Will
Daniel have his Day?
Daniel Day-Lewis is set to become The Academy Awards
(Oscars) most prestigious winner. If he wins the Oscar for his role as Abraham
Lincoln, in the Steven Spielberg film Lincoln,
he will earn his third award for Best Actor in a Leading Role. No other actor
has done this in The Academy’s eighty-five history. What is more fascinating with
Day-Lewis’s career is the overwhelming amount of awards he has received in his relatively
short acting career. He has appeared in only twenty films yet has won
eighty-seven internationally recognised awards. That is ratio no other actor in
the history of film has even nearly replicated.
The recognition he receives is largely due to the
fact he is method actor. This means he will become the character during his
time of making the film. This dedication to a role ended in broken ribs during
the filming My Left Foot as he spent
two weeks hunched over in a wheelchair. During the filming of The Last of the Mohican’s he lived off
the land, and learned how to hunt and fish. He also carried a rifle around the
film set at all times. In his performance as Bill the Butcher in Gangs of New York, he learned how to be
butcher. When he contracted pneumonia on set he refused medication because his
character would not have been able to the receive treatment. Due to the efforts Day-Lewis puts in to
his work he refuses to make back to back films. This gives him the opportunity
to select films which he wants to invest his time in too. However this seems to
be positive for his career, as he is in more demand as an actor, as film makers
know they will be getting quality if not quantity.
Will he win his third Oscar? Yes!
The politics of this film will ensure he wins, as he
is playing the man who abolished slavery in America. Therefore without Lincoln there
would be no Barack Obama. Putting the politics on one side, Day-Lewis’s performance
is nothing short of extraordinary. Every envisagement I have ever had of Abraham
Lincoln came to life in his performance. When watching him act I felt like it
was Lincoln I was watching. As an audience member when he was screen I somehow
forgot I was watching a movie. The film contains other notable performances
from Tommy Lee Jones and Sally Field, however Day-Lewis truly steals the show. He
deserves his third Oscar.
I can’t say he is the greatest actor of all time or
he is my favourite but I would say no other actor has better selection of acting
performances on film. He just has not made a bad film that he plays the lead
role. This is down to the dedication he puts in to his art and for that he
deserves the recognition.
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