Last year, Eddie Redmayne won a well-deserved Academy Award for Best Actor for his transformative portrayal of Stephen Hawkings battle with motor neurone disease in the period biopic The Theory Of Everything. This year, its hard not to see his transformative performance in the period biopic The Danish Girl as a thinly veiled ruse to repeat the trick. If he wins next month, itll come as something of a shock, simply because The Danish Girl simply isnt that good. To use Rotten Tomatoes as a barometer, last years Redmayne-headlined biopic has a 91% score on the popular review comparison site while The Danish Girl has 75%. Critics can agree that its solid, but few are vouching that Redmayne deserves another Oscar. Ultimately, his performance as Lili/Einar lacks the originality of his Hawking. Weve seen male actors in female roles countless times, and its a tough to argue that Redmayne brings anything truly unique and vote-worthy to that canon. The Danish Girl regales an important story that needed telling, but that doesnt mean the Academy has to honour Redmayne for the second year in a row.
