Joaquin Phoenix's Most Memorable Roles Through the Years
Joaquin Phoenix is no stranger to the spotlight! The Joker star, 45, got his start in television alongside his late brother, River Phoenix, and sister Summer Phoenix, and quickly rose through the ranks to become one of the most recognized names in Hollywood.
Joaquin took a brief hiatus from acting following River’s infamous overdose in October 1993, just days after Joaquin’s 19th birthday. Two years later, Joaquin returned to the industry and starred with Nicole Kidman in the chilling horror flick To Die For. As he slowly continued to reemerge from his acting break, he found a niche playing conflicted, dark characters who battled their own inner demons.
To Die For was a box office hit, but 2000’s Gladiator was the moment that returned Joaquin to mainstream success. The film won the Academy Award for Best Picture that year, and Joaquin was nominated for a Golden Globe, a BAFTA and a Screen Actors Guild Award. He also received his first-ever Oscar nomination, making him and River the first pair of brothers to be Oscar nominees.
After a few more horror-inspired films, Joaquin lent his voice to Disney’s Brother Bear, which earned a nomination for Best Animated Feature at the 2004 Oscars.
His most chilling and astounding role to date, however, is surely his turn as The Joker in Todd Phillips’ critically acclaimed DC comic villain origin story. The film scored a total of 11 nominations for the 2020 Oscars, and Joaquin has already received a BAFTA, a Critics’ Choice Award, a Golden Globe and a SAG Award for his performance.
Scroll down to revisit more of Joaquin Phoenix’s most memorable roles.
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Joaquin starred alongside Nicole Kidman in this gripping drama directed by Gus Van Sant. The New York Times’ Janet Maslin said the “raw [and] anguished” performance made “him an actor to watch for.”
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This adventure drama followed three friends vacationing in Malaysia, one of whom (Phoenix) is later arrested on charges of drug possession. The other men, played by Vince Vaughn and David Conrad, are left to decide whether they return to Malaysia to share his sentence or leave him there to die.
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The Ridley Scott film showed off Joaquin’s star power. He played a fictionalized version of Roman Emperor Commodus in the historical drama, a character critics claimed he gave a “deliciously creepy perversity.”
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Joaquin starred with Mel Gibson in M. Night Shyamalan's science fiction thriller as a retired baseball professional who discovers that the planet has been invaded by aliens.
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Nominated for Best Animated Feature at the 2004 Oscars, the Disney film tells the touching story of an Inuit boy who seeks revenge on the bear that killed his older brother. Joaquin was later replaced by Patrick Dempsey for the movie’s sequel in 2006.
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Teaming up with Shyamalan once again, Joaquin played an Amish farmer whose community lives in fear of dark creatures in the woods. Bryce Dallas Howard, Adrien Brody and Sigourney Weaver also star in the haunting film.
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Joaquin played a photographer who falls witness to the Rwandan genocide in this critically acclaimed film. “It's a weighty message movie, but it's a message worth delivering — and the cast's delivery is flawless,” one review said at the time.
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His portrayal of country music legend Johnny Cash earned him a Golden Globe in 2006 after the singer himself approved of the casting choice. Joaquin also scored a Grammy Award for Best Compilation Soundtrack for learning to perform all of Cash’s greatest hits in the movie on his own.
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Though the film was widely panned, Joaquin still made an impression with his role as a disgruntled father who’s willing to stop at nothing to find out who killed his son in a hit-and-run accident.
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After a few critical misses, Joaquin made an exceptional comeback in Spike Jonze’s Her as a man who falls in love with an Alexa-like computer system (voiced by Scarlett Johansson). “It's hard to imagine someone more affecting than Phoenix in the role," one critic wrote at the time.
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Based on a Thomas Pynchon book, this comedy-drama crime story scored Joaquin his fifth Golden Globe nomination.
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In what many believed was his strongest role to date, Joaquin played a former FBI agent and Gulf War veteran suffering from PTSD in the Amazon Studios thriller.
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Starring alongside his partner, Rooney Mara, Joaquin took on the role of Jesus in this lukewarm biblical drama.
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His disturbing performance in the DC comic villan’s origin story has received rave reviews since its October 2019 release. Joaquin has scored a BAFTA, a Critics' Choice Award, a Golden Globe and a SAG Award for the role, and the film garnered 11 nominations for the 2020 Oscars.
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