Oscar Week: Meet the Nominees

In just less than a week, ABC will broadcast the 83rd Annual Academy Awards, and we thought we’d take a look and get to know the nominees from the acting categories! Each day we will highlight one person from each category, so you can know just who’s in the running and make your own judgement on who you think should win! Plus, each day, we’ll give a brief overview of two of the ten nominated Best Picture films leading up to the big day. Remember, be sure to head into our forum HERE during the week where we will be voting for what nominees we think should win, leading up to First Annual Yakkster Oscars to be handed out on Sunday, February 27th. (No need to register to vote!) On top of that, just to see who’s the best when it comes to actual Oscar predictions, we’ll have a “Predict The Actual Winner” contest, with a prize of course! To enter to win a prize, you must be registered in the forum. CLICK HERE TO REGISTER, then go vote!

Today, we’ll kick off the Best Actor category with Javier Bardem for Biutiful! You may remember this man’s award winning turn in the movie “No Country For Old Men” … or at least his “Ode To The 80′s” hairdo. Did you know that he chose that hair? But I digress.

Biutiful is a drama film directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu, starring Bardem. It is the story of Uxbal, a father ridden with cancer, and tells of his struggles to reconcile love, spirituality, crime, fatherhood and his own mortality amidst the crime-filled underworld of Barcelona. Uxbal strives for reconciliation quite obviously before his own life ends. Kirk Honeycutt of the Hollywood Reporter calls the film, “a gorgeous melancholy tone poem about love, fatherhood and guilt” with Bardem’s performance described as  ”… a knockout.” Betsy Sharkey of the LA Times wrote, “Bardem gives a performance of staggering depth, unquestionably one of the year’s best.” The film, and Bardem, has received a lot of support amongst Hollywood heavyweights such as Sean Penn and Julia Roberts.

Next: Annette Bening, Best Actress Nominee