In Pics | 9 unforgettable Christopher Plummer movies

Canadian acttor Christopher Plummer, who passed away on Friday, was an insperable part of the film industry. He impressed fans with his sincere performances and stellar body of work. Here is a look at nine movies, which prove he was an artiste par excellence.

'Sound of Music' | The actor played a stuffy Austrian naval officer and widowed father in the film version of the musical The Sound of Music, and he became a bona fide movie star. In the decades that followed, Plummer would sometimes dismiss the film, one of his biggest box office hits, as cloying and simplistic. Credit: IMDb.

'Beginners' | Plummer became the oldest actor ever to win an Academy Award when he took home his first Oscar at 82 for writer-director Mike Mills’ semi-autobiographical drama 'Beginners'. He plays Hal, a septuagenarian who belatedly comes out as gay and subsequently strengthens his bond with his mixed-up middle-aged son Oliver. Credit: AFP Photo.

'The Silent Partner' | Plummer was proud of his Canadian roots, and though he worked all over the world, he frequently returned to make movies with some of his home country’s finest filmmakers. In the cult favorite 'The Silent Partner', he plays a brutal thief who matches wits with a devious bank teller (Elliott Gould) after a heist goes awry. Credit: IMDb.

'Murder By Decree' | Another venerable Canadian director, Bob Clark, guided Plummer through one of his juiciest roles, playing Sherlock Holmes in a movie about the Jack the Ripper murders. James Mason plays the part of Dr. Watson, while Donald Sutherland plays the real-life medium Robert Lees, who claimed to have solved the case via psychic visions. But the star of the show is of course Plummer, who conveys the steely persistence of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s famous sleuth, but also gives the character a bit of joyful bounce whenever he gets to outsmart somebody. Credit: IMDb.

'An American Tail' | One of Plummer’s most useful tools as a performer was his voice: deep and resonant, with just enough rasp to add a little edge. He was in-demand as a voice-over artist for documentaries and commercials; and he brought gusto to several classic animated films, including 'Up' and 'My Dog Tulip'. His first turn in a cartoon was a charmingly kooky one, playing a French pigeon who encourages the hero to follow his dreams by singing the can-do ditty 'Never Say Never'. Credit: IMDb.

'The Insider' | In this docudrama about how the tobacco industry’s lawyers pressured the producers of the CBS newsmagazine 60 Minutes, Plummer plays reporter Mike Wallace, known and feared for his dogged interviewing style. The actor doesn’t attempt a Wallace impression. Instead he embodies the contradictions of a famous journalist, who believes in the pursuit of truth but also fears losing corporate sponsorship. Credit: IMDb.

'Knives Out' | In one of Plummer’s final performances, he plays a popular mystery novelist whose accidental death causes problems for his greedy, scheming family. Plummer’s character Harlan Thrombey only appears in flashbacks, but his friendship with his nurse Marta (Ana de Armas) — and his keen understanding of his heirs’ failings — help to fill writer-director Rian Johnson’s clever murder plot with both genuine warmth and a sharp point-of-view. Harlan comes across as so wise and so kind that the audience will believe anything he says. Credit: IMDb.

'The Thorn Birds' | Plummer notched one of the 11 Emmy nominations earned by this popular TV miniseries adaptation of Colleen McCullough’s novel. (He lost the “Outstanding Supporting Actor” award to his castmate, Richard Kiley.) Reunited with Duke, who had directed The Silent Partner, Plummer plays a very different kind of character: a high-ranking Catholic Church official who mentors a young priest (Richard Chamberlain) struggling with his desire for a woman (Rachel Ward) in the Australian farmlands. The elder archbishop has a small but vital part to play in this sweeping saga, serving as a voice of conscience and compassion to a man in spiritual crisis. Credit: IMDb.

'The Last Station' | It took until 2010 — 52 years after his movie debut — before Plummer picked up his first Oscar nomination, for playing Tolstoy in writer-director Michael Hoffman’s adaptation of the Jay Parini novel The Last Station. The story is set during the last year of the Russian author’s life, and mostly concerns how his wife Sofya (Helen Mirren) battled with her husband’s devotees over whether his work should fall into the public domain after he died. Credit: IMDb.