‘The Revenant’ Sucked And Leo Shouldn’t Have Won The Oscar

The world rejoiced on Sunday night when Leonardo DiCaprio won the Best Actor Oscar at the Academy Awards. Did he really deserve to win though?

When Leo's name was announced it was already a foregone conclusion. Prognosticators all believed he was the one to beat and they were right.

It was a big moment, so much so, the Twittersphere blew up making it the most tweeted about moment in the history of the social media giant.

But why were people so happy that DiCaprio won the award? Was his performance in The Revenant so astounding that it was better than the rest of the nominees?

Speaking of The Revenant, it's not a great movie. It's confusing, over wrought and thirty minutes too long.

In many cases, great actors can make a mediocre film excellent. However I don't feel that way about The Revenant. DiCaprio's win felt more like a "make good" for the three previous nominations where he didn't score the Oscar.

When DiCaprio was in The Wolf of Wall Street a couple of years ago he deserved the Oscar, an award he didn't win. I got the feeling that America wanted DiCaprio to win because he's Leo. After all, he was Jack Dawson in Titanic and we'll "never forget."

If Leonardo DiCaprio didn't deserve the Best Actor Oscar, who did? Matt Damon.

Damon was in a film very similar to DiCaprio's, The Martian. Damon was isolated, alone and scared much like DiCaprio.

The similarities between Damon and DiCaprio's performance begins and end there however.

Damon, like DiCaprio, mostly act by themselves. You can sense Damon's character's desperation, fear and hunger. Meanwhile DiCaprio, who is in another very similar situation, grunts, crawls, hobbles and plays near-dead throughout.

The Martian was also well received by critics and movie goers alike. It was also a smash at the box office.

The Revenant was all of those things too. But the difference between Damon and DiCaprio was the latter never won an Oscar.

Damon picked up a Best Original Screenplay Oscar with Ben Affleck in 1997. Meaning Damon could get skipped this year. DiCaprio never has and this was the Academy's way of congratulating him on a career of great work.

Unfortunately, that's how I feel it works with the Academy. That said, lifetime achievement awards shouldn't be bundled into Best Actor Oscars.

Don't get me wrong, DiCaprio is a fantastic actor and deserving of all of the accolades he receives, but handing him the Oscar for Best Actor in The Revenant was a mistake.