13 Intense Movie Performances That Are Incredibly Difficult To Watch

6. Robert Carlyle - Trainspotting

Like Daniel Day Lewis and Ralph Fiennes, Robert Carlyle is at his best when given the opportunity to flex his volatile muscles in performances. He might be disarmingly charming in The Full Monty and Carla's Song, but he is far more memorable for his psychotic turns in The Beach, The World Is Not Enough and as Adolf Hitler, so it's not surprising that his most affecting, and most disturbing performance should be his most unleashed.

As self-styled patriarch Francis Begbie, Carlyle is an explosive bottle rocket, with a great big red button that says do not press, but which occasionally just defies logic and presses itself, leading to a hail of hellfire.

Begbie is the kind of character who makes every scene that he appears in unavoidably tense, a ticking time bomb who can and will explode at regularly intervals so it's impossible to watch him in comfort.