As Oscar night, Sunday February 24th, nears, what about those 20 Oscar nominated actors? Check out these earlier performances to see why this year’s nominations are hardly accidental. One magazine just did a look back at Sam Elliott – “A Star Is Born” Supporting Actor nominee – and skipped “Lifeguard”! This is crazy because “Lifeguard” was
As Oscar night, Sunday February 24th, nears, what about those 20 Oscar nominated actors? Check out these earlier performances to see why this year’s nominations are hardly accidental. One magazine just did a look back at Sam Elliott – “A Star Is Born” Supporting Actor nominee – and skipped “Lifeguard”! This is crazy because “Lifeguard” was not just his breakthru role, it set the template for Elliott’s career: The soft-spoken man’s man of few words who lives by an unbending code of honor.
With Glenn Close, seven times a nominee now with “The Wife,” there are several key performances in a brilliant decades-spanning career. Albert Nobbs, a woman living as a man in turn of the century Ireland, was her sixth Academy nomination. “Dangerous Liaisons” (‘89) showcases a most evilly seductive Close. And of course: nutty Alex, who will not be wronged and left as a one weekend stand, in easily her most famous, most celebrated role in “Fatal Attraction” (’87).
Viggo Mortensen, a Best Actor nominee for the third time with “Green Book,” has several exceptional showcases in a career that has been marked by selectivity. Always serious and reflective, he won notice directed by Sean Penn in the 1991 “The Indian Runner” and then starred in two high-profile 1998 remakes: “A Perfect Murder” opposite Gwyneth Paltrow and Michael Douglas, reworking Hitchcock’s “Dial M for Murder,” and Gus van Sant’s color, shot-by-shot copy of Hitchcock’s “Psycho” opposite Julianne Moore and Vince Vaughn. It was being paged from New Zealand by Peter Jackson that made Mortensen a global star. Jackson was several weeks into filming his gargantuan trilogy simultaneously when he decided to replace the actor initially cast as Aragorn in “Lord of the Rings.” Looking as if he was born to ride wildly through pristine landscapes to save the world, Mortensen went from Middle Earth to his first Oscar nominated lead performance with David Cronenberg’s 2007 “Eastern Promises,” a London-set underworld story. A key sequence saw Mortensen’s heavily tattooed Russian gangster naked in a sauna, trying to survive an attack by knife-wielding hired assassins.
Amy Adams, a Best Supporting nominee for “Vice,” shares with Close the honor of being recognized six times now without a win. Key to Adams’ career are two must-see films. First, the movie that made her — at 30 – into a star: “Junebug” (2005), an offbeat, low-budget dramedy with Adams as an upbeat pregnant woman who remains optimistic despite much evidence to the contrary. It’s the first of her Oscar nominated roles. Then came her delightful, in every sense, Disney debut with the musical “Enchanted” (2007), a self-mocking rom-com that propelled her onto Hollywood’s A list.
AcornTV’s criminally-charged double whammy
AcornTV has two new crime series this month. The Dutch 12-episode “The Oldenheim Twelve” premieres Feb. 18, followed a week later on Feb. 25 with “London Kills: Series 1,” a procedural detective series revolving around an elite murder squad. Holland’s “Oldenheim” is startlingly good (English subtitles!). As it begins it echoes a now-familiar international murder mystery series premise: the gorgeous, lovely teenage girl who suddenly disappears and whose desperate search reveals all sorts of secrets of just about everyone.
