Top Ten WORST Best Actor Winners

Here's a quick breakdown of my top ten WORST performances to win the Best Actor Oscar. Lemme hear your opinion in the comments!

10. AL PACINO - SCENT OF A WOMAN (1992)

Number ten is always a tricky spot to fill, because there are so many

performances that could easily find a place on this list. Today, my opinion swayed towards Al Pacino's hammy, loud, over-the-top and garish work in Scent of a Woman. Al Pacino is a tremendous actor - his performance in Dog Day Afternoon easily ranks as one of my favourite performances ever, and he was all sorts of cold and calculating in The Godfather Part II. He mostly won for (and when I say "mostly" won, I mean, it was the entire reason he won) this "performance" because of his previous losses in this category. This is a consolation Oscar at its worst and most embarrassing. Pacino barely scratches the surface of his genius, leaving us with a soulless caricature of a performance that we'd all be best to forget.

WORST MOMENT: Everytime Pacino grunts "Who-ha"... or however that horrible excuse for a catchphrase goes.

9. JOHN WAYNE - TRUE GRIT (1969)

Another consolation Oscar. This one is particularly embarrassing though in that Wayne doesn't even try to play a character. He's simply playing John Wayne, which he doesn't even do convincingly either. It almost feels as if it's True Grit starring John Wayne as a caricature of John Wayne. There's no depth to Wayne's version of Rooster Cogburn - no method to his madness, no lovable nice guy underneath the drunk exterior (unlike Jeff Bridge's portrayal in the 2010 remake). It's a pity Wayne didn't earn an Oscar for his brilliant, subtle and complicated work in the Searchers. Instead, he won for the exact opposite here- a performance that is dumb, obvious and wholly simplistic.

WORST MOMENT: When Cogburn, charging to the final showdown, puts his horses reins in his teeth so he can double fist his pistols - it's a painful reminder of Wayne's finer performances in Stagecoach, The Searchers, etc.

8. DUSTIN HOFFMAN - RAIN MAN (1988)

This isn't necessarily a bad performance - admittedly, Hoffman plays the role well. My issue here is that he won for "Best Actor in a Leading Role" - a category whose greatest victors include Marlon Brando in On the Waterfront, Jack Nicholson in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, George C. Scott in Patton and Gregory Peck in To Kill a Mockingbird. And then in 1988, Dustin Hoffman took the top prize for his one note performance in Rain Man. It doesn't even begin to compare. Hoffman exploits his characters few quirks and hams them over and over and over throughout the entire film. There's no development for his character, nomoral - just a constant, obnoxious mugging for attention and sympathy, that is beneath Hoffman's capabilities. The character who does grow and makes a convincing 180 in the film? Tom Cruise's character. If anything, Dustin Hoffman is merely playing support to emphasize the journey of personal discovery Cruise's character goes through throughout the film.

WORST MOMENT: All the blank stares and one word sentences. It breaks your heart to see Lenny Bruce, Ratso and Benjamin Braddock reduced to simplistic character ticks.

7. TOM HANKS - FORREST GUMP (1994)

I will make no secret of my personal vendetta against and disdain for Forrest Gump - I HATE Forrest Gump. As a film, it's extremely over-rated, horribly (brutally, painfully) sentimental and just not near as smart or as clever as it likes to think it is - the film itself is probably more simplistic and clueless than the title character. But Hanks dumbed down version of a dumb Alabama boy falls victim to the same malady as the other performances on this list - after two minutes, we've seen all this performance has to offer. I think Hanks' performance - and Forrest Gump in general

- is "love it or hate it". You're either going to buy into the film's treacly sweet story and characters and be swept away by it all, or you're not and you're gonna be completely repulsed by it. The latter is me.

WORST MOMENT: Everytime Hanks speaks in that accent - particularly a catchphrase - that fake, grating accent.

6. HUMPHREY BOGART - THE AFRICAN QUEEN (1951)

Ugh. Great movie. But, ugh.

WORST MOMENT: Is there just one?

5. BING CROSBY - GOING MY WAY (1944)

I hate Going My Way. I hated Bing Crosby in Going My Way. It's such a falsely earnest and self-righteous performance. You can almost hear Crosby thinking "I'm better than you" as he sings and smiles and cheeses his way through the whole film. The heart and soul of the film is really Barry Fitzgerald, and its sad to see Fitzgerald ooze such charm and warmth so naturally and then to see Crosby using all the tricks in the "Obvious Acting Handbook" to achieve an eighth of it.

WORST MOMENT: The entire performance is the worst moment.

4. CHARLTON HESTON - BEN-HUR (1959)

Me Charlton Heston. I actor. I make film.

The above three sentences showed more creativity, personality and emotion than Heston did in three hours of Ben-Hur. A dull, lifeless and wooden performance, straight from beginning to end.

WORST MOMENT: How about we a do a "One Moment Where He Doesn't Ruin the Film"? When Ben-Hur is rowing the slave ship... he's hot and gross and looks uncomfortable - the most convincing scene Charlton Heston has in the whole film.

3. YUL BRYNNER - THE KING AND I (1956)

My strong dislike for old-timey musicals probably didn't help Yul Brynner's hammy, loud and cheap performance avoid this list, but alas. Brynner spends the entire film yelling in a hokey accent, and does little to make anybody, anywhere care about anything that he does. Another one note performance stretched out for two hours too long.

WORST MOMENT: Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera...

2. ROBERTO BENIGNI - LIFE IS

BEAUTIFUL (1998)

I didn't know the Acadmey gave out Oscars for acting like a lame, less thoughful, more irritating version of Charlie Chaplin? Congratulations Mr. Benigni, you showed us all wrong! You are a true trail blazer! The slapstick comedy in Life is Beautiful is borrowed from every other physical comedian who ever lived (Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, to name two)

and the awkward shift to sentimentality and serious war film material is insulting and all subsequent emotions exploited from that scenario are completely unearned. Roberto Benigni spends the entire film - including the Holocaust scenes - looking like a baffoon, and acting like a clown that even the worst clown would find annoying. It's insulting to the potential of the material and insulting to audiences who don't find a grown man sticking his tongue out to be just the funniest thing ever.

WORST MOMENT: When he actually won the Oscar and... well, we all know how that story goes.

1. REX HARRISON - MY FAIR LADY (1964)

I have never - and I repeat, NEVER - loathed entirely an actor, character or performance as much as I despised Rex Harrison as Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady. Not once does he come across as charming - more like bigoted, cruel and selfish - nor does he show one iota of class or intelligence. Clearly Eliza has gone batshit insane by the end of the film when she decides to say with the entirely detestable Higgins - Harrison's performance gives no justification as to why Eliza would want to be with somebody who clearly hates woman, and is frankly a dick. Harrison shows no warmth, no charm, NOTHING in the two and a half something hour running time of the film, and add on top of that, he doesn't even sing (ITS A MUSICAL!) so much as talk with style. It is truly a heinous, ugly, loud, obnoxious and garish performance, I have no clue as to how Oscar voters were so charmed as to honor this performance over career best turns from Peter Sellers in Dr. Strangelove or Anthony Quinn in Zorba the Greek, or the stunning interplay between Peter O'Toole and Richard Burton in Becket. Why? WHY!?

WORST MOMENT: All of them. Every single one of them. Seriously, why!?