Albert Finney

Actors

Albert Finney (May 9, 1936 – February 7, 2019) was an English actor, who maintained a successful career in theatre, film and television. He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and worked in the theatre before attaining prominence on screen in the early 1960s, making his film debut in Tony Richardson’s The Entertainer (1960), with Laurence Olivier, Brenda de Banzie, Roger Livesey, Joan Plowright, and Daniel Massey.

A recipient of BAFTA, Golden Globe, Emmy and Screen Actors Guild awards, Finney was nominated for an Academy Award five times, as Best Actor four times, for Tom Jones (1963), with Susannah York, Hugh Griffith, Edith Evans, Joan Greenwood, Diane Cilento, George Devine, and David Tomlinson; Sidney Lumet’s Murder on the Orient Express (1974), with Lauren Bacall, Ingrid Bergman, Sean Connery, John Gielgud, Vanessa Redgrave, Michael York, Jacqueline Bisset, Anthony Perkins and Wendy Hiller; Peter Yates’s The Dresser (1983), with Tom Courtenay, Zena Walker, Eileen Atkins, Michael Gough, and Edward Fox; and John Huston’s Under the Volcano (1984), with Bisset, Anthony Andrews, and Katy Jurado; and as Best Supporting Actor for Steven Soderbergh’s Erin Brockovich (2000), with Julia Roberts and Aaron Eckhart.

Other films in the 1960s include Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960), with Shirley Anne Field, Rachel Roberts, Hylda Baker, and Norman Rossington; Carl Foreman’s The Victors (1963), with Vincent Edwards, George Hamilton, Melina Mercouri, Jeanne Moreau, George Peppard, Maurice Ronet, Rosanna Schiaffino, Romy Schneider, Elke Sommer, Eli Wallach, and Michael Callan; Night Must Fall (1964), with Mona Washbourne and Susan Hampshire; Stanley Donen’s Two for the Road (1967), with Audrey Hepburn, Eleanor Bron, William Daniels, Claude Dauphin, and Nadia Gray; Charlie Bubbles (1968), with Billie Whitelaw, Liza Minnelli, and Colin Blakely; and The Picasso Summer (1969), with Yvette Mimieux and Luis Miguel Dominguín.

Films in the 1970s include Ronald Neame’s Scrooge (1970), with Alec Guinness, Edith Evans, Kenneth More, Michael Medwin, and Laurence Naismith; Stephen Frears’s Gumshoe (1972), with Whitelaw, Frank Finlay, and Janice Rule; Alpha Beta (1974), with Rachel Roberts; and Ridley Scott’s The Duelists (1977), with Keith Carradine, Harvey Keitel, and Tom Conti.

Films in the 1980s include Loophole (1981), with Martin Sheen, Susannah York, Jonathan Pryce, Colin Blakely, and Tony Doyle; Wolfen (1981), with Diane Venora, Gregory Hines, and Edward James Olmos; Michael Crichton’s Looker (1981), with James Coburn, Susan Dey, Leigh Taylor-Young, and Terri Welles; Alan Parker’s Shoot the Moon (1982), with Diane Keaton, Karen Allen, Peter Weller and Dana Hill; Annie (1982), with Carol Burnett, Ann Reinking, Tim Curry, Bernadette Peters, Geoffrey Holder, Edward Herrmann and Aileen Quinn; and Alan J. Pakula’s Orphans (1987), with Matthew Modine and Kevin Anderson.

Films in the 1990s include Joel & Ethan Coen’s Miller’s Crossing (1990), with Gabriel Byrne, Marcia Gay Harden, John Turturro, Jon Polito, and J.E. Freeman; The Playboys (1992), with Aidan Quinn, Robin Wright, and Milo O’Shea; Bruce Beresford’s Rich in Love (1992), with Jill Clayburgh, Kathryn Erbe, Kyle MacLachlan, Piper Laurie, Ethan Hawke, Suzy Amis, and Alfre Woodard; Mike Figgis’s The Browning Version (1994), with Greta Scacchi and Modine; A Man of No Importance (1994), with Brenda Fricker, Michael Gambon, Tara Fitzgerald, Rufus Sewell, and Patrick Malahide; The Run of the Country (1995), with Matt Keeslar and Victoria Smurfit; Agnieszka Holland’s Washington Square (1997), with Jennifer Jason Leigh, Ben Chaplin, Maggie Smith, and Judith Ivey; Alan Rudolph’s Breakfast of Champions (1999), with Bruce Willis, Nick Nolte, Barbara Hershey, Glenne Headly, Lukas Haas, Omar Epps, Vicki Lewis, Buck Henry, Ken Campbell, and Jake Johannsen; and Simpatico (1999), with Nolte, Jeff Bridges, Sharon Stone, and Catherine Keener.

Films in the 2000s include Traffic (2000), with Don Cheadle, Benicio Del Toro, Michael Douglas, Erika Christensen, Luis Guzmán, Dennis Quaid, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Jacob Vargas, Tomas Milian, Topher Grace, James Brolin, Steven Bauer, and Benjamin Bratt; Nick Castle’s Delivering Milo (2001), with Anton Yelchin, Bridget Fonda, and Campbell Scott; Tim Burton’s Big Fish (2003), with Ewan McGregor, Billy Crudup, Jessica Lange, Helena Bonham Carter, Alison Lohman, Robert Guillaume, Marion Cotillard, Steve Buscemi, and Danny DeVito; and voicing in the animated film Corpse Bride (2005), with Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Emily Watson, Tracey Ullman, Paul Whitehouse, Joanna Lumley, Richard E. Grant, and Christopher Lee.

Later films include A Good Year (2006), with Russell Crowe, Marion Cotillard, Didier Bourdon, Abbie Cornish, Tom Hollander, and Freddie Highmore; Michael Apted’s Amazing Grace (2006), with Ioan Gruffudd, Romola Garai, Ciaran Hinds, Sewell, Youssou N’Dour, Gambon, and Benedict Cumberbatch; Paul Greengrass’s The Bourne Ultimatum (2007), with Matt Damon, Julia Stiles, David Strathairn, Scott Glenn, Paddy Considine, Édgar Ramírez, and Joan Allen; Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (2007), with Philip Seymour Hoffman, Hawke, and Marisa Tomei; Tony Gilroy’s The Bourne Legacy (2012), with Jeremy Renner, Rachel Weisz, Edward Norton, Allen, Stacey Keach, Oscar Isaac, and Glenn; and Sam Mendes’s Skyfall (2012), with Daniel Craig, Javier Bardem, Ralph Fiennes, Naomie Harris, Bérénice Marlohe, Ben Whishaw, and Judi Dench.

Finney received several awards for his performance as Winston Churchill in the BBC–HBO television biographical film The Gathering Storm (2002), with Vanessa Redgrave, Derek Jacobi, Ronnie Barker, Jim Broadbent, Tom Wilkinson, Celia Imrie, Linus Roache and Hugh Bonneville. Other TV movies and miniseries include Pope John Paul II (1984), with Caroline Bliss, Brian Cox, and John Forgeham; The Endless Game (1989), with George Segal, Kristin Scott Thomas, Ian Holm, and John Standing; The Image (1990), with John Mahoney, Kathy Baker, Swoosie Kurtz, Marsha Mason, and Spalding Gray; The Green Man (1990), with Nicky Henson, Josie Lawrence, and Michael Culver; Cold Lazarus (1996), with Frances de la Tour, Ciarán Hinds, and Diane Ladd; and Nostromo (1997), with Claudio Amendola, Paul Brooke, Lothaire Bluteau, Claudia Cardinale, and Colin Firth.

Each review will be linked to the title below.

(*seen originally in theaters)

(**seen rereleased in theaters)

  • The Stoops to Conquer (1956) – directed by Edward Burnham & Dennis Monger – TV movie
  • The Claverdon Road Job (1957) – directed by Peter Dews – TV movie
  • A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1959) – directed by Peter Hall – TV movie
  • The Entertainer (1960) – directed by Tony Richardson
  • Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960) – directed by Karel Reisz
  • Billy Liar (1960) – directed by Lindsay Anderson – TV movie
  • Tom Jones (1963) – directed by Tony Richardson
  • The Victors (1963) – directed by Carl Foreman
  • Night Must Fall (1964) – directed by Karel Reisz – also producer
  • Two for the Road (1967) – directed by Stanley Donen
  • Charlie Bubbles (1968) – also director
  • The Picasso Summer (1969) – directed by Serge Bourguignon & Robert Sallin
  • Scrooge (1970) – directed by Ronald Neame
  • Gumshoe (1971) – directed by Stephen Frears
  • Alpha Beta (1973) – directed by Anthony Page
  • Murder on the Orient Express (1974) – directed by Sidney Lumet
  • Forget-Me-Not-Lane (1975) – directed by Alan Bridges – TV movie
  • The Adventure of Sherlock Holmes’ Smarter Brother (1975) – directed by Gene Wilder – uncredited cameo
  • The Duelists (1977) – directed by Ridley Scott
  • Loophole (1981) – directed by John Quested
  • Wolfen (1981) – directed by Michael Wadleigh
  • Looker (1981) – directed by Michael Crichton
  • Shoot the Moon (1982) – directed by Alan Parker
  • Annie (1982) – directed by John Huston
  • The Dresser (1983) – directed by Peter Yates
  • Pope John Paul II (1984) – directed by Herbert Wise – TV movie
  • Under the Volcano (1984) – directed by John Huston
  • The Biko Inquest (1984) – also co-directed with Graham Evans – TV movie
  • Orphans (1987) – directed by Alan J. Pakula
  • The Endless Game (1989) – directed by Bryan Forbes – miniseries
  • The Image (1990) – directed by Peter Werner – TV movie
  • Miller’s Crossing (1990) – directed by Joel & Ethan Coen
  • The Green Man (1990) – directed by Elijah Moshinsky – miniseries
  • The Playboys (1992) – directed by Gillies MacKinnon
  • Rich in Love (1993) – directed by Bruce Beresford
  • The Browning Version (1994) – directed by Mike Figgis
  • A Man of No Importance (1994) – directed by Suri Krishnamma
  • The Run of the Country (1995) – directed by Peter Yates
  • Karaoke (1996) – directed by Renny Rye – miniseries
  • Cold Lazarus (1996) – directed by Renny Rue – miniseries
  • Nostromo (1997) – directed by Alastair Reid – miniseries
  • Washington Square (1997) – directed by Agnieszka Holland
  • A Rather English Marriage (1998) – directed by Paul Seed – TV movie
  • Breakfast of Champions (1999) – directed by Alan Rudolph
  • Simpatico (1999) – directed by Matthew Warchus
  • Erin Brockovich (2000) – directed by Steven Soderbergh
  • Traffic (2000) – directed by Steven Soderbergh
  • Hemingway, the Hunter of Death (2001) – directed by Sergio Dow
  • Delivering Milo (2001) – directed by Nick Castle
  • The Gathering Storm (2002) – directed by Richard Loncraine – TV movie
  • Big Fish (2003)* – directed by Tim Burton
  • Ocean’s Twelve (2004) – directed by Steven Soderbergh – uncredited cameo
  • Corpse Bride (2005)* – directed by Mike Johnson & Tim Burton
  • Aspects of Love (2005) – directed by Gale Edwards – filmed play
  • A Good Year (2006) – directed by Ridley Scott
  • Amazing Grace (2006) – directed by Michael Apted
  • The Bourne Ultimatum (2007) – directed by Paul Greengrass
  • Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (2007) – directed by Sidney Lumet
  • The Bourne Legacy (2012) – directed by Tony Gilroy
  • Skyfall (2012) – directed by Sam Mendes