Casey Affleck's Oscar winning performance is aging so well.

SAG has lost a lot of its luster after the merger with AFTRA. Before 2012, it was actors honoring actors. Since 2012, radio personalities and background singers have diluted the body to the point of losing some of its essence. They should limit the voting to just the SAG portion of the body if they want to regain their prior status.

It's an all-timer for sure

This is what happens when you deliver great work in an excellent movie with an aces screenplay - and in something that works beyond the confines of Oscar-bait. It's been four years and MBTS is still so damn exciting.

Agree. It's probably because doesn't give away the character in the first 5 minutes, is reserved and keeps you intriegued by his situation and carefully puts the pieces together, by the end the impact is undeniable. It's cinematic, what his major competition in that category is not.

Also, was a rare case of portraying a man in a vulnerable way that's not that common, another one that year with a similar edge is Shahab Hosseine in The Salesman

A pitch perfect performance but kinda one-note too. I rarely been a fan of that kind of "quietly suffering" performances. Denzel should have won his third oscar for his titanic performance in Fences that year.

This. Affleck was very fine, if a bit one note. But the role is inherently quite one-note, so it's not really his fault. I think part of the reason it's not done much for his career since is the lack of range the performance required. Good casting more than anything, but it's a one trick role...how do you follow up? He's still playing the same monotone types in indie flicks. If it was as monumental a performance as some suggest, his career and the level of roles subsequently offered to him would have been transformed. Truth is, a lot of actors could have slotted easily into that role to a similar standard. That performance is not going to jump you into the Bale/Phoenix casting level bracket, where people see you as some sort of virtuoso who can fit into anything..

On the other hand I think Washington's loss for a technically far superior performance weirdly elevated his own standing in the industry (and it was already pretty high to begin with). I don't think  there is as much urgency to nominate him the following year for a critical and box office disappointment like Roman J Israel Esq if there wasn't some buyers remorse for not giving it to him for Fences. The loss makes a third Oscar more likely than not at some point, and may be the catalyst that gets him to Nicholson's Oscar record, so it may have been a blessing in disguise for him.

At the time I was annoyed Affleck won, because as you said, Washington was better (I thought he was a lot better to be honest).

But the truth is the wrong people win every year (I'm not sure I agree with a single acting winner this year, but I still need to catch up on a few more performances) and the loss seemed to raise Washington's stock in many ways so it's not too bad. He'll have his chances to win again, and Affleck may not. And most of the people on this thread complaining about his SAG win take regular shots at him in general, so I wouldn't read too much into that

I said nothing about Washington winning SAG. I made a factual observation about SAG losing its luster because they let in radio personalities and background singers into their voting membership. I understand your ass is still raw from the pounding I gave it over the last couple of days, but maybe you should read what people are actually saying?

I rarely criticize awards bodies anymore for going their own way or having a different pick to mine. I find that pretty narcissistic, as if everybody else should feel the same way we do about something as subjective as art. SAG-AFTRA either thought Washington was better or that he was due for one or that they shouldn't be awarding somebody accused of sexual harassment/assault (or most likely a combination of all 3). And that's fine, because it's their award and they can do with it as they wish. But it's also a fact that the award isn't what it used to be because it's no longer just actors honoring actors. And you'd have to be an idiot to deny that fact.

I mean, he’s helped a lot by the extremely mixed reception a lot of the past decade’s Best Actor winners have. Especially Redmayne, Oldman and Malek. I’d say the only other three that are commonly viewed as good winners are DDL, Firth, and DiCaprio. I know this forum likes Dujardin and McConaughey’s wins a lot, but I don’t see that opinion reflected very much outside of here and I don’t think their films have aged well in a lot of people’s eyes. At best, I’ve seen them viewed as fine and middle tier. Too early to say where Phoenix will land.

It all depends on where you ask. On places like this forum, Phoenix's win is already getting backlash (even though this forum loves him in general), with some claiming it's one of his worst performances etc. You go on social media though (Twitter etc), there's almost nothing but love for Phoenix's win. Affleck is reasonably well appreciated here, but quite often on social media in the years since, I often see a lot people saying they can't believe Washington lost to that performance, so it's arguably not aged very well with general audiences.

I'm looking forward to the absolute random and meaningless "evidence" that pupdurcs will conjure up that supports his statement.

The reaching will be funny to watch.