, director, and producer Emerald Fennell digs her heels deeper into the themes of power dynamics and the consequences of privilege that she explored in 2020’s explosive Promising Young Woman, this time folding in palace intrigue by moving the action to the lofty estate of a family of aristocrats at the eponymous Saltburn. A decadent feast for the senses, Fennell’s sophomore feature calls to mind a tale as old as time framed through a modern lens: an unassuming Oxford scholar is allured by the corrosive power of wealth, finding himself sucked into a vortex of desire, greed, and materialism. It’s Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby with the hyper-modern visual high-shine of Euphoria and the cold calculation of a Bret Easton Ellis novel, plus a splash of the wealthy ennui found in a Sofia Coppola film. Read More

‘THE BANSHEES OF INISHERIN’ Examines the Tragic Hilarity of a Country at War With Itself

October 6, 2022 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged Barry Keoghan, Ben Davis, Brendan Gleeson, Colin Farrell, Kerry Condon, Martin McDonagh, Out in Theaters, Reviews, Sheila Flitton, The Banshees of Inisherin Leave a comment

A Very Civil War

The year is 1923. In Inisherin, a small, remote island off the east coast of Ireland, the days are filled with an almost apocalyptic ennui. From across the bitter cold of the Atlantic, the report of gunfire and cannons signal the ongoing Irish Civil War. Ireland’s Civil War came on the heels of their War of Independence from Great Britain. And claimed even more lives. It pit brothers and friends against one another, forcing allies who had fought alongside each other just the year prior against England at each other’s throats. The war was deeply personal and subsequently bitter and bloody. Read More

An Opportunistic Knight Quests in Superbly Crafted, Narratively Adventurous ‘THE GREEN KNIGHT’

July 28, 2021 by Matt Oakes Posted in Out in Theaters Tagged A24, Alicia Vikander, Andrew Croz Palermo, Barry Keoghan, Daniel Hart, Dev Patel, Erin Kellyman, Joel Edgerton, Kate Dickie, Malgosia Turzanska, Ralph Ineson, Sarita Choudhury, Sean Harris, The Green Knight 2 Comments

David Lowery is a visual poet. Throughout his celebrated career, the Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, Pete’s Dragon, and A Ghost Story director has leaned on visual language and unconventional film grammar to connect with audiences, championing the emotional resonance of imagery over traditional narrative structure. In many ways, his films are in the same vein as American auteur Terrence Malick: thoughtful and dense, visually resplendent, whispery tone poems designated strictly for the Film Buff crowd. In that capacity, Lowery suffers Malick’s shortcomings, particularly as it pertains to resting too much within the opaque interiority of his characters and letting plotting fall by the wayside.

SIFF ’18 Capsule Review: ‘AMERICAN ANIMALS’

May 7, 2018 by Matt Oakes Posted in Festival Reviews Tagged American Animals, Barry Keoghan, Barry Layton, Evan Peters, SIFF 2018 1 Comment

Bart Layton’s audacious feature debut uniquely tacks together documentary and narrative styles to tell the stranger than fiction tale of a notorious art heist gone horribly wrong. Barry Keoghan and Evan Peters are strong as apathetic, bored college students who fall victim to glamorized fables of the perfect crime in Layton’s white-knuckle exploration of young white male entitlement and the dubious nature of truth and memory. This slick caper boasts a unique storytelling approach and gripping moments of high tension but struggles with pacing and periphery character development. (B) Read More

2017 Silver Screen Riot Awards

January 23, 2018 by Matt Oakes Posted in Awards, Lists Tagged Barry Keoghan, Birdboy, Get Out, Jodran Peele, Michele Pfeiffer, paul thomas anderson, Raw, Robert Pattinson. Frances McDormand, Silver Screen Riot Awards, The Work 3 Comments

With the announcement of the Academy Awards nominees, we’re finally in the race to the finale of this year’s award’s seasons. Seeing that Mr. Oscar tends to get it wrong so much of the time (although this year’s nominees were fairly great across the board), we have an annual tradition of issuing our own awards to recognize the best storytelling and performances throughout the year. Since we’re not tied to any silly number of nominees, we went ahead and listed every one that we thought deserving of a mention, even if the list well exceed more than 5 or 10. You won’t find a Best Picture category here as I think that is properly summarized by our Top Ten Films segment, which I would urge you to visit if you haven’t already. With that out of the way, the SSR Award goes to… Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘THE KILLING OF A SACRED DEER’

October 24, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Most Popular, Out in Theaters Tagged Barry Keoghan, Collin Farrell, Nicole Kidman, Raffey Cassidy, Reviews, Sunny Suljic, The Killing of a Sacred Deer, Yorgos Lanthimos Leave a comment

No one makes ‘em like Yorgos Lanthimos, the Greek auteur/comedic sadist responsible for such cinephelic gems as Dogtooth and The Lobster. Taking much of the same human-as-reporters-of-fact Wes Anderson forthrightness and filtering it through a lens of awkward depravity, The Killing of a Sacred Deer follows pace with The Lobster, wherein singles mingled forcibly lest they be hunted down by a strictly coupled off society. This is something even more dark, otherworldly and delirious where coupledom proves a debilitating battle of wits and parents have little loyalty. Read More

Out in Theaters: ‘DUNKIRK’

July 18, 2017 by Matt Oakes Posted in Most Popular, Out in Theaters Tagged Aneurin Barnard, Barry Keoghan, Christopher Nolan, Cillian Murphy, Dunkirk, Fionn Whitehead, Hans Zimmers, Harry Styles, Hoyte van Hoytema, Jack Lowden, Lee Smith, Mark Rylance, Tom Hardy 2 Comments

A visceral sensation from start to finish, Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk delivers the experience that 3D has promised to for so many years. Immensely immersive, Dunkirk envelopes you in its perfectly orchestrated chaos from the very first moments, surrounding you with the sights and sounds of war-torn Dunkirk as soldiers scurry for safety, hugging you in a sickly embrace of unease while Hans Zimmers’ sublimely nerve-inducing score tears at your composure. Hypnotic in its ability to put you on edge and suck you headfirst into the screen, Nolan’s sure-to-be Oscar juggernaut forces you to scour every inch of the screen for danger and refuses to relent for but a moment. A layered triptych that integrates three disparate narratives, all working on their own timelines, Dunkirk is nothing short of a verifiable masterstroke of cinematic construction and the lauded director’s most artistic and impassioned vision yet. Read More