Oscar Volley: Best Supporting Actor

It's the final pre-nomination Oscar volley. Here's Eric and Chris to discuss Best Supporting Actor

A win for Ryan Gosling in "Barbie" would age so well. But Oscar rarely goes comedic.

CHRIS:  Hey Eric! It's Barbenheimer 2.0 in the Best Supporting Actor race. In my mind, the two most secured nominees in the bunch are from the pair of box office summer behemoths - Robert Downey Jr. in Oppenheimer and Ryan Gosling in Barbie. It'll be interesting race to see if Gosling can overtake Downey Jr. to win for a comedic performance, but that's a post-nomination conversation. It's not just that both of these men starred in the hottest movies of the year, they gave indelible performances that are cemented in the conversation this year (well, I would say Gosling did, but I'll hold space for the Downey lovers). 

May December was gaining momentum and critical acclaim at just the right time to be a major awards player (at least around the time the Globe nods were announced), which made me ecstatic...

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Tom Wilkinson (1948-2023)

by Cláudio Alves

THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL (2014) Wes Anderson

True character actors often feel like a thing of the past, one of those artifacts of bygone eras lost in our collective trudge forward. And yet, some performers keep the idea alive into the 21st century, shining brightly as something other than an all-consuming star. Such was the case of Tom Wilkinson, the two-time Academy Award-nominated actor who died suddenly last Saturday, surrounded by family. He was 75 years old. 

I concede that it might feel wrong to start the new year with an obituary. Still, one must pay respect to the fallen titan, an artist of integrity and craft whose filmography contains over a hundred credits, from minor indies to awards juggernauts, chamber dramas, blockbusters, animation, and the whole shebang. On this sad occasion, let's remember the greatness of Tom Wilkinson…

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More Category Confusion: LEAD or SUPPORTING?

by Cláudio Alves

Category confusion is always a hot topic in the Film Experience comment section. It's been debated across this awards season, from regional critics honors to the major precursors, from the smallest indie flick to some of the year's biggest blockbuster offerings. So. It's only logical for the LEAD or SUPPORTING polls to make a return. Last time, the lot included Killers of the Flower Moon, Passages, Barbie, and much more. Now, let's redirect our collective attention to newer releases, including the much-discussed May December. Are Charles Melton and Julianne Moore co-leads alongside Natalie Portman? Let's discuss…

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Wyler, Kazan, Ashby, Scorsese – Who's Next?

by Cláudio Alves

Barbra Streisand in FUNNY GIRL was the last performance William Wyler directed to an Oscar win.

As stated in the Scorsese at the Oscars write-up, the Killers of the Flower Moon auteur is one of only four directors to have helmed Academy Award-winning performances in all acting categories. The others are William Wyler, Elia Kazan, and Hal Ashby, with the former having the record to end all records. Across 32 years, Wyler directed fourteen victorious turns, including multiple champions in the four races. Such a feat won't likely be equaled, but that doesn't mean the quartet is bound to stay put forever. Some directors are on the cusp of joining the ranks of Wyler, Kazan, Ashby, and Scorsese…

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The Apology Nomination

by Cláudio Alves

Sometimes, even the Academy thinks they messed up. That's how you get what I like to call "apology nominations," crucially different from "career nominations" because they come in response to one or more specific slights in the recent past. They are the honors that resound with an echoing sorry if you ring them just right, and there's no better example than Paul Giamatti's 2005 Best Supporting Actor nomination for Cinderella Man. After his shocking Sideways snub, one feels he would have been included for anything remotely Oscar-friendly.

It doesn't mean this reliable character actor didn't deserve it, of course, but there's a narrative quirk to how he got there, a faint sense that AMPAS was making up for a mistake. Now that Giamatti's back in the race with The Holdovers, it got me thinking about other cases of the phenomenon in the years since Cinderella Man…

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