Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#6171
of 909177 performers
Top 1%
Tim Griffin works on versatility rather than volume, and the catalogue keeps proving that the quieter choice was the correct one.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Tim Griffin appears in 13 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Tim. Iron Man is the clearest case: a film rated 7.9 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 mystery, drama, thriller. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Will Merrick, Joel Edgerton, Clint Eastwood and others, Tim Griffin 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.
Iron Man (2008) as CAOC Analyst · Star Trek (2009) as Kelvin Engineer · Missing (2023) as James
Career snapshot
Ranked #6171 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
13
2000–2023
Career length
23 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
7.9
Iron Man
Average Nutevio score
6.8
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.7
Iron Man
Most frequent director
J.J. Abrams
2 films together
Longest collaboration
2×
With J.J. Abrams
Most common genre
Drama
6 titles
Average runtime
1h 51m
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
6.6
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
2020s
7.4 average MV
The 2020s are where the work and the material meet. Missing — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2020s
7.4
Across 1 catalogue film in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2020s
7.4
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
2000s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. Star Trek, The Men Who Stare at Goats, Iron Man.
Most productive era
2000s
6 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 | 2000s | 2010s | 2020s |
|---|---|---|---|
| Drama | 6.43 films | 6.62 films | 7.41 film |
| Action | 7.63 films | 6.53 films | — |
| Thriller | 7.41 film | 6.54 films | 7.41 film |
| Comedy | 6.03 films | 6.41 film | — |
| Romance | 6.02 films | — | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
2000Boys and Girls
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Timmy.
Highest rated performance · Career peak
2008Iron Man
7.9 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
2023Missing
The current state of the argument, as James.
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.
13 of 13 films
as CAOC Analyst
Directed by Jon Favreau
as Kelvin Engineer
Directed by J.J. Abrams
as James
Directed by Will Merrick
as Colonel Gronski
Directed by Clint Eastwood
as John Nevins
Directed by Paul Greengrass
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
CAOC Analyst
Iron Man (2008)
Performance score7.7
The performance the rest of the career is read through. CAOC Analyst gives Tim Griffin a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Kelvin Engineer
Star Trek (2009)
Performance score7.4
Star Trek asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Kelvin Engineer is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
James
Missing (2023)
Performance score7.2
Missing asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. James is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Colonel Gronski
American Sniper (2014)
Performance score7.2
American Sniper asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Colonel Gronski 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 CAOC Analyst
Start here. Iron Man is the clearest statement of what Tim Griffin does — accessible, 126 minutes, and rated 7.9 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Tim 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.
The Bourne Supremacy (2004)
Keeps the action register of Iron Man but asks for a colder reading of it.
Star Trek (2009)
Keeps the action register of The Bourne Supremacy but asks for a colder reading of it.
American Sniper (2014)
Keeps the action register of Star Trek but asks for a colder reading of it.
Missing (2023)
A deliberate change of key after American Sniper — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
J.J. Abrams
Director
2 films together
Notably Star Trek
Robert Iscove
Director
1 film together
Notably Boys and Girls
Paul Greengrass
Director
1 film together
Notably The Bourne Supremacy
George Clooney
Director
1 film together
Notably Leatherheads
Jon Favreau
Director
1 film together
Notably Iron Man
Grant Heslov
Director
1 film together
Notably The Men Who Stare at Goats
Doug Liman
Director
1 film together
Notably Fair Game
John Singleton
Director
1 film together
Notably Abduction
Clint Eastwood
Director
1 film together
Notably American Sniper
Joel Edgerton
Director
1 film together
Notably The Gift
Will Merrick
Director
1 film together
Notably Missing
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
J.J. Abrams
Director
2 films together · 7.2 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Star TrekJon Favreau
Director
1 film together · 7.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Iron ManWill Merrick
Director
1 film together · 7.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
MissingClint Eastwood
Director
1 film together · 7.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
American SniperPaul Greengrass
Director
1 film together · 7.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Bourne SupremacyJoel Edgerton
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 GiftDoug Liman
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Fair GameGrant Heslov
Director
1 film together · 6.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Men Who Stare at GoatsRobert Iscove
Director
1 film together · 6.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Boys and GirlsGeorge Clooney
Director
1 film together · 5.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
LeatherheadsJohn Singleton
Director
1 film together · 5.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
AbductionSix 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
Iron Man
as CAOC Analyst
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
Leatherheads
as Ralph
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Iron Man
as CAOC Analyst
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Iron Man
as CAOC Analyst
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Iron Man
as CAOC Analyst
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. Tim Griffin 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
23 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
6 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
Missing
as James
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Missing
as James
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
Leatherheads
as Ralph
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Super 8
as Commando
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Iron Man
as CAOC Analyst
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Star Trek
as Kelvin Engineer
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Leatherheads
as Ralph
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Iron Man
as CAOC Analyst
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
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Have your say
Community
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Reference
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