Leonardo DiCaprio: Ranking Every Performance From Worst To Best
9. Edward "Teddy" Daniels - Shutter Island
If it's your wish to spend two hours watching Leonardo DiCaprio descending into total madness, then this is the movie for you. As US Marshal Teddy Daniels, who has been sent to a remote mental institution housed on an island off the coast of Boston to investigate the disappearance of a patient, he's mesmerizing in a strange and nearly sickly fashion. Watching an actor edging his way around an old building for an entire movie could have been boring as hell, but Scorsese's knowing direction, coupled with Leo's acting chops, make it near-unmissable.
8. Danny Archer - Blood Diamond
"MA' NAME IS DANNY ARCHER, AL'RIGH BRO?" That's to say, most people tend to be more caught up as to whether or not Leo did a convincing South African accent for his role as a rouge-ish gunrunner in Edward Zwick's divisive film about political unrest in 1999 Africa. The problem is that nobody seems to have the answer to that question. Seriously. Nobody. Good or bad, we can all probably agree that DiCaprio was brilliant regardless - many felt this was the first movie role where he seemed like an actual man, and not a boy-man. AL'RIGH BRO?
7. Howard Hughes - The Aviator
There's a sense that Leonardo DiCaprio invested a lot of time and energy into getting his performance in tune for Martin Scorsese's The Aviator, the director's long-coming biopic of innovator, pilot and film director Howard Hughes, one of the 20th century's most controversial - not to mention elusive - figures. What we all remember, of course, is the part where Leo has the beard and the long nails and it's all a bit disgusting, but this is an otherwise haunting portrait, carefully rendered. Oscar nomination, of course, but no win this time, either. Those sons of b*tches.
6. Frank Abagnale - Catch Me If You Can
What fun! And here's a post-Titanic flick that successfully embraced DiCaprio's boyish charms instead of trying to subvert them - he's fresh-faced and consistently wonderful from start to finish, a true movie star in every sense of the word. Look: he's practically glowing! So as Frank Abagnale, a con artist who travels across America pretending to be other people because that gives him his kicks, Leo felt totally in sync with the breezy nature of one of Steven Spielberg's most underrated movies.
