Countdown to the Oscars: Best Actor

We’re counting down the days until the Academy Awards! We’ll be here, breaking down each of the 23 categories, talking a bit of history, and trying to figure out who is going to win all those gold statues. So check back throughout the next three weeks for Last Cinema Standing’s Countdown to the Oscars.

Best Actor

The nominees are:

Austin Butler in Elvis

Colin Farrell in The Banshees of Inisherin

Brendan Fraser in The Whale

Paul Mescal in Aftersun

Bill Nighy in Living

Though I feel pretty good about my prediction in this category, I cannot guarantee who will win. However, I can with a good deal of certainty guarantee none of the five nominees will rush the stage to slap a presenter during the show. Of course, I would have said the same thing before last year’s show, and I would have been wrong. So, let’s see what happens.

Austin Butler in Elvis – The Academy does not really deserve its reputation for being obsessed with performers portraying real people. Over the past 50 years of Best Actor and Actress, the Academy has handed out 100 statues. Exactly 33 of those have gone to performers playing real people, which means fully two-thirds of the time, the award goes to an actor bringing to life a fictional character.

The reputation persists, I think, because the ones we remember tend to be the most egregious examples, like Rami Malek in Bohemian Rhapsody or Eddie Redmayne in The Theory of Everything. No one complains when Daniel Day-Lewis wins for Lincoln or Will Smith (slap aside) for King Richard. Butler will slot pretty easily into the latter category for his full-bodied imitation of Elvis Pressley. It is an excellent performance and probably the saving grace of Baz Luhrmann’s otherwise mediocre Elvis. For a movie that goes wrong in so many ways, Butler is worth the price of admission.

Brendan Fraser in The Whale – If you follow this stuff at all, you know Fraser’s story. It has been written about extensively all over the place. In interviews, on red carpets, and in speeches, Fraser never comes off as anything but genuine and humble, grateful for the praise but a little bewildered by it all. His return to fame is one of the few positive things that has come out of internet nostalgia culture. Millennials who grew up on George of the Jungle and The Mummy have plastered Fraser everywhere on social media as a cause celebre. You may have seen the bumper stickers.

The lead role of Charlie in Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale is a fascinating part for the once-upon-a-time matinee idol. Buried beneath layers of makeup and CGI, Fraser brings you into the world of a morbidly obese man who cannot forgive himself for things he has done and has essentially decided to die. But even in that state, he seeks ways to connect to his daughter and pass along a message of hope, kindness, and generosity. Fraser plays this one for the people in the back row, but it is actually perfectly attuned to the frequency of the film around him. He’s back, like he never left.

Colin Farrell in The Banshees of Inisherin – This is the best performance of the year for me. The entire ensemble of The Banshees of Inisherin is doing tremendous work, but Farrell is transcendent. It would be condescending to suggest we didn’t know he was capable of this. He’s been great in plenty over the years, from Minority Report and The New World to In Bruges and The Lobster, but this is the best he has ever been. It’s a performance that proves his best is better than most.

Watch the way Farrell’s Pádraic reacts at the inciting incident of the film. Brendan Gleeson’s Colm tells him he doesn’t want to be friends anymore, and in two seconds, without saying a word, Farrell communicates everything – the pain, the incomprehension, the disbelief. It washes over in waves, and we feel it with him. The events of the film feel silly at first, but the movie works because Farrell never treats them as such. This is deadly serious for Pádraic. And as things get darker and darker, Farrell is already there, waiting for the audience to catch up to him.

Paul Mescal in Aftersun – When the Academy Award nominations were announced, Mescal was in London, playing Stanley Kowalski in a West End revival of A Streetcar Named Desire. That’s a great part for him, and it wouldn’t be too hard to imagine the young actor following in the footsteps of Marlon Brando in becoming one of the “It” actors of his generation. That’s a lot to put on a 27-year-old performer, but those are the kinds of comparisons you draw when you are Oscar nominated for just your second feature film.

Charlotte Wells’ elegant little coming-of-age drama follows young dad Calum (Mescal) and his 11-year-old daughter, Sophie (Frankie Corio), on their Turkish holiday. He is doing the best he can to be a father to this adolescent girl, but he is struggling, as he barely knows who he is, let alone how to understand his preteen daughter. Mescal brings depth and compassion to the role that would be difficult for a seasoned performer to convey. But, here he is in his first leading role, announcing himself as an actor to watch for a long time to come.

Bill Nighy in Living – On the flipside of that coin, we have the 73-year-old Nighy, who was 20 when he first performed Tennessee Williams on the British stage in 1969, some 53 years before Mescal got to it. His long film career has run the gamut from Shaun of the Dead to Love Actually to a key role in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. He has truly done it all, and yet, this is his first Academy Award nomination.

It would be easy to dismiss this nomination as a lifetime achievement nod, but that would be to ignore the work Nighy is actually doing in this film. It is no easy feat to step into the shoes of Takashi Shimura, the legendary Japanese actor, for a remake of one of Akira Kurosawa’s most revered films, about a dying bureaucrat looking to find some meaning in his final days. Nighy puts a uniquely British spin on the part while never losing the soul of the material. He carries the longing and regret of his years with him in everything he does, and in the film’s closing moments, borrowed from the Kurosawa film, we see that weight lifted and we finally view the man who once was.

The final analysis

Many Oscars prognosticators would have you believe this is a closer race than it is, particularly after Brendan Fraser’s triumph at the Screen Actors Guild Awards. But, if 2020 taught us anything, it taught us you can’t trust SAG when it comes to this one. That was the now-infamous Chadwick Boseman-Anthony Hopkins year. Boseman was a sure thing, especially after the posthumous recognition from his peers. And, that was true right up to the moment the 2020 Academy Awards ceremony ended with Hopkins’ name being read and Hopkins being prevented from accepting via Zoom call. It was a weird time.

In any event, Fraser has not received near the acclaim Boseman did in the runup to that ceremony. Butler won the BAFTA, he won the Golden Globe, and his rising star has shown no signs of slowing at any point this season. In my view, Butler is running away with this thing.

The only potential spoiler could come in the form of Colin Farrell sneaking up the middle if Fraser and Butler split the vote. That scenario is pretty rare, but many have used it to explain the 2002 Oscars when Adrian Brody won for The Pianist, beating out Jack Nicholson (About Schmidt) and Daniel Day-Lewis (Gangs of New York), who were considered neck and neck for the award. If it happens, it will make me as happy as anything else Sunday night is likely to make me, but I won’t hold my breath.

Will win: Austin Butler in Elvis

Should win: Colin Farrell in The Banshees of Inisherin

Should have been here: Felix Kammerer in All Quiet on the Western Front

A note about my favorite snub: All Quiet on the Western Front is entirely Paul’s story. He is our guide into the abyss. If that central performance doesn’t work, the whole thing falls apart. Luckily, Felix Kammerer is more than up to the task. Paul’s transformation from fresh-faced teen to shell-shocked vet is brutal, heartbreaking, and all too real, and Kammerer makes us feel every ounce of his pain.

Next time: Best Actress

Countdown to the Oscars: Best Supporting Actress

We’re counting down the days until the Academy Awards! We’ll be here, breaking down each of the 23 categories, talking a bit of history, and trying to figure out who is going to win all those gold statues. So check back throughout the next three weeks for Last Cinema Standing’s Countdown to the Oscars.

Best Supporting Actress

The nominees are:

Angela Bassett in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

Hong Chau in The Whale

Kerry Condon in The Banshees of Inisherin

Jamie Lee Curtis in Everything Everywhere All at Once

Stephanie Hsu in Everything Everywhere All at Once

This is a mess this year – a big, beautiful, glorious mess. As someone trying to make predictions with at least a little authority, I hate it. As a fan of drama and surprises at the Academy Awards, I love it. I’d normally save this next bit for the final analysis section down below, but it’s just too juicy to wait. Here’s where we stand right now:

For a long time, Angela Bassett was the presumed frontrunner, splitting a lot of the critical accolades with Kerry Condon. But, Bassett is a legend, and there has been a feeling that this is her time. Then, she won the Golden Globe and everything seemed on track. However, Condon came along and won the BAFTA, which as you may know, is my favorite predictor of upsets in the acting categories. So, I was ready to go that way. 

But, the Screen Actors Guild Awards arrived and threw another curveball. Jamie Lee Curtis won. Like Bassett, Curtis is Hollywood royalty and has been doing this thing forever. It wouldn’t be beneath the SAG membership to give an award for a lifetime of achievements, but if that were the case, why Curtis and not Bassett? For what it’s worth, Stephanie Hsu just won the breakthrough performer award at the Independent Spirits, so she’s not out of it either.

The wild card in all of this is that Everything Everywhere All at Once peaked at exactly the right time. It won an unprecedented four SAG awards right as ballots were about to be sent out. It got the WGA and dominated the Indie Spirits with ballots in hand. It looks like a big, historic winner, and nobody doesn’t want to be on the side of that. The problem is: Will Hsu and Curtis split votes? I don’t know. Nobody knows, and it’s great.

Jamie Lee Curtis in Everything Everywhere All at Once – I like Curtis a lot. She was a major part of my childhood in movies like Halloween, My Girl, and House Arrest. She’s wonderful in Prom Night, Knives Out, and the Freaky Friday remake. She seems like a fun, funny presence in interviews and when giving speeches. All around, an easy person to root for. I don’t think she’s particularly good in this movie.

Now, she is saddled with playing a humorless IRS agent, a kind of cult enforcer, and the hot dog-fingered lover of Michelle Yeoh in one universe. It’s all pretty thankless. That said, she’s also overdoing it in every single one of those characters. One could say she is matching the tone of the film around her, and that would be correct, but it doesn’t make it good.

Kerry Condon in The Banshees of Inisherin – Sandwiched between Colin Farrell and Cate Blanchett at the top of my list of the performances of the year would be Kerry Condon as Siobhán. Condon is working in every part of the emotional spectrum, bringing dignity, grace, and common sense to the character who serves as the rational center of this wild story. Such characters can often be drag to play, but Condon’s wit and intelligence make Siobhán just as fascinating as the characters that orbit around her.

It’s not just in the big, showy moments we all saw in the trailer, although she nails those, too. Condon wows in the quiet, sad moments that might otherwise fly by under the radar but which add up to a whole character. The first time she heads down to the pub, intent on grabbing a sherry and being a part of the community, there is a spring in her step and a shy smile on her face. The way she turns down Dominick (Barry Keoghan) for a date is so gentle and honest. There are a dozen little moments like these throughout the film, and they never stop impressing each time they crop up.

Angela Bassett in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever – Bassett knows how to command a room. Ryan Coogler is a magnificent director who knows how to give Bassett the space to shine, but that doesn’t work if Bassett ever gives less than her all, if she ever takes her foot off the gas once. Queen Ramonda must command the respect of every single person in the room at all times, and Bassett accomplishes this through sheer force of will.

A lot has been made of Bassett being the first acting nominee from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I would argue it’s more remarkable that this recognition is coming for a performer playing a hero. Villains always tend to stand out in comic book movies. They get to have more fun. They’re bigger, bolder. That is why both Heath Ledger and Joaquin Phoenix won Oscars for playing the Joker and no one has ever been nominated for playing Batman. Heroes tend to be too one-note in comic book movies. They are stoic, determined, and representative of a moral certitude that may work in battling evil but doesn’t offer an actor much in the way of range. Bassett cuts through all of that to find depth and layers in a monarch beset on all sides by enemies and standing up to protect her family and her kingdom.

Stephanie Hsu in Everything Everywhere All at Once – Speaking of villains that get to go big, Hsu swings for the fences as this film’s central antagonist, Jobu Tupaki. In a different universe, we are meant to have sympathy for her as Joy Wang, daughter of a chilly, withholding mother. Hsu seems to have a perfect read on both characters, and for all the dumb things the movie makes her do, we at least believe in the characters underneath it all.

You might know Hsu from The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel on Amazon or from Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, but this performance was really the first time I took notice of her. Her strength, spirit, and intensity all jump off the screen, and I can’t wait to see what she does next.

Hong Chau in The Whale – I have not had a chance to see the Kelly Reichardt film Showing Up that premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last May. If, however, it is as good as I have heard, then Chau truly had one of the great years in recent memory. In addition to having Showing Up at Cannes, she had a major role in box-office hit The Menu and garnered this Oscar nomination for The Whale. And though The Whale has not been particularly loved by critics, Chau has received nothing but plaudits for her work.

She plays Liz, a kind of nurse/caretaker to Brendan Fraser’s morbidly obese Charlie. She is protective of him but never coddles him, always urging him to get to a hospital and get his life together. As the film goes on, we learn the depth of their connection, and Liz’s actions take on more meaning and nuance. Chau plays all of this beautifully, matching Fraser’s energy in scene after scene. When she breaks down, Chau makes us feel the wait of her burden and all the pain it is causing her.

The final analysis

Okay, so what are we doing? Let’s look at the recent history of each of the major awards bodies and see which is most vulnerable and which seems right on the money. We’ll use 2010 as a cutoff:

Golden Globes – They have matched with the Oscars nine of the past 12 years. The three they missed were 2020 when Youn Yuh-jung won the Oscar but was not even nominated at the Globes (Jodie Foster won for The Mauritanian in an all-time strange victory); 2015 when Alicia Vikander won the Oscar for The Danish Girl (the Globes went with Kate Winslet in Steve Jobs, who beat Vikander who was nominated for Ex Machina); and the historically close 2013 race when Jennifer Lawrence won the Globe but Lupita Nyong’o memorably won the Oscar.

Screen Actors Guild – The guild has matched the Oscars 11 of the past 12 years. The only miss came in 2018 when the Oscar went to Regina King, who was not nominated at the SAG Awards. The guild went with Emily Blunt for The Quiet Place, a performance that was not even nominated at the Academy Awards.

BAFTAs – The Brits are spottier. They have matched eight times in 12 years. They missed in 2010, going with Helena Bonham Carter for The King’s Speech (eventual Oscar winner Melissa Leo was not nominated). They missed that 2013 race, also going with Lawrence over Nyong’o. They matched the Globes in 2015, going with Winslet over Vikander, who was again nominated for Ex Machina, not The Danish Girl. And, in 2018, like at the SAG Awards, King was not nominated, clearing the way for Rachel Weisz in The Favorite.

Going back to the beginning of the SAG Awards in 1994, only once has a performer won the Oscar without winning at least one of these major awards first (that was Marcia Gay Harden for Pollock in 2000, a performance not even nominated anywhere but the Oscars). So, we can safely eliminate Hong Chau and Stephanie Hsu, though if Hsu wins on the wave of Everything Everywhere All at Once momentum, we shouldn’t be surprised.

The Golden Globes are a weirdo organization, grasping at straws to regain their relevance, and as great as Angela Bassett is, I think she’s running in third place. There may also be an element of MCU bias here, as well. It would be tough to imagine voters getting over that, though they’ve never minded rewarding actors playing the Joker in Batman movies.

So, Curtis or Condon? Well, over more than a decade, the SAG Awards have been the more accurate predictor in this category compared to the BAFTAs, so I’m forced to predict Jamie Lee Curtis. I’m at peace with that. If she wins, I will be right. If she loses to Condon, I will be happy to be wrong. If anything else happens, well, I was never going to get it anyway. That’s it. Curtis. Final answer.

Will win: Jamie Lee Curtis in Everything Everywhere All at Once

Should win: Kerry Condon in The Banshees of Inisherin

Should have been here: Claire Foy in Women Talking

A note about my favorite snub: I mentioned this in my Adapted Screenplay piece, but Women Talking should have been up for a lot more Oscars than the two for which it is nominated. That it received no acting nominations for an ensemble that could easily have made up the entirety of this category will forever baffle me. I could have gone with anyone from the cast in this spot, and Jessie Buckley in particular was brilliant, but if I have to pick one, it’s Claire Foy. Her speech about protecting her children is one of the great movie moments of the year and will stay with me long after this Oscars season has passed.

Next time: Best International Feature

Countdown to the Oscars: Best Makeup and Hairstyling

We’re counting down the days until the Academy Awards! We’ll be here, breaking down each of the 23 categories, talking a bit of history, and trying to figure out who is going to win all those gold statues. So check back throughout the next three weeks for Last Cinema Standing’s Countdown to the Oscars.

Best Makeup and Hairstyling

The nominees are:

All Quiet on the Western Front

The Batman

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

Elvis

The Whale

Remember 2015 and 2016 when Love Larson and Eva von Bahr were nominated in back-to-back years for their work on a pair of popular Swedish hits that most Americans had never heard of? That was cool. Remember Ali Abbasi’s weird little Swedish gem Border in 2018? Also cool. How about last year and the love shown to the long-awaited sequel Coming 2 America? That was neat and out of left field. 

All of this is to point out that this year’s crop of Makeup and Hairstyling nominees feels a little safe, a little traditional. Every one of these films is nominated for at least three awards this year, and two are Best Picture nominees. There is nothing that feels spontaneous or quirky, like in 2020, when Matteo Garrone’s Pinocchio snuck into the lineup. No matter. Just an observation.

As it stands, these nominees reflect a growing trend within the Makeup and Hairstyling Branch of the Academy to favor showy character prosthetics that contribute to a leading or supporting performance in some major way. The Batman, Elvis, and The Whale are all a part of this trend. Four of the past five winners fit this bill, as well, with Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom the exception in 2020. Otherwise, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Bombshell, Vice, and The Darkest Hour all feature main characters buried under layers of prosthetics. So, let’s start there.

The Whale – The makeup is everything in Darren Aronofsky’s weepy drama. Okay, there is Brendan Fraser giving the performance of a lifetime. But, that performance does not exist without the prosthetic work, which is aided by a lot of CGI. Fraser is not a small man, but the work to transform him into a believable 600-pound man is, pardon the pun, gargantuan. Fraser’s character appears fully nude multiple times in the film, meaning the full-body prosthetics must hold up under scrutiny. More than that, the facial pieces have to bear the weight of Aronofsky’s many closeups without compromising Fraser’s performance. Your mileage may vary, but if the movie works for you, the makeup deserves a lot of credit.

Elvis – From a character makeup standpoint, Baz Luhrman’s wild biopic is The Whale times two. First, there is Austin Butler’s Elvis, which requires a number of subtle facial prosthetics, as well as tremendous attention to detail with the singer’s famously coiffed hair. Second, there is Tom Hanks’ fat suit, as well as the curiously oversized nose prosthetic. There is also a ton of work put into recreating the period-accurate hairstyles of the large crowds in attendance for many of the Elvis shows in the movie. Add all of this together, and for a movie I didn’t like, the work is quite admirable and this nomination well deserved.

The Batman – There is a joke to be made here about Robert Pattinson’s Batman being the first caped crusader to don eyeliner, but we’ll save it for another time. No, much like Batman Returns’ nomination in this category 30 years ago, this is all about the Penguin. This past year, as part of an anniversary screening of Returns, I actually got to see a live demonstration of the makeup, prosthetics, and hair piece it took to transform Danny DeVito into Oswald Cobblepot. It was cool to see and emphasized the work that goes into making these fantasy characters truly spark to life. Here – and I know this is cliche to say – Colin Farrell is unrecognizable as the Penguin. It’s a remarkable transformation that deserves much praise.

All Quiet on the Western Front – Perhaps the most iconic image to come out of this film is that of star Felix Kammerer’s ashen face, caked in mud, delivering that thousand-yard stare. So much of the movie is about the main character’s transformation from eager, fresh-faced youth to that broken, battered man, and the makeup really helps give the audience a sense of where we are in that story. Really, this is the story of all the men maimed and scarred by the war. We see their bruises, their wounds, and their missing limbs, and the cost of the war is made real and tangible. The makeup is haunting and shattering all throughout the film.

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever – The original Black Panther film was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture. This one is nominated for five, but only two in the same category as the first feature (Original Song and Costume Design). Makeup and Hairstyling is one of the places the 2018 film missed out, though there were only three nominees in the category that year. The film was part of the final seven-film bake-off, so it stands to reason that with five nominees, it would have been in. The tattoo work alone on the Wakandans and the Talokan people is wonderfully impressive stuff, and similar to The Batman, it is a major lift to bring these fantastical characters into a reality we recognize.

The final analysis

I keep going back and forth between The Whale and Elvis. Based on recent history, either would be a logical winner, and there is very little to separate them. But let’s try.

Going back to 2011, four of the 11 Makeup and Hairstyling winners have been for films that also won a lead performance Oscar (The Iron Lady, Dallas Buyers Club, The Darkest Hour, and The Eyes of Tammy Faye just last year). If we think Butler is going to win Best Actor, then Elvis is a reasonable bet here. In addition, from 2000 to 2018, in every instance when a Best Picture nominee was cited in this category, a Best Picture nominee won the award. This would also point to Elvis (or All Quiet on the Western Front).

However, this is where it gets fun. The past three years have painted a different picture. In 2019, Bombshell beat out Joker and 1917. In 2020, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom beat out Mank. And last year, Tammy Faye beat out Dune. So, Picture is no longer the slam-dunk indicator we would once have considered it. In addition, looking at 2019 again, Bombshell featured a Best Actress-nominated performance from Charlize Theron, but it beat out Renee Zelwegger’s Best Actress-winning performance in Judy in this category. So, even if Butler does triumph in Actor, the Fraser film is not out of the running here.

We also cannot ignore the Academy’s willingness to go with the fun, showy blockbuster in this category, which in this case I believe would be The Batman over Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. More than likely, those two films will split votes, preventing a victory on par with Star Trek, Mad Max: Fury Road, or Suicide Squad. War films do not tend to do particularly well here, and even Saving Private Ryan lost to Elizabeth in this category, so unless All Quiet on the Western Front is going to sweep (like it did at the BAFTAs), it’s probably out of the running.

All of which brings us back to: The Whale or Elvis? If you’re placing a bet, go with Elvis. It is the more beloved film, it is the Best Picture nominee, and it features your likely Best Actor winner. That is the smart way to play this game. But, I just cannot get past the fact that The Whale does not exist without the makeup, and it’s right there, front and center the entire time. What are we doing here if not trying to have a little fun? So, you be smart. I’m going out on the limb.

Will win: The Whale

Should win: The Batman

Should have been here: Babylon

A word on my favorite snub: Damien Chazelle’s Babylon is a rise-and-fall movie that covers years of its characters’ lives and eventually decades. The subtle aging, along with the more extravagant hair and makeup looks that abound – particularly for Margot Robbie’s character – would have been a wonderful complement to the more conventional slate of nominees this year.

Next time: Costume Design