THE FILMS NOMINATED for Best Picture don't seem to have much in common, but let's follow the advice given in the ad campaign for American Beauty -- certainly the most overrated movie of the bunch -- and "look closer." In each film, a person dissatisfied with his life (Kevin Spacey in American Beauty, Tobey Maguire in The Cider House Rules, Tom Hanks in The Green Mile, Russell Crowe in The Insider, Bruce Willis/Haley Joel Osment in The Sixth Sense) finds a measure of fulfillment by idealizing somebody else (Wes Bentley, Michael Caine, Michael Clarke Duncan, Al Pacino, Osment/Willis) and trying to live up to their example.

The situation is more explicitly presented in several better movies that the Academy pushed into minor categories or ignored outright (Being John Malkovich, Fight Club, Boys Don't Cry, eXistenZ), but we all know the Oscar nominees and winners are chosen based on politics and Hollywood favoritism, even as they desperately desire to be symbols of quality and beauty. This desire, reflected both in the Academy and the Academy's choices, brings us to the secret poster boy for movies in 1999: Jude Law. The ultimate alter ego, he is perfect not just as the object of desire, but as the object that everyone desires to be.

Not that he's going to win. Tom Cruise has the Supporting Actor award locked up. This, however, makes for a handy comparison. I've always wanted to like Tom Cruise more than I've actually liked him. He takes risks and bears the reign of celebrity with the phony indifference I expect from movie stars. But he works so hard at winning you over (pulling out the endless grins, tilting his head just so), and his multitude of narcissistic tics feel so rehearsed, that more often than not, he comes across as overeager and too anxious to please. (This is precisely the slick surface and insecure foundation Kubrick exploited so well in Eyes Wide Shut.)

Law, on the other hand, is like the beaming "After" picture for a self-confidence seminar. It's a given that most movie actors are good-looking. Many of them are quite beautiful. Only a few, however, are comfortable enough with their beauty that it seems less an accident of birth than a birthright. Like Alain Delon, Richard Gere, or Denzel Washington (and unlike Cruise or, say, Brad Pitt), Law glides through his movies without making the effort to seduce you. He knows he's already accomplished that, and the energy saved only makes him more magnetic. Even when playing a cowardly hero-by-default in David Cronenberg's eXistenZ, Law commands your attention -- though it's typical of Cronenberg's intellectual take on sexuality that he sheared Law's wavy locks and emphasized his bulging eyes and prominent Adams apple, finding the repressed nerd in the golden boy.

In I Love You, I Love You Not (1996), co-star Claire Danes describes Law's Big Man On Campus as "Perfect. There's not one thing wrong with him. He shines." This is the vivid overstatement of a schoolgirl, of course. It also happens to be entirely accurate. Just look at him. Light doesn't bounce off of him, it radiates from him. Or perhaps that's just an illusion generated by the sharp angles of his face, combined with the most intelligent, piercing eyes in cinema right now. (Named after the eponymous hero of Hardy's Jude the Obscure, Law shares his namesake's "serious and tender gaze," but without his hapless pessimism.)

One reason it's so enticing to dream yourself into Law's shoes is his characters' certitude that they deserve everything they've gotten, and how they're always hungry for more. In Gattaca, there's a scene in which Law and Uma Thurman, never having met, must pretend to be lovers. When she goes to peck his cheek he demands a kiss on the lips, which is funny, but the brilliance of the scene is how he refuses to let go of her hand, cradling it with a gentleness that threatens untapped reserves of force, if needed. Ultimately, that's what Law is all about: A perfect play-acting of civility that can't hide the actor's frank, robust carnality.

This same self-assurance brought such conviction to Law's flashy turn in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, which bewitched not only Clint Eastwood, but also his co-star, Kevin Spacey. Though he was barely noticeable amid the mindless flash of Shopping (1994), and a surprising failure as a vampire in the straight-to-video Wisdom of Crocodiles (1998), his Oscar-nominated turn in The Talented Mr. Ripley only confirms how easily Law slips into our desire to be better than ourselves: He's handsomer, cockier, and more alive.

So he won't win Sunday night. He's too young, too good-looking, and too primed to take over the world for Academy voters to warm up to him just yet. He'll applaud as Cruise walks down the aisle, possibly bite his lower lip when he smiles, and those beautiful eyes will flash. Right then, I'll be watching in amazement, because on Jude Law's face there won't be a hint of disappointment or ingratitude. Why should there be? His time is sure to come.