Best Actor 1931: Lionel Barrymore in A Free Soul

Lionel Barrymore won an Oscar from his only acting nomination for portraying lawyer Stephen Ashe in A Free Soul.

A Free Soul tells of a father Stephen Ashe and daughter Jan Ashe (Norma Shearer) who are harmed down by their own vices his alcoholism, and her relationship with a brutal gangster (Clark Gable), whom the father got off a murder charge.

Lionel Barrymore's performance here is sometimes treated negatively as an overly hammy performance, and I very much disagree with that view. Barrymore style of acting does indeed always have a degree of theatricality to his performance, but that is not automatically a bad thing, if he uses it in the right manner. Also I would disagree with it because this is one of his more restrained performances.

Barrymore's portrayal of Ashe is functionally good in the early scenes. He required to do a few scenes of being a smooth lawyer which he does well enough, but also a man who requires to get drunk to get along with life. Barrymore actually does these early drunk scenes in a just fine manner, not overly realistic but still in a manner that works, since he does not go over the top.

His relationship with Norma Shearer is key to the film though. They are both actually pretty good in showing the relationship between the father and daughter. They both have the right naturalism together, and create their painful relationship together well. It is interesting how Barrymore portrays him as a loving father, but one who is unable to really help in her problematic relationship.

An interesting part of his performance though is his portrayal of Stephen Ashe's alcoholism. It is true he has the usual drunk scenes, which are fine, but most interesting about his portrayal are his scenes in the country where both Ashe and his daughter try to shed his daughter. Lionel Barrymore is truly effective in that he shows a deep pain from his alcoholism, and effectively portrays the brutal effect withdrawal has on him.

Barrymore's final scene though perhaps is his best where Ashe in court tries to defend Jan's old boyfriend (Leslie Howard) who killed the gangster. It is a very dramatic speech that Ashe makes to the jury, and Barrymore handles quite well. He puts the right passion and power into his speech, that I do not deny that it probably did give him the Oscar. Overall his performance is certianly from 1931 since it is dated in its own way, but it is also certainly an effective heartfelt performance.

Best Actor 1931: Adolphe Menjou in The Front Page

Adolphe Menjou received his only Oscar nomination for portraying newspaper editor Walter Burns in The Front Page.

The Front Page is an okay screwball comedy, but its remake His Girl Friday is superior.

Adolphe Menjou is barely in the film for about its whole first half, he only shows briefly as Walter Burns lures his best reporter Hildy (Pat O'Brien) into following the story of a man who is about to be executed. In this brief scene Burns convinces Hildy by basically threatening to put a  frame up on him  by falsely calling the fire department and falsely blaming him. Its a short scene but Menjou is fine in showing the sly controlling way of his character, showing he is always two steps ahead of everyone.

He shows up eventually once again to push Hildy, and Hildy's fiancee, and just about everyone else around as he orchestrates the events to turn out the exact way he wants to. I will say Menjou is good and is properly commanding in his manipulations of everyone and everything around. He has a good enough amount of energy, and shows up the underlying intelligence of his character through his manner, such his shifty eyes.

Although he is fine, and seems downright amazing when the last performance someone saw was Richard Dix, he still could have been even better as Cary Grant is in the same role in His Girl Friday. The rating may seem a little low but I do like him, its just he just does not have that much to overall, and he as Grant showed the role can be something really effective and entertaining.

Best Actor 1931: Richard Dix in Cimarron

Richard Dix received his only Oscar nomination for portraying Yancey Cravat in Cimarron.

Cimarron is quite a bad, and boring western. There is not anything interesting about it not even as a historical curiosity.

Richard Dix's performance possibly has to be seen to be believed at times, because it defies the conventions of every other performance that I have reviewed so far in the category, it certainly stands alone, which is not praise trust me. Richard Dix is not an actor I say i have seen before watching this film, but he has quite the bizarre acting tendencies.

Richard Dix's screen presence, or that lack thereof is quite an abnormality. He has this voice that almost sounds like a more relaxed Bing Crosby at times. His performance is quite hard to believe how just downright dull he is some of the time, as he either smiles very plainly, or talks through this very slow very boring speeches of his that he does not seem to put that much effort into.

He does not have a single bit of chemistry with a single member of the cast, and certainly does not have with his co-star Irene Dunne who portrays his wife. They do not really show the slightest bit of emotion to one another that seems at all human. They mostly just stare at one another not anything more than that.

Now the best and the worst part of his performance is his strong rooting and tooting he does sometimes during his performance. These are bizarre out of place with his dull characterization the rest of the time. Now the reason I said also best because they are rather unintentionally funny considering how odd these yells he does.

Dix is never charming, he never is commanding, he is never interesting, he just is there most of the time, even when he is talking loudly it is hard to pay attention to this performance, which defies almost every method usually used to create a good performance. He is never ever for a single moment up to the task of this performance.

This is just a terrible performance from beginning to end, it either bores one or causes one's mouth to become agape in reaction to his moments where he decides to cry out. This is an example of a bad old timey performance, the type of performance that gives other performances from this time a bad name, there is never one single second of this performance that is good for even a moment.

Best Actor 1931

And the Nominees Were:

Richard Dix in Cimarron

Adolphe Menjou in The Front Page

Lionel Barrymore in A Free Soul

Jackie Cooper in Skippy

Fredric March in The Royal Family of Broadway 

With the recent passing of Jackie Cooper, I thought I ought to take a look at at this year where he received his only Oscar nomination.  

Best Actor 2007: Results

5. George Clooney in Michael Clayton- Clooney in my opinion fails to create a very interesting character with Michael Clayton, as well as he fails to really be truly effective lead for a thriller.

4. Johnny Depp in Sweeney Todd- Depp I do not find is entirely bad as Todd, but his approach to Sweeney is one note of anger and depression that just is not that interesting.

3. Tommy Lee Jones in In The Valley of Elah- I like much of Jones' performance, which is emotionally on the mark in showing the character's grief, and pain. I did not believe though was the entire change of the character, which was not made convincing by him or the script.

2. Viggo Mortensen in Eastern Promises- This  is a strong effort that relies effectively on both Mortensen ability to show the command and control of Nikolai, as well as Mortensen ability to suggest the underlining and hidden motivations of his character.

1. Daniel Day-Lewis in There Will Be Blood- The sheer scope, and achievement of this performance leaves an undeniable impression. 

Best Actor 2007: Viggo Mortensen in Eastern Promises

Viggo Mortensen received his first Oscar nomination for portraying Nikolai Luzhin in Eastern Promises.

Eastern Promises tells the story of the Russian Mob in England.

Viggo Mortensen in this role begins with quite a challenge actually considering he has to play a driver for the Russian mob. This to begin with is a challenge since it requires the use of a Russian accent, and frankly the Russian accent is one of the easiest accents someone can get a bad laugh with. Mortensen handles his accent well though, making it seem entirely natural, and appropriate to his character.

For most of the film Mortensen character is not all that much of a mystery at the beginning of the film, as he seems to be just a relatively low level Russian mobster who does all the hard work for Kirill (Vincent Cassel) the son of the mob boss Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl). Mortensen in these early scenes as the perfect demeanor and if I may say, coolness in the role. He just as has the right manner in how he portrays Nikolai. 

Mortensen is excellent in showing the manner in which he reacts with Kirill, and how he performs his jobs in the mob such as when he prepares a murdered mans body for disposal. Mortensen has the perfect ease and natural manner that suggests that Nikolai is a pure professional in even these gruesome jobs, as well as clearly having done this for awhile now showing the history of the character.

His relationships with the other characters are the key to Mortensen's performance, that show the truth underneath his tough exterior. His relationship with Kirill is interesting because at times Nikolai shows an incredible warmness to his like a caring older brother, who tries to protect the younger brother from harm such as from the abuse of Kirill's father.

His other relationship is with a nurse Anna (Naomi Watts) who is brought into the mob world due to helping a soon to die pregnant woman who was severely abused by the mob. His relationship with her is interestingly played, since he does show a quick attraction to her, before he really knows her, or she no he. Mortensen plays that first seen in a very charming fashion showing a different side to Nikolai, but later on when business decides his actions he puts on colder method, a facade of sorts, to deal with her.

Near of the end of the film though there is a rather big revelation that is most certianly a big spoiler. It is revealed that he is actually an undercover agent for the mob working for the Russian and British authorities in order to infiltrate the mob. This sort of turns the whole concept on the character on its head, and watching it a second time, Mortensen never clearly gives away the hidden nature of Nikolai, but does suggest it through a very slight air of distaste and disgust he has with the mob life as he goes about his tasks in that life.

Mortensen performance is an excellent piece of work, which is a nice smooth and slick piece of acting. He never exactly gets much of chance to slow down and develop but he brilliantly develops Nikolai as the film proceeds through anyways. It is a strong performance throughout and the strength of the performance is best summed through his last shot. It shows a now in power Nikolai, with a powerful outward demeanor, but Mortensen shows a great subtle suggestion of Nikolai thoughts of a better life of what he could have head.  Overall a strong effective performance which improves even  more on repeated viewings.

Best Actor 2007: Johnny Depp in Sweeney Todd

Johnny Depp received his third Oscar nomination for portraying Sweeney Todd formally known as Benjamin Barker in Sweeney Todd.

Sweeney Todd is a musical about a mad barber who murders people who come to his shop, and than his land lady bakes them into a pie. I am a bit mixed on this adaptation on one hand the music is good, but on the other hand some of the singing does not quite cut it, and frankly its tone should have included more dark humor as the stage version has.

Johnny Depp portrays Sweeney Todd in an extremely one note fashion, and that is all there is to it. He shows him to be constantly angry and depressed at the same time, who constantly as the look of revenge on his face at every moment in the film. He barely even takes this expression off when he is attempting to lure people into his barber's chair.

Now this is how they chose to portray Sweeney in this film, and that does I think contribute to the tone that I find a little lacking. The film decides to use Sweeney as always a constant overtly angry figure, or as a dead pan character in that he is just internally angry figure who almost completely ignores all others.

Depp technically does the anger and the depression well enough, but part of what Sweeney Todd usually is portrayed as is a gleeful villain, as well as being a depressed one. You can see this sort of portrayal by George Hearn in the filmed stage version, which I do think is better than Depp's because Hearn not only shows the anger and depression, but also does show that Todd still gets a kick out of what he is doing, and really enjoys his chance at revenge.

Now Depp does sing the part well enough, certianly he handles his end better than Helena Bonham who just simply does not have the vocal strength for her part. He performs the song as well, showing the anger, and depression once again as well as the insanity of the character well. I don't think this is a bad portrayal overall, I just wish they had done more with Sweeney overall, and made him more than just dark and brooding basically throughout the whole film.