10 Black, Minority And Ethnic Actors Who Should Have Made The Oscar Cut This Year

Every year, the Oscar nominations bring controversy. A seemingly surefire fan favorite nominee misses out, a less-deserving candidate makes it in; trivial stuff, usually. This year was different - or not, considering the real problem with the Oscars 2016 whitewash is that it's essentially just a repeat of last year's awards. Again, like 2015, and across all four acting categories, every single one of the 20 nominees is white. Certainly, it was a tight competition as ever for BME (black, minority and ethnic) actors - with under-representation in the industry being the true root of the diversity issue, 2016 was just another year in which white Academy Award candidates vastly outnumbered non-white runners. All the same, there were more than a few BME performers that deserved to make the final short lists this year that didn't, and here are ten of them. 8) Idris Elba For Beasts of No Nation Cary Fukunaga's incredible Beasts of No Nation hasn't made the cut in a single category at this year's Oscars, a minor travesty considering how strong it is in so many areas, from cinematography, to editing, to directing. But the category it came closest to, the one it most stood a chance of appearing in, was Best Supporting Actor, represented by none other than Idris Elba. In the end though, he didn't make it in. The problem with this year's Best Supporting Actor race is that there were some incredibly strong contenders, a good deal of whom were snubbed (sorry, Michael Shannon and Paul Dano). The final five are all mighty talents, but the argument could be made that Tom Hardy isn't exactly at his peak in The Revenant, playing the role as he does rather hammily. Beasts of No Nation, on the other hand, is home to the superior villain: Idris Elba's frightening Commandant, a man so unsettling you might be inclined to watch his scenes through your fingers. 7) Abraham Attah For Beasts of No Nation Elba may have been the film's favorite to win a nomination, but his co-star - and Beasts of No Nation's lead - Abraham Attah was arguably the most deserving of the two to secure an Oscar nomination. As child soldier Agu, Attah displays the maturity of an actor who's been at it for decades, rather than the untrained newcomer that he actually is. Though Attah was never a strong Best Actor contender, everything about his role suggests he should have been. If we're nominating actors based on what the worthy material represents, as it's strongly suspected voters did for Redmayne in The Danish Girl, then why not nominate Attah? Not only is his role a difficult and important one, and not only is he far more soulful and natural than Redmayne in the movie, but he pulls off the feat at a mere 14-years-old (as he was at the time of filming). Surely that's worthy of a nomination? 6) Viola Davis For Blackhat The critics regarded her turn in Blackhat highly, but in reality, AMPAS was never going to go for Violas Davis for Best Supporting Actress. The film bombed and as a whole failed to connect, while no one from the movie bothered (or had the money) to mount a campaign. It's a shame, because Davis is superb in Blackhat, giving the definition of a strong female performance without it bearing the cliches the description might suggest. Davis tops Best Supporting Actress 2016 nominees Kate Winslet and The Danish Girl's Alicia Vikander at least, both of whom landed nominations as safe favorites. Vikander in particular seems out of place: though her turn in Ex Machina was indeed Oscar nom-worthy, The Danish Girl lumbers her with a flatly-written character. Davis in Blackhat, on the other hand, makes a meal of a character that was nothing but a cipher on the page. 5) Oscar Isaac For Ex Machina 2016, like 2015 before it, was the year of the whitewash, with no black actor being nominated at the Oscars for a second year running. But did you know Latino actors haven't been represented at the ceremony since 2012? They, like the black community, have again found themselves without representation in 2016. Not that there weren't options for voters. Take Oscar Isaac, for instance, the Guatemalan-born actor who so excels in Alex Garland's Ex Machina as a sly, sinister tech overlord. This was good Best Supporting Actor nominee material: a complex (check) and troubled (check) yet compelling (check) villain (check) that required the actor to go through a physical transformation (check check check). It would've been neat to top a great year for Isaac off with an Oscar nom for his trouble, but it wasn't to be. 4) Benicio Del Toro For Sicario Another Latino actor who missed out on a Best Supporting Actor nod this year, Benicio Del Toro had an even greater chance than Isaac of getting down to the last five for his turn in Sicario. But faced with that tough competition, he - like Elba and Isaac, Shannon and Dano - was kept out. It's regrettable. Del Toro doesn't just impress in Denis Villeneuve's Mexican border thriller - it may be his best performance to date. A bold claim, perhaps, especially regarding a man with Del Toro's record (The Usual Suspects, Traffic, Che), but considering what he achieves in the film - building from minimal dialogue a character so riveting he was immediately given his own spinoff movie - it might just be true. 3) Samuel L. Jackson For The Hateful Eight Quentin Tarantino's latest may be long-winded, over-indulgent and thematically scrambled, but it has a few aces. One of them, namely, is Samuel L Jackson, giving one of his best performances in a good while in his first official leading role for QT. Jackson is the standout in The Hateful Eight's ensemble, playing bounty hunter Major Marquis Warren with intelligence. Some of the role feels familiar - Jackson's speechifying reminds of Jules Whinfield's Ezekiel bit, while his incredulous F-bombing recalls just about every part he's played for Tarantino - but somehow this one just feels more personal to Jackson. Perhaps the role's racially-charged nature is what brought Jackson to giving a more human, deeply felt performance than we're used to seeing from him. Again, more deserving than Redmayne. 2) Tessa Thompson For Creed With Sylvester Stallone wowing with probably his best ever performance as Rocky Balboa, the conversation never really got going about what a delight his Creed co-star Tessa Thompson also is in the film. Like Blackhat's Viola Davis, Thompson works with very little and makes a meal out of it, making Adonis Creed's girlfriend into a flesh-and-blood human being rather than just a simple fighter's moll. If we were to push Vikander out of Best Supporting Actress (again, not her fault that The Danish Girl gave her and everyone around her nothing to work with), Thompson would be a more than deserving replacement. Creed never really managed to pick up the awards momentum to be a real contender this year, but seeing as Sly's name on the ballot for Best Supporting Actor, it seems a shame Tessa Thompson didn't make it, too. 1) Any Of The Main Trio For Straight Outta Compton If there were an Oscar for Best Trio, the three leads of Straight Outta Compton would have bagged it this year. Unfortunately, there isn't, so there was never much chance of Jason Mitchell, Corey Hawkins and O'Shea Jackson Jr. securing noms in 2016. The reason being that it's just too difficult to separate the pack and single just one of them out. All three have their strengths. Jason Mitchell is rough but at-times achingly sympathetic as Eazy-E. Corey Hawkins is a quietly, confidently riveting Dr Dre. And O'Shea Jackson Jr, son of Ice Cube himself, brings an uncanny realism in playing his own father. Truthfully, these guys were never going to be contenders for acting Oscars this year (they would have split each other's votes), but each one made a huge impression regardless.