Meet the Contenders: Benedict Cumberbatch "The Imitation Game"
Saturday, November 29, 2014 at 3:00PM Each weekend a profile on a just-opened Oscar contender. Here's abstew on this weekend's new release, THE IMITATION GAME.
Benedict Cumberbatch as Alan Turing in The Imitation Game
Born: Benedict Timothy Carlton Cumberbatch was born 19 July 1976 in London, England
The Role: Norwegian film director Morten Tyldum (Headhunters) makes his English-language film debut with this film starring Cumberbatch as real-life British mathematician Alan Turing, who during WWII was in charge of a team that cracked Germany's Enigma code, thus making it able for the Allies to win the war. The film jumps back and forth between three periods in Turing's life, primarily focusing on his work during the war, his early days as a lonely youth in boarding school, and his post-war conviction for gross indecency after admitting to his homosexuality.
The film had been in development for a few years since Graham Moore's script topping the annual Black List in 2011. At one point Leonardo DiCaprio was attached to star and directors such as Ron Howard and David Yates had shown interest before eventually landing with Tyldum and Cumberbatch.
Previous Brushes With Oscar: Cumberbatch appeared in last year's Best Picture winner 12 Years a Slave. In fact, including that Oscar winner, four out of the five films he appeared in last year (Star Trek Into Darkness, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, and August:Osage County) received Oscar nominations. He has also had roles in two previous Best Picture nominees (2007's Atonement and 2011's War Horse) and appeared in Oscar nominated films The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (which also brought him a British Independent Film Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor).
What Critics Are Saying:
Cumberbatch, as you might expect, bristles with brilliance in the role – and should be considered an Oscar frontrunner. We’ve seen him as Sherlock Holmes, so we never doubt that he packs more brainpower than anyone else on the Enigma-busting team. But, unlike the emotionally cold sleuth, Turing is a real-life historical figure, sensitive and troubled. He feels deeply and passionately for his life’s work, and tears often flood his eyes, a repressed stammer forcing itself on his lips. The performance bears so many shades of varying emotion, on the surface and deep below, that it is nothing short of miraculous.
-Thelma Adams Yahoo! Movies
In Cumberbatch’s sure hands, Turing is less a force of nature than a passionate force of logic and integrity — a bold and beautiful mind. He displays far more than an Oscar-baiting repertoire of tics and twitches. There is a bright, burning inner life in evidence, too, taking us beyond the flashbacks, flash-forwards and neat dialogue beats. It’s a tough thing to perform, but Cumberbatch aces it.
-Dan Jolin Empire
As an actor, Benedict Cumberbatch can do just about anything, but even after playing a le Carré spy, a slave master, a Star Trek villain and Julian Assange, he may never have had a role that fits him with the emotionally tailored perfection of Alan Turing.
-Owen Gleiberman BBC.com
Cumberbatch is really good as Turing. Probably no other casting was possible. He is a bit Sherlockian, but it is a confident, plausible and thought-through performance.
-Peter Bradshaw The Guardian
My Take: There's a scene early in the film where a young Alan Turing separates his carrots from his peas so that the two colors remain independent of each other. It's also a perfect metaphor for the way the film compartmentalizes the various aspects of Turing's life. Turing was a great mathematic genius, publishing theories and building the prototype for the modern-day computer before he was 30. He was also a homosexual that kept his orientation a secret at a time when admitting it was a crime. But the film seems to only bring up his homosexuality when it's convenient to the narrative (he was able to keep secrets in his work because he was hiding a personal secret of his own!), never feeling like an integral or actual part of who Turing was. And Cumberbatch's Turing is so asexual that it's hard to imagine him attracted to anything other than thoughts and work. But it's those scenes where Turing is tirelessly devoted to solving problems and brainstorming that Cumberbatch's innate intelligence and cleverness works best for the role, believably playing the smartest man in the room and one who's not above stating just that. Cumberbatch layers Turing's inner conflict throughout, providing more depth to the character than the script calls for. If only he was allowed to integrate all the aspects of Turing's personality together within the same person, to let the peas mix with the carrots, and not just feel like great pieces separated from the complete whole.
Fun Fact: Fittingly for a film called The Imitation Game, Cumberbatch has been making the rounds doing his spot-on impersonations. Here he is doing impressions of Alan Rickman, John Malkovich, and Jack Nicholson (among others). Cumberbatch has gained a reputation for his impression of Alan Rickman and even provided it for an episode of The Simpsons, where he also voiced a Prime Minister character based on Hugh Grant in Love Actually.
Probability of a Nomination: Very Likely. It seems that at this point the three men guaranteed a Best Actor nomination are Redmayne, Keaton, and Cumberbatch. He has been brewing as the next big thing for a couple years now. Missing out on a nomination last year when The Fifth Estate didn't turn out as the Oscar hopeful it was intended as, it seems like with this role, in this film - now is his time. He's also having a great year that will raise his profile, thanks to his Emmy win this year for he wildly popular Sherlock and the recent announcement of his engagement. Charming in interviews (of which he has done many already - hitting his awards campaign tour hard) and with the backing of Harvey Weinstein behind him, a nomination seems like a done deal.
"The Imitation Game" opened in NYC and LA yesterday, November 28
Reader Comments (14)
If TIG gets the big nomination (Picture), I feel the film is going to be in the same position as AMERICAN HUSTLE, DALLAS BUYERS CLUB and THE WOLF OF WALL STREET were last year for me - the movies that boast really good performances, but are too much less than the sum of their parts to be considered as the best film of the year. (And if Tyldum gets a Director nomination, it's just going to feel like Tom Hooper all over again for me (and I hope Fincher doesn't get a nod to make it even more so!)).
I saw it last week here in London and really enjoyed it; I thought it was beautifully unpretentious and that's how I feel about Benedict's performance. Keira was great in her supporting role, really fresh and great contrasting temperature for Turning.
LOVED the movie, it was excellent! Benedict was incredible in the role, definitely worth a nomination. As is Keira Knightley who was magnificent as the only female code-breaker.
by the way, I also saw "Paddington" and I am very happy that Nicole Kidman will finally have a Box Office hit (it has been a while, hasn't it?)
+ she's wonderfully bitchy in the film, look out for that moment where she picks up a stuffed weasel thinking it's her phone :D
Here's my statement: I HATE Benedict whatever his last name is. He creeps me out & I am still bitter that he stole Mark Ruffalo's emmy for "Sherlook-do-we-really-need-another-version-of-that-tier-story? There I sais it!
stjeans: Tout sais une mouthful. Salut!
I am not keen on him or his film or this perforamnce which is to me what it was a surface perforamce and Knightley's role was unrealistic,Joan was not like that and took me out of the story,supporting cast was better and I am a huge Keira fan..
Do not understand the disdain Cumberbatch receives online. He can act. Unlike the assembly line of pretty faced white boys who do nothing but will some day grow up to have their own McConaughey Oscar win?---I hate whatever that was he just received.
3rtful - Ridiculously devoted, undiscriminating internet fanbases can be a powerful deterrent sometimes. I am just beginning to look past it in Cumberbatch's case.
I based my view on the film and his way into movies.
yeah yeah bullcrap.
In the 80s Meryl was sometimes ridiculed by less talented and (at the time) more established actors for 1) doing only drama; 2) for being unable to speak properly because of all the accents she's doing in her films; 3) for looking strange!
Decades later she's laughing in everyone's face.
Blanchett is too theatrical for some.
Kidman is too cold for others.
Cumberbatch, a LAMDA graduate (one of the best drama schools in the world) will soon laugh in your face the same way the three great names mentioned above already are.
And with an Oscar to his name, too!
Wow. I was unaware of a backlash against Cumberbatch. Is there really that much disdain for him? I like his performances, although I feel I sometimes see a little too much "acting" and not enough being, but that happens with everyone at some point. I think he is phenomenal as Sherlock and if he has a drawback, it's that it is hard for him to subvert his intelligence for when a character needs to be a little more middle of the road (Charles in AOC for example). Haven't seen TIG yet.
I think he'll be our shock snub,just a feeling.
This is a good movie. Benedict has done good job