Remember my farewell blog? Well you can forget it now because for the time being, I'm back. I doubt that I'll be nearly as active as I used to be, and once school starts again I'm almost positive that I'll rarely post anything, but I just think that calling it off entirely might have been a little too much. So you could say that I'm making a slight return. And how should we celebrate my resurrection? With another one of my Top 10 lists of course!

This time around I've decided to do the Top 10 Best Acting Performances That Were Overlooked By The Academy Awards. These are the best performances that weren't nominated for Oscars, and the rankings are based entirely on quality of the performances, not on how much they were robbed by the academy. And I'm not counting performances in foreign films, seeing as they never get nominated to begin with.And without further ado, here we go...

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#10:

Johnny Depp (Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas)

This is one of those movies that's almost impossible to watch because of how crude and surreal it looks, but at the same time is surprisingly entertaining. And what really makes this movie entertaining is Depp's performance as Raoul Duke (an alter-ego of Hunter S. Thompson). Just the way that he moves is fun to watch, and you kind of feel on edge the whole time about what he's going to do next, seeing as he's high most of the time. Depp's performance is just as chaotic and strange as the rest of the movie, but he's still extrememly captivating.

#9:

Jeff Bridges and John Goodman (The Big Lebowski)

Because I'm technically part of The Big Lebowski's cult following, this is a little biased. But how could anyone deny how great both Jeff Bridges and John Goodman were in this movie? I decided to put them both on here because I couldn't really choose one over the other seeing as they're so different. Jeff Bridges as The Dude is a very laid back and lazy guy who just wants to save his "johnson". Goodman as Walter Sobchak is a foul mouthed and high strung Vietnam veteran who wants to help out The Dude but just gets on his nerves most of the time. Both performances are hilarious and fantastic in their own ways and are just something that you have to see to get the full affect.

#8:

Val Kilmer (Tombstone)

Tombstone is one of those movies witha practically perfect cast. Everyone in this movie does a superb job. But the one actor that I think really stands out in Tombstone is Val Kilmer as the famous gunslinger Doc Holliday. To be honest, I'm really not that crazy about Val Kilmer in anything else. But his performance in Tombstone makes up for all of his mediocre films. Throughout the majority of the movie, Holliday is either drunk or extremely ill, but that doesn't stopKilmer's performance from being great. Even when he is drunk or sick, he's still really charismatic and entertaining. So even though all of Tombstone's cast really delivered, Kilmer left everyone else in the dust.

#7:

Armie Hammer (The Social Network)

It must take a lot of effort to play two people who are on screen together for the majority of a movie. Well technically, Armie Hammer only played one of the Winklevoss twins in The Social Network, on set the other was played by Josh Pence, but you see Hammer as both of them. But that doesn't matter, because Armie Hammer gave one of the best performances of 2010, and got robbed by the academy, plain and simple. The Winklevoss twins had the majority of The Social Network's best lines, including one of my favorite quotes of all time,"We can do that ourselves. I'm 6'5', 220, and there's two of me." Brilliant.

#6:

Robert Mitchum (The Night Of The Hunter)

It's funny how today people consider this to be a legendary performance, and yet Mitchum didn't even get an Oscar nomination for it. And why wouldn't it be considered legendary? It's a chillingly great performance by one of the greatest actors who ever lived. Mitchum plays Harry Powell, a greedy and homicidal killer posing as a preacher who comes to a small town after hearing about a large sum of money that's been hidden in the town. He then begins to hunt down the children of the man who once posessed the money (the children being the only people who know where the money is). It really is a bone-chilling performance, and while the movie as a whole isn't that scary, Mitchum's performance is, and is very worthy of an Academy Award.

#5:

Jimmy Stewart (Vertigo)

If you've seen Vertigo, then you're probably as surprised as I was when I found out that Jimmy Stewart didn't even get nominated for Best Actor for his performance in this movie. It really is one of the greatest performances of all time. Stewart plays a semi-retired San Francisco detective who's assigned to follow a man's wife whose been acting strangely. He then gets sucked into a chain of events and becomes obsessed with the woman and preserving her image. If you're a Stewart fan, then you probably won't like seeing him just on the verge on insanity, but that's what makes the performance great.

#4:

George C. Scott (Dr. Strangelove)

What fascinating about this performance is that the film's director (Stanley Kubrick) actually tricked George C. Scott into giving an over the top performance for this movie. Scott wanted to make the performance subtle and realistic, but Kubrick wanted him to be unrealistically eccentric. So Kubrick said that he wanted Scott to try the performance over the top first, but he promised that he wouldn't film it. Of course, Kubrick ended up filming it and we got one of the greatest performances ever put on film. I guess you could say that because the performance was unintentional, it shouldn't have gotten an Oscar nomination, but I think that itdoes, just because it really is one of those unforgettable roles that really stands out.

#3:

Anthony Perkins (Psycho)

If you know me well, then you're probably a little surprised that this is only number three, seeing as Psycho is one of my top 5 favorite movies of all time. And what makes Psycho such an incredible movie (besides the cinematography, brilliant twist ending, and great direction) is Anthony Perkins' performance as Norman Bates.When you first see him, you feel kind of sorry for him. He seems innocent and insecure, but still a little strange. And then as the plot unfolds you see what kind of twisted person he really is. I hope that's not giving too much away. Perkins does a fantastic job of making the character mousy and innocent, but also keeps it serious enough that we don't really know how he's going to act towards things. Psycho is just one of those movies that you have to see to believe, and the same goes for Perkins' performance.

#2:

Malcom McDowell (A Clockwork Orange)

It's pretty rare for a movie to be nominated for Best Picture and yet the lead isn't nominated for Best Actor/Actress. And out of all of the movies where I would expect that to happen, A Clockwork Orange is probably the last. Malcom McDowell's performance as the violent, Beethoven loving Alex DeLarge has become one of the iconic roles in cinema history. And why wouldn't it be? He's brilliant! The character is just so despicable and unpredictable that you can't help but kind of like him. He's a terrifying individual and McDowell makes it all the more scary. Especially during the more violent scenes, mainly because of how he's so obviously loving what he's doing. No matter how horrible the things he's doing are, he's full of glee, and that makes an already scary person all the more terrifying.

#1:

Christian Bale (American Psycho)

This just might be my favorite performance of all time. It's not as monumental of a movie as Psycho or A Clockwork Orange, but it's still pretty damn good. First of all, I'm a big Christian Bale fan. I know that sounds weird, but come on, the guy's an incredible actor! And American Psycho is easily his best performance, and that's saying a lot. I love how he changes moods so quickly from a fun loving guy in his late 20's to a complete homicidal maniac in a matter of seconds. As well as how many different ways of delivering lines Bale uses. He can be smug, suave, over the top, eccentric, bitter, and completely insane. You never know what you're going to get out of him. And if you don't believe me, just watch this clip (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwicLgOGJOI). But be warned, it gets pretty brutal. This really is an incredible performance, and it deserves more than just an Academy Award.

P.S. I realize that are no performances by women on this list. I looked around a lot to try and find one that fit into the list, but literally all of the truly great performances had either gotten Oscar nominations or were from foreign films. There are probably quite a few from films that I haven't seen, but I just wanted everyone to know that I'm not sexist;)

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Song of the Day:
Interpol - Untitled
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ejoxw_xrTJc

Picture of the Day: