Alternate Best Supporting Actor 1990: Armand Assante in Q & A

Armand Assante did not receive an Oscar nomination, despite being nominated for a Golden Globe, for portraying Roberto 'Bobby Tex' Texador.

When Q & A began I thought I was potentially watching a hidden gem, after all it's directed by Sidney Lumet, as it appeared it was going to be a well written story about a young assistant district attorney Al Reilly (Timothy Hutton) trying to uncover the truth behind an extremely corrupt police officer Lt. Mike Brennan (Nick Nolte). Well I suppose it is about that, but after all it is directed by Sidney Lumet who could make a terrible film just as readily as a masterpiece. After about the half hour mark it became obvious it was going to be closer to a Morning After than the Verdict. Just like the Morning After it has a terribly out of place score, and ends having the subtlety of a jack hammer. After all it throws in stuff about racial discrimination, which could be fine, but the problem is it feels thrown in. I think everything became clear, what type of movie it was going to be, when suddenly Hutton's character was accused of being racist by his old girlfriend in such a terribly written way that I knew where the film was headed. Well actually it was even before that where Assante's character accuses Al of bringing him in for questioning only because that ex-girlfriend is his current girlfriend. 

Well anyways Armand Assante plays another criminal, back to the theme of the year. A rather poorly defined drug dealer who we meet in that interrogation scene. He does not say much other than try to look like the calm and cool sort of gangster type. Well Assante walks in then runs back out and we see essentially the way Assante will play the part. All that I've seen from Assante it is kinda similar style where he's a bit flamboyant to say the least. He's always kinda moving a bit even when he's standing still and he seems to purposefully accentuate every line he gets. Well this sort of approach might not always work but it does work well enough here since it is a natural fit for Texador who just kinda does things his own way. Assante brings enough of a charismatic incisiveness to the role as he verbally beats down Al's early on, and it sets up the toughness of the character well enough. Well that means we're going to get more of Texador's character and find out what really makes him unique.

Well we don't really get that all we get is watching him attempt to avoid being murdered by the out of control Mike Brennan by first pooling other people on his hit list then going to Al to take him down. I suppose Assante has the most consistent writing behind him in that Texador always seems to be the same person we met in his first scene, but then again the film actually does strangely little with him. He kinda goes from scene to scene just saying "Mike Brennan has to be stopped and here's how". It is a doubled edged sword in that he gets avoid some of the ludicrous, or terrible moments that the other performs must endure, but that's only because he's used so little. It's very repetitive until he gets blown up on a yacht which came off as unintentionally funny to me and really should have ended with Nick Nolte saying "Ain't I a Stinker". Assante does just fine with what he has to work with. He brings the right confidence and calm in creating the cool gangster, the film just does not given him anywhere to go with it. I liked his performance but I'm not sure if it was even possible to love it.