Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#5997
of 909177 performers
Top 1%
Phil Davis represents the rare performer whose career became more ambitious with every decade — 54 years in, and Phil is still choosing the harder script.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Phil Davis appears in 20 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Phil. In the Name of the Father is the clearest case: a film rated 7.7 by our editors, where the performance carries weight the script only implies.
The recognisable elements are versatility, transformation, quiet performance. Watch two of these films back to back and the method separates from the material — the same instrument, tuned differently for action, crime, thriller. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Ben Kellett, Nick Nevern, Ed Bye and others, Phil Davis helped set a standard other performers now audition against. Awards bodies have been slower than the work, which is usually the sign of a career built on choices rather than campaigns.
In the Name of the Father (1993) as Detective · Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982) as Roadie · Notes on a Scandal (2006) as Brian Bangs
Career snapshot
Ranked #5997 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
20
1972–2026
Career length
54 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
7.7
In the Name of the Father
Average Nutevio score
5.7
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.9
In the Name of the Father
Most frequent director
Nick Nevern
2 films together
Longest collaboration
2×
With Nick Nevern
Most common genre
Drama
12 titles
Average runtime
1h 44m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
6.8
out of 10
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio metric
Cultural impact and legacy, measured separately from craft — how far the work travelled once it left the cinema.
Nutevio Influence Score
6.7
out of 10
A quieter influence — felt inside the films rather than across the industry.
How far the work travelled past the people who saw it first.
What survives once the release-week conversation has burned off.
Institutional acknowledgement, weighted but never decisive.
Years of chosen, relevant work rather than years merely employed.
Statuettes, read as evidence rather than verdict.
Roles named without needing the film named alongside them.
Directors who wrote parts because this performer existed.
The reading other performers now have to answer.
Actor DNA
A fingerprint derived from the roles themselves — register, range and the kind of film they carry.
The shape of a career
Every performance plotted in time. Hover a point to read the title behind it.
Peak years
Where the scores, the awards and the sheer volume of work agree with each other.
Best decade
1980s
7.2 average MV
The 1980s are where the work and the material meet. The Bounty, Pink Floyd: The Wall — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
1980s
7.2
Across 2 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
1980s
7.3
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
1970s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. Quadrophenia, The Canterbury Tales.
Most productive era
2010s
5 films
The busiest stretch of the catalogue — volume that reads as appetite rather than availability.
Range, mapped
Genres down the side, decades across the top. Warmer cells mean stronger titles.
| Genre | 1970s | 1980s | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s | 2020s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drama | 6.52 films | 7.22 films | 7.71 film | 6.74 films | 6.42 films | 5.61 film |
| Action | — | 6.71 film | 6.61 film | — | — | 3.63 films |
| Thriller | — | — | — | 6.31 film | — | 4.04 films |
| Comedy | 6.21 film | — | — | 6.51 film | 6.04 films | — |
| Crime | — | — | — | 6.31 film | — | 0.01 film |
| Romance | — | — | — | 6.82 films | 6.22 films | — |
| Horror | — | — | 6.61 film | — | 6.51 film | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
Where our catalogue meets this career, as 2nd Homosexual Lover (uncredited).
Highest rated performance · Career peak
7.7 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer. Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.
Most recent film
2026Rise of the Footsoldier: Retribution
The current state of the argument.
Our order
Every performance in the catalogue, ordered by Nutevio Score.
Every title
Filter by genre or decade, and compare any two titles side by side.
20 of 20 films
as Chalky
Directed by Franc Roddam
as Edward Young
Directed by Roger Donaldson
From the library
Every movie and TV credit stored for this name in the Nutevio catalogue — filter by media, role or sort by rating.
Loading credits…
The defining work
#1
Detective
In the Name of the Father (1993)
Performance score7.5
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Detective gives Phil Davis a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Roadie
Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982)
Performance score7.4
Pink Floyd: The Wall asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Roadie is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Brian Bangs
Notes on a Scandal (2006)
Performance score7.2
Notes on a Scandal asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Brian Bangs is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Chalky
Quadrophenia (1979)
Performance score7.2
Quadrophenia asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Chalky is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movieStart here
A guided path through the work, ordered so each film explains the next.
Best entry point
as Detective
Start here. In the Name of the Father is the clearest statement of what Phil Davis does — accessible, 133 minutes, and rated 7.7 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Phil at the most legible performance, then move forward in time so each film reads as a response to the one before it rather than a repetition of it.
Quadrophenia (1979)
Keeps the drama register of In the Name of the Father but asks for a colder reading of it.
Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982)
Keeps the music register of Quadrophenia but asks for a colder reading of it.
The Bounty (1984)
Keeps the drama register of Pink Floyd: The Wall but asks for a colder reading of it.
Notes on a Scandal (2006)
Keeps the drama register of The Bounty but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Nick Nevern
Director
2 films together
Notably Rise of the Footsoldier: Vengeance
Pier Paolo Pasolini
Director
1 film together
Notably The Canterbury Tales
Franc Roddam
Director
1 film together
Notably Quadrophenia
Alan Parker
Director
1 film together
Notably Pink Floyd: The Wall
Roger Donaldson
Director
1 film together
Notably The Bounty
David Fincher
Director
1 film together
Notably Alien³
Jim Sheridan
Director
1 film together
Notably In the Name of the Father
Douglas McGrath
Director
1 film together
Notably Nicholas Nickleby
Lasse Hallström
Director
1 film together
Notably Casanova
Woody Allen
Director
1 film together
Notably Cassandra's Dream
Bill Condon
Director
1 film together
Notably Mr. Holmes
Jesse Peretz
Director
1 film together
Notably Juliet, Naked
Ed Bye
Director
1 film together
Notably Dial M for Middlesbrough
Ben Kellett
Director
1 film together
Notably Shedites
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Nick Nevern
Director
2 films together · 2.8 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Rise of the Footsoldier: VengeanceJim Sheridan
Director
1 film together · 7.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
In the Name of the FatherAlan Parker
Director
1 film together · 7.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Pink Floyd: The WallDouglas McGrath
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Nicholas NicklebyFranc Roddam
Director
1 film together · 6.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
QuadropheniaRoger Donaldson
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The BountyDavid Fincher
Director
1 film together · 6.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Alien³Ed Bye
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Dial M for MiddlesbroughBill Condon
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Mr. HolmesLasse Hallström
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
CasanovaJesse Peretz
Director
1 film together · 6.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Juliet, NakedWoody Allen
Director
1 film together · 6.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Cassandra's DreamPier Paolo Pasolini
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Canterbury TalesBen Kellett
Director
1 film together · 0.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
SheditesSix degrees
Follow the thread outward — director, film, co-star, and the film after that.
Categories of our own
Six editorial categories we apply to every performer we cover.
Most rewatchable
In the Name of the Father
as Detective
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
Pink Floyd: The Wall
as Roadie
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
In the Name of the Father
as Detective
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
In the Name of the Father
as Detective
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
In the Name of the Father
as Detective
If the career had to be argued in a single scene, our editors would pick one from this film and rest the case.
In their films' words
“You can build a whole film around a performer who knows when not to speak. Phil Davis has known it for a long time.”
Head to head
Put two careers on the same scale and see where the argument actually sits.
Ours alone
Recognitions handed out by this desk, on criteria no awards body uses.
Career Achievement
Awarded
54 years of relevant work — not merely a long career, but a long career of choices.
Modern Classic Performer
Awarded
Defining performances delivered inside the last twenty-five years, in films already being taught rather than merely remembered.
Drama Legend
Awarded
12 catalogue titles in drama, each one a reference point for the films that followed.
Our desk
Best ending, best opening, best twist and the rest — categories we apply to everyone we cover.
Best ending
In the Name of the Father
as Detective
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Dial M for Middlesbrough
as Jed
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
Notes on a Scandal
as Brian Bangs
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Mr. Holmes
as Inspector Gilbert
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
The Bounty
as Edward Young
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Alien³
as Kevin
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
The Canterbury Tales
as 2nd Homosexual Lover (uncredited)
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Alien³
as Kevin
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
If you like this performer
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Works with the same directors — David Fincher
Michael Caine
Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
Edward Norton
Works with the same directors — David Fincher
Zach Grenier
Works with the same directors — David Fincher
Richmond Arquette
Works with the same directors — David Fincher
Have your say
Community
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Reference
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