Best Actor 1997

[Sabin]

Kevin Kline isn't great IMO in The Ice Storm. He's such a fussy actor that asking him to play uber-WASP is almost too much. I didn't feel drawn into his affair and remained very distant to me, unlike the rest of the stellar cast. He basically just walks around with pursed lips. In & Out is nowhere near as riotous as it should be. One the one hand, it plays like the most mediocre episode of Will & Grace, which really isn't saying much. It's amazing to think that "The Kiss" was such a big deal considering how unromantic it was in nature. Kevin Kline's performance is an act of Gay-face, but there is something innately amusing about comedies in which characters lose their grip on identity and reality, so there is something innately amusing about In & Out, and Kevin Kline who is more than up to the task and seems to thrive on how one dimensional all of this is. The entire ensemble does excellent sitcom work except for Joan Cusack who is pretty amazing. I remember being astonished that she was getting critic's awards, let alone key nominations for the kind of performance that is destined to be overlooked.

[bizarre]

Confused by the Kline appreciation here. I love The Ice Storm but he's merely solid and his role is hardly large enough to be called a lead in the first place. He's not great in In & Out, either.

[HarryGoldfarb]

I voted for Jack... Count me on the ones who enjoy As Good as it Gets (Hunt included)... Ulee's Gold was close to boring and all the time I couldn't stop thinking Fonda was playing no other character than his own father. Wag the Dog is a film I really like, but I don't associate that Hoffman performance with something like "the best of the year". Hated The Apostle. Damond comes in an actually close second in my estimation...

[rudeboy]

Damon's charismatic, star-making performance would have been my choice at the time although a recent viewing confirms that the movie only works in fits and starts. Still, he carries it pretty successfully, making one root for Will even when he's being a complete arse. My vote went to Fonda, though, who is compelling and moving in an otherwisr rather bland film.

Had Al Pacino not been given his laughable career Oscar a few years earlier I'm pretty sure he'd have been carried to a nomination and possibly win for what I feel may be the strongest work of his career. His final moments in the film are devastating. Ian Holm surely also should have been up there for his rare and wonderful leading role.

1. Al Pacino, Donnie Brasco
2. Ian Holm, The Sweet Hereafter
3. John Hurt, Love and Death on Long Island
4. Kevin Kline, The Ice Storm
5. Tony Leung, Happy Together

[OscarGuy]

I've seen all five performances and they are mostly week and missing the likes of Kevin Kline in The Ice Storm, Ian Holm in The Sweet Hereafter, John Cusack in Grosse Pointe Blank, Kevin Kline in In & Out. Hell, I'd even vote for Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic before some of these.

Damon in Good Will Hunting is fine for a young actor, but I think the film mostly succeeds on its story, not on the performances. I think Affleck's better, but he's clearly support. I hate The Apostle and while Robert Duvall gives a good performance, but I still don't like it, but that's probably more because of the film than anything else. I soured on Duvall after that and found most of his performances after to take on characteristics of this one (or perhaps they were just Duvall's characteristics to begin with as I don't think I've seen him stretch much since), so he's right out. Hoffman is good in Wag the Dog, but I would consider this a stunt performance more so than I would in Rain Man, but since I liked Rain Man stunt-regardless, Hoffman's work here doesn't bother me. I think the film is more fun than its given credit for, but I still wouldn't have voted for him. Nicholson is a fine actor and As Good As It Gets is probably his best late-career work. I wouldn't mind his win much if it didn't feel like a prelude to bringing us one of the great Best Actress injustices of all time. Helen Hunt's win has more to do with Nicholson's work than Hunt's work, so I blame him a little. Out of this lot, I'd probably even vote for him if it weren't for Fonda.

Ulee's Gold might be a slightly tedious film, but it's not because of Fonda's wonderful performance. He's subtle, almost natural. The one problem I have is that this almost feels like Fonda trying to turn in a performance like Paul Newman's in Nobody's Fool. I'd almost say some of what Fonda does here was influenced by Newman's prior work. Yet, when compared with these five nominees, he's clearly the best of them.

As for my best five list:

1. Kevin Kline - The Ice Storm (since I could only choose one of his two, this is the far better performance than In & Out)
2. Ian Holm - The Sweet Hereafter
3. John Cusack - Grosse Pointe Blank
4. Peter Fonda - Ulee's Gold
5. Jack Nicholson - As Good As It Gets

[ITALIANO]

I wish I could break this three-way tie but I can't - I still haven't seen The Apostle, and as I feel that Robert Duvall's performance, on paper at least, is one I might vote for, I have to abstain. Of the four I've seen, I'd pick either Nicholson or Hoffman, but till I finally get The Apostle - and I'm working on it - I won't make my choice.

[The Original BJ]

My choice for the year's best actor, by a wide margin, is Ian Holm in The Sweet Hereafter -- a heartfelt, morally complex performance in a great movie. It seems like the surprise on Oscar nom morning was that Sweet Hereafter got the nominations it did, so I'd hate to sound greedy, but Holm should have been there too.

I also think Russell Crowe gave one of his best performances in L.A. Confidential, but I guess that movie had too many solid male performances for any to really gain traction.

Without Holm on the ballot, I'm not terribly enthusiastic about any of these men as winners, and thought about voting for a number of them.

Hoffman is the one I'd strike first. I've loved him so many times over the years, but I thought this nomination was a real waste of space. Wag the Dog has an amusing conceit, and some smart, funny moments, but I found Hoffman's character a buffoon, and think this performance tips the movie too far into to silliness. (And there IS an Academy Award for producing. It's called Best Picture.)

I think Ulee's Gold is a pretty dreary movie, with some really stiff dialogue. Peter Fonda is definitely the best thing about it, in probably the most full-bodied role of his career. But I don't respond as highly as many do to this performance. I think Fonda has some lovely moments, but he was definitely not the actor his father or sister were, and he can't overcome the nature of his material.

In his review of As Good As It Gets, Mike D'Angelo makes a good point about the problematic characterization of Melvin Udall: what is his problem, exactly? Does he have extreme OCD? Or is he just an asshole? I don't think James L. Brooks (& Andrus) really figured out this character, nor did they come up with a convincing enough arc that explains why the other characters in the movie ultimately fall for him. Despite all that, I do think Nicholson gives a pretty funny performance -- the screenwriters DID give him a lot of good dialogue -- and his chemistry with Helen Hunt achieves a tenderness that makes you sort of fall for the movie, even when significant chunks don't work. In my book, Nicholson is at least a three-Oscar actor, and, given the lack of competition, I'm not at all outraged that he won. But I can vote for him plenty for his very best performances, so I won't pick him for this.

I come close to choosing Robert Duvall, who won two of the three major critics' awards. I think The Apostle is a reasonably interesting movie about faith and what it means to some people, and Duvall absolutely takes hold of the screen during those sermons. But the movie also goes on WAY too long, and those sermons really start to overstay their welcome. Duvall would have been a respectable enough choice, but the movie (and the performance) aren't exactly what I'd deem exciting enough for true enthusiasm. I kept waiting for a moment that I really thought justified major prizes, and it never quite came.

So is my vote really Matt Damon, the newbie up against a slew of veterans? I'll grant that there's a rawness to Damon's acting here that he would polish up over the years. But I also think his youthful energy and from-the-gut emotion are part of what made this breakthrough memorable. Will Hunting is a very smart guy, unsure of how to funnel his intelligence into anything productive, and Damon beautifully captures many of the challenges of being intelligent in a world that sometimes values smarts, but not always. As I said, it's not a major performance, but instead of picking one of the vets who I'd have enthusiastically rewarded elsewhere, by a hair, I'll go with Damon's star-is-born moment.

[Mister Tee]

If only Al Pacino had been there in Matt Damon's place, it would have been a whole slate of the Over the Hill Gang. Pacino's performance would have been the best of the bunch, too. He seemed to will himself into smallness and insignificance in this role: standing outside the social club, hoping for attention from the big cheese, was an incredibly heart-rending moment, one that required him to utterly submerge his generally outsized persona. His movie was a better vehicle than the other contenders had, as well. (There were other good movies -- The Ice Storm, Boogie Nights, LA Confidential -- that had creditable lead male performances, but none that really struck me as best actor level)

All of the actual nominees came from problematic projects. For me, Ulee's Gold is what the early batch of 80s indies made me fear the niche would always be: honest, heartfelt, deadly dull movies about stupefying ordinary people. Peter Fonda does nothing wrong, but his character is without much interest, and the film is so dry it almost amounts to sensory deprivation.

I'm with Magilla in finding Wag the Dog only fitfully funny, not the laugh-riot I was promised (and I managed to catch the movie during the brief period when it was pure imaginative satire -- a week before the Grand Scandal turned it topical). Unlike some here, I'm a long-time fan of Dustin Hoffman, and was perfectly pleased to see him get one last nod from the Academy. But the role and film are too minor for consideration.

I liked pretty much everything about Good Will Hunting except the idea and structure; it's an example of what talented folk can do with a fairly stale premise. I thought Matt Damon's work heralded the arrival of a good young actor (actually, I'd thought he also stood out in the otherwise unmemorable Courage Under Fire a year earlier). But it's not so notable a piece of work as to merit best actor.

The Apostle is, like Ulee's Gold, a sort of movie that doesn't interest me conceptually -- generally, rural folk are not my favorite characters -- but I liked what Robert Duvall did, as both director and leading man, to make the film's situations singular and interesting. I can understand picking him, especially if you passed him by in the Tender Mercies year. But I went with him there, and that's enough.

I find As Good As It Gets a wildly schizophrenic affair. For me, at the baseline plot level, it's pretty close to a piece of shit. Yet I find a good many of the film's set pieces funny and endearing in the best James L. Brooksian way. Given the fuzzy nature of the writing credits (it was WGA-deemed a collaboration between Brooks and Mark Andrus, but Andrus didn't even show up to the WGA dinner when they won), I'm guessing Andrus -- otherwise known for the unimpressive Life As a House -- wrote the original draft, and Brooks bigfooted his way in and reshaped alot of it, with help from his leading actors. And here's where I have to depart from alot of common wisdom: I think Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt both do a great job in elevating the material. Jack was by then mostly past doing anything but his persona (Jack-ing off, if you will), but here he employed it to its funniest effect in some time. In this motley crew of actors, that's enough to get my vote.

[FilmFan720]

This is the kind of year where I wish there was a none of the above option...a lot of mediocre performances in mediocre movies.

We'll start with Nicholson, who I will actually come out and say is fairly offensive in this film. Maybe Brooks is more at fault than Nicholson, and I understand the film is supposed to be broad, but I have several people very close to me with OCD and this film captured none of that disorder correctly. It is mean and buffoonish, almost like an SNL skit. That movie has little redeeming quality for me, and Nicholson isn't it.

Matt Damon has turned into one of my favorite actors, but after Good Will Hunting I actually thought it was Ben Affleck who was going to have the great career...his charisma overshadows the flat work of everyone else in the film. Peter Fonda and Robert Duvall are both fine in their performances, but I remember being so underwhelmed by their work and their films that I have a hard time voting for them here. This is minor work from both of them.

So, I am left with Dustin Hoffman, who at least made me laugh. I'll go for him.

It isn't like we had to have this weak of a slate, though. Ian Holm was hands down the best performance of the year (in a film that got a surprising level of support from the Academy) and should have been here. Kevin Kline had a great year, with two brilliant performances, and I would have nominated him for The Ice Storm. Christopher Guest gave the years funniest performance in Waiting for Guffman, Mark Wahlberg gave the year's breakthrough performance in Boogie Nights and Alan Arkin is wonderful in Four Days in September. That would be my lineup.

[Big Magilla]

1997 represented a changing of the guard, so to speak, but you couldn't tell that from the Oscr nominations.

At the beginning of the talkie era it was clear that most of the silent screen stars, both male and female, were unable to meet the demands of talkies which required naturalistic acting as well as good looks and the ability ot project in order to connect with audiences. Big name stage stars for the most part did not suit the new era either, making way for a whole batch of new stars including James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, Spencer Tracy and many more to come. By the 1950s these actors, though still going strong, were eclipsed by an exciting new batch of male stars that inlcuded Marlon Brando, Paul Newman and James Dean. By the late 1960s, early 1970s, a more hip group of young actors which included Dustin Hoffman, Jack Nicholson and Al Pacino took over. By 1997, they, too, were beginning to be eclipsed by a younger generation. The year's most exciting performers were Matt Damon in both Good Will Hunting and The Rainmaker; Mark Wahlberg in Boogie Nights; Guy Pearce and Russell Crowe in L.A. Confidential and yes, Leonardo DiCaprio in Ttianic, but only Damon managed a nomiantion.

Of the older actors, the only one of the nominees I liked was Nicholson who gave one of his most perfectly nuanced performances in As Good As It Gets. If they had to nominate another veteran over the new crop of actors then Ian Holm in The Sweet Hereafter should have gotten a nod over Hoffman, Peter Fonda and Robert Duvall.

I found Wag the Dog to be only mildly entertaining and was not impressed by either Hoffman or Robert De Niro. Fonda, though good, was channeling his father throughout Ulee's Gold. It was a decent performance, but the film was so predictable (to me anyway) that I wondered what all the fuss was about.

I've never gotten the acclaim for The Apostle. I coudln't stand Duvall's overbearing character or his performance and his endless selling of the film on TV left me cold. Farrah Fawcett was the only one in the film I liked.

I voted for Nicholson.

[mlrg]

Not a very strong line up performance wise. Great names though.

Never understood the praise for Duvall. The movie is really a labour of love but I couldn't connect.

Voted for Nicholson.

[MovieFan]

Robert Duvall- The Apostle. I absolutely hate Nicholson's win, there was no need to give him another Oscar for such an average performance

[Reza]

My picks for 1997:

Jack Nicholson, As Good As It Gets
Ian Holm, The Sweet Hereafter
Al Pacino, Donnie Brasco
Leonardo DiCaprio, Titanic
Billy Connolly, Mrs Brown

The 6th Spot: Matt Damon, Good Will Hunting

[Damien]

In 1996, I thought that Jerry Maguire was just about the phoniest movie ever made, a film in which hardly any characters, action, dialogue or situations had the ring of truth to them or any resemblance to real life. But then, just a year later came As Good As It Gets, a film in which absolutely no characters, action, dialogue or situations had the ring of truth to them or any resemblance to real life. In fact, it made Jerry Maguire look positively Chekovian in comparison. And the worst thing about it was Jack Nicholson, hamming it up as if he had bought out every delicatessen on the Lower East Side. The character made no sense, and Nicholson’s antics made him even more unbelievable and noisome. I look at this performance and woner, how at the time of Five Easy Pieces, Carnal Knowledge and The Last Detail did I adore Jack Nicholson and how in the world did it come to this. Another swell job by the voters in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Robert Duvall and Dustin Hoffman are two actors I generally can’t stand and these two performances did nothing to up them in my estimation. Duvall, at least, wasn’t quite as somnolent as usual but it was just another in his gallery of drearily dull characterizations. And Hoffman managed to be even more obnoxious than usual – a stupid nomination for a stupid performance in a stupid film.

I think Matt Damon has developed into a wonderful, possibly even great, actor, something he first gave evidence of in 1999 with The Talented Mr. Ripley. (And what a fearless actor he’s become. Not to mention a great citizen.) But I was thoroughly unimpressed with everything about Good Will Hunting, which I found completely conventional, predictable and uninteresting. Which is pretty much how I felt about Damon’s performance.

So that leaves Peter Fonda, but it’s in no way only because the competition is so dire. Fonda’s performance in Ulee’s Gold is a master class in the power of understatement. So much emotion is pent up inside of him, and he gives the audience an inkling of this while also showing his world-weary efforts to be even-tempered. It’s a lovely performance. I’ve always liked Fonda and felt that he was an under-rated actor, I was delighted when he finally earned recognition for his work, winning both the New York Film Critics Award and a Golden Globe. Pity he lost the Oscar to that buffoonish performance.

My Own Top 5:
1. Ethan Hawke in Gattaca
2. Peter Fonda in Ulee’s Gold
3. Joaquin Phoenix in Inventing The Abbots
4. Nick Nolte in Afterglow
5. Al Pacino in Donnie Brasco

[Bruce_Lavigne]

Nicholson is out immediately. I recently caught As Good as It Gets on TV, and was surprised at how much he doesn't rely on the "Jack" tricks that sabotage most of his later work (though he does use them), and he's quite entertaining. But in a film that practically assaults with its ordinariness, he's far too slight to merit consideration.

I can't say anything better about Damon. He evolved into an actor I like a lot, but at this point, there wasn't really a lot to him, and while he's perfectly fine in Good Will Hunting, he's also nothing to get excited about. And again, the movie is startlingly ordinary given its reputation (at the time) as some kind of achievement.

Hoffman is probably in the best film of the nominees, and it's always a treat to see what he can do with a truly satisfying comic role. I don't begrudge him his nomination, but I want a little more from a winner.

I'd be fine with either Duvall or Fonda. Both are nominated for very, very minor films, but both do extraordinary work within those limiting confines.

Fonda in Ulee's Gold suggests incredibly deep wells of emotion beneath an almost minimalist exterior. The comparisons to his father are well-warranted, but this is more than just an homage, and it gives an endlessly compelling anchor to a movie that might pass completely unnoticed without it.

Such a description could just as easily apply to The Apostle, but Duvall provides it with an equally compelling central character. The difference, I think, is that Duvall has the trickier role. We've seen a million southern preachers in a million movies, and Duvall's Sonny is just as prone as his cinematic (and real-world) brethren to the kind of energetic sermons that have led more than one actor fatally over the top... or worse, into a crude stereotype. The difference is that Duvall the writer-director cares too much about Sonny to make him anything less than a wholly specific character, and Duvall the actor marries Sonny's showmanship and bluster to a great actor's control, disguised as pure raw, unaffected life-force. (I'm perhaps alone on this board in this assessment, but for my money Duvall is indeed one of the great American movie actors.) This is quite possibly his best performance, and it's one I vote for without hesitation.


My top 5:
1. Robert Duvall, The Apostle
2. Al Pacino, Donnie Brasco
3. Ian Holm, The Sweet Hereafter
4. Peter Fonda, Ulee's Gold
5. Guy Pearce, L.A. Confidential