Kevin Spacey as Supporting Actor?

Rating: 10/10 (17 June 2005)

I watched this film a few months ago and I was very impressed with Spacey's performance, as always. There is one thing that bothers me though- why was he supporting actor? It is true that he does not do very much in the narrative, which occupies the main core of the film, yet he is the narrator (like Morgan Freeman in Shawshank Redemption, which earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Leading Actor, and there was a debate about whether it should have been Tim Robbins), and given that he is the latent villain as well, should he not have been nominated as Best Leading Actor? Does anyone agree with me here? I am convinced that if he had been nominated for Best Leading Actor, he would have won the Oscar because his portrayal of the apparently weak yet sophisticated Verbal Kint was very powerful, especially since his role was very difficult to play (harder than his role as Lester Burnham in American Beauty, in my opinion).