7. Samuel L Jackson - Jackie Brown
Samuel L Jackson's sophomore go in a Quentin Tarantino film was that of Ordell Robbie, a crooked arms dealer in the 1997 Elmore Leonard adaptation. In Jackie Brown, Jackson plays a much more subdued character than what he is known for, operating a small but lucrative business running guns and drugs in Los Angeles. Jackson just has to give a look and you know he means business, and he plays Robbie with a confidence and swagger that is prevalent in the majority of his work. In one of his finest scenes, Robbie has just been swindled out of a half million dollars in cash, and he discovers that his old friend Louis (Robert DeNiro) realized what was going down. Upon hearing this news, Jackson looks down, thinks about what has to happen very hard before ultimately pulling the trigger on his friend. A powerhouse performance that adds depth to the standard movie crime boss without uttering a single word. Samuel L Jackson has already been generating a strong buzz surrounding his performance in Tarantino's next film, Django Unchained.