Dearest Reader, we know you want to move on from 2024 but please allow us our final indulgences for only one more week - promise!
Jason Schwartzmann (Queer) was one of MANY supporting performances that might have been discussed this past year if Leads weren't usurping the supporting actor oxygen
by Nathaniel R
The film year has ended with Adrien Brody (The Brutalist) and Kieran Culkin (A Real Pain) taking their Oscar categories. So... on account of the timeless procrastinator's slogan 'better late than never' I'm now sharing my own ballot. It was rather shocking / unpleasant (given my predilections) to realize that the men had arguably outdone the women (or at least equalled them) in acting achievements this past cinematic year. Nevertheless, since I far prefer watching / discussing actresses on the silver screen, I’m forcing the men to share one constrained listicle article. Take that, men – you can’t keep a good actressexual down.
Herewith the finalists (i.e. top dozen) for my own ballots in both Supporting Actor and Best Actor at the Film Bitch Awards. The official nominees are also announced...
SUPPORTING (Alpha Order)
Since this year's Oscar lineup was so very strong, the brilliant performance from Culkin is the only nominee that's not featured on that list above. Instead he's in the lead list where he belongs. The supporting categories are usually the acting categories with the least overlap between the industry's annual shortlists and mine. Part of this is due to the fact that I ignore fraudulent campaigns. Part is on account of different tastes. And part is surely due to seeing films all year long unlike the average Academy voter who seems to hibernate between winters emerging to watch a dozen movies before voting. For fun here are the stats on the alignment (or lack thereof) between myself and the Academy's acting branch over the past 10 seasons.
Okay moving on to the leading men.
LEAD (Alpha Order)
If there were a “body of work” Oscar annually, 2024's would have to go to Sebastian Stan, right? The Winter Soldier gave two very differently demanding but enormously successful performances and to sweeten the achievement he was honored for both of them during awards season. Raise your hand if you first saw Stan in The Covenant (2006) and weren’t expecting much but to lust after him for a few years until casting directors moved on to the next TV-pretty boy. Oops, was that just me? It’s always so life-affirming when people prove everyone wrong by constantly levelling up as Stan has been doing fairly consistently and methodically since.
As previously noted in Oscar-focused articles, my own Film Bitch Awards for male actors are eerily close in both categories to industry preferences this year which is a complete rarity (especially in supporting where Oscar voters are usually crazy-lazy)!
For fun here is how my own list aligned with Oscar lists for Lead Actor in the past ten years...
Adrien Brody won the Oscar. Will he win the Film Bitch Gold Medal? Stay tuned.
Continue to the nominees and capsule quotes on these performances...