In the competitive field of Best Actor contenders, Oscar-winner Leonardo DiCaprio (“The Revenant”) contends with rising star Adam Driver as well as long overdue veterans Antonio Banderas and Joaquin Phoenix.Driver’s strong performances in “The Report” and “Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker” support his first shot at a Best Actor Oscar with Noah Baumbach’s “Marriage Story” –which earned raves on the fall festival circuit — in which he and Scarlett Johansson play a couple dealing with a fractious divorce.Spanish Oscar-winner Pedro Almodóvar (“All About My Mother”) launched at Cannes his auto-fiction “Pain & Glory” (Sony Pictures Classics), starring regular muse Banderas as an aging filmmaker looking back on his life.
Banderas gives a moving, intimate performance unlike anything else he has ever done; his Best Actor win at Cannes marked a strong start on the road to his first Oscar nomination.
Critics have backed him, but he missed SAG and BAFTA nods.
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