Best Actor: Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart
Other nominees: George Clooney, Up in the Air; Colin Firth, A Single Man; Morgan Freeman, Invictus; Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker.
Whenever we went out on a limb in our Oscar nomination predictions we fell off the tree. Thanks to the Academy's decision to be (mostly) unpredictably predictable this year, we've decided to stick to the tried and true in our Oscar winner predictions, beginning with the best actor category: Jeff Bridges, for both his troubled country singer in Crazy Heart and his 40+-year career as an actor in films such as The Last Picture Show, Fat City, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, Starman, The Fisher King, The Contender (but not King Kong).
Following critics awards in Los Angeles and Boston, the Broadcast Film Critics' Association and the Hollywood Foreign Press Association really got the ball rolling when they chose to screw up Bridges' underappreciated status (we're paraphrasing one of his acceptance speeches here) by picking his troubled country singer instead of George Clooney's downsizing expert in Up in the Air. Then came the best actor SAG Award. And now the best actor Academy Award seems all but inevitable.
Some say that what matters is what's on screen, etc. etc. Don't you believe it. Several actors have won career achievement awards under the guise of a best actor or best supporting actor statuette, e.g., John Wayne (True Grit), John Gielgud (Arthur), Don Ameche (Cocoon), Sean Connery (The Untouchables). And what's more, Bridges' performance has garnered some pretty good notices.
Photo: Crazy Heart (Lorey Sebastian / 20th Century Fox)
100% agree. Jeff Bridges deserves this and will win. He has been sweeping up the awards this year. Most times we end up seeing a surprise but this time I think the deserving will win and I can't wait it is long overdue.