re: Gary Oldman in Darkest Hour

Good transformational performance, yes, and incredible, yes,...

but when you have a role with that much makeup and once you find the voice you want, those parts are not as difficult many make them out to be because you have so many secondary elements to immerse yourself in the role.

Honestly, playing an everyman or a character where it's only you and the camera, that's a far more difficult "great" performance to pull off.

That's why I always thought Cruise was so much better in Rain Man than Hoffman. Cruise had the hard role, Hoffman just had to find his place and then go with a "one note" character.

Cruise had to really carry the story along, with no real gimmicks, all while being an a-hole that you liked... Much more difficult to pull off.

It's why I also thought Rourke was so good in the Wrestler... It was just him, opening a vein for the character. No prosthetics, no accent, no limp, no nothing. Just a beaten down man.