If I Picked the Winners: Best Supporting Actor 1994

     Recently I have been on a tear of highlighting my favorite years in cinema. I discussed the 2007 Best Supporting Actor race (my all-time favorite cinematic 12-month period), in which Javier Bardem won for one of the most iconic villainous roles in the last decade or so with the serial-killing, air-gun aficionado, misanthrope Anton Chigurh in the Coen Brothers Best Picture-winning instant classic, "No Country for Old Men". I then went on to analyze another great year in film, 1967, where I delved into the Best Actor race (won by Rod Steiger for "In the Heat of the Night"), only to return to the extraordinary year a few weeks later with a look at the year's Best Picture race (also won by "In the Heat of the Night"). All this focus on years with outstanding cinematic output set off an atomic chain reaction in my mind, "What other years would I put up with the ranks of the 2007s and 1967s of the world". Given the large body of Oscar history (not counting the years before 1927), there is a wide variety of choice of superb years to choose from (1939 being the most commonly cited "Golden Year"), but after careful consideration, and given my current collection of viewed films (which is still frustratingly lower than I would like), the next year that I would nominate for Hall of Fame status is 1994.

     Unlike 1967, I can't really say that 1994 started a revolution or set a new language of film, but was instead the fateful aligning of planets, the blind luck of happenstance, or if you must, "the perfect storm". A group of directors, both new and old, were firing on all cylinders in 1994. Quentin Tarantino, Woody Allen, Tim Burton, Robert Zemeckis, Frank Darabont, and Robert Redford, for whatever reason, were all on their A-game, creating classic films that entered and stayed in our consciousness, and as always, directors on their A-game mean actors allowed to exercise their true potential. Case in point, Best Supporting Actor, which boosts a truly great lineup of amazing performances. It's the type of nominees list that you yearn for every category each year (but rarely materializes). Could it have been improved though? For once, I'm confident in answering this question in the negative. My only two possible substitutes both have questionable qualifications as "supporting" actors. The first is Bruce Willis in "Pulp Fiction" as the boxer on the run Butch. Now since one whole story line of the film is dedicated to him, I would have a hard time swallowing a nomination for him as a supporting actor, but with the Academy's awkward classification technique, I have no idea what Academy members considered the performance to be. The other case to consider is Tim Robbins in "The Shawshank Redemption". In my mind (and I feel fairly safe in saying in every sane mind in the world) Tim Robbins is the star of film, but since the Academy did nominate Morgan Freeman in leading role, we have to consider the possibility that some may have voted for Robbins as a supporting actor (which would be beyond ridiculous, but in the past, that threshold has not stopped the Academy from making unwise decisions). Finally, the one other person I would be tempted to include in the category, despite their small screen time, is Harvey Keitel as "The Wolf" in "Pulp Fiction". Like I said, it is a really small role, but it is such a memorable character, and Keitel nails it so perfectly, it would be extremely tempting to nominate him. It's a fine crop of nominees though, so let's get to it.