Why doesn’t Robert Pattinson win awards?
Being the face of a major franchise in your teens and early twenties might not sound like the toughest gig in the world, but when you consider the trajectories of the many people who have walked this path, the challenges are undeniable. Think about Anakin Skywalker himself, Hayden Christensen, or The Hunger Games’s Josh Hutcherson. Both have continued to act, but you won’t see them headlining an awards frontrunner anytime soon.
One of the few actors who has beaten the trend is Robert Pattinson. After playing the sparkly vampire Edward Cullen in the wildly successful Twilight series, he seemed destined to remain trapped in amber as a pale, spiky-haired image on bedroom walls around the world. Instead, however, he started to take bold strides in the opposite direction, seeking out directors known for their daring filmmaking.
He worked with David Cronenberg, Werner Herzog, Claire Denis, and, more recently, Christopher Nolan and Bong Joon-ho. He even took a gamble on several young directors just before they became breakout auteurs, including the Safdie brothers, Robert Eggers, and Brady Corbet.
All of this makes Pattinson look, quite frankly, like a bit of a genius. Not only did he manage to make excellent movies (Good Time and The Lighthouse deservedly received almost across-the-board praise), but he also managed to show real Hollywood acumen. He could spot auteurs before critics and audiences could. He got in on the ground level. Most importantly, people seem to enjoy working with him and think him worthy of their projects, which makes it more likely that he’ll continue collaborating with notable directors.
So why hasn’t any of this translated into awards? The Safdie brothers, Eggers, and Corbet, have all earned countless prizes since working with Pattinson, but in his entire career, the actor himself has accumulated precious few accolades. His most notable nominations have been from the Independent Spirit Awards for Good Time and The Lighthouse and the Gotham Awards for Good Time. That said, these are slightly undercut by the six Razzie nominations he’s earned and that win for the ‘Favorite Hottest Actor’ 420 award, whatever that is.
This begs the question: is Pattinson’s strategy of working with cutting-edge auteurs detracting from his skills as an actor? Every one of the directors mentioned here, particularly Cronenberg, Herzog, Joon-ho, and Eggers, are celebrities in their own right. People go to see their movies not because of who the actors are, but because of who the director is.
If Pattinson is a cineaste who just happens to be an actor, he’s probably living the dream. That roster of directors is the holy grail of collaborators for anyone who loves cinema, especially if you aren’t particularly concerned about basking in the glow of critical praise. The fact that Pattinson has rarely taken on movies that are obvious acting showcases (think of Daniel Day-Lewis’s filmography or even Leonardo DiCaprio’s for contrast) suggests that this might be the case.
In a 2019 interview with IndieWire, he all but confirmed this theory. “I became an actor to do interesting movies — that’s the thing I care about,” he said. “If my career becomes making arthouse movies for one patron, that’s cool with me.”
On the flip side, though, Pattinson has voluntarily returned to major franchise territory in recent years. As the current Batman, he’s treading dangerous ground. Christian Bale might have managed to avoid being typecast as a comic book superhero, but he had a whole career of tour de force performances behind him and the help of Christopher Nolan to make sure the movies were more akin to arthouse cinema than the MCU. In contrast, Pattinson has Matt Reeves, a seasoned franchise man.
When asked about why he took on the role, Pattinson revealed that he was a long-time fan of the character and that he just “had a weird instinct about it.”
Given how stellar his instincts have been up to this point, it’s hard to fault him for following where they lead. He’s unlikely to receive major accolades for playing the Caped Crusader (even Bale couldn’t do that), but it might help reintroduce him to audiences and directors as a leading man who can carry a film on his own merits. In theory, this could land him more roles that showcase what he has to offer as an actor rather than as one of the colours that an auteur uses to paint their cinematic canvas.
