Alternate Best Supporting Actor 1996: Results

5. Eric Tsang in Comrades: Almost a Love Story - Tsang delivers a moving portrayal of a gangster with more heart than you'd expected.

Best Scene: Many wives.

4. Ed Harris in The Rock - Harris, despite being in a dumb film, gives a complex portrayal of a soldier whose convictions slowly bring about his tragic downfall.

Best Scene: Breakdown of command.

3. Harry Belafonte in Kansas City - Belafonte gives a film stealing performance by subverting his typically affable presence, in his portrayal of almost demonic philosopher/gangster.

Best Scene: Racist joke.

2. Charlton Heston in Hamlet - Heston proves his measure with Shakespeare in making the words sing, but also offering such potent emotion within it.

Best Scene: Monologue

1. Peter Stormare in Fargo - Good predictions Razor and Bryan. Stormare offers the perfect other half along with Steve Buscemi, as two less than professional criminals, in his performance that works both as a hilarious deadpan comedic partner, and a chilling portrayal of a truly amoral killer.

Best Scene: Highway Massacre

Updated Overall

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Alternate Best Supporting Actor 1996: Eric Tsang in Comrades: Almost a Love Story

Eric Tsang did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Pao Au-Yeung in Comrades: Almost a Love Story.

Comrades: Almost a Love Story is a sweet, if a touch overlong, film about two mainlanders in Hong Kong, who can't quite seem to come together.

Eric Tsang plays one of the potential obstacles between the love story that seems always on some sort of on the brink between  Qiao Li (Maggie Cheung) and XiaoJun (Leon Lai). This as Tsang portrays a mob boss costumer of Qiao's, at a message parlor. Eric Tsang would later play notably a mob boss in Infernal Affairs, however Pao Au-Yeung here is a far cry from that more dramatic criminal he would later play. This as we really come in at first to the man, mostly head down, just receiving his massage and attempting to flirt with Qiao. Tsang delivers a bit of the expected "brunt" to the role when he demands force be used to handle some issue relayed by his men, but even this is just a perfunctory statement. We we get more passion is as he speaks to Qiao of his new tattoo adorning his back, along with his more expected tattoos, that of Mickey Mouse, her favorite character. It is then we see that Pao isn't your standard mob boss as we see the two begin an actual romance. Though this first seems likely to be short lived as Pao essentially tries to allow her to leave by speaking of all the wives he has in other countries, Tsang handling this moment as one of false bravado. This not as a boast, but as a man attempting to not only soften his own wound, but to most earnestly make Qiao feel better about herself. This in his face though a real sorrow of the loss, that Tsang strictly conveys the genuine sense of love in the moment. This showing the real heartbreak in the man in the moment, before Qiao decides to marry him. Although the scenes following this are brief, however Tsang uses them well. This in providing a real warmth in the interactions and a purity of the man's manner, as though this is Pao as his truest self. This in portraying just a to the point sweet man, who loves his wife, and wants to just live a good life with her. Tsang naturally delivers a potent affection this as he makes it natural from that of the former gangster, to just a caring husband in every sense. This making it so when he makes his untimely exit it is something that is felt, and not just an obstacle to get gotten over for the sake of the leads finally getting together. This in Tsang successfully creating a sympathetic portrait of both the typical "other guy" of the narrative and of a gangster. It's a relatively short performance but Tsang delivers still a memorable impression within that screentime.

Alternate Best Supporting Actor 1996

And the Nominees Were Not:

Charlton Heston in Hamlet

Ed Harris in The Rock

Peter Stormare in Fargo

Harry Belafonte in Kansas City

Eric Tsang in Comrades: Almost A Love Story