Oscars 1994: If We Picked The Winners (Best Supporting Actor)

by Christopher Lominac

1. Samuel L. Jackson in Pulp Fiction

samuel-l-jackson-pulp-fiction

Landau may have taken home the Oscar for his performance, and he would easily be my number one pick in numerous years, but anyone competing in 1994 always had one big obstacle in his way, because he was going up against one of the greatest movie characters of all time: Jules Winfield. This classic character that made Samuel L. Jackson a household name and would go on to spawn a career that would lead Jackson to appear in more $100 million-plus grossing movies than any other actor in history, is one of my favorite creations in the history of film. Jules from Pulp Fiction is hands down one of the coolest cats in the history of Earth (fictional or non-fictional, film or any other medium, this universe or any other parallel universes). Even if the only scene Jules had appeared in was the scene in which he and Vincent (John Travoltra) kill the guys who messed with Marsellus (Ving Rhames), the "What ain't no country I've ever heard of. They speak English in what?" speech and the reciting of the fake bible verse Ezekiel 25:17 would be enough to give him the Oscar in my book. The sheer bravado of Jules, and the possible existence of a human being like Jules, is so revolutionary that even if Samuel L. Jackson had solely banked his career off of variations of the character (which he has to some extent), he still deserves a life-time achievement award. Beyond creating the untouchable bad ass aura of Jules Winnfield, Jackson also has great chemistry with John Travoltra's Vincent Vega. Their friendship is the driving force of the film, and the humorous back and forth between the characters is easily the most memorable part of the film. The ease with which Jackson transforms between nonchalant aloofness and intensely furious anger is also quite impressive. There are very few supporting actor roles that I can think of off hand that I would rank ahead of this. It's purely iconic, a role that will forever go down in the annals of cinema as one of the best. It€™s just too bad the Academy did not see this at the time.
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A film fanatic at a very young age, starting with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle movies and gradually moving up to more sophisticated fare, at around the age of ten he became inexplicably obsessed with all things Oscar. With the incredibly trivial power of being able to chronologically name every Best Picture winner from memory, his lifelong goal is to see every Oscar nominated film, in every major category, in the history of the Academy Awards.