Best Performances from Oscar Nominees – The Supporting Actor

Continuing a look at the best performances and movies from this year’s Oscar nominees, here are the best performances from this year’s Best Supporting Actor nominees.

CHRISTIAN BALE (Nominated for The Big Short)

BEST PERFORMANCE – THE FIGHTER (2010)

• Christian Bale is one of the best actors working today.  His chameleon-like style to lose himself in every role, both physically and emotionally, along with coming out with a movie almost every year, makes him a rarity among actors today.  Immediately after I saw him in The Fighter, I knew that Oscar was his.  Bale, yet again, loses himself in the role of the drug addicted former boxer Dicky Eklund, the brother of Boston boxer “Irish” Mickey Ward.  Dicky means well, but his addictions and arrogance hurt him, his brother, and his family.  It’s an emotionally stirring and arresting performance that stands as Bale’s best.

TOM HARDY (Nominated for The Revenant)

BEST PERFORMANCE – BRONSON (2009)

• Bronson is one of the craziest movies I have ever seen.  This was my introduction to director Nicolas Winding Refn (who would go on to make the masterful Drive in 2011) and Tom Hardy and boy, did they make an entrance.  Tom Hardy has had other great performances in other great movies, but he has never had a role like he did in Bronson.  This tells the bizarre true story of Michael Peterson, a young man who is sentenced to seven years in prison after robbing a bank and ends up serving over three decades in solitary confinement and grows the alter ego of Charles Bronson.  This is an off-the-wall, insane, committed performance and Hardy has never been better.

MARK RUFFALO (Nominated for Spotlight)

BEST PERFORMANCE – ZODIAC (2007)

• Ruffalo is one of the great character actors in Hollywood.  He’s been in so many movies and given so many great performances.  Trying to narrow down his best performance was tough, as I could chosen Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2005), Shutter Island (2010), or his Oscar nominated turns in The Kids Are Alright (2010) or Spotlight (2015).  But I went with a performance that gets overlooked, much like the movie itself.  Zodiac is a masterpiece and Ruffalo’s performance does not get the love it should.  As Inspector David Toschi, Ruffalo is a ticking time bomb obsessed with finding the Zodiac killer.  It’s a layered performance that spans over a decade and Ruffalo disappears into it.

MARK RYLANCE (Nominated Bridge of Spies)

BEST PERFORMANCE – BRIDGE OF SPIES (2015)

• I am not very familiar with Rylance’s filmography.  He’s a long time stage actor and pretty big over in England.  This is actually the first movie I have ever seen him in and he made an impression.  His performance as a captured Soviet spy in America during the height of the Cold War is very stoic and relatively funny.  His attitude through out the film is oddly calm, which is a great parallel to the movie, since everyone is tense during this crises.  This is a great performance for the veteran actor to get notice for.

SYLVESTOR STALLONE (Nominated for Creed)

BEST PERFORMANCE – CREED (2015)

• Stallone isn’t really known for “good” performances.  The man is an action icon, having been in such classics as First Blood (1982), Demolition Man (1990), and Cop Land (1997).  The choice for his best performance was a battle between the same character, Rocky Balboa, in different movies, Rocky (1976) and Creed (2009).  But what Stallone did in Creed is something I didn’t think he was capable of.  Bringing back a character that most thought was dead, he adds so much emotion and power to the character.  Balboa is beaten down and at the end of his run.  He’s lost everyone he loves until Adonis (Michael B. Jordan) comes into his life and gives him something to live for.  Stallone shows a new side to the iconic character and it is a performance that should hopefully win him the Oscar this year.

What are you favorite performances from this year’s Best Supporting Actor nominees?  Comment below or hit me up on Twitter @kevflix or on Facebook at Kevflix.