Never one to shy away from tough subject matter, 1996 saw Rickman take the role of amon de Valera in the biopic of Irish revolutionary Michael Collins. Starring alongside Liam Neeson and Julia Roberts, our man puts in a totemic performance and constantly threatens to steal the show from his more famous Hollywood counterparts. Following the story of the fabled freedom fighter in the wake of the failed Easter Rising of 1916, the movie has the crashes, bangs and explosions that look great on the cinema screen alongside Neeson's handsome heroics and Roberts' usual hysterics, but it's Rickman who brings the seriousness, the gravitas, that a film dealing with such politically inflammatory material needs. Not for the first time, Michael Collins proved that Rickman can take a relatively background role yet still pour his powerful influence - not to mention phenomenal credibility - all over a movie to make it ten times better than it would have been without him.