Biggest Best Actor Oscar Flubs of the Past 20 Years

There is always some controversy about who is nominated for the Best Actor Oscar this year, so of course there is even more buzz about who wins the award. Some years, however, the choice leaves many movie buffs incredulous as obviously fantastic performances lose to obviously underwhelming ones. Many such instances can be found in the last 20 years.

1990: Oscar winner, Jeremy Irons for Reversal of Fortune. Irons did a good job becoming Claus von Bulow. The problem is that von Bulow is a boring character. What a surprise that Irons is able to play an emotionless, snobbish man. On the other hand, Robert de Niro was nominated this year for Awakenings. If both he and Robin Williams had been up for the award, I would have been torn since they were both fantastic. But de Niro had to create a variety of physical characteristics as well as emotional personas for his role. He has had some amazing opportunities in his career, but this one is definitely one of his best performances. It was a flub to choose Irons instead.

1992: Oscar winner, Al Pacino for Scent of a Woman. Al Pacino is one of the best actors ever, which you may already know I believe. But this was not a particularly amazing performance. It was good, certainly, but, once again, it was up against better for the year. Robert Downey Jr.'s performance in Chaplain was nothing short of incredible. He created a person on screen, not just a character, a person we loved and hated and everything in between. It's hard to believe someone might beat out Pacino as best actor, but this year, it was a flub.

1998: Oscar winner, Roberto Benigni for Life is Beautiful. This one is also a flub. It seems pretty obvious here that the voters wanted to reward the movie, Rain Man and Mississippi Burning were both this same year. Benigni is a lot of fun, but seeing any of his other movies or even his acceptance speech this year would show viewers that he wasn't really acting; he was really being his own wonderful self. The winner should have been Edward Norton for American History X. After having already been cheated out of an award for Primal Fear (in which he played one of the creepiest and sweetest characters ever), he was lucky enough to get another "role of a lifetime." Again, here we have an actual dynamic character played so he is real. Watching this movie juxtaposed with Death to Smoochy should show viewers a good idea of the breadth and depth of talent Norton has.

2000: Oscar winner, Russell Crowe for Gladiator. His performance was fine; he certainly did fit the emotionless soldier of Rome. But also nominated this year was Tom Hanks for Cast Away. I know, I know, Hanks is already an Oscar winner, and many people begrudge him that. But this competition is supposed to be about the most amazing work done that year. Cast Away called for Hanks to have conversations with a volley ball, to show fear, panic, determination, exuberance, disappointment, acceptance. I don't think a lot of actors could have pulled off this role.

2007: Oscar winner, Daniel Day Lewis for There Will Be Blood. I have to admit that I've never understood the attraction to Lewis, so I might call any award for him a flub. He always seems to be a bit over the top, creating characters that may be fun to watch but aren't particularly believable. That may be fine if you are Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean (also nominated this year), but it doesn't work for the roles Lewis has chosen. Another actor this year often outshines his counterparts but is often overlooked, as well: Viggo Mortensen. I've never seen him in something in which he did a poor job (he was even good in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre film he did), but the film for this year, Eastern Promises, saw him create a character that leapt off the screen. The story goes that he roamed the Russian taverns for a while before filming began and that the people there were afraid of him. That translated on the screen to an amazing performance.

The last ten years of the 20^th century didn't really bode well for Best Actor Oscar choices; too many flubs left the voters' methods in doubt for many viewers. But the next decade didn't fare any better. The controversy is likely to continue beyond this article and into the next century.