Bob’s Not Dead: 5 Best Robert De Niro Performances Of The 2010s

Martin Scorsese’s grandiose, star-studded, bank-breaking The Irishman is set to hit Netflix in early 2019. The mob epic follows Irish hitman Frank Sheeran through his dealings with legendary Teamsters boss Jimmy Hoffa. De Niro plays Sheeran, and is accompanied by enough fantastic actors to fill out the Yankees’ opening day roster. (Go ahead, check out the full cast, then pick your jaw back up and finish this article.)

To read movie message boards, you’d think this is the first promising De Niro flick in 20 years. And while he has admittedly made crappy comedies in his old age, including the cringe-worthy Dirty Grandpa, he bounced back from his creatively-tepid 2000’s for several inspired performances in the past eight years. Don’t believe me? Still living in fear that they’ll make a fourth Fockers film? Milk this list for all its worth to remind yourself that Bobby D’s still got it. (After all, you can milk anything with nipples.)

 

Joy (2015)

Directed by David O’Russell
Co-starring Jennifer Lawrence

The third of his three collaborations with David O. Russell is by far the least celebrated, but De Niro still sweeps across the screen like the Miracle Mop with poisonous bravado. As Rudy, the father of inventor/entrepreneur Joy Mangano, De Niro conjures up the toxic insecurities that made characters like Rupert Pupkin (The King of Comedy) and Johnny Boy (Mean Streets) so magnetic. Rudy goes through marriages like toilet paper and is a professional failure, so he viciously projects his own shortcomings onto his daughter (beautifully played by Lawrence), who spends the entire film overcoming her family’s perception of her. Watch how Rudy lectures Joy on the proper way to be divorced as he’s being dropped on her doorstep by his ex-wife like an unwanted puppy. Only De Niro can make such a distasteful human so endlessly watchable, not to mention hilarious.

 

Being Flynn (2012)

Directed by Paul Weitz
Co-starring Paul Dano

Bobby Milk’s nuanced performance about untreated mental illness was overshadowed by, well, his other nuanced performance about untreated mental illness in a much better film released the same year (more on that later). However, that De Niro’s work as Jonathan Flynn went largely unnoticed is a shame given how much he gave himself to the character. In the decade preceding the movie, De Niro had rarely allowed himself to be as vulnerable as he was here, getting thrown out of homeless shelters, screaming profanities at the heavens and comparing himself to the greatest authors of all time. He finally found himself back playing a human being, rather than a caricature or a sleekly-written box-office draw. Sure, the human being was irrational and hopelessly delusional, but isn’t that what De Niro plays best?

 

Hands of Stone (2016)

Directed by Jonathan Jakubowicz
Co-starring Edgar Ramirez

Boxing fans enjoyed this film, film critics found it tread too closely to the Rockyesque comeback story, and millennials were delighted to learn that Roberto Duran redeemed himself following “No mas.” What all three had in common was their respect for De Niro’s performance. Here, the master is in his element without getting too comfortable. As the legendary Ray Arcel, he bobs and weaves between concerned parental figure to and frustrated trainer of Ramirez’s Duran. More than his colorful mannerisms or his endearing use of the word “schmuck,” De Niro’s performance is memorable for the look in his eyes, which contain an immeasurable amount of pain over boxing’s fall from innocence.

 

The Wizard of Lies (2017)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfDheHahDIU

Directed by Barry Levinson
Co-starring Michelle Pfeiffer

HBO made it, so of course audiences and critics alike adored this film. However, the praise lavished on The Wizard of Lies, a TV movie about Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme and its devastating consequences, is well deserved. It’s not easy to make an interesting film out of such a well-known story, but the movie is carried by the consistency of its bleak tone and the strength of its acting. Michelle Pfeiffer is fantastic as Bernie’s wife, Ruth Madoff, while Nathan Darrow and Alessandro Nivola give fine turns as Madoff’s heartbroken sons. Of course, the film’s gravitational pull is De Niro, who plays Madoff with outstanding precision. The interview segments between Madoff and Diana B. Henriques find De Niro mastering the art of self deception. Even as he defends his actions with the nerve to take a moral high ground, there is a look in his eyes that lets us know he knows it’s all bullshit. And yet, the indignance in his voice never wavers.

 

Silver Linings Playbook (2012)

Directed by David O. Russell, co-starring Bradley Cooper

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lj5_FhLaaQQ

Directed by David O. Russell
Co-starring Bradley Cooper

Was there ever going to be another performance to top this list? This you can call a comeback. It was a return to the volatile characters that turned De Niro into a screen icon without being a forced attempt to recapture the magic of old. De Niro’s Pat Sr., an avid Philadelphia Eagles fan with undiagnosed Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and Bipolar Disorder, is alarming without being disdainful and humorous without ever resorting to parody. And just when you think Pat Sr. is a lost cause, De Niro comes through with the finest example of a tear-jerker of his career. We had to rethink this whole thing.