Alternate Best Supporting Actor 2002: Timothy Spall in All or Nothing

Timothy Spall did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Phil in All or Nothing.

All or Nothing is more mid-tier Mike Leigh, in that while it doesn't feel aimless like the least of his efforts it doesn't quite find that cathartic rhythm of his best work, about 3 working class families that live in the same apartment complex.

Frequent Leigh collaborator Timothy Spall returns once again to play a technical patriarch as he had done in Secrets & Lies. This man though not exactly living his best life, but you know I'd feel the same way if James Corden was my son (okay that was a bit cruel but so was his performance in Cats). This as we find him in the first half of the film slogging through his life as a not particularly invigorated cab driver, who is the husband of the similarly downtrodden Penny (Lesley Manville) with two young adult children who live with them. Spall's performance in the early scenes of the film is a man in basically a depressive haze. Spall's quite powerful in fashioning just the way the man just is always looking almost like a beaten hound dog with his shrunken expression, and the way he always seems to look away from any conflict. This as we see as his wife attempts to speak to her son their son who is an overweight layabout, we Spall just staring with that same somberness. Later Phil does attempt to get his son to do anything and he speaks with just a meek sense of defeat even before one word comes out of his mouth. Spall realizing a man in Phil he basically has become stuck within this state, and has been brought down within it for a long time. This as even as he drives his cab it is with eyes of a man somewhat lost within those perpetual troubles that are sitting within his mind.

Spall most important moment in the first half of the film is when he has a conversation with an initially rude French costumer who berates him for his carelessness. Eventually the conversation turns towards a more positive note. Spall is wonderful in he is able to combine a dreariness with an affable quality. This as he has a sincerity in his still so modest way of speaking in the conversation though there is a positive spirit as the costumer seems to show a genuine interest. When pressed about his personal experience with his wife, and the love of their relationship though, Spall's voice falls further into that sorrow of the man. This to the point that after that Phil drives towards nothingness for awhile, this while his son suffers a non-fatal heart attack. Spall is exceptional in the scene of bringing such an honest reality to someone trying to escape his for a moment. This as we see Phil just go drive to the coast and away from it all. There Spall brings an unsentimental moment of a man trying and really failing to find happiness, and instead stuck still in that glare of depression. This coming to a head in the film's second half where Phil and his family take more closely center stage. This as his wife Penny derides him for trying to escape work seemingly and taking so long to react to his son's condition. Spall moment of finally breaking from internalized depression to it externalized is simply incredible. This as it isn't angry it is just a desperate statement of his depression in his anguish in every word as he speaks of his wife's treatment of him, but more so his fear that she no longer loves him. Spall in every moment, as he still looks away, and speaks still so modestly even when heightened, finds such a genuine vulnerability in every second of his speech. A speech that evokes basically a complete hopelessness. Penny though reacts though with tenderness towards Phil, where as much as the two performers so effectively portrayed that state of deterioration, that are as effective in the moment of just sincere warmth between them. This allowing for an earned final scene of the two visiting their son who is recovering. Both don't suddenly change the people entirely rather we just see just the same people with a hope and a happiness in the moment. Spall's little smile still isn't big, but all the sweeter in a way as it feels so authentic in the man he showed us throughout the rest of the film. This earning this change even with the transition as brief as it is. Spall's performance being again just a powerful modest work ideal for the approach of Mike Leigh.