3. Matthew McConaughey
Matthew McConaughey is an actor much like Channing Tatum who I had pretty much written off prior to a few years ago when he started giving good performances again, firstly in Tropic Thunder as Ben Stiller's agent, and then as Mick Haller in The Lincoln Lawyer. 2012 really has been his year, though, having starred as lawyer Danny Buck in Richard Linklater's hilarious Bernie, a role that has earned him considerable awards acclaim. It doesn't stop there, though; his most diverting role came as Detective Joe Cooper in William Friedkin's Killer Joe, a marvellously dark film which allows McConaughey to take on a very different role indeed, harnessing that suave demeanour to become something a whole lot more insidious and dangerous. His most popular performance by far - and the one for which he has received a surprising amount of awards attention - is as Dallas in Steven Soderbergh's Magic Mike, the charming leader of the male strippers, coasting off of McConaughey's natural charm for all it is worth. In 2012, he also starred in Lee Daniels' The Paperboy and Jeff Nichols' Mud, though neither of them have had wide releases in most territories yet. 2013 looks set to be another great year so far; he's lost a considerable amount of weight to play AIDS-afflicted Ron Woodroof in Dallas Buyers Club, and will play Mark Hanna in Martin Scorsese's The Wolf of Wall Street.