14 Underrated Daniel Craig Films That Deserve Your Consideration

For a lot of, Daniel Craig arrived absolutely shaped in a tuxedo, brooding within the shadows of On line casino Royale like a superbly broken weapon. However Craig’s magnetism—angular, haunted, quietly queer-coded lengthy earlier than Queer (2024)—has been growing because the Eighties, the place he honed his edges in British theater and a string of unsung movie performances. His enchantment has all the time been break up between severity and softness, the charisma of somebody who by no means fairly appears comfy within the highlight however is electrifying in its glare. Earlier than he turned Bond, Craig performed dreamers, drifters, psychopaths, and romantics—roles that requested for extra vulnerability than violence.

There’s one thing thrilling about watching an actor earlier than the mythology hardens round them. This record isn’t only a assortment of Craig’s lesser-known work; it’s a shadow biography instructed via character research and profession pivots. These are the movies the place you see his vary open up like a fracture, the place he stretches towards one thing fragile, unknowable, or utterly unhinged. In a world of rigorously managed film stars, Daniel Craig stays somebody who has all the time appeared just a little harmful—not as a result of he’s holding a gun, however as a result of he may really be feeling one thing.

14

‘The Mom’ (2003)

The Mom

Launch Date

November 14, 2003

Runtime

112 minutes

Director

Roger Michell

Writers

Hanif Kureishi

Producers

Angus Finney, David M. Thompson, Kevin Loader, Stephen Evans

Daniel Craig’s efficiency in The Mom is the type of factor that will get memory-holed as soon as a franchise hardens your jawline into IP. In Roger Michell’s uncooked and unsettling home drama, Craig performs Darren, a working-class handyman who begins an affair with the mom of his much-younger girlfriend—a premise that feels prefer it must be lurid, however as an alternative unfolds with aching restraint. Anne Reid is astonishing within the title function, and Craig matches her with a efficiency filled with pressure, intercourse, and self-hatred. Earlier than Bond, Craig was already taking part in males torn aside by want and sophistication guilt.

The Age Hole, Reversed

What’s outstanding about The Mom is how delicately it treats its characters’ loneliness with out excusing their betrayals. Craig’s Darren is fragile, charismatic, and clearly scared of his personal gentleness—the type of man who’s solely delicate in moments he can’t management. There’s a scene the place he confesses he’s petrified of himself, and also you consider him. That confession, delivered with out melodrama, reveals the early bones of Craig’s capability to complicate masculinity: a person who doesn’t communicate a lot, however feels far an excessive amount of.

13

‘Love and Rage’ (1998)

This little-seen Irish interval drama pairs Craig with Greta Scacchi in a narrative of doomed love that begins as a pastoral romance and curdles slowly into psychological horror. Craig performs James Lynchehaun, a real-life determine whose obsessive relationship along with his employer escalates into brutality. It’s a task that’s onerous to think about one other actor making an attempt with out leaning too far into both attraction or monstrosity—however Craig performs the entire spectrum, switching between tenderness and rage with terrifying ease.

Colonial Need and Management

Love and Rage is not only a love story gone improper—it’s a portrait of colonial masculinity unraveling. The movie’s temper is damp and bitter, and Craig suits into it like he was born in that grey gentle. He’s magnetic even when he’s repulsive, displaying early indicators of his expertise for making audiences complicit of their want for harmful males. It’s one of many first movies the place you get the sense Craig is pulling one thing out of the soil—rage, lust, cruelty—and providing it to the digital camera with out apology.

12

‘Enduring Love’ (2004)

Enduring Love

Launch Date

November 26, 2004

Runtime

100 minutes

Director

Roger Michell

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In Enduring Love, Craig performs a person shaken by a freak tragedy—witnessing a person fall to his dying throughout a hot-air balloon accident—after which stalked by one other witness, performed by Rhys Ifans, in a psychological spiral that drifts between grief, guilt, and obsession. The movie, primarily based on Ian McEwan’s novel, begins with probably the most quietly terrifying sequences in British cinema and solely tightens from there. It’s a narrative about randomness, about how one second can puncture the phantasm of security, and Craig carries that trauma like a person slowly being hollowed out.

Concern With no Masks

What’s so compelling right here is how unadorned Craig permits himself to be. This isn’t action-hero ache; it’s existential fragility. His character, Joe, is a rationalist, a lecturer, somebody who thinks the world may be solved via logic—and watching that crumble feels eerily prescient of the sorts of male unravellings we now see in every single place onscreen. Craig offers Joe’s terror a physicality: he winces, he shuts down, he refuses consolation. It’s a haunted efficiency, and a reminder that even earlier than Bond, Craig specialised in males who crumble gracefully.

11

‘Some Voices’ (2000)

Some Voices

Launch Date

August 25, 2000

Runtime

101 minutes

Director

Simon Cellan Jones

Set in a pre-gentrified West London that also feels bruised from Thatcherism, Some Voices is a small, luminous movie that lets Craig do what he’s hardly ever allowed to in blockbuster mode: disappear into somebody who may by no means be okay once more. He performs Ray, a schizophrenic man lately launched from a psychiatric hospital, attempting to reconnect with the world—and along with his brother, performed by David Morrissey. The movie floats between moments of light humor and quiet despair, lit with a dreamy palette that mirrors Ray’s unpredictable interiority. It’s a romance, too—Ray falls for a girl named Laura—but it surely by no means lets the viewer consider love will treatment him.

Softness on the Fringe of Collapse

What makes Craig extraordinary right here is his restraint. Ray isn’t manic or tragic within the normal ways in which movies so usually painting psychological sickness; he’s simply attempting. And Craig offers him this hovering lightness, like his thoughts may float off mid-sentence. There are scenes the place his physique turns into language—shuffling, twitching, folding in—and others the place he’s nonetheless, watching the world with a type of cautious awe. That is Craig at his most susceptible, unprotected by narrative logic or masculine armor, giving a efficiency that lingers as a result of it by no means insists on being profound.

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10

‘Flashbacks of a Idiot’ (2008)

Flashbacks of a Idiot

Launch Date

June 5, 2008

Runtime

110

Director

Baillie Walsh

Writers

Baillie Walsh

This movie appears like somebody tried to write down a dream about being Daniel Craig—fame, remorse, buried adolescence—however made it bizarre and elliptical and unhappy sufficient to work. Craig performs Joe Scott, a washed-up Hollywood actor spiraling into substance abuse and self-loathing, whose return to his English seaside hometown reveals outdated wounds and an unfinished love story. The narrative unfolds like a hangover: hazy, fragmentary, by some means too loud and too quiet without delay. It didn’t land with critics, however that will have been the purpose—this isn’t a comeback movie, it’s an elegy.

Daylight, Synthpop, and the Ache of Turning into

At its core, Flashbacks of a Idiot is a examine of the variations of ourselves we abandon, and Craig is fearless in taking part in Joe as somebody who is aware of he’s not value rooting for. What’s most transferring is the lengthy central flashback, the place a teenage Joe falls in love—set to Roxy Music’s “If There Is One thing”—and we see, for a second, the fantastic thing about who he may need been. Craig’s efficiency holds that pressure: the grownup Joe is hollowed out, however you possibly can nonetheless glimpse the echo of youth inside him. It’s an imperfect movie, however one that provides Craig area to be poetic, damaged, and at last human.

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9

‘Layer Cake’ (2004)

Layer Cake

Launch Date

June 3, 2005

Runtime

105 Minutes

Earlier than On line casino Royale turned him into the pondering particular person’s motion hero, Layer Cake handed Craig a loaded weapon and a tangled conscience. As an unnamed drug seller attempting to retire from the enterprise cleanly, Craig performs a person who believes in programs—guidelines, order, quiet exits—and slowly realizes he’s in a world that feeds on chaos. Directed by Matthew Vaughn with hyper-stylized precision, the movie is slick however not soulless, violent however calculated. Craig doesn’t swagger; he strategizes.

The Precursor to Bond, With out the Mythology

That is Craig as a person nonetheless negotiating energy—sensible, icy, watching every little thing. What makes his efficiency so compelling is the quiet twitch beneath the floor: the dawning understanding that intelligence won’t save him. Not like Bond, this character has no license to kill, only a fragile sense of management, and Craig performs the unraveling superbly. There’s a second close to the tip, gun in hand, the place he appears to be like extra drained than triumphant. Layer Cake is fashionable and funky, sure—however Craig’s efficiency offers it weight. It’s the function that proved he didn’t want the Bond branding to command a display. He simply wanted the silence between strains.

8

‘Notorious’ (2006)

Notorious

Launch Date

October 13, 2006

Runtime

110 minutes

Director

Douglas McGrath

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It’s not possible to speak about Notorious with out acknowledging the shadow of Capote—launched the yr prior and broadly heralded for Philip Seymour Hoffman’s Oscar-winning efficiency. However Notorious deserves its personal lane, and Daniel Craig is a giant purpose why. On this quieter, extra emotionally charged tackle Truman Capote’s relationship with assassin Perry Smith, Craig steps into the latter’s sneakers and strips away the acquainted hardened exterior. His Perry is soulful, risky, and unnervingly seductive—like a person conscious of the parable he’s changing into, and decided to manage the narrative.

Tenderness Behind Bars

Craig doesn’t simply brood; he lets Smith’s contradictions unfold slowly: a person able to brutal violence, but in addition of immense vulnerability. His chemistry with Toby Jones’ Capote is devastating, notably in a late scene the place the strains between intimacy and manipulation collapse completely. If Capote is about self-discipline and management, Notorious lets itself bleed just a little—and Craig’s efficiency is the incision level. He offers the type of presence that lingers in your chest, not as a result of it’s loud, however as a result of it whispers one thing unresolvable.

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7

‘The Trench’ (1999)

The Trench

Launch Date

September 17, 1999

Runtime

98 minutes

Director

William Boyd

• 
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  James D’Arcy

  Pte. Colin Daventry

• 

  Paul Nicholls

  Pte. Billy Macfarlane

Set in the course of the 48 hours main as much as the Battle of the Somme, The Trench compresses World Struggle I into one thing each intimate and claustrophobic. Directed by William Boyd, it’s extra of a psychological chamber piece than a conflict movie, and Craig performs Sergeant Winter—harsh, deeply drained, and straddling the road between surrogate father and army functionary. The movie is grim by design, unfolding completely inside the damp partitions of a trench, and Craig’s presence brings the burden of management with out glorifying it.

Muck, Reminiscence, and Male Silence

What’s haunting about Craig’s work right here is how clearly he communicates dread—not via speeches or theatrics, however via glances, posture, silence. That is management as gradual emotional erosion. There’s a scene the place he tries to calm the younger troopers earlier than they go excessive, and also you see in his eyes that he doesn’t consider a phrase of what he’s saying. It’s certainly one of Craig’s earliest showcases of his energy in stillness—his capability to make doubt, concern, and resignation flicker beneath a hardened exterior. A quiet movie, however not a forgettable one.

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6

‘Defiance’ (2008)

Defiance

Launch Date

December 31, 2008

Runtime

137 minutes

Too simply dismissed as Oscar bait with a grenade launcher, Defiance deserves a re-examination—not simply as a uncommon World Struggle II movie centered on Jewish resistance, however as a deeply bodily efficiency from Craig. He performs Tuvia Bielski, the chief of a partisan group hiding within the Belarusian forests and defending lots of of Jewish refugees. What may have been a one-note story of heroism as an alternative turns into a nuanced story about moral compromise, brotherhood, and the burden of survival.

Management within the Mud

Craig brings a tough, grounded dignity to Tuvia, not as a mythic determine, however as a person continually at odds with the violence he should commit. He spends a lot of the movie both silent or shouting—there’s not a variety of in-between—and each extremes really feel earned. What makes the efficiency stand out is how a lot it rejects triumphalism. Craig performs Tuvia as exhausted, grief-stricken, and fiercely protecting, not of his legacy, however of the individuals in entrance of him. It’s one of many few action-oriented roles the place his energy comes from the refusal to glorify violence—and that makes it uncommon.

5

‘Dream Home’ (2011)

dream home

Launch Date

September 29, 2011

Runtime

84 Minutes

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On paper, Dream Home ought to’ve been a moody, status thriller: a haunted-man psychological puzzle starring Daniel Craig and Rachel Weisz, directed by Jim Sheridan. However the movie was re-cut by the studio, advertising gave away its main twist, and critics panned it on arrival. But inside the fractured construction and uneven tone lies a efficiency from Craig that’s surprisingly tender and emotionally uncooked. He performs Will Atenton, a person who strikes his household into a rustic house solely to slowly unravel a deeper, extra tragic fact.

The Horror of Grief in Disguise

The twist—broadly spoiled, but nonetheless value experiencing—isn’t what makes Dream Home fascinating. It’s Craig’s navigation of the skinny line between love and delusion, between reminiscence and fantasy. He’s unusually uncovered right here: we see him grieve, hallucinate, doubt himself, crumble. The movie might not absolutely cohere, however Craig’s presence grounds it. He offers a style story a layer of actual emotional ache, as if he’s taking part in not a person in a thriller, however somebody attempting to outlive the insufferable structure of loss.

4

‘The Invasion’ (2007)

The Invasion

Launch Date

August 17, 2007

Runtime

99 Minutes

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The fourth remake of Invasion of the Physique Snatchers got here with main baggage—studio interference, a second director introduced in for reshoots, and a important reception that known as it each flat and pointless. However rewatch it now, and The Invasion feels oddly prescient. Craig performs a health care provider who aids Nicole Kidman’s CDC psychiatrist as an odd, empathy-erasing epidemic spreads throughout Washington D.C. It’s smooth and sterile, however there’s one thing eerie in the way it captures a society sliding into calm, enforced compliance.

Politeness as Apocalypse

Craig’s function isn’t showy, however that’s what makes it work. He performs the straight man to Kidman’s rising dread, the final human pulse in a world going numb. There’s a quiet chemistry between them that underlines what the movie is attempting to say: that emotional messiness—love, anger, ache—is the very last thing that makes us human. The Invasion isn’t excellent, but it surely’s quietly unnerving, and Craig’s cool steadiness offers the movie a middle of gravity it desperately wants. In a world of physique doubles and placid smiles, he nonetheless flinches.

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3

‘Renaissance’ (2006)

renaissance

Launch Date

March 16, 2006

Runtime

105

Director

Christian Volckman

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An animated French noir with rotoscope-style black-and-white visuals so stark they really feel carved in chrome, Renaissance is much less a movie than a fever dream of company dystopia. Set in a hyper-surveilled Paris of 2054, the story follows a detective unraveling the disappearance of a scientist tied to a robust biotech firm. Craig voices the lead, Barthélémy Karas, with a gravelly restraint that makes the movie’s chilly aesthetic really feel much more chilling. It’s Sin Metropolis meets Blade Runner, if each movies have been dipped in ink and drained of sunshine.

Monochrome and Monotone—however Hypnotic

That is Craig not as a face however as a texture: his voice carries weight, exhaustion, and latent violence. In a movie the place human expressions are sometimes abstracted, Craig’s efficiency turns into surprisingly grounding. He offers Karas not simply noir grit, however the sense of somebody all the time watching the clock, attempting to outrun the system. Renaissance isn’t heat or straightforward—it’s dense and infrequently emotionally distant—however Craig’s voice cuts via like static on a clear sign. It’s one of many few occasions we get to expertise his persona stripped to pure tone.

2

‘Obsession’ (1997)

Nearly nobody talks about Obsession, partly as a result of it barely had a launch and partly as a result of it’s an odd hybrid of erotic thriller and psychological thriller that doesn’t fairly land—but it surely holds a captivating early Craig efficiency. He performs John MacHale, a person tangled in a deadly attraction storyline set towards the brooding backdrop of Nineties rural Scotland. The plot veers from melodrama to psychodrama, however Craig brings a type of harmful calm to the middle—a person you belief simply sufficient to remorse it.

Watching Craig Earlier than He’s Watching You

What’s fascinating right here is how Craig experiments with ambiguity. He’s not but refined, not but mythologized, and Obsession lets us watch him lean into that messy, pre-fame mode. His presence is magnetic however uncooked, just a little unpredictable, like somebody determining the place to place the burden in a sentence. The movie itself is flawed and oddly paced, however Craig’s efficiency—simmering, withheld, simply barely off-center—is a glimpse of the darker edges he’d later sharpen into metal.

1

‘Logan Fortunate’ (2017)

Logan Fortunate

Launch Date

August 18, 2017

Runtime

118 Minutes

This is perhaps probably the most purely pleasant Daniel Craig efficiency ever captured on display. As Joe Bang, a bleach-blond, egg-loving explosives professional serving to two brothers rob a NASCAR race, Craig is all twitch and attraction, like somebody who obtained electrocuted in a Waffle Home toilet and got here out enlightened. Logan Fortunate, Steven Soderbergh’s Southern-fried heist movie, thrives by itself bizarre wavelength, and Craig syncs to it completely, gleefully dismantling his Bond persona one scene at a time.

Blowing Up the Bond Delusion from the Inside

Craig’s comedic timing right here is impeccable—not in a punchline method, however in how he makes use of silence, drawl, and stillness to punctuate the absurdity round him. Joe Bang is a personality who’s each in on the joke and utterly honest, and Craig performs him with a type of giddy reverence. It is a man who has nothing to show anymore, which makes the efficiency all of the extra liberating. If On line casino Royale launched us to the fashionable motion man, Logan Fortunate is the place that man lastly discovered the best way to chortle.