Best Supporting Actor 1937: H.B. Warner in Lost Horizon

H.B. Warner received his only Oscar nomination for portraying Chang in Lost Horizon.

Lost Horizon tells of a group of people whose plan is hijacked and later crashes who were escaping from a revolution in China that find themselves in a strange perfect place known as Shangri-La.

H.B. Wanner portrays Chang a man of some importance in Shangri-La who at first finds the people on the plane, and later tries to make them accustomed to the place. With a name like Chang one can easily say that he probably he is suppose to be Chinese. Thankfully H.B. Warner does not portray the role as so. He does not put a voice or try any mannerisms to try to suggest this in anyway, which is most certainly a good thing. He instead just portrays him straightly as a wise man who knows much of what there is to know about Shangri-La.

H.B. Warner is entirely fine in the part of the wise Chang. There is a nice low key pleasantness in his performance, and Warner also does a good job of conveying the mystery of Chang. There is always an otherworldly quality to Warner here that works well for the part of Chang. Chang is one of the primary representatives of Shangri-La, and Warner's performance does effectively bring to life the pleasantness as well as mysteriousness of the place. Warner properly stays consistent as Change, never changing at all during the film, as Chang is a constant.

Warner really does not have a bad moment in his performance, and plays the part well especially sense it could have easily been portrayed in a very bad fashion considering the time. It also is a bit too limited of a part, and he just does not have that much of an impact on the film. I liked him in the film, but really his character just is never that interesting. It is just too limited for anything to really come from the part and really in the end this is a career nomination for Warner. Thankfully he is at least good in the part, but his performance is just not that memorable.