Some prominent 2008's Actress wins in roughly chronological order: Sally Hawkins, Sandra Corveloni, Dominique Blanc, Melissa Leo, Hawkins (twice more), Anne Hathaway (twice), Kate Winslet and Hawkins Many awards groups have come and gone eager to have their say and loudly proclaim their opinions on the "best" of film acting for 2008. That these diverse opinions, once you get past festival season, are often barely distinguishable from one another is neither here nor there for this discussion since this time it's all about me!me!me! or, rather, mine!mine!mine! (I get so territorial with my beloved actresses, you know).
If you value awards consensus, which is often an interesting curio for each film year, there's roughly only 7 great performances by a leading actress given this year (so far ... Oscar speaks on Thursday morning and could surprise). Those are, alphabetically:
- Anne Hathaway as "Kym" in Rachel Getting Married
- Sally Hawkins as "Poppy" in Happy-Go-Lucky
- Angelina Jolie as "Christine Collins" in Changeling
- Melissa Leo as "Ray Eddy" in Frozen River
- Kristin Scott Thomas as "Juliette Fontaine" in I've Loved You So Long
- Meryl Streep as "Sister Aloysius" in Doubt
- Kate Winslet as "April Wheeler" in Revolutionary Road
Still and all: I always wish we saw more variety in awards season. Where was the hoopla for Julianne Moore's return to form (twice over)? Where were the kudos for career stretches from two continually undervalued actresses Famke Janssen and Emily Mortimer? Oh, riiiight, "continually undervalued" ... I answered my own question.
And, just for fun, since I'm always eager to share my actress affliction with all of you, here are the 16 lead performances I considered noteworthy in some way (from the 100+ films I saw) and that I shuffled around in rank throughout this annual Sophie's Choice ordeal of choosing "the best"
