Streep and Rourke might also have strong cases going for them, but I just checked back with the stats and it is actually very rare that a Best Actor/Actress award is awarded to someone who was NOT in a Best Picture nominee even though there are other contenders who are from a BP nominee.


Recent years:

2007:

Daniel Day-Lewis (BP nom for his film)
Marion Cotillard (won against Ellen Page despite np BP nom!)


2006:

Forrest Whitaker (no BP nom among the entire category)
Helen Mirren (BP nom for her film)


2005:

Philip Seymour Hoffman (BP nom for his film)
Reese Witherspoon (no BP nom among the entire category)


2004:

Jamie Foxx (BP nom for his film)
Hilary Swank (BP nom for her film)


2003:

Sean Penn (BP nom for his film)
Charlize Theron (no BP nom among her categry)


2002:

Adrien Brody (BP nom for his film)
Nicole Kidman (BP nom for her film)


2001:

Denzel Washington (won against Tom Wilkinson and Russell Crowe despite no BP nom!)
Halle Berry (won against Nicole Kidman and Sissy Spacek despite no BP nom!)


2000:

Russell Crowe (BP nom for his film)
Julia Roberts (BP nom for her film)


1999:

Kevin Spacey (BP nom for his film)
Hilary Swank (won against Annette Bening despite no BP nom for her film)


1998:

Roberto Benigni (BP nom for his film)
Gwyneth Paltrow (BP nom for her film)


1997:

Jack Nicholson (BP nom for his film)
Helen Hunt (BP nom for her film)


1996:

Geoffrey Rush (BP nom for his film)
Frances McDormand (BP nom for her film)


That means: during the past 12 years 17 times Best Actor/Actress came from BP nominees, three times it was not possible because there was actually no conender from a BP nominee and only four times someone won Best Actor or Actress despite the film not having a BP nom and being up against other contenders with BP noms: Denzel Washington, Marion Cotillard, Halle Berry and Hilary Swank.

Moreover, none of these four winners have previously won Best Actor/Actress. It's still possibe for Rourke and Streep to win, but I'd say it's quite a major handicap.

That, and Penn gave a brilliant performance compared to Rourke being Rourke...

I think a big handicap for Penn is that when someone wins another Oscar so recently, then the movie also ends up winning Best Picture.

This was the scenario for Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump), Hilary Swank (Million Dollar Baby), Kevin Spacey (American Beauty), Jodie Foster (The Silence of the Lambs), Dustin Hoffman (Rain Man).

So if Penn does win Best Actor (which I still think Rourke will get it), we could be looking at a Best Picture upset for Milk.

No, Milk will not win Best Picture. The association to Best Actor/Best Picture was true for a long while but hasn't been true this decade (hello Ray, hello There Will Be Blood, hello Capote, hello Mystic River, hello The Pianist) and it won't hold up with Penn this time if he wins.

I'm on the fence here. SAG is a good indicator but EVERYONE gets to actually vote for the Oscars (not just in their categories, like nominations), so it will really depend on what the distribution looked like for the SAG awards in the end. We can only guess. If Penn has a slight edge with the Actors and somewhat less of an edge with the non-actors, Rourke can take it. If it was a SAG landslide for Penn then it would be nearly impossible for Rourke to win.

The ball is in Penn's court, but Rourke is definately in the running.

I'm going with Rourke but I wouldn't put money on this.

I wouldn't mind seeing Rourke win for sentimental reasons, but there's no question that Penn put in the best performance by far.



(Of course, choosing the actual best performance is not the main criteria for Oscar voters, it's all about the politics, as this thread illustrates - - but that's all part of the fun!)

Good analysis there, but considering it has happened four out of twenty four times, i'd say those odds plus his status as the favorite keep Rourke in a pretty good position.

Winslet's got Actress wrapped up, though.

Penn's SAG win needs to be discounted as a make-up win for losing for Mystic River, similar to Russell Crowe not winning the SAG for Gladiator so he wins for A Beautiful Mind. There may be voters who vote Penn for SAG but Rourke in Oscars because they want to spread the wealth.

No it doesn't. Just because it happens one time does not denote a pattern.


Four out of 24 times is not a current sustainable pattern. In the late 1980s through early 1990s it was a big pattern, but lately it hasn't held true, so there's enough there to assume that the connection either a) was never strong, just random, b) no longer applicable.

In all the cases mentioned... Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump), Hilary Swank (Million Dollar Baby), Kevin Spacey (American Beauty), Jodie Foster (The Silence of the Lambs), Dustin Hoffman (Rain Man)... all of those movies had a LOT more going for them than Milk on Awards night other than the Best Actor win. Meaning: All were considered the front runners (or in the case of M$B, one of the two frontrunners) to win.

You could more easily argue (IMO) the other way around, that the film gives power to all of the other award chances (so Milk being a bigger frontrunner would ensure Penn's victory) than the actor being the strength behind the picture winning.

Four out of 24 is really not that much of a pattern...it is still an exception more than a rule.

Also, even out of these four, three times it was an actress, meaning that only Denzel Washington could upset a contender from a BP nominee during the past 12 years. And to be frank, his Oscar for Training Day has always felt to me like a career achievement award. It was not a bad turn, but not one of his best and there were better contenders against him.

Told ya.

Denzel Washington still remains the only one that could upset during the past 13 years or so... I'm still stunned he won over Crowe anyway.