The 10 worst Oscar-bait performances of all time
If you think that the Oscars are an honest reflection of the very best movies to come out any given year, it comes with no pleasure to inform you that you are wrong. Instead, think of the Academy Awards more like an elite clique of sparkly celebrities and bullish media moguls, with every piece of the Hollywood puzzle working around the clock to keep up the pretence that they are a respectable, mystical business.
Indeed, the reality is that, whilst an Oscar cannot be outright bought by a movie studio, they can come pretty darn close, pumping money into a particular production whilst gearing the content of a movie to rub the Academy up the right way. The perfect Oscar-bait movie, therefore, consists of an established director taking on a war movie, biopic or modern melodrama with a popular Hollywood actor in the lead role.
So transparent in modern filmmaking that they’ve become something of an in-joke amongst fans, Oscar-bait movies are best remembered for their tragic lead performances. Featuring an actor who shouts, screams and allows their face to be applied with several layers of prosthetics, the likes of Gary Oldman, Leonardo DiCaprio and Meryl Streep are each guilty of overacting in their attempts to snatch a precious Oscar statuette.
So, let’s expose such actors and dig into the ten worst Oscar-bait performances of all time.
The 10 worst Oscar-bait performances:
10. Gary Oldman – Darkest Hour (Joe Wright, 2017)
The British actor Gary Oldman won the Oscar for ‘Best Leading Actor’ back in 2018 thanks to his prosthetic-laden performance as Winston Churchill. Recognised as one of the most celebrated historical figures of all time, it’s no surprise that the Academy favoured Oldman’s performance over the likes of fellow nominees Daniel Day-Lewis, Timothée Chalamet and Daniel Kaluuya, even if their performances were far superior.
Delivering a decent impression of the politician under some Oscar-winning makeup work, all Oldman had to do was deliver Churchill’s famous “We shall fight on the beaches” speech to have the award sealed before the ceremony had even begun.
9. Glen Close – Hillbilly Elegy (Ron Howard, 2020)
Glen Close is officially one of the unluckiest Hollywood actors when it comes to the Academy Awards, being nominated eight times without ever walking away with a statuette. First nominated for ‘Best Supporting Actress’ back in 1983 for The World According to Garp, Close has never gone further than a mere nod multiple decades later, with the 2020 drama Hillbilly Elegy being her most recent attempt.
The Netflix film follows a student who reflects on three generations of family life and is a strange, meandering mess of a movie which uses desperate melodrama to cry for an Academy Award.
8. Sean Penn – I am Sam (Jessie Nelson, 2001)
After Dustin Hoffman won an Oscar in 1989 for his performance in Rain Man and Tom Hanks was honoured by the Academy in 1995 for his role in the patriotic drama Forrest Gump, movie characters defined by mental challenges were seen as potential award-winning roles. As a result, Sean Penn chose to appear in the Jessie Nelson movie I am Sam, where he played the title character, a mentally handicapped man fighting for custody of his daughter.
The movie itself is passable melodramatic Oscar bait, but Penn’s performance really strives for attention, ignoring all character nuances. Unfortunately for Penn, whilst he was nominated for an Oscar, Denzel Washington eventually claimed his crown for Training Day.
7. Renee Zellweger – Cold Mountain (Anthony Minghella, 2003)
Screenwriter Anthony Minghella is known for such classic movies as The English Patient, The Talented Mr. Ripley and Truly Madly Deeply, but many forget about his 2003 Oscar-winner Cold Mountain. However, such doesn’t come as much of a surprise, with the entirely forgettable American civil war movie containing no memorable features aside from a collection of hammy performances from the likes of Nicole Kidman, Jude Law and Renée Zellweger.
Bafflingly, Zellweger won an Academy Award for her try-hard performance, miraculously beating out the likes of Marcia Gay Harden and Patricia Clarkson, who were nominated for Mystic River and Pieces of April, respectively.
6. Ashton Kutcher – Jobs (Joshua Michael Stern, 2013)
When you think of the Steve Jobs biopic, it’s likely that Danny Boyle’s brilliant 2015 movie comes to mind, where Michael Fassbender gives an Oscar-nominated performance. In fact, you may have entirely forgotten that comedian Ashton Kutcher once portrayed the iconic tech pioneer in the 2013 movie Jobs, directed by Joshua Michael Stern, where he stars beside the likes of Josh Gad, J.K. Simmons and Lukas Haas.
Nominated for ‘Worst Actor’ at the Razzies instead of garnering any Oscar attention, the film was a shameless attempt at Oscar bait, with Kutcher’s performance going all out for attention. Despite his efforts, Kutcher just comes across as himself in a bad wig.
5. Eddie Redmayne – The Danish Girl (Tom Hooper, 2015)
The British actor Eddie Redmayne has come under fire from social media in recent years thanks to his irritatingly earnest performances in such films as Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and The Theory of Everything. For our money, the most irritating of his Oscar-bait performances was his character in Tom Hooper’s The Danish Girl, a transgender artist based loosely on the Danish artist Lili Elbe.
Later regarding the role as a “mistake” due to his belief that his role should’ve been played by a transgender actor, the performance goes down as an awkward credit in his filmography.
4. Meryl Streep – The Iron Lady (Phyllida Lloyd, 2011)
There’s a reason why Meryl Streep is one of the most decorated actors in Oscars history, with the icon being astute in deciding which roles to take on. Nominated a staggering 21 times, Streep has taken an Oscar home on three occasions, winning for Kramer vs. Kramer, Sophie’s Choice and the flagrant Oscar-bait movie The Iron Lady, which told the story of Margaret Thatcher, the first female British prime minister of the UK.
Biopics have always been irresistible for the Academy, but The Iron Lady is certainly one of the worst to grace its red carpet, and Streep does little to earn her award besides slurring out a few catchphrases.
3. Sandra Bullock – The Blind Side (John Lee Hancock, 2009)
The 2009 Oscar-winner The Blind Side is seen as one of the most undeserving award winners of all time, with the semi-biographical sports movie being a transparent melodrama. Telling the story of Michael Oher, a homeless man who becomes an NFL superstar with the help of a caring woman and her family, Sandra Bullock stars as the attentive mother who leads the young athlete to glory.
Beating Gabourey Sidibe’s extraordinary showing in Lee Daniels’ Precious, as well as Carey Mulligan’s work in An Education, Bullock’s straining performance screamed of easy Oscar bait.
2. Leonardo DiCaprio – J. Edgar (Clint Eastwood, 2011)
Rightfully considered to be one of the finest actors of all time, Leonardo DiCaprio finally won his long-awaited Oscar in 2016 for his performance in the Alejandro González Iñárritu film The Revenant. But, before this time, DiCaprio launched the kitchen sink in his attempts to get an Academy Award, appearing in the awful Clint Eastwood biopic J. Edgar, which explored the life of the American law-enforcement administrator, John Edgar Hoover.
Totally ignored by the Academy, J. Edgar featured a desperately hammy performance from DiCaprio at its core, which was not enough to elevate this sorry drama.
1. Rami Malek – Bohemian Rhapsody (Bryan Singer, Dexter Fletcher, 2018)
Tracking the story of the iconic British rock band Queen and their lead singer Freddie Mercury, Bohemian Rhapsody accounts the life of the frontman, leading up to his famous performance at Live Aid in 1985. Riddled with its own narrative problems, Bryan Singer’s film is a karaoke history of the band’s enormous legacy, reducing each monumental landmark to a meaningless morsel of conversation before getting back onto the flashy performance sequences.
Rami Malek provides a decent impression of Mercury but entirely fails to capture his personality and mood. Still, his performance convinced the Academy that he was worthy of an Oscar for ‘Best Leading Actor’. It probably has something to do with Malek’s light prosthetics and the film’s biopic identity.
