Best Performances

The most remarkable moments in film this past year weren’t 3-D action sequences but characters so real they hurt. Here, the actors who made us believe.

By Lynn Hirschberg
Photographs by Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin
Styled by Melanie Ward
Portfolio designed by Lee Swillingham and Stuart Spalding at Suburbia

February 2011

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Natalie Portman in “Black Swan”

“The movie that I watched the most when I was growing up was Dirty Dancing. I always loved Penny, probably because I was really like Baby. I was a Jewish girl from a Jewish family, so of course I liked the tall, skinny blond girl.”

By Lynn Hirschberg
Photographs by Inez Van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin
Styled by Melanie Ward

February 2011

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Best Performances

The most remarkable moments in film this past year weren’t 3-D action sequences but characters so real they hurt. Here, the actors who made us believe.