After seeing the movie this summer (at LAFF w/ some awesome Folcs
), I decided that Heath definitely deserved the nomination. Before I saw it, I was kind of annoyed that there was talk of him being nominated because I thought that it was only because of sympathy votes. Now I can't say he deserves to win because I haven't seen some of the other roles that are up for the Oscar but he definitely deserves the nomination.
Like Labby said, unfortunately we won't ever really know if he would have won the Oscar had he still been alive. If he does win it, there will always be speculation that it was because of sympathy votes. Still, it was an amazing performance.
I'm not surprised it wasn't nominated for Best Picture though. It was definitely one of the best films of the year but I just couldn't see it getting nominated. Like Trin said, it's not very often that a Sci Fi/Fantasy/Supernatural movie gets nominated for Best Pic. I mean, Star Wars didn't even win Best Pic and it TOTALLY deserved it IMAO.
