Alternate Best Actor 2023: Glenn Howerton in Blackberry

Glenn Howerton did not receive an Oscar nomination because the Academy is IDIOT SAVAGES, despite being nominated for an Independent Spirit Award and a few critic's awards, for portraying Jim Balsillie in Blackberry.
 

Blackberry depicts the rise and fall of the company that invented the first smartphone.
 

It is with much pleasure that I can finally review Glenn Howerton for a performance, as I have always been a champion of his all time great comedic work on It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, so to see him find a decent role, and then excel at it feels like vindication. And excel he does as the CEO of the company invited on hesitantly by the more tech minded Mike Lazaridis (Jay Baruchel) to run the company on the business side of things. Howerton of course has a powerful golden god-esque presence to begin with but importantly what he is doing here is crafting a particular character here that is making use of his talents we know him for but directed in the right way to become this guy. This guy that Howerton sets up as specifically a shark in the business world whose methods are that of basically personal force more than anything and his ability to try to guess the worst intentions of others, since he himself often would pick those intentions. Howerton in the early scenes portraying Balsillie as the man with the aggressively specific intention and his eyes are that of a predator looking for some sort of opportunity for gain, watching for it, in order for him to be able to strike. His performance works particularly effectively as contrast to the meek Baruchel and Mike's goofy second Doug (Matt Johnson), where Howerton presents everything as man whose mind is for success without caring who he has to figuratively murder for them to advance. A man who unlike them isn't lost in anything other than making sure he can make it unquestionably to the top.
 

I think something important that Howerton does is that he basically utilizes what he is known for to enliven the work but doesn't allow it to pigeonhole the performance into the wrong kind of genre of performance. Howerton as a comedic performer often is the one making things funny merely by the nature of his performance and his very specific line delivery and intensity of his performance. That is here, and this is a very entertaining performance as he is the colossal ball buster and vicious businessman who seems like a tornado through the sloppy world of Mike's nerd infested company. Howerton's a hoot every second he comes in and so directly cuts through every scene with the man demanding action from them without hesitation or reservation in regards to how they might feel about it. He's fun to watch, but he also does two important things to really keep it from just becoming a one note caricature rather than an extreme character. One is that Howerton's intensity is with specific intention towards showing the way the man's intensity is always attached to making things happen and for success. He's a  man who is pretty heightened all the time, but he's not always at 11. Howerton goes to 11 at the right moments where you see it basically as the man's arsenal to launch his attacks in order to either get his company to actual work for him, or to try to come basically to present arms with like minded business centric men who he knows how to battle and in what ways.
 

The other is that Howerton is not always that specific intensity that is outward, though he presents Balsillie as always a pretty intense guy, he balances it with moments that does give the right hints to the character as a man even if it isn't something he wants to show frequently. When for example early on he goes to the bank to find his investment was immediately used for debt, Howerton shows a disbelief as the man can be lost. Or later when he admits to having lost his job before joining their company and having mortgaged his house to support this endeavor. Howerton brings just a hint of vulnerability fitting a man who has no desire to show it whatsoever, but it is there as cut-throat as he can be. Howerton makes the most though in balancing it to grant nuance to his performance. Which also is in even the business side of the character where Howerton is great in showing the different methods of the man which are not singular to his more aggressive style which we specifically see when either motivating or in direct conflict with someone. As we see when he first pitches the phone, Howerton brings a more persuasive force where he accentuates all the positives and presents a more open quality as the man trying to sway the people to his sale. Or when we see him play against a more powerful shark in the CEO of Palmpilot, Howerton brings it in to play the seeming submissive as eloquently as the shark, in bringing the sense of subterfuge as just a natural part of his arsenal.
 

Howerton very much carries the film as we follow the Blackberry in its success streak, though seemingly battling one crisis after another, including an attempted hostile takeover, where Balsillie will build up no matter what even when the tech may not be able to handle it. Howerton brings an appropriate for a Safdie film type of locked-in conviction of his performance to go from one problem to another to keep selling everything. Where Howerton is the pressure cooker performance and is captivating every second of it. Part of this is including his anger, which let's be honest here Howerton plays anger perhaps better than almost anyone if he is able to do it in a way that is hilarious while also being completely convincing in its viciousness. Which is entirely ideal here as he brings such a perfect kind of shamelessness consistently as Balsillie does whatever he can to try to keep Blackberry on top. Which we naturally get great moments of him going about his negotiations where Howerton's expression is always just focused on the goal not on anything else, as he speaks to offering millions of dollars to get the right engineers, he speaks just whatever it takes, including illegal stock offers, which Howerton presents as just another weapon for him to use no more than no less. Meanwhile bringing only the most direct wraith on his own staff when anything goes wrong, and Howerton is hilarious yet also convincing in just presenting it as the innate nature of the man whenever anything is less than perfect. Although I love just the bits of balance, such as when the engineers do present him with a great idea, the jubilation in his voice is just as sincere, if entirely related to clearly the money he is about to make. 

The last act, which I would say is the weakest act of the film, where the company is scrambling to deal with the Iphone, and I say that in that I think there just needed to be a little more of just minor respite to indicate their top of the world status, if even just for one complete scene. I just think this would've helped tee up just a little more of them becoming potentially somewhat overly comfortable in their position to get blindsided as they do, as we jump into Balsillie as he seems more concerned with buying, and secretly moving a hockey team rather than dealing with the company. Howerton regardless though is still great in the scenes of him maneuvering this deal as basically just another target with just this nonchalant and shameless brandishing of his power now. Still just a mesmerizing performance in itself, as we see Balsillie's last day presented essentially as he attempts to figure out how the Iphone is going to work with so much data use, while trying to close the deal on his hockey team and avoiding the investigation into his illegal stock sales. Howerton naturally goes one step beyond the 11 to bring all of it into this final sequence of just the man going as far as he can all at once, and again he is simply fun to watch nearly lose it in this section. Primarily when we see the NHL denies his purchase deal for having boasted about his plans to move it, where Howerton naturally brings Balsillie a bit lost for words in seeing his lack of shame coming to bite him before backpedalling towards his usual choice of intense anger. I will say this is the one time where I perhaps saw more Dennis than Balsillie, as he delivers the ridiculous line at the NHL which is that he is "From Waterloo where the Vampires hang out" as some kind of warning but I'll let him have it. As one he has to sell an absurd line, so perhaps going all in in this way into his "training" for selling insane lines is the way to go, and two he manages to make it work just by going for it as he does. What I like though is that after this we finally see the man lose steam which Howerton portrays as the collapse of the man's confidence as he first hears the plan to make the Iphone work as crushing and then finds out that Mike is giving him up to the FTC. Howerton plays it as basically this state of exhaustion with a hint of almost this kind of admiring surprise as he sees Mike finally assuming the role of the shark, that he had always played, and portrays the accepting disbelief of Balsillie in the moment beautifully. Balsillie is finally a man lost for words, and Howerton earns that by creating this final depletion of that fire that energized him, and perhaps he exhausted in his hockey purchase failure. And I won't lie this whole performance I got a kick out of, one it was proof of something I already knew, however proof in the form of a consistently captivating, entertaining and altogether compelling portrait of drive for success regardless of cost, a performance that remembers the essential traits of a great performance:

Demonstrate character in every action.
Elevate the dialogue.
Nuance should be utilized appropriately.

Navigate tone. 

Invigorate the audience.

Service the material.

(For the Five Star Man)