For the first time in 20 years, Leonardo DiCaprio thought his performance in The Wolf of Wall Street may have finally won him an Academy Award.
As Jennifer Lawrence announced Matthew McConaughey’s name and awarded him the Best Actor in the category Leading Role, the cameras panned to Leonardo.
The audience was expecting a disappointed gesture, a dejected expression. However, DiCaprio rose to hug his competitor with open arms and a sincere smile.
Even though buzz was circulating Hollywood that DiCaprio had a good chance of finally winning an Oscar, he was let down by the Academy once again.
DiCaprio has been nominated for four academy awards since 1994. He was first nominated for Best Actor in a supporting role for his impersonation of an 18-year-old with a developmental disability in the movie What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.
His next chance to acquire an Oscar was in 2005 for his performance in The Aviator. But the awards concluded with another let down.
DiCaprio took on the role of Howard Hughes, an American business magnate, investor, aviator, aerospace engineer, film maker, and philanthropist, who suffered from chronic obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Blood Diamond, which hit theatres in 2007, was the next motion picture DiCaprio starred in and was nominated for. Once again he was up to win Best Actor, and once again he failed to win the Oscar.
He played the role of Danny Archer. The film, which depicts a country torn apart by the struggle between government loyalists and insurgent forces, had a controversial yet well-meaning message.
The political activism within the movie may have struck the heartstrings of the Academy. Yet, once again, DiCaprio left the Oscars empty-handed.
The movie that hit theatres in 2013 was one of DiCaprio’s best performances yet. DiCaprio played the role of Jordan Belfort, a successful New York stock broker, in The Wolf of Wall Street.
DiCaprio portrayed Belfort’s true story in a captivating way. However, he could not step up to the plate when up against McConaughey in his film Dallas Buyers Club.
Another Oscar had slipped through his hands.
DiCaprio is continuously cast to play roles that are difficult to embody. Not every actor can transform himself into someone with a developmental disability or someone with OCD without actually having first-hand experience.
DiCaprio grabbed ahold of those roles and created characters that were so believable to his audience. His ambition and lack of hesitation should have, by now, earned him an Academy Award.
DiCaprio also seems to consistently play roles that are based on true stories and real people.
It seems much harder to play a realistic person because the actor or actress has to completely take on another personality, and image that is not their own.
They have to fully embody and recreate that person. DiCaprio sits at a rare intersection of popular and critical consensus: everyone thinks he’s commendable. And yet, every year the prolific actor finds himself clapping for someone else.
Coincidently most of the films he has been in have won Academy Awards, but he himself has not been able to grasp an award.
“It’s astonishing to think that DiCaprio — who has been acting for 20 years now — has yet to win an Oscar”, said Middletown High School senior Kim Habitch. “He’s played a leading role in numerous films and is so versatile.”
DiCaprio even starred in the major motion picture The Titanic in 1997. The movie itself won Best Picture but he, as an actor, was not even nominated for an award that year.
Awards are all about image. Maybe Dicaprio has not reached his full potential or has neglected to take on roles that allow him to reach the potential he possesses.
“To me, the Oscars are more about how the public perceives the films and what is best about them”, said MHS senior Emma Dainton. “The awards are not necessarily about who is the best actor.”
Award shows in general are all about what the people want, not necessarily about who truly deserves to be awarded.
Leonardo DiCaprio is amazing at what he does. He has demonstrated a high level of dramatic versatility in his films.
