re: Was Bradley Cooper in AS better than Ralph Fiennes in Grand Budapest?

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This is my issue. He was spectacular, but it seemed almost impossibly natural. Is that a testament to his acting, or was it just the perfect casting?

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It's not like Fiennes just walked through the role in his normal manner of speaking and acting. "Impossibly natural" doesn't just happen. That was an amazing performance. A performance where he didn't have the benefit of adding a thick accent or altering his physique to set his character apart from his normal appearance.

Eddie Redmayne is winning all of the awards (in part) because his role is super-obviously apart from his normal appearance/behavior. There's a built-in benefit to those roles where you're severely crippled or alter your physique and manner of speaking. It's why some actors go for those roles that have them looking deformed or extremely less attractive. It's why Jennifer Aniston assumed she'd get an Oscar nom for playing a scarred, crippled, drug addict.