Oscar Predictions 2012: Acting

Let's take a look at the acting categories.

Best Supporting Actor

Christopher Plummer, Beginners
Max von Sydow, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
Jonah Hill, Moneyball
Kenneth Branagh, My Week With Marilyn
Nick Nolte, Warrior

This has been a lock for quite some time and is probably the lock of the night. Jonah Hill never really had a shot this year and Nick Nolte's performance wasn't going to gain any traction despite Warrior being under appreciated. Christopher Plummer has been a Hollywood great for some time and still remains statue-less. With a brilliant performance as a recently out widower he was fantastic in Beginners. Then all of a sudden people remembered that Max von Sydow is also old and doesn't have an Oscar so he looked to be gaining some support but I don't think it will matter as Plummer is the more deserving of the two. And while this was previously mentioned in the comments section by a good friend it is worth repeating how Albert Brooks and Patton Oswalt took their snubs to twitter.

Best Supporting Actress
Janet McTeer, Albert Nobbs
Bérénice Bejo, The Artist
Melissa McCarthy, Bridesmaids
Jessica Chastain, The Help
Octavia Spencer, The Help

I know how boring, another lock. The Help's success is directly based off the performance of Spencer and Viola Davis. Spencer has already walked away with an arm full of awards for her performance plus she actually deserves the award. Creeping up behind her is Bérénice Bejo from The Artist, but for her to win would be a huge upset. It may surprise you that I think Bejo is in a better position to upset than Melissa McCarthy who stole the show in Bridesmaids but we all know the Academy hates comedies already, plus she won an Emmy for her movie performance so that has to count for something. While I think McCarthy and Spencer did equally well in their respective movies Spencer should have an easy win of it.

Best Actress
Glenn Close, Albert Nobbs
Rooney Mara, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Viola Davis, The Help
Meryl Streep, The Iron Lady
Michelle Williams, My Week With Marilyn

Why won't they let poor Meryl Streep alone, haven't they done enough to her psyche. Forcing her to sit in the front row year after year and knowing she is going to lose. It looks like now she is in second place following the front runner Viola Davis. While Streep may have won the BAFTA award and the Golden Globe for The Iron Lady, Davis won the critics’ choice and SAG award. And doesn't playing Margret Thatcher seem like her begging to win. They may be knotted up in Oscar precursors but it appears Davis has more support from The Academy. Viola Davis will be the 14 th person to beat out Streep for the Oscar.

Best Actor
Jean Dujardin, The Artist
Demián Bichir, A Better Life
George Clooney, The Descendants
Brad Pitt, Moneyball
Gary Oldman, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Finally a category that is still up for grabs. With both George Clooney and Jean Dujardin having won a golden globe for their performance this is really anyone's race. Dujardin may have the slight advantage having won the SAG award. Since the race is so close we could actually look at the performances themselves. Both men starred as men who were broken and beaten down in their story. No matter how hard you looked it still seemed like Clooney with all his Clooney charm playing the part rather that Matt King on the screen. Dujardin has the advantage of being an unknown but he also had to convey all of his emotion via expression. You still got what he was thinking without more than 5 words spoken and that to me speaks to a better performance. I believe that Dujardin deserves the win more so I'm going with him as my pick.

Tomorrow we'll give a look at Best Picture.

Drive

Ryan Gosling is capable of almost anything, and has left little doubt that he is one of the brightest stars in Hollywood. He has can play the heartthrob and romantic like in The Notebook, he can be a heart breaker like in Blue Valentine, he can be funny and charming like in Crazy, Stupid, Love. In the last movie mentioned he stepped out of his comfort zone and tried a comedy. He is often very adventurous in his roles and always knocks then out of the park. In Drive he seems to take a step back in to what he knows and while he does well in the role I doubt this will be a role worth remembering.

For director Nicolas Winding Refn this is his first stab at American film making. He has been very popular in Europe and has shown a knack for making movies, but of his movies that I have seen they have all been very stylistic. There are those who praise his style and concepts as high art and enjoy his projects for it. In Drive he appears to be making an ode to the eighties be it the font on the movie poster and credits, the music, or the white jacket our protagonist wears throughout the story. He obviously is very knowledgeable on the era and creates a wonderful atmosphere. But he always seems to over commit to it. Alright Don, we get the image you are going for but sometimes it seems that you are more concerned with style over substance. Some people will praise his work, and with a 13 million dollar budget maybe the only thing he could afford was an eighties looking B movie. It was a fun style but sometimes, much like in Bronson it overwhelmed the story.

The story is good though, it features Ryan Gosling in the lead role as a man who works as a mechanic and a stunt driver and also moonlights as a getaway driver. In the opening monologue he lays down the rules. He gives them 5 minutes to do whatever they want, outside of that they are on their own. With a hero that dabbles on the other side of the law he must hold a strict moral code on what he is willing to do in order for the audience to side with him. It also helps that the hero seems to epitomize cool. In order to prepare for the role Gosling rebuilt the 1973 Chevy Malibu that his character drives in the movie. The writers also do their best to help the audience connect with the character. He only speaks when it is absolutely necessary. This type of writing is rarely seen anymore, more often opting for dialogue that expresses what our characters think. Here the actors express themselves, rather than verbalize their thoughts.

There are a slew of actors who help to get Gosling's point across and help to define him and his actions. A plethora of television actors make brief appearances in the movie for some defining moments to our other actors including Bryan Cranston, Ron Perlman, and Christina Hendricks. One of the most surprising performances though belongs to Albert Brooks. I can't remember the last performance I liked of his, not counting voicing a fish looking for his son and a billionaire trying to take over the world. He brings a cool calm and trusted performance to the movie that really accentuates his character. Gosling's romantic opposite is played by up and coming A-list actress Carey Mulligan, whose talent seems to go wasted. She is asked to do little for her own character and instead only to move plot and provide support to Gosling. This is something rarely seen anymore either, a supporting actress actually there solely for the support of the main actor. But as the female lead and boasting such a talent it is a shame to see Mulligan’s go to waste in a movie that asks her to do very little.

Mulligan's biggest contribution may be that she brings to the movie what many in the audience may already be expecting. There are very few times Gosling has not been involved with a romantic counterpart, so for the females in the audience she brings some of that to the story. But really any expression of love in the movie is there to accentuate the violence willing to be done for it. For the guys in the audience there is no shortage of blood. It takes a violent turn during the second half. It is almost shocking how violent they go, but maybe even worse it is sometimes laughable how bloody some of the scenes get. Also shocking is despite the movie being called Drive just how little our main character spends behind the wheel. I understand not wanting to be lumped into the same genre as The Fast and the Furious, but there is really only one good driving sequence which I can't help but feel was inserted in at the producer's request to increase the action pacing a bit.

The movie is fun, but it just gives off the impression that it is trying too hard. The movie really wants to fit into a certain genre and be a certain style. It wants to be an art house movie and an action movie and I don't know if the two blend well together. Some people are going to love it, a lot of blood a lot of action why wouldn't they, but for me the need to be artistic as well as bloody made it too ridiculous. For some people that is exactly what they are going to want. If you want an eighties movie with a hero the likes of an Eastwood then you should enjoy this movie. I enjoyed it, but it took me a long time to really formulate any kind of opinion on it which usually means that the movie is good but certainly not a must see. B-