![]() ![]() A heartfelt and timely story, it's the kind of sympathetic role actors and audiences alike can't help but be drawn to. But in 2011, Bichir received the opportunity to lead A Better Life, an independent film about an undocumented immigrant in Los Angeles working as a landscaper and attempting to provide for his son. Demián Bichir had been a star in Mexican films and Telenovelas but was most known to American audiences for his role as Tijuanan mayor/drug cartel kingpin/love interest on the show Weeds. Where so many of these nominations seem to be just way to include a popular and respected actor, Weaver's solo nomination is one of those great stories honoring a deserved nominee from a small but worthy film.Ī great part can do wonders for a movie star, but taking a chance on someone less known can deliver something extraordinary. She seems ordinary and sweet and just loves her sons and then she starts kissing them on the mouth." Weaver's impact was so great, not only did she secure the Oscar nomination, she has worked on more mainstream and American films, including receiving a second Oscar nomination two years later for Silver Linings Playbook. I think that’s part of the interest that you find out gradually just how bad she is. As she relayed to Collider: "The temptation would have been for me to jump in and make her a villain from the beginning which wouldn’t be half as interesting a story. Her one film to make any waves stateside was 1975's Panic at Hanging Rock, which contributed to launching the career of Peter Weir ( The Truman Show, Dead Poets Society.) In Animal Kingdom, Weaver plays the matriarch of an Australian crime family and expertly toes the line between a caring, affectionate mother and grandmother and a devious sociopath, and masterfully playing that contradiction. Jacki Weaver had been a working actress on stage and screen since the 1970s exclusively in Australia. If the performance you give in the movie brings international attention to a small crime thriller from another continent and that carries you all the way to an Oscar nomination, you definitely get to make this list. Stanley Tucci gives an Oscar-worthy performance as Paul Child, Julia's husband, but Tucci was snubbed in favor of his performance in The Lovely Bones, for which he was the film's only nomination. Meryl Streep has been nominated for a lot of Oscars, and this one is one of her most deserved. She plays up the humanity of a woman making something of her life in a new setting, the perseverance Child had, and the heart in her loving marriage. With the help of a script penned by the incomparable Nora Ephron, Streep is far from a cartoon character like Child. This proves not to be an issue for Meryl Streep in Julie & Julia. She has been the subject of parody for years, most famously by Dan Aykroyd on Saturday Night Live. Julia Child, with her gargantuan height, boisterous gestures, and highly distinctive voice, almost comes off as a cartoon character. There is a fine line between impersonation and becoming the character of a real-life figure. Sometimes this is lobbed as a critique at the Oscars' expense, but in fairness, the challenge can be noteworthy. Real-life figures are a challenge the Academy often rewards actors for. Attempting to understand the complications is what led to the most lauded performance of Whitaker's career. When reflecting on the role, Whitaker recalls not viewing Idi Amin as a villain but looking into the layers that made up who Amin was and, in spite of it all, found a way to have sympathy for him. Whitaker is able to shift between the charismatic leader that charms the people all the way to an abhorrent tyrant having his friend strung up by hooks and every aspect of Amin in between. This all changed with 2006's The Last King of Scotland, in which Whitaker played Ugandan dictator Idi Amin. Forest Whitaker has been working in the entertainment industry both on-screen and behind the camera since the early 80s and despite being a successful and respected actor, his only role to receive major award buzz before his Oscar nomination was playing Charlie Parker in Clint Eastwood's Bird, for which Whitaker won Best Actor at the Cannes Film Festival. Peter O'Toole in Venus, Will Smith in The Pursuit of Happiness, and Ryan Gosling in Half Nelson all gave performances strong enough to get the film noticed, but the same can be said of the winner. At the 79th Academy Awards, four of the five best actor nominees were the sole nomination received by their films.
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