As proof that these articles are a bit silly to be writing right now, as I pointed out in my Best Actress article, these are all just a snapshot,
since clearly after the raves The Theory
of Everything Felicity Jones got at Toronto she’ll likely go lead and might
even win the entire thing.
Still, though, it’s a fun bit of silliness and I hate
starting things I don’t complete (the 2013 OVP is starting up again this week,
I promise), so we’ll continue on with Best Actor. This category always feels ridiculously full, and once again
that’s the case with a number of actors taking on many challenging roles,
though I must admit that even here I feel a tad underwhelmed. I genuinely get bored with AMPAS’s
bizarre and constant love of biopics.
The reality is that while these are occasionally brilliant (Zodiac, A Social Network, basically the
David Fincher ones), by-and-large they are boring because they stick to
well-known and predictable narratives and while they occasionally have superb
acting, they rarely delve into tangents and interesting ways of telling a
story.
Still, though, this is about Oscar’s opinions and not mine,
and Oscar loves him a biopic, which should surely help the handsome and affable
Eddie Redmayne make his way into the Academy’s good graces. The
Theory of Everything got an outstanding response in Toronto and though he
is pretty young by this category’s standards, I still think we should count on
his name amongst the nominees.

Benedict Cumberbatch’s The
Imitation Game has a little bit of a smell around it right now in my
opinion, though I am basing that on nothing other than the trailer, which gave
away the entire movie (that always leaves a bitter taste in my mouth and makes me a bit nervous about the movie). Still, this is Harvey’s big player this
year, and it’s hard to imagine Cumberbatch, who is at “that moment” in his
career, going much longer without Oscar attention, especially for something so BAIT-y.
Continuing the oddly first-timer heavy aspect of this
category (really, there’s a decent chance that all five of the nominees in this
category will be first-time nominees, which would be the first time this has
happened in Best Actor since 1934) we have Michael Keaton, back from the career
abyss with a show-stopping role in Birdman. Hats off to Keaton for playing a very
meta character (a washed-up actor most famous for playing a superhero…sound
familiar?), and I think that if this delivers Keaton could be in a position
very similar to Mickey Rourke in The
Wrestler a few years ago.

That being said, I think we’re looking at a first-timer at
this point for the fifth slot.
Jack O’Connell is the lead of one of the year’s biggest pictures (Unbroken), but is probably too young at 24 and
way too hot to be nominated in a category that likes their nominees middle-aged
and sexless. Timothy Spall is
leading a Mike Leigh film which is occasionally good for an acting citation
(though Leigh's more consistent for writing, where he's almost certain to be nominated again this year). Therefore, my gut is telling me that this is going to go to
David Oyelowo at this point. His
star is on the rise after The Butler,
and Selma has that sort of feel of a
film that is going to land a huge number of nominations.
My Predictions: I’ve
kind of already gone there (Cumberbatch, Oyelowo, Carell, Keaton, and
Redmayne). If I had to name some
names that I think are being underestimated, we’ve got Gael Garcia Bernal (Jon
Stewart is going to campaign the hell out his Rosewater and everyone likes
Stewart), Spall (whom I already listed but bears repeating: he did win Cannes,
after all), and perhaps Oscar Isaac who is a major emerging talent but may be
picking too Indy of films with Inside Llewyn Davis last year and A Most Violent Year this year (which will help him in the long run with his career
but will probably mean he’ll have to wait for a milquetoast biopic in a few years to compete
with Oscar).
Is there a winner? Oddly, while his costar
Jones is nearly the perfect age to win, Eddie Redmayne is almost certainly too
young to win Best Actor with Oscar.
Instead, I’d suspect that he’ll settle for an “investment nomination”
and he’ll applaud for either Keaton or Carell, both of whom are at the right
point in their careers to pull off a Forest Whitaker-style win (winning on what
will likely be your only nomination).
How bizarre would it be for Steve Carell to have an Emmy but no Oscar
though? Share your thoughts on this and this entire slate in the comments!
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