After listing my top three films to miss out on a Best Picture Oscar I think it fair that I do the same with Best Actor. There have been, of course, so many fantastic actors who have made the short walk to the podium to accept the gong thereby placing themselves at the very top of their profession. Sydney Poitier, Tom Hanks and Spencer Tracy are only a few of the greats to have graced our screens. But for every Hanks, there is a Cage, for every Poitier there is a Spacey.
Here are my top three how on earth did that happen moments within the Best Actor category.
Cast your mind back to February 1989..if you’re old enough. In the previous twelve months you would have watched Morgan Freeman portray perhaps his most iconic character in the unforgettable Driving Miss Daisy. Tom Cruise has pulled at your heart strings with an incredible performance as a paralysed Vietnam veteran in Born on the Fourth of July and Kenneth Branagh (I know he takes it all too seriously but sometimes it works) has brought Shakespeare to the silver screen as Hamlet. Not only that, but Robin Williams had also shown us how teachers (in the films!) can actually inspire their pupils to great things in Dead Poets Society. Which one of these performances in films that have stood the test of time to this day won the ultimate accolade for their work? The answer..none of them. Daniel Day-Lewis (in my opinion one the best actors of all time before people complain) walks off with the gong for his performance in My Left Foot. He was good, no question, but hardly worthy of victory against the other performance I’ve mentioned. Daniel Day-Lewis incidentally has been nominated in this category four times in his career – winning twice. Ironically his two defeats have been for far superior performances than the two in which he was victorious.
It is hard to believe that in the near 90 years of Academy Award history, no man has won more than two Best Actor awards. One of these men is Tom Hanks. His successes in Philadelphia and Forrest Gump made him the first man since Spencer Tracy in the 1930s to win in consecutive years in 1993 and 1994. Incredibly, nearly twenty years later, perhaps the best actor of his generation has failed to make it a treble. He should have though, in 1997, when his performance in Saving Private Ryan was truly outstanding. In perhaps the ultimate film within the genre of war, Hanks played the role of Captain John Miller with his usual panache showing that, no matter what the role, he has the ability to be believable. If there was to be a challenger that year , it should have Edward Norton in American History X but even he was cast aside in favour of Roberto Benigni (Google him if you think I’ve made him up) who won for his part in Life Is Beautiful. Good film, good role for Benigni – who also directed it – but in no way superior or even equal to Hanks. After losing again in 2000 for Cast Away, Hanks hasn’t been close since but surely he will win that elusive third Oscar in the near future.
And so to my final choice, the one I believe to be the biggest shock over the years. I considered Jamie Foxx in 2004 for somehow defeating the inspirational Don Cheadle to win for his performance in Ray and our friend Kevin Spacey for stealing what should have been Russell Crowe’s in 1999. Did Al Pacino really win for his performance in A Scent of a Woman in 1994? Yes. Did the unbelievably ridiculous Nicholas Cage win in 1996 for Leaving Las Vegas? It hurts me to type this but YES he did! But for me the biggest travesty in this category came in 1991 when Jeremy Irons took the accolades for his role of Claus von Bulow in Reversal of Fortunes. This easily forgettable film (be honest, you’re checking it on Wikipedia now) did allow Irons to display his ability to play the moody and controversial characters he has been famous for throughout his career but it was hardly a career defining moment. That year Gerard Depardieu but in the performance of his life in Cyrano de Bergerac and Robert De Niro was excellent in Awakenings but everyone nominated should have been no more than spectators in the Costner Show.
His mercurial epic Dances with Wolves rightly won him Best Director but his own performance as Lieutenant John J. Dunbar should have seen him become the first man to win both awards in the same year. The film, similar to his individual performance, has stood the test of time and never fails to hit home each and every time I watch it. Costner, however, has become one of those guys people love to hate. It has often bothered me why this is so? Is it simple jealousy that he is clearly good at his job and, at a relatively young age, showed he good direct equally well? The same happened to Mel Gibson and, more recently, Clooney. But that is maybe a debate for another blog entry!
Get involved! Leave a comment after reading this blog and let us all read your nominations in the category discussed. Also don’t forget to take part in our poll on which film will win Best Picture this year!
No comments:
Post a Comment