Chris Cooper Ranked

Welcome to "Ranked", a weekly series where I rank a franchise or filmography from worst to best and hand out assorted related superlatives. This week, I'm profiling the work of Chris Cooper-whose latest project "Boston Strangler" begins streaming on Hulu tomorrow. 

Chris Cooper's Filmography Ranked:

19.Adaptation. (D-)

18.Guilty by Suspicion (C-)

17.Capote (C-) 

16.Demolition (C)

15.The Boure Supremacy (C) 

14.Money Train (C+)

13.Irresistible (B-) 

12.The Kingdom (B)

11.A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood (B)

10.The Muppets (B)

9.Live by Night (B)

8.August: Osage County (B)

7.The Bourne Identity (B)

6.Breach (B) 

5.Little Women (B)

4.Jarhead (B)

3.American Beauty (A-)

2.Me, Myself & Irene (A)

1.The Town (A)

Top Dog: The Town (2010)

As a native of Cambridge, Massachusetts, Ben Affleck was obligated to make a Boston-set crime movie and he fulfilled his duty beautifully. The Town is a tense, emotional and riveting heist thriller with high rewatch value that remains Affleck's most impressive work as a director to date.    

Bottom Feeder: Adaptation. (2002)

I've actually enjoyed every other Spike Jonze movie I've seen and had no problem connecting with Charlie Kaufman's quirky, surrealistic style on Being John Malkovich-which was also directed by Jonze. Adaptation is a different beast entirely. While I've seen dozens of movies that I hated more than this, I'd be hard pressed to think of another movie that had more contempt for its viewer than this sanctimonious, condescending meta "comedy" that views enjoying/making "low art" (the primary punching bag here is thrillers) as the ultimate sign of human stupidity. I'd take watching an inept genre film over this masturbatory, elitist bullshit 100 times out of 100.  

Most Underrated: Me, Myself & Irene (2000)

Out of all the idiotic comedies The Farrelly Brothers put out from the mid 90's through the early 2010's, this is my favorite. Jim Carrey's remarkable physical comedy skills are such a perfect match for this goofy story about a Rhode Island state trooper with a recently developed split personality who is tasked with driving a woman (Renee Zellweger) who allegedly committed a crime to upstate New York, and it turns just about every scene into an unpredictable, insane laugh riot.

Most Overrated: Adaptation. (2002) 

Just an insufferable slog of a film that is a hyper-committed pair of Nicolas Cage performances away from being completely useless.