4. Benedict Cumberbatch
Best: The Imitation Game (2014) It might not have been universally loved, and criticised for not pushing the boundaries it could have tackled more bravely, but The Imitation Game is at its best when Cumberbatch is on screen. And even as the film seeks to preserve the mysteries of Alan Turing, the portrait he offered was still disarmingly brilliant and utterly watchable. Let's hope he's as good with comic book sorcerors as he is with computer geniuses. Worst: The Fifth Estate (2013) As bad films go, The Fifth Estate is considerably less bad than some of the others on this list, but in proximity with Cumberbatch's better work, it's stunted, glum and all-too insistent of its own importance without really backing it up.