Best of '15: Hunkalicious Screen Beauty
Wednesday, December 23, 2015 at 8:00PM Our Year in Review party continues! Cue mood music.
Since The Film Experience obsessives over actresses almost daily, the actors could use a little spotlight from time to time. So this entry into our year in review party is a beauty break starring the year's best man candy in cinema ...with a little TV thrown in for extra flavor.
15 A superhero... but which one?
Any of The Avengers will do but if actors are going to be expected to be on special diets and grueling workout routines daily for those spandex ready bodies, you'd think Marvel would let them go shirtless for more than 10 seconds each movie. Chris Evans is still the most delicious among them but we'll give this round to Paul Rudd for the sleeker non-steroidal fitness regimen (which we hope becomes more the norm because Henry Cavill's Superman body is so cartoon weird; it's like a giant chest and shoulders with random stick appendages and face).
Runner up goes to Chris Hemsworth When Wet: in that silly pool of visions in Age of Ultron; shipwrecked and starving but still somehow maintaining the workouts in In the Heart of the Sea; or even just those carefully wet stray Blackhat bangs
Fourteen more people or categories after the jump. But fair warning... it's slightly nsfw. So it's a good thing you're on Christmas break. In the immortal words of Tina Belcher...
14 [Tie] Great Body / Terrible Personality
Karl Gusman in Love and Jamie Dornan in 50 Shades of Grey have instant drool outsides but beauty proves skin deep. Inside one's a whiny ignorant American narcissist who continually mistreats his women and the other is a control freak with as yet untold ISSUES, all caps intended. Who wants to sign contracts before sex? Papercuts are lousy foreplay.
You'd touch his butt, too.
13 Alexander Skarsgård in The Diary of a Teenage Girl
Because if anyone can get away with playing a man who sleeps with his girlfriend's underage daughter and not make you instantly loathe him, but stay engaged in the intra-family drama it's him. (Bonus points for those Tarzan stills.)
12 Chris Pratt in Jurassic World
Bless Pratt for not losing the funny when he found the body. And for providing such charm to the otherwise charmless 'passable karaoke version' of Jurassic Park. Bless costume designer Daniel Orlandi for putting him in those tight stretchy pants.
11 Jude Law in Spy
Still got it. Especially in a tux.
10 Special Prize in Naked Coupling
Wagner Moura & Clements Schick in Futuro Beach. Fine performances. Fine chemistry. Fiiiine.
09 Daniel Wu in Into the Badlands
The acting may be a little wooden but in the end there's still wood. (Are any of you watching this show? It's kinda bad but the Wu keeps me watching)
Tab & Tony Perkins, lovers on a double date
08 Tab Hunter in Tab Hunter: Confidential
2015 was a fine year for documentaries about screen stars with high profile titles about Ingrid Bergman and Marlon Brando leading the pack. But how about this loving entertaining expose of 50s teen heartthrob and box office draw Tab Hunter and his secret gay life? The film came from prolific documentarian Jeffrey Schwartz (I Am Divine, Vito) and he made great use of movie, tv, game show, and Oscar clips with Tab's All American blonde beauty and blazing white smile front and center.
07 [Tie] Dream Boyfriends
Sam Elliott for sweeping Blythe Danner off her feet and back on the bicycle in I'll See You In My Dreams. And Emory Cohen's huge heart in Brooklyn of course. dat accent. dem lips doe
06 Michael B Jordan in Creed
It's not the muscles but the sensitivity. Okay okay the sensitivity encased in the muscles. Seriously Michael B Jordan is such a strong actor and has been since way back in the Friday Night Lights days. Oscar nomination please. Now would be a great time since he's better than the expected nominees.
05 [Tie] Be Erotically Intoxicating! Your Plot Depends On It
Louis Garrell has to be carnal enough to send Saint Laurent's life unravelling and James Marsden has to wreck everyone with his irrestibility while also being a touch gone to seed in The D Train. They both succeed and how.
04 The Countess's Men in American Horror Story: Hotel
People complained that the men circling our pop diva turned actress/vampire looked alike without quite realizing that that was the point. Eventually Hotel spelled it out for the viewers but why complain with so much dark haired, pale, cheeks-for-days masculine beauty via Cheyenne Jackson, Matt Bomer, Finn Wittrock, and Wes Bentley none of whom anyone would ever kick out of bed unless they were sensible enough to notice the bloodstains, daggers, and dead bodies around them. And even then...
P.S. Despite it's visual pleasures Hotel is the weakest and dullest season ever of this show that may have now outstayed its welcome.
03 Joe Manganiello in Magic Mike XXL
For stepping it up comically with a freshly pumped role in the sequel. For actually showing it off in the surprisingly modest sequel. For giving it to the very interested and rarely better Andie MacDowell and above all that ace convenience store scene.
02 Oscar Isaac in Ex Machina
What a performance. And what, um, cleavage. And how brilliant to exude so much carnality in scenes that don't ask for it, to keep his prey/guinea pig (that'd be Domnhall Gleeson) continually off balance and under equipped for the mind games to come. Bonus points for that maverick charm as the galaxy's "most daring pilot" in Star Wars: The Force Awakens but we wish he were in more of the movie.
01 Matthias Schoenaerts in... well... everything
People's Sexiest Men Alive, whoever they've been recently (we don't track it) got nothing on the Belgian Brando. One of the hardest working men in showbiz had lead romantic roles in Far From the Madding Crowd and A Little Chaos. In either of the films you could have practically ripped him from any still and placed him on a romance novel cover for instant bestseller action. His suave art dealer gifted The Danish Girl with extramarital sexual heat. And that wasn't even all. He just kept giving it to us. He also remade one of his Belgian hits (The Loft) for America and headlined the festival hit bodyguard thriller Disorder co-starring Diane Kruger to great effect.
More Year in Review
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Reader Comments (31)
We all know how I feel about #2, but damn if my heart doesn't skip a beat every damn time.
Aside from Eternal Sex God Oscar Isaac, my hunk of the year is Billy Eichner! Let's get some love for the less butch guys!
I am unwell today and this is EXACTLY what I needed. Thank you. Bless. (FYC for next year, John Krasinski in that awful-looking Michael Bay movie that comes out in January).
My goodness what delicious post!
But AHS: Hotel is weaker than Freakshow? Granted I checked out of Hotel weeks ago, but lord what a slog Freakshow was.
That Schoenaerts photo (or whatever is) isn't displaying in my browser. The humanity! The horror!
Agreed on Matthias being #1, just because he was so swoonworthy in Far From the Madding Crowd.
Disagreed on AHS: Hotel, which I am not watching but which can't be as bad as Freakshow, because nothing can bet that bad. I want those hours back.
Kind of shocked that Ulliel isn't on here. I mean Garrell is Garrell, naturally, but the whole film was about watching Ulliel - and at times, every bit of him.
And Marsden in The D Train - oh my. Wish the film had been better. He was something else in it.
Michael B. Jordan should clearly be number one (also he has been great since "The Wire" which predated "Friday Night Lights") and I'd pick Chris Pratt to place. Also I'd put in a special mention for John Boyega who is so damn cute in "Star Wars"
And there might be something wrong with me, but I'm more into Domhnall Gleeson than Oscar Isaac in "Ex Machina." Am I the only who would take the nerdy ginger waif over the hunky, swarthy livewire?
I will take care of Henry Cavill's "Superman body' if you're not interested. And I'll take a side of beefy Joe Mantagnelloooohmy to go too.
BTW, Tab Hunter's autobiography is dishy fun, telling tales of growing up beautiful and gay in California. Recommended.
Am I the only who would take the nerdy ginger waif over the hunky, swarthy livewire?
No JJsDiner, you are not.
Glenn -- i am happy to provide
Chris -- i actually prefer less butch guys but they aren't held up sexually in movies very much
Derrick & Kacey B -- you will soon discover how boring Hotel is if you ever actually watch it (which I don't really recommend)
Paul -- fixed
JJs -- i never saw the Wire. i know i know
forever1267 -- it's all yours. definitely not for me.
rebecca -- i would normally be way more into the nerdy ginger waif, trust. but OSCAR ISAAC.
I'd add Richard Madden in Cinderella.
Very nice. Is Wes Bentley the one Lady GaGa is having an affair with?
Oh yes, Richard Madden in his tights in CINDERELLA.
But American Horror Story was never any good?! It had moments, but it has always been a mess (and I hate it for holding a place in the miniseries categories in awards when it's not a miniseries).
Nat: Thank you! ::slurp::
JJsDiner & Nat: Michael B. Jordan was great on All My Children even before The Wire
;-)
Bulge of the year: Richard Madden
Every member of the Kings of Tampa!
No on Michael B. Jordan, just seems off for me.
I think Mark Ruffalo is still a hunk though he didn't disrobe in anything this year. Or did he?
Despite it's visual pleasures Hotel is the weakest and dullest season ever of this show that may have now outstayed its welcome.
Liiiiiiiiieeeeeeeessssss. Denis O'Hare as Liz Taylor elevates this season way beyond Coven and Freakshow.
You should do a Bollywood hunks one...just cause.
What about the dudes from Ryan Murphy's other (kinda terrible) show, Scream Queens?
But yep, you're spot on with #1 and #2.
Oh yeah, Oscar Issacs in ExMachina - so supercalifragilistically hot. But the Jude Law thing? I've never gotten his supposed sex appeal (though he's a fine actor- he's still fantastic in Talented Mr. Ripley).
Never found Joe Mangiello all that attractive: he's too built up. Anyone spending that much time at the gym/taking that many steroids just ain't sexy to me.
Also: AHS: Hotel is leaps and bounds better than the flaming disaster-pile that Freakshow was. But AHS def needs to wrap up soon, glad to hear next season will be its last.
Matthias S. is a beaut, agreeance.
"I'd add Richard Madden in Cinderella."
Me too. He looked great in those white tights.
Matthias Schoenaerts was gorgeous in Far From the Madding Crowd. It's too bad that he still hasn't gotten his big break out role yet.
+1 for # 1 Matthias Schoenaerts (SWOON)
I kinda thought the Dad in inside out was hot. Those big brown eyes, stubble & moustache, cute monkey impression.... I know he's animated but... Haha. Great post Nat, thanks! So many hunks :) I like them all.
Scrap what I said before and sub in the men of Sens8. What a mess of a show. A beautiful, oft-naked, homoerotic hot mess of a show.
Mr Pratt on the that motorcycle is the stuff movie dreams are made of....
Co-sign on Billy Eichner! Quite sexy in a Liev Schreiber sort of way. But Oscar Isaac rules the roost. That dance scene alone elevated him enormously in my mind. And the less said about the cipher in Fifty Shades of Grey, the better.
I have to admit, I just watched Kingsman and would definitely have Taron Egerton high on this list.
Rewatched parts of A Most Violent Year in that, and Oscar Isaac has never looked more beautiful than he has there. (Jessica Chastain, too, for that matter.) After seeing TFA, I'd like nothing more than Oscar and Adam Driver going back to their indie roots and doing a tiny, dialogue-only, action-free movie together where they just are beautifully morose and simmering the entire time.
What an amazing compilation! Especially happy to see Louis Garrell here – he’s my love. Joe Manganiello is great as well!
Lena - have you ever seen HEARTBEATS? his cameo at the end is so choice.