The Best and Worst of Tilda Swinton

“The Best and Worst of” series chronicles the career highlights and lowlights of an actor starring in one of the week's new theatrical releases. This week, I take a look at the filmography of “Suspiria” star Tilda Swinton.

Films starring Tilda Swinton that I've seen:
Adaptation.
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe  
Michael Clayton
Burn After Reading
Moonrise Kingdom
Snowpiercer 
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Trainwreck
Hail, Caesar!

Doctor Strange
Okja
Isle of Dogs

Best Performance: Snowpiercer (2014)
Swinton is a force when he's she's on her game, so this choice was pretty difficult. Ultimately, the sheer terror she imposed as the primary villain in Bong Joon Ho's post-apocalyptic action thriller Snowpiercer was enough to edge out her more subtle turn in Michael Clayton and surprisingly hilarious performance in Trainwreck.  

Worst Performance: Okja (2017)
Swinton's latest collaboration with Bong Joon-Ho wasn't exactly the triumph that the prior one was. In a preachy environmental adventure flick that featured numerous high quality actors (Jake Gyllenhaal, Lilly Collins, Paul Dano) churning out uncharacteristically terrible performances, Swinton was the worst of all. Her turn as evil CEO Lucy Cerrando is not only so cartoonish that it seems like she came straight off the set of one of Joel Schumacher's Batman movies, but it completely clashes with the stern, heavy-handed tone of the rest of the film.

Best Film: Trainwreck (2015)
There's been a solid amount of great romantic comedies released over the last several years (Crazy, Stupid, Love, The Big Sick, Sleeping with Other People), but Trainwreck is still my favorite by a comfortable margin. Just about every member of this ensemble cast (Amy Schumer, Bill Hader, LeBron James, Swinton, John Cena, Vanessa Bayer, Colin Quinn) brings their A-game, there's some moving drama and sincere insight on how relationships are handled in the modern era that helps make the central romance feel pretty authentic and most of all, it's hilarious from start to finish.

Worst Film: Adaptation. (2002)
Adaptation boasts a level of pretension that is so abundant and shameless that it deserves a nice, polite round of applause. I've never been a big fan of Charlie Kaufman, but this masturbatory satire about the very relatable struggle of trying to write a movie script that's based on source material written by someone else is easily the most insufferable piece of elitist porn he's ever produced. Nothing says a great time at the movies like a film that takes glee in shitting on audiences that enjoy straightforward crime thrillers and horror films over the refined nuances of a poetic arthouse drama written by a true intellectual like Kaufman. Fuck this smug, finger-wagging pile of trash.    

Thank you for reading this week's edition of “The Best and Worst of”. The next victim of my praise and ire will be “Bohemian Rhapsody” star Mike Myers.