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Originally Posted by buffetfroid
And don't forget, released by Criterion, The Devil and Daniel Webster!
Haven't seen anyone mention noir regular Elisha Cook Jr.
A more recent favorite of mine is J.T. Walsh.
Also, Walter Brennan. Does he count as a character actor?
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JT Walsh was great. I remember he died very suddenly and pretty young of a heart attack. I was a kid who was obsessed with movies when Walsh died and I had just seen him in "Breakdown". How about another Walsh, M. Emmet? M. Emmet Walsh is great at playing dirtbags. Ned Beatty has to be in the discussion for best modern character actors as well. The speech he gives in "Network" is brilliantly done. Charles Durning also has to be at the top of the list.
Interestingly, the movies in the 80s and 90s that had a lot of great character actors were action movies. You had a fairly wooden lead like Arnie, Stallone, Lundgren, Van Damme, Seagal surrounded by a lot of great character actors. Guys William Forsythe, Henry Silva, Powers Boothe, Lance Henriksen, Keith David, Gary Busey, William Sadler, etc.. Powers Boothe is probably one of my favorite modern character actors. He's incredible in films like "Southern Comfort", "Extreme Prejudice" and "Tombstone".