The Academy electorate has a fondness for clowns playing Hamlet, which should ensure a place for Jim Carrey, already a Golden Globe winner for The Truman Show. Oscar's pet of the 1990s, Tom Hanks, who already has won best actor twice this decade, is aiming for a hat-trick with Saving Private Ryan. Nick Nolte's riveting, expressive performance in Affliction should ensure him a nomination, and Ian McKellen's superb portrayal of the gay, English film-maker, James Whale, in Gods and Monsters, should be rewarded, too.
The fifth place will probably go to Golden Globe winner Michael Caine for his vigorous performance in Little Voice, although he has some formidable opposition in Brendan Gleeson (The General), Warren Beatty (Bulworth), Sean Penn (Hurlyburly), Edward Norton (American History X), Joseph Fiennes (Shakespeare in Love), and John Travolta, whose vote will be split between two films, A Civil Action and Primary Colors.
Prediction: Jim Carrey, Tom Hanks, Nick Nolte, Ian McKellen, Michael Caine