Kevin Spacey was recently awarded at the Taormina Film Festival, with a recognition of his long and incredible career. The last seven years have been at least turbulent and difficult for the late Keyer Soze, one of the most iconic, multifaceted and memorable interpreters of our time, capable of making an impression with some simply legendary acting performances, which have become common heritage. The trials and accusations for sexual harassment have seen him increasingly excluded from the big and small screen, with enormous repercussions on a personal and economic level. Today that he turns 65, it is however right to look at his artistic path, with a Top 5 dedicated to his most important and significant cinematic performances, those thanks to which he has become one of the most famous faces to the general public.

The Usual Suspects (1995)

Its metamorphic capacity probably reached its peak in The Usual Suspectsperhaps the best crime thriller of the 90s, a gem by Bryan Singer, written by Christopher McQuarrie. The protagonists, in addition to Kevin Spacey in the role of small-time crook Roger “Verbal” Kint, are a group of die-hard criminals made up of Dean Keaton (Gabriel Byrne), Todd Hockney (Kevin Pollak), Michael McManus (Stephen Baldwin) and Fenster (Benicio del Toro). Having ended up in the police’s sights as suspects in a gun truck robbery, they are forced to band together when the mysterious and very powerful boss Keyser Soze forces them to carry out a robbery on board a ship. The outcome will be tragic and detective David Kujan (Chazz Palmintieri), while grilling Kint, will realize that nothing is as it seems between lies, red herrings, false truths and much more. The truth? The terrible Keyser Soze is Kint himself, capable of lying, deceiving, playing the part of a small fry to perfection, but in reality a ruthless, manipulative, terrifying criminal mastermind who in the end will get away with it at the best moment. The Usual Suspects definitely launched Kevin Spacey’s career, winning him the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. It remains one of the most iconic acting performances of the 90s, in an absolute cult that made history, where Spacey demonstrated an adaptability and a unique ability to interpret every possible emotion.

Se7en (1995)

In 1995, Kevin Spacey became one of the most iconic villains in the history of cinema thanks to Se7endirected by David Fincher, another thriller masterpiece that sees Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt in the roles of William Somerset and David Mills respectively. They are two detectives who are investigating the brutal deaths committed by a serial killer, who they will eventually discover is called John Doe. It will be the beginning of a hunt for the murderer of incredible refinement and complexity, a gloomy labyrinth made of death, religious symbols, traps and dead ends, in which the ending remains one of the most extraordinary, shocking and upsetting that the history of cinema has given us. If Se7en still today it is considered one of the greatest thrillers of all time, this is also thanks to Kevin Spacey, who in a few minutes in the role of the killer, manages to materialize before our eyes the very essence of evil, of madness, in its supreme and most threatening form. Andrew Kevin Walker’s screenplay still takes your breath away for its ability to give charm and incredible suspense to the whole, but without Kevin Spacey, the film would never have been the same. He, lugubrious, pale, with that barely visible Mona Lisa smile, has remained engraved in the memory of viewers as one of the most terrifying villains ever seen.

American Beauty (1999

Kevin Spacey finally takes on the Oscar for Best Actor thanks to American Beauty by Sam Mendes, without a doubt one of the most iconic films of the last decades, by far one of the titles that have most changed the very identity of American cinema, capable of defining an era and at the same time marking its end. Lester Burnham, a forty-year-old who is now perpetually depressed, dull, with a failed marriage, a daughter who hardly speaks to him and a career that has now stalled, discovers within himself a determination and a desire to live that he was unaware of. In the grip of a sort of all-encompassing desire for revenge, which spares no one, he sets out on a journey that will involve a vast and varied humanity that surrounds his home, his loved ones, in the middle of that respectable, bourgeois and hypocritical neighborhood. American Beauty allows Kevin Spacey to tie himself into a character that as the film progresses, becomes more and more cynical, desperate but certainly determined not to flatten himself anymore in that homologation, which is the true, great theme of Sam Mendes’ film, a small jewel of writing and harmony. Without a shadow of a doubt his most memorable performance, from a cinematographic point of view the peak of his career, with a character that is still incredibly current today in telling us how difficult it is to be different from the norm.

LA Confidential (1997)

Curtis Hanson was called to direct in 1997 LA Confidentialbased on the novel by the great James Ellroy. Set in the fierce and amoral Los Angeles of the early 50s, it sees Kevin Spacey in the role of the disillusioned Detective Jack Vinceness, who together with Bud White (Russell Crowe) and Ed Exley (Guy Pearce), tries to discover the truth about a massacre that took place at a diner, but behind which they sense there is something more than mere urban violence. THE Confidential is one of the greatest noir of all time, in which the theme of hypocrisy, violence in American society and the lack of true justice, have in the character of Jake Vincennes a symbol as coherent as it is fascinating for his nature at the same time cynical and optimistic. If Russell Crowe and Guy Pearce recall the theme of virile friendship and justice, Kevin Spacey instead, elegant, charming, eloquent and apparently self-confident, manages to become the symbol of a sensational mix of light and shadow, of a desire for revenge and resurrection, but also a great humanity. Spacey was able to render in a few words the very essence of that powerful narrative that thanks to James Ellroy, has revolutionized the description of an era and its protagonists.

Margin Call (2011)

Signed by JC Chandor, Margin Call And a criminally underrated masterpiece of writing and direction, but above all the most important film ever made about the economic crisis of 2008, the one that turned Western civilization upside down and completely changed our life parameters. Kevin Spacey, surrounded by a cast that includes Stanley Tucci, Jeremy Irons, Demi Moore, Zachary Quinto, Paul Bettany and Simon Baker, leads us into those fateful hours before the financial crash, in a bank whose name we are never told, but which represents all those who for better or worse in those hours destroyed the lives of millions of people to save themselves, without any restraint or second thoughts. To this day, his performance as Sam Rogers remains incredible for the ability to make him the symbol of a failure that is also generational, social, cultural, not simply personal or existential. Margin Call he sees him furious yet resigned, indignant but already defeated from the start, but not devoid of humanity, scruples, in fact he is the last to give in to the monster for which he worked. Perhaps the most underrated film of his career, but also the one where he demonstrated that despite the passing of time, he knew how to put himself in the shoes of a character every time, giving him credibility, unpredictability and the unique ability to be the bearer of important themes.