1982 Oscars: Who should have won in the major categories Part II

This is the second part of a completely unnecessary but hopefully not uninteresting exercise in could shoulda woulda when it comes the Academy Awards of yesteryear.

We all know by now that they almost always get it wrong, oftentimes not even nominating the best films or performances in any given year.

Like OMG Malcolm McDowell was not nominated for his career defining performance as Alex, the lead of A Clockwork Orange or filmmakers like Stanley Kubrick and Robert Altman never winning one (not counting honorary). So here I am looking at the year 1982  -- the year I was born, and as I've written before, a pretty strong year for movies.

In my last post I weighed in on the two major supporting actor categories and decided that if it had been up to me I would have awarded James Mason and Teri Garr, rather than Louis Gossett, Jr. and Jessica Lange, although they are terrific in the films they both won for.

But what about Best Actor and Best actress ...

BEST ACTOR

Winner
Ben Kingsley – Gandhi as Mahatma Gandhi

Other nominees
Dustin Hoffman – Tootsie as Michael Dorsey/Dorothy Michaels
Jack Lemmon – Missing as Edmund Horman
Paul Newman – The Verdict as Frank Galvin
Peter O'Toole – My Favorite Year as Alan Swann

It's easy to see why Kingsley won this award. It's the part that made him a star, he really becomes Gandhi in the film and it's one of those prestige types of performances that are impossible to ignore -- think Daniel Day-Lewis in Lincoln. But I would have given it to Kingsley nearly twenty years later for his ferocious turn in Sexy Beast. Poor Peter O'Toole never won his Oscar and while he's delightful in My Favorite Year, he should have won twenty years earlier for Lawrence of Arabia, one of the great lead performances ever. Then there's Jack Lemmon and Dustin Hoffman, both wonderful as always, but also both already winners in this category. For me, the strongest performance, the most awards worthy and let's face it overdo was...

My winner
Paul Newman – The Verdict as Frank Galvin

Astonishingly Newman had not won an Oscar yet by 1982 (the academy would finally right that wrong four years later, awarding him for The Color of Money). This, however, might be the best of an astonishing run of later year performances from Newman who had matured from pretty boy matinee idol to a compelling, complicated leading man. His work here is reminiscent of George Clooney's in Michael Clayton -- he is a tortured loser in search of his soul and he gets (in his mind) one last shot at redemption through a medical malpractice case. Newman kills it in close-ups, in monologues, with his physicality. This is quite possibly the performance of his career and he should have won for it.

BEST ACTRESS

Winner
Meryl Streep – Sophie's Choice as Zofia "Sophie" Zawistowski

Other nominees
Julie Andrews – Victor/Victoria as Victoria Grant/Count Victor Grazinski
Jessica Lange – Frances as Frances Farmer
Sissy Spacek – Missing as Beth Horman
Debra Winger – An Officer and a Gentleman as Paula Pokrifki

It's hard to deny the power of Meryl Streep's work in Sophie's Choice, it kind of overpowers everyone else here -- and don't get me wrong -- this is a murderer's row of nominees. If memory serves, Lange (who scored the rare double nomination in a single year) is a real powerhouse in Frances as is Spacek in Missing. Julie Andrews' has the lightest role, but she's Julie fricken' Andrews. And Debra Winger does the best acting in virtually every big blockbuster she was ever in. But...

My winner
Meryl Streep – Sophie's Choice as Zofia "Sophie" Zawistowski

I gotta give it to Meryl -- this is not just her best performance -- there's an argument to be made that is the best female performance ever. it's not just the impeccable accents she does -- even though that is impressive -- it's just the whole emotional devastation of her character's arc is unparalleled. Even if you've never seen it -- you've heard of it -- the Sophie's choice moment, where she must choose which one of her children will live and which one will die. It should be an impossible scene to play, but she somehow does it credibly and convincingly. So this one they got right.