Philip Seymour Hoffman had that rarest ability an actor can possess: His presence in a film guaranteed that there was something worth seeing in it. He was unforgettable in virtually every performance he ever gave, as astonishing in the little-known film Owning Mahoney playing a Canadian bank teller with a gambling addiction as he was with a small part in The Big Lebowski. He gave the best performance of 2012, in my opinion, when he starred as the founder of Scientology, more or less, in The Master. For journalists, he achieved a weird kind of perfect doubleness, managing to become the polar opposites, Lester Bangs of Creem magazine and Truman Capote of The New Yorker, both with complete conviction. He did one of the most menacing thugs you'll ever find in Punch-Drunk Love. He did the perfect sadsack in Synecdoche, New York. All in all, he was perfect in whatever role he played, the ideal character actor.
But the first movie he stole was Boogie Nights. And even in the tiny role of Scotty in that film, everybody could already see the total mastery he would later demonstrate in every movie he ever graced. The scene that stands out most clearly is the one where he tries to kiss Dirk. Every piece of characterization in the whole film has been leading up to this scene, which nonetheless comes as a complete surprise. He encapsulates the creepiness of the hanger-on wannabe perfectly: first funny, then shocking, then offputting, then upsetting, then heartbreaking. It was as full a range of human emotion that you can find in a single scene, a portrait of the variety of humanity.
There is always another leading man just around the corner, but I honestly don't know who could possibly replace Philip Seymour Hoffman now that he's dead. Who else could do this?
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