Dunno if this will get up and running, but if it does, i think it's anoying to have it five lists in one discussion-thread... This is the newest update:

1. There Will Be Blood – Daniel Day-Lewis (2007)
2. Silence Of The Lambs – Anthony Hopkins (1991)
3. American Beauty – Kevin Spacey (1999)
4. Forrest Gump – Tom Hanks (1994)
5. Shine – Geoffrey Rush (1996)
6. Capote – Phillip Seymour Hoffman (2005)
7. Brokeback Mountain – Heath Ledger (2005)
8. Mystic River – Sean Penn (2003)
9. Ray – Jamie Foxx (2004)
10. The Last King Of Scotland – Forrest Whitaker (2006)
11. The Pianist – Adrian Brody (2002)
12. Gangs Of New York – Daniel Day-Lewis (2002)
13. American History X – Edward Norton (1998)
14. The Scent Of A Woman – Al Pacino (1992)
15. Milk – Sean Penn (2008)
16. Philadelphia – Tom Hanks (1993)
17. Malcolm X – Denzel Washington (1992)
18. Training Day – Denzel Washington (2001)
19. The Shawshank Redemption – Morgan Freeman (1994)
20. Leaving Las Vegas – Nicolas Cage (1995)
21. Hamlet – Kenneth Branagh (1996)
22. The Dark Knight – Heath Ledger (2008)
23. Schindler’s List – Liam Neeson (1993)
24. Pirates Of The Caribbean – Johnny Depp (2003)
25. In The Name Of the Father – Daniel Day-Lewis (1993)
26. Chaplin – Robert Downey Jr. (1992)
27. The Unforgiven – Gene Hackman (1992)
28. A Beautiful Mind – Russell Crowe (2001)
29. No Country for Old Men – Javier Bardem (2007)
30. House Of Sand & Fog – Ben Kingsley (2003)
31. Crazy Heart – Jeff Bridges (2009)
32. The English Patient – Ralph Fiennes (1996)
33. Gladiator – Russell Crowe (2000)
34. Lost In Translation – Bill Murray (2003)
35. The Usual Suspects – Kevin Spacey (1995)
36. I Am Sam – Sean Penn (2001)
37. The Aviator – Leonardo DeCaprio (2004)
38. Saving Private Ryan – Tom Hanks (1998)
39. The Wrestler - Mickey Rourke (2008)
40. Half Nelson – Ryan Gosling (2006)
41. Michael Clayton – George Clooney (2007)
42. Inglorious Basterds – Christoph Waltz (2009)
43. Monster’s Ball – Billy Bob Thornton (2001)
44. Quills – Geoffrey Rush (2000)
45. Gods & Monsters – Ian McKellen (1998)
46. Pulp Fiction – Samuel L. Jackson (1994)
47. As Good As It Gets – Jack Nicholson (1997)
48. The Remains Of The Day – Anthony Hopkins (1993)
49. Reversal Of Fortune – Jeremy Irons (1990)
50. A Single Man - Collin Firth (2009)

missing pacino and lemmon's performances from glengarry glen ross, both top 50 worthy

this list needs to be split into 90s and 00s instead of combined. here is a suggestion for a 2000s list. and one that doesnt focus as much on just the US.

1. Daniel Day-Lewis as Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood (2007; USA - English)
2. Ulrich Muhe as Hauptmann Gerd Wiesler in The Lives of Others (2006; Germany - German)
3. Tony Leung Chiu Wai as Chow Mo-wan in In the Mood for Love (2000; Hong Kong - Cantonese)
4. Javier Bardem as Ramón Sampedro in The Sea Inside (2004; Spain - Spanish)
5. Christoph Waltz as Col. Hans Landa in Inglourious Basterds (2009; USA - English/French/German/Italian)
7. Bruno Ganz as Adolf Hitler in Downfall (2004; Germany - German)
8. Benicio del Toro as Javier Rodriguez in Traffic (2000; USA - Spanish)
9. Philip Seymour Hoffman as Truman Capote in Capote (2005; USA - English)
10. Heath Ledger as The Joker in The Dark Knight (2007; USA - English)
11. Mathieu Amalric as Jean-Dominique Bauby in The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007; France - French)
12. Tony Leung Chiu Wai as Chow Mo-wan in 2046 (2004; Hong Kong - Cantonese)
13. Forest Whitaker as Idi Amin in The Last King of Scotland (2006; UK - English)
14. Toni Servillo as Giulio Andreotti in Il divo (2008; Italy - Italian)
15. Shahrukh Khan as Devdas Mukherji in Devdas (2002; India - Hindi)
16. Daniel Day-Lewis as Bill 'The Butcher' Cutting in Gangs of New York (2002; USA - English)
17. Tahar Rahim as Malik El Djebena in A Prophet (2009; France - French/Arabic)
18. Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003; USA - English)
19. Adrien Brody as Wladyslaw Szpilman in The Pianist (2002; France - English)
20. Vincent Cassel as Jacques Mesrine in Mesrine (2008; France - French)
21. Javier Bardem as Anton Chigurh in No Country for Old Men (2007; USA - English)
22. Min-sik Choi as Dae-su Oh in Oldboy (2003; South Korea - Korean)
23. Daniel Auteuil as Georges Laurent in Cache (2005; France - French)
24. Amitabh Bachchan as Debraj Sahai in Black (2005; India - Hindi)
25. Daniel Bruhl as Alex Kerner in Goodbye Lenin! (2003; Germany - German)
26. Russell Crowe as John Nash in A Beautiful Mind (2001; USA - English)
27. Tony Leung Chiu Wai as Chen Wing Yan in Infernal Affairs (2002; Hong Kong - Cantonese)
28. Jamie Foxx as Ray Charles in Ray (2004; USA - English)
29. Sergi Lopez as Harry in Harry Is Here to Help (2000; France - French)
30. Sasson Gabai as Lieutenant-colonel Tawfiq Zacharya in The Band's Visit (2007; Israel - English/Arabic)
31. Leonardo DiCaprio as Howard Hughes in The Aviator (2004; USA - English)
33. Masahiro Motoki as Daigo Kobayashi in Departures (2008; Japan - Japanese)
34. Aamir Khan as Bhuvan in Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India (2001; India - Hindi)
35. Sean Penn as Harvey Milk in Milk (2008; USA - English)
36. Gael Garcia Bernal as Octavio in Amores Perros (2000; Mexico - Spanish)
37. Ken Watanabe as Masayuki Saeki in Memories of Tomorrow (2006; Japan - Japanese)
38. Tom Hanks as Chuck Noland in Cast Away (2000; USA - English)
39. Benicio del Toro as Ernesto 'Che' Guevara in Che (2008; Spain - Spanish/English)
40. Stephen Chow as 'Mighty Steel Leg' Sing in Shaolin Soccer (2001; Hong Kong - Cantonese)
41. Bill Murray as Bob Harris in Lost in Translation (2003; USA - English)
42. Jet Li as General Pang Qingyun in Warlords (2007; Hong Kong/China - Mandarin)
43. Jeff Bridges as Bad Blake in Crazy Heart (2009; USA - English)
44. Ben Kingsley as Don Logan in Sexy Beast (2000; UK - English)
45. Javier Bardem as Reinaldo Arenas in Before Night Falls (2000; USA - English/Spanish)
46. Andy Lau as Inspector Lau Kin Ming in Infernal Affairs (2002; Hong Kong - Cantonese)
47. Heath Ledger as Ennis Del Mar in Brokeback Mountain (2005; Canada/USA - English)
48. Shahrukh Khan as Kabir Khan in Chak De India! (2007; India - Hindi)
49. Silvio Orlando as Bruno Bonomo in Il caimano (2006; Italy - Italian)
50. Denzel Washington as Det. Alonzo Harris in Training Day (2001; USA - English)

working on the next 50.

Why does it need to be seperated? The other lists comprise multiple decades. Not that I disagree...

well that goes back to when I started the movie section and i was too young and half-assed the research and it was easier to combine the older decade lists cause i wasnt as familiar with as many performances. and at that point, it was late 2003 or early 2004 (can't remember exactly) and it made no sense to have a list for the 00s at that point. but at this point, with the decade finished and all of us having a lot more knowledge not only of American film but worldwide, it just makes sense to divide them in my opinion.

who actually has control of this list, by the way? once i left it i lost track of who picked it up.

TWBB at no.1?

"A Serbian film is the best acted and directed film of the decade."

I didn't say that though.

I'm thinking Bardem is too high, and that Del Toro is definately too high.
I was kinda expecting Gantz to be number 2.

fair enough, but i'll give you their credentials and see if it changes your mind a bit. for Del Toro (im assuming you are talking about Traffic, not Che, but i'll do both just in case). Traffic gets underrated because its a foreign language performance in its home country- which is home for a lot of this forum too. but along with Waltz's Landa and Heath's Joker, it was the most dominant "supporting performance" in terms of award recognition in the decade. the thing is, its not a supporting performance. in addition to winning pretty much every award possible in the US for supporting actor, he also won "lead performance" from the Screen Actor's Guild. i treat the SAG award, for a list like this, just as important as the Oscars. the Oscars may be the industry leader, but this is an acting specific list, and all the actors in this country got together and said that performance was the best of the year. the only reason he didn't win best actor at the Oscars was because they stuck him in a supporting category and i'm not gonna hold that against him. for the record, he also won best actor at the Berlin International Film Festival. basically, except for the Satellite awards, the dude was undefeated in terms of possible awards.......... then you have Che, which Sean Penn (who won the award that year) said was the biggest oscar snub he's seen. but the Oscars don't matter in this case, because the Goyas (Spain's equivalent to the Oscars) were smart enough to award him best actor in addition to his Cannes Best Actor award.

in terms of relevance, the major awards here are Oscars/SAG/Globes (US), Cesar/Lumiere (France), Goya/SAU (Spain), Lolas/Bavarian (Germany), Hong Kong Film Awards/Critics Society (Hong Kong), BAFTAs (UK), Academy/Blue Ribbon (Japan), Davids/Critics (Italy), Ariel (Mexico), Filmfare/National (India)... also the Asian and European film awards... and to a lesser extent, the Nikas (Russia) and the major awards (forgetting names here) in Israel, the smaller European countries, AFI (Australia) and Genies (Canada). and of course the accredited film festivals, specifically the biggest ones (Cannes/Venice)

as for Bardem, again i'm not sure which you are talking about, so i'll do all three. The Sea Inside couldn't have better credentials. won both major awards in Spain for best actor (the Goya and the Spanish Actor's Union) in addition to receiving the very rare nomination over here at the Globes (only a handful of foreign language performances get nom'd here). plus the Venice best actor win and, the most telling, a European Film Award for Best Actor over Ganz (probably the best year of competition for that award overall, with Bruhl in the mix as well). you can't really do much better than saying its the best performance in its country, best performance on its continent, and so good that it got nom'd in a country it has nothing to do with. as for No Country, not only did he sweep all the major awards here for supporting actor, but in the process he created what will likely go down as one of the top 5 characters of the decade as well. and for Before Night Falls, its possible its too high. but it did win some major critics awards as well as its Oscar/Globe noms and a Venice best actor award.

then for Ganz. he just didn't dominate the way the others did. DDL couldn't lose an award in the US or UK. Mure swept all the awards in Germany, plus a European Film Award, plus even a BAFTA nomination (once again a performance so good that it got nominated in a foreign country). Leung didn't sweep in Hong Kong, but it has since gone on to be the most talked about role of his career- a career that is basically unmatched in his generation. Bardem beat Ganz out for the European award in addition to sweeping in its country. and Waltz won everything he could in the US and UK plus winning a Cannes best actor. Ganz, although his performance has gained acclaim since its release, failed to win at the German Film Awards plus the German Film Critics Association. he also lost to Bardem as i mentioned. he did win best actor from the London Film Critics Circle though. the international acclaim and the lasting popularity of the performance make it worthy of its spot, but i just cant see it being above the performances above it.

we also have an unusual bias against "supporting" performances for some reason, even though at least three years of the decade a supporting performance has been far and away the best (Del Toro, Ledger, and Waltz). its strange.

I was talking of their highest ranked performances (Traffic and Sea Inside respectively). Not that they shouldn't be on there, or even in the top 10, just that some other performances are more deserving.

Would probably have Capote in top #5, above Waltz... Both amazingly challenging performances, but Seymour Hoffman is just... Seymour Hoffman... Dunno if i can give a rational argument other than "ithink it's better"...

Heath's Joker should probably be somewhere on that list.