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Before The Devil Knows You're Dead (2007)
Hoffman's drug-abusing businessman who plots to rob his own parents' jewelry store is a masterclass in onscreen desperation - as the plan spirals out of control, so does Hoffman's Andy Hanson.
Devil was Sidney Lumet's final film, Hoffman makes it one of his best.
Magnolia (1999)
Until Magnolia , Hoffman had spent most of his career playing bullies, schemers and outcasts. When his long-time collaborator Paul Thomas Anderson cast him at / as the heart of his sprawling epic, it was a turning point for his career.
Says Paul Thomas Anderson: "I wrote the character of the saintly nurse Phil Parma in Magnolia for Phil. Phil is that good - he’s committed to art and not in a phony, grandstanding way. He really wants to live a life in the arts that means something.”
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2013)
Possibly playing on Hoffman's potential to be typecast as a blockbuster villain (following Mission Impossible 3 and the general trend for thespians who move into the multiplex), his casting as Plutarch Heavensbee was a stroke of genius.
It might seem strange to include this one on a list of such cinematic greats, but then again, every Hoffman performance was memorable - as a representation of his ability to shine in the mainstream as much as indie roles, this performance is just as essential as everything else here.
Synecdoche, New York (2008)
Not many actors can pull off a portrayal of a lifetime played out onscreen, but we follow Hoffman's Caden Cotard from his 30s, through to old age, and his eventual death with fascination.
He is our guide through an infinitely complex story, which explores philosophical, psychological and postmodern concepts via a meta-referential plot about a theatre director whose commitment to realism leads to some pretty extreme surrealism.
Capote (2005)
Hoffman was nominated for four Oscars - three for Best Supporting Actor and once for Best Actor - winning the latter for this incredible performance as the writer Truman Capote.
He dedicated his Oscar win to his mother, with these moving words. "She's here tonight; I'd like you if you see her to congratulate her," he said.
"She brought up four kids alone, and she deserves congratulations for that. … She took me to my first play and she stayed up with me and watched the NCAA Final Four. Her passions became my passions.
Be proud, mom, because I'm proud of you. We're here tonight. It's so good."
Boogie Nights (1997)
Watching Hoffman in Boogie Nights is an uncomfortable experience. Everything, from his too-tight t-shirts, to his hunched posture to his needy giggle is designed to make you squirm in your seat.
It's that love (demonstrated mainly through glimpses and glances) that allows us to feel sympathy for what could potentially be a pretty creepy character.
It's a background performance that comes to the foreground with every viewing of the film.
The Master (2012)
Another Oscar-nomination came for Hoffman's fifth (and sadly, final) collaboration with Paul Thomas Anderson, and it's arguably the best of the bunch.
Featuring at least two scenes - the processing scene, the end sequence - that are amongst the best of his career, if you haven't caught The Master yet, take it to the top of your list.
Charlie Wilson's War (2007)
It might be called Charlie Wilson's War , but this is Philip Seymour Hoffman's film. He steals it from under the feet of the titular Tom Hanks, with his foul-mouthed CIA agent being the most memorable element of the film.
His director, Mike Nichols, said of Hoffman: "Last year, he did three films - The Savages, Charlie Wilson’s War and Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead - and in each one he was a distinct and entirely different human. It’s that humanity that is so striking - when you watch Phil work, his entire constitution seems to change. He may look like Phil, but there’s something different in his eyes. And that means he’s reconstituted himself from within, willfully rearranging his molecules to become another human being.”
