Ryan Gosling: Top 5 movie roles - video

Published Sep 22 2011, 16:40 BST  |  By Ben Lee and Mayer Nissim

Having already seen Crazy, Stupid, Love and Drive launched in the US earlier this year, the affable Ryan Gosling will be dominating UK cinemas this week when both movies are released tomorrow.

To mark Gosling's rising career, Digital Spy takes an in-video look at the actor's best film roles to date.

Danny Balint in The Believer (2001)
Ed Norton may have picked up a 'Best Actor' Oscar nod for his white supremacist in American History X a few years earlier, but Gosling's turn as an orthodox Jew-turned-neo-Nazi here betters it. Gosling dominates a film that fearlessly takes on matters of life, death, faith, love and hate - a film that throws up questions and isn't afraid to leave the most difficult unanswered.



Noah in The Notebook (2004)
Adapted from Nicholas Sparks's first novel, The Notebook is the weepie to end all weepies. Gosling plays the young Noah who embarks on a relationship with Allie (Rachel McAdams) in a story narrated in a nursing home. It's the oldsters that really get the tears flowing, but you only buy into it because of what came before. It also spawned the best awards acceptance we've ever seen.



Dan Dunne in Half Nelson (2006)
The accolades, and a well-deserved Academy Awards nomination, rolled in for Gosling's performance as an idealistic-but-coke-addled teacher in Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden's breakthrough film. Ryan proved himself to be one of the rare few who can actually convince in that tricky inner-city teacher doin' it for the kids role.



Lars Lindstrom in Lars and the Real Girl (2007)
In what many would perceive to be a risky role, Gosling is pitch-perfect as the awkward and socially inept Lars, who buys a sex doll and begins a relationship with her as if Bianca were real. Gosling's genuine and sympathetic turn is rewarded with an almightily touching payoff when the community eventually bands together to accept Bianca as one of their own.



Dean in Blue Valentine (2010)
Gosling and Michelle Williams drew plenty of plaudits for their heartbreaking and draining portrayal of a couple whose marriage is deteriorating. Just when you wonder how the seemingly incompatible pair got together in the first place, scenes of the bleak present are juxtaposed with flashbacks showing the birth of their relationship and the actors' adorable chemistry. Those moments are pure bliss.



Which Ryan Gosling film roles should have made the list? Leave your comments below!