Continuing my 2013 Oscar rant, I will now take a look at the acting categories, in which none of my personal #1 choices were even nominated.In Best Actor, we start with Bradley Cooper for Silver Linings Playbook. Thank you... it was an honor to be nominated. Denzel Washington (Flight) is one of our greatest movie star-actors, a two-time winner, and a six-time nominee; he probably won't win this year. Joaquin Phoenix (The Master) was nominated twice before, and won't win again this year. That movie just simply ran out of momentum. Getting warmer, Hugh Jackman has his first nomination this year, and as much as I hated Les Misérables, I contend that he was born to play the part of Jean Valjean; despite the movie's ill-fated approach, Jackman still manages a few home-run moments in the movie. (Plus he just seems like such a nice guy!)
The winner will be Daniel Day-Lewis for Lincoln. Voters, critics, and moviegoers are just so endlessly impressed by chameleon-type actors like Day-Lewis, who can so completely disappear inside a role, do accents, etc. For me, it's only interesting as a demonstration of skill. I give Day-Lewis less credit than most because he rarely puts himself on the line. You can watch all of his movies and not have any idea about who the guy is or what he cares about. He hides completely and never opens himself up. Compare him with Bill Murray, who played another U.S. President in Hyde Park on Hudson. It's not as factually correct, but it's a great deal warmer and more personal. Moreover, it's even more interesting, as Murray found emotional ways to connect his own feelings and experiences with those of FDR.
And so we come to our amazing list of people who were not nominated: John Hawkes for The Sessions, a solid disease-of-the-week performance; a ferocious Matthew McConaughey for Killer Joe; an acting tour-de-force, and a great audition tape, for Denis Lavant in Holy Motors; Bill Murray, and saddest of all, Jack Black in Bernie. My #1 choice, Black found his ultimate perfect role, a miraculous, seamless blend of character and character actor, stretching his skills and experience, but making them all his own. It's a shame the Academy didn't see it or get it.
The (Possible) Winner: Daniel Day Lewis (Lincoln)Should Win: Hugh JackmanDeserved to Be Nominated: Jack Black (Bernie) John Hawkes (The Sessions), Matthew McConaughey (Killer Joe), Denis Lavant (Holy Motors), Bill Murray (Hyde Park on Hudson)
Best ActressI met Quvenzhané Wallis (Beasts of the Southern Wild) this year and she's adorable, but... thank you, it was an honor to be nominated. Naomi Watts deserves an Oscar someday, but she keeps getting nominated for unwatchable junk like The Impossible, rather than for her great works like Mulholland Drive or Eastern Promises. Maybe someday.
Voters may have heard that Emmanuelle Riva is an old lady and was in some classic French films like Hiroshima, Mon Amour, though it's debatable whether they had ever heard of her before this, and whether they had ever actually seen any of her classic French films. Moreover, she has the easy part in Amour; she gets to lie in bed and be sick. Her male co-star Jean-Louis Trintignant does all the heavy lifting, though his role is less showy. (It's the Rain Man factor.) It's an honor to be nominated.
Jennifer Lawrence had a good year with her enormous hit The Hunger Games (notwithstanding her terrible horror movie House at the End of the Street), and she was by far the best and most cohesive thing in Silver Linings Playbook. She brought instinct to her role and found spaces in-between the text in which to inject more character. It's a very good performance. Equally good is Jessica Chastain in Zero Dark Thirty. It's a locked-down role, a character that hides her emotions most of the time, but it's also the entrance point to some very complex material, and she draws viewers in... she wears just enough humanity to make a connection. These two are pretty much tied at the moment, though with Lawrence winning the SAG award and generally making more money in 2012, I'd say that she's the front runner.
Which brings us to the actual best actress of the year: Rachel Weisz in The Deep Blue Sea. This was a performance without gimmicks. Her character, Hester, is beautiful, not sick, and simply a victim of a tragic love affair. Weisz opens her heart like never before, topping all her previous work, and finding an emotional sincerity I did not see anywhere else in 2012. Of course, she was not nominated.
The (Possible) Winner: Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook)Should Win: Jessica Chastain (Zero Dark Thirty)Deserved to Be Nominated: Rachel Weisz (The Deep Blue Sea), Michelle Williams (Take This Waltz), Sara Paxton (The Innkeepers)
Best Supporting ActorSo far the winners for this category have gone in all directions. We can eliminate Robert De Niro (Silver Linings Playbook), who has his seventh nomination and his first since 1991. He has won two Oscars, but the last one was in 1980. This particular performance just doesn't feel right for a "comeback." Philip Seymour Hoffman has received some attention for The Master, and it's a commanding, showcase performance, but it's such a baffling, unemotional movie that it's unlikely voters will go crazy for it. Christoph Waltz is also getting some notice for Django Unchained, and he's great, though he won just three years ago, for another Quentin Tarantino movie.
I loved Alan Arkin in Argo, in the kind of blatant, scene-stealing performance that character actors just live for. It's so much fun and so funny that it almost threatens to throw the movie off-balance. But Tommy Lee Jones for Lincoln is probably the best choice, and, if the SAG awards are any indication, the potential winner. As a measuring stick, we can look at the amazing list of talented actors that turn up in small roles in that film, including some of the most powerful character actors of our time, and then notice that Jones actually stands out from them. Like Murray, he brings his own personality to a performance and finds a balance.
Of those not nominated, it's sad that Matthew McConaughey had such a good year, but failed to land his first nomination in any category. His performance in Bernie floored me, but most others seemed to like his strutting in Magic Mike. Either one would have been nice.
The (Possible) Winner: Tommy Lee Jones (Lincoln)Should Win: Tommy Lee JonesDeserved to Be Nominated: Matthew McConaughey (Magic Mike and/or Bernie), Javier Bardem (Skyfall), Dwight Henry (Beasts of the Southern Wild), Samuel L. Jackson (Django Unchained)
Best Supporting ActressIt was an act of generosity to nominated Jacki Weaver for Silver Linings Playbook. She was awesome and should have won in 2010 for Animal Kingdom, sure, but this nod just smacks of how much influence the Weinsteins have over the voters. People seemed to love Sally Field in Lincoln, but other than the fact that I did not recognize her at first, I'm not sure what the hullabaloo was about (truth be told, she seemed so much older than Abe... I wondered for a moment if she was supposed to be his mom).
Helen Hunt went above and beyond for The Sessions, sharing the screen with the showboat performance of John Hawkes, and actually equalling him. She was warm, sexy and wonderful, and may have earned back the goodwill of the people. Amy Adams was my #1 pick in this category for the year, but not for The Master. In that movie, she hardly even seemed to be onscreen at all, and when she did appear, her job seemed to be to stifle the drama. In the lovably corny baseball movie Trouble with the Curve, she was fiery, sexy, smart, exasperated, hurt, and everything else. Above all, she sparred with Clint Eastwood and came out on top.
Other non-nominees were Shirley MacLaine, so funny and so mean in Bernie, and Scarlett Johansson, who nailed the sexy girl-next-door quality of Janet Leigh in Hitchcock. Sarah Silverman should have been noticed for playing an alcoholic in Take This Waltz, and Juno Temple was just positively ethereal in Killer Joe. Many people adored Ann Dowd in Compliance. I did not much care for the movie, but I concede that it was a fine job of acting.
This leaves Anne Hathaway for Les Misérables, our clear front-runner. She's the best thing in that failed movie, as she often is the best thing in whatever movie's she's in. She usually brings a hint of something genuine to a character. She seems to just live onscreen. Not to mention that she's outrageously beautiful and charismatic and you simply can't take your eyes off of her. (I've been hearing lots about how much of a pain she is in real life, but I'm choosing to ignore these rumors.) Her signature song in Les Misérables is one of that movie's few "wow" moments, recorded in one long take, with streaming tears and everything. Nice work.
The (Possible) Winner: Anne Hathaway (Les Misérables)Should Win: Anne HathawayDeserved to Be Nominated: Amy Adams (Trouble with the Curve), Shirley MacLaine (Bernie), Ann Dowd (Compliance), Scarlett Johansson (Hitchcock), Sarah Silverman (Take This Waltz), Juno Temple (Killer Joe)
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