Sunday 9 November 2014

Alternate Best Supporting Actor 1977: Results

5. Peter Cushing in Star Wars - Cushing gives an effectively evil performance making the most out of his very simple role.

Best Scene: Testing the Death Star.
4. Dirk Bogarde in Providence - Bogarde is good enough in his rather broad scenes as an excessively cold man, but his best scene is in portraying the warm version of the man.

Best Scene: Clive's Birthday.
3. Richard Attenborough in The Chess Players - Attenborough has a limited part but makes a strong impact as usual with his powerful screen presence.

Best Scene: Outram's introduction.
2. James Mason in Cross of Iron - Mason gives a great portrait of the quiet exasperation and sadness of a man who still fulfills his duties while having no real passion for it.

Best Scene:  Colonel Brandt sends Captain Kiesel away.
1. Dennis Hopper in The American Friend - Well this was no contest for me as Hopper just stood easily above the rest. Hopper's version of Tom Ripley is absolutely compelling, chilling and yet surprisingly moving.

Best Scene: The Train Murder.
Overall Rank:
  1. Dennis Hopper in The American Friend
  2. James Mason in Cross of Iron
  3. David Warner in Cross of Iron
  4. Alec Guinness in Star Wars
  5. Maximilian Schell in Cross of Iron
  6. James Caan in A Bridge Too Far
  7. Harrison Ford in Star Wars
  8. Anthony Hopkins in A Bridge Too Far
  9. Richard Attenborough in The Chess Players
  10. Dirk Bogarde in Providence
  11. Jason Robards in Julia
  12. Robert Redford in A Bridge Too Far
  13. Tom Conti in The Duellists
  14. Sean Connery in A Bridge Too Far 
  15. Peter Cushing in Star Wars
  16. Gerard Blain in The American Friend
  17. Maximilian Schell in A Bridge Too Far
  18. Fancisco Rabel in Sorcerer
  19. James Earl Jones in Star Wars
  20. Bill Macy in The Late Show
  21. Amidou in Sorcerer
  22. Laurence Olivier in A Bridge Too Far
  23. Martin Shakar in Saturday Night Fever
  24. Edward Fox in A Bridge Too Far
  25. Bob Balaban in Close Encounters of the Third Kind
  26. Klaus Lowitsch in Cross of Iron
  27. Edward Fox in The Duellists
  28. Christopher Walken in Annie Hall
  29. Dirk Bogarde in A Bridge Too Far
  30. Alun Armstrong in The Duellists
  31. Francois Trauffaut in Close Encounters of the Third Kind 
  32. Albert Finney in The Duellists 
  33. Gene Hackman in A Bridge Too Far
  34. Eugene Roche in The Late Show
  35. David Warner in Providence 
  36. Michael Caine in A Bridge Too Far
  37. Vincenzo Crocitti in An Average Little Man 
  38. Hardy Kruger in A Bridge Too Far
  39. Bruno Cremer in Sorcerer 
  40. Vas Bisoglio in Saturday Night Fever
  41. Romolo Valli in An Average Little Man
  42. Amjad Kahn in The Chess Players
  43. Tony Robets in Annie Hall  
  44. Vadim Glowna in Cross of Iron
  45. Victor Banerjee in The Chess Players 
  46. Roberts Blossom in Close Encounters of the Third Kind
  47. Maximilian Schell in Julia
  48. Tom Skerritt in The Turning Point
  49. Barry Miller in Saturday Night Fever
  50. Curd Jurgens in The Spy Who Loved Me 
  51. John Considine in The Late Show
  52. Strother Martin in Slap Shot
  53. Paul Benedict in The Goodbye Girl 
  54. Geoffrey Hearn in The Spy Who Loved Me
  55. Anthony Daniels in Star Wars
  56. James Earl Jones in The Exorcist II: The Heretic
  57. Ed McMahon in Fun With Dick and Jane
  58. Dick van Patten in High Anxiety 
  59. Desmond Llewelyn in The Spy Who Loved Me
  60. Denholm Elliot in A Bridge Too Far
  61. Harvey Korman in High Anxiety
  62. Bernard Lee in The Spy Who Loved Me 
  63. Nicholas Ray in The American Friend
  64. Roger Fritz in Cross of Iron 
  65. Elliot Gould in A Bridge Too Far
  66. Fritz Weaver in Black Sunday
  67. Paul Sorvino in Oh, God!
  68. Jim Jordan in The Rescuers
  69. Michael V. Gazzo in Black Sunday
  70. Ralph Bellamy in Oh, God!
  71. Jackie Gleason in Smokey and The Bandit
  72. Richard Kiel in The Spy Who Loved Me
  73. Max von Sydow in The Exorcist II: The Heretic   
  74. John Vernon in A Special Day
  75. Jeff Carlson in Slap Shot
  76. Steve Hanson in Slap Shot
  77. Colin Blakely in Equus
  78. Donald Pleasence in Oh, God!
  79. Mike Henry in Smokey and The Bandit
  80. Ryan O'Neal in A Bridge Too Far
  81. Lionel Stander in New York, New York
  82. Ron Carey in High Anxiety
  83. James Mitchell in The Turning Point
  84. Harry Andrews in Equus
  85. Lou Salerni in Sasquatch The Legend of Bigfoot
  86. Mikhail Baryshnikov in The Turning Point
Next Year: 1946 Lead

16 comments:

Matt Mustin said...

Humphrey Bogart in The Big Sleep
Dana Andrews in The Best Years of Our Lives
David Niven in A Matter of Life and Death
Cary Grant in Notorious

GM said...

Edward G. Robinson - The Stranger
Orson Welles - The Stranger
David Niven - A Matter of Life and Death
John Garfield - Humoresque
Henry Fonda - My Darling Clementine
Dana Andrews - The Best Years of Our Lives

Luke Higham said...

Louis: Ratings & thoughts on Fox, Olivier, Schell, Connery, Redford, Hopkins and Caan in A Bridge Too Far.

The only suggestion I can come up with right now is Cary Grant in Notorious.

Your general thoughts on A Bridge Too Far as well.

Oh, RatedRStar, I'm really looking forward to Your rant, when Rains gets thrown off his mantlepiece by Barrymore.

Louis Morgan said...

Luke:

I actually was rather pleasantly surprised by the film which I might put as Attenborough's best. Many of the large scale scenes are quite impressive and well done. I found the various stories surprisingly easy to follow and I thought the star casting contributed to that well. I liked that even though it was about a failed mission Attenborough had some uplifting moments making it so the overall failure is even more powerfully felt. I do feel the ending is a bit a letdown, but not enough to hurt the film all that much.

Fox - 3(When Fox goes broad it usually goes badly, but in this case I thought it worked. He brings the right proper ego and larger than life conviction and delivers his big speech quite effectively)

Olivier - 3.5(He comes in a bit late but I felt his mostly reactionary performance was quite moving and helped to bring the needed weight to the loss of life in the film)

Schell - 3.5(Schell for the most part just needs to be the German menace, which he certainly is. Schell brings a greater complexity though in a very subtle fashion as he seems to suggest some humanity in his character, and I particularly loved his final scene with Hopkins)

Connery - 3.5(Connery's role is pretty straight forward but Connery's pretty good in that straight forwardness. He brings his usual strong presence and command and is quite good in portraying the growing frustrations of his character as the battle wages on)

Redford - 3.5(Rather than being peppered throughout like most of the stars he just is in one long sequence which happened to be one of my favorite sequences in the film. I thought Redford was great in creating his character in a matter of minutes and carried his scene wonderfully well)

Hopkins - 4(Strong work from Hopkins as he kinda portrays the deterioration of his force through his performance and is effective in portraying the way the battle takes a toll on his character mentally and physicaly. He also is particularly moving in his later scenes as he shows the quiet resignation of his character, yet Hopkins is terrific in portraying that the passion of the man never goes away. His last scene with Schell is so great as Hopkins still portrays such a striking defiance in his character even after he's been completely defeated)

Caan - 4.5(Caan's character doesn't have a major card to play and technically his scenes could have been disposed, but Caan makes them worthwhile. Caan's already a perfect fit for this sorta gruff Sergeant role anyway and in a typical tough guy side he does well. He does more than that though and I love every second of his pivotal scene. He's terrific, and rather funny as the Sergeant evades the Germans particularly the moment where he and a German soldier seem to have an understanding for a moment. He's outstanding as he brings so much heart later on in the scene when the Sergeant insists that the Army Surgeon take care of his fellow soldier or he'll kill him. A great almost one scene wonder.)

Matt Mustin said...

Louis, I know you love a good "One Scene Wonder", as do I, so I was wondering what your ratings and thoughts are on the following (if you can remember them):
Christopher Walken in Sleepy Hollow
William Fichtner in The Dark Knight
Jude Law in The Aviator
Pete Postlethwaite in Inception
SPOILER: Bill Murray in Zombieland

RatedRStar said...

JUDGEMENT DAY IS SOON UPON US

Jean Marais - La Belle Et La Bete (One of my winning requests)
Cary Grant - Notorious
Dana Andrews - The Best Years Of Our Lives
Henry Fonda - My Darling Clementine
David Niven - A Matter Of Life and Death

Anonymous said...

So now what would your top 10 films of 1977 be Louis?

Anonymous said...

Also Louis, I'd like to know your top 5 for Best Actress and Supporting Actress for 1977

Robert MacFarlane said...

Jean Marais in La Belle Et La Bete

Yeah, that's really it.

Louis Morgan said...

Matt:

Walken - 3(To be frank I prefer Walken when he's not being weird. That being said even his weird performances usually offer some entertainment value and that's the case for this one as well)

Fichtner - 2.5(It think his face makes his role more memorable here than anything he does performance wise)

Law - (I don't really remember him all that well)

Postlethwaite - 3(Felt he and Murphy kinda stole the emotional heft away from DiCaprio in the film. Their one scene together was perhaps my favorite moment from that film as they both brought such a poignancy to the relationship of their two characters that technically did not matter that much to the main story)

Murray - 3.5(Hilarious performance to be sure and turns his whole appearance into the best scene from that film)

Anonymous:

Top Ten:

1. The Duellists
2. The Late Show
3. Cross of Iron
4. The American Friend
5. Star Wars
6. Sorcerer
7. A Bridge Too Far
8. An Average Little Man
9. Eraserhead
10. Black Sunday

Actress:

1. Diane Keaton - Annie Hall
2. Lily Tomlin - The Late Show
3. Sophia Loren - A Special Day
4. Jane Fonda - Julia
5. Marsha Mason - The Goodbye Girl

Supporting Actress:

1. Shelley Winters - An Average Little Man
2. Vanessa Redgrave - Julia
3. Liv Ullmann - A Bridge Too Far
4. Melinda Dillon - Close Encounters of the Third Kind
5. Cloris Leachman - High Anxiety

GetDonaldSutherlandAnOscar said...

Dana Andrews - The Best Years of Our Lives

Also, I can't imagine Barrymore shooing Rains off from the top spot. It's A Wonderful Life is my favourite film of all time, and Notorious is one of my least favourite Hitchocks, but even I have to concur that Rains is simply fantastic in his role, and has a lot more to do than Barrymore, who is still great.

If anything, I think Travers has the better chance of ursurping Rains, although that might just be my subjective opinion :)

GetDonaldSutherlandAnOscar said...

Also rewatching Star Wars original trilogy again has really made me appreciate Mark Hammill more, I've always found him rather underrated in holding the film together with what is frankly, a rather poorly writte (underwritten, even) character.

Also, I love the Ewoks now :)

Anonymous said...

Thoughts/ratings on:
Christopher Walken in Annie Hall
Gene Hackman in A Bridge Too Far

Anonymous said...

Ratings/thoughts on Cloris Leachman in High Anxiety and Liv Ullmann in A Bridge Too Far. Also, it looks like you upgraded Vanessa Redgrave's rating for Julia, can I have your new rating and thoughts on her?

Scott Gingold said...

Dana Andrews, The Best Years of Our Lives
Groucho Marx, A Night in Casablanca

Louis Morgan said...

Anonymous:

Walken - 3(An enjoyable bit of Walken strangeness to be sure)

Hackman - 3(A thankless role to be sure, he should have been given Ryan O'Neal's part, as his character is given like a minute every thirty minutes. It's made even more thankless as the script rather randomly decides whether or not he will speak broken English making some problems for the accent Hackman uses as it is random when his character should have a thicker or thinner accent. Hackman still does just fine with that though, and is particularly good with his various reactions throughout that bring some weight to any scene that he is in)

Anonymous:

Leachman - 3.5(High Anxiety for the most part is a lot failed puns and Mel Brooks failing to capture Hitchcock's visual the way he managed to capture James Whale's. Leachman's absurd portrayal of an excessively wretched and bizarre nurse I thought was easily the highlight)

Ullman - 3.5(Like Olivier she comes in rather later but offers some fine support when she does. Her performance manages to be quietly moving portrayal of a civilian being forced into watch the intense suffering of the conflict)

Redgrave - 3.5(Not really new thoughts but I do feel she does deserve credit for her major scene which she handles very well)