The Final Conclusion - Best Actress 1980

1980

5. Gena Rowlands in Gloria

Gena Rowlands (despite her great talent) is not able to save this trainwreck of a movie called Gloria, but at there are some short, but quite strong scenes that ingrained in my memory. I wasn't very disappointed to tell the truth (I knew what to expect), but it's painful to write so negatively about Gena.

4. Mary Tyler Moore in Ordinary People

This is a fantastic performance, which is extremely haunting and captivating. Mary is able to make Beth a breathing, understandable human being, for whom you really feel sorry. Thanks to Mary Tyler Moore, I was perfectly able to understand Beth's emotions and feelings.

3. Goldie Hawn in Private Benjamin

Goldie gives a great and extremely hilarious performance in Private Benjamin, which might very well be her best work, though it's nothing for the ages. The most important thing is that I loved her and the character as well, and she entertained me so well. I loved her, that's it.

2. Sissy Spacek in Coal Miner's Daughter

I was quite pleased by Sissy's performance in this movie. Sometimes I was so captivated by her, that I forgot that I was actually watching a movie. It's a really gripping, powerful performance, which is extremely subtle, but is full of layers, quiet emotions and brilliant singing.

1. Ellen Burstyn in Resurrection

This extremely controversial performance was so healing for me. I loved every moment of it, though I doubt that love is the right word for it. It really made me re-think if The Exorcist is my favorite performance of Ellen. Ellen in Ressurection is thought-provoking, harrowing and unforgettable.

So I can proudly announce

that my winner is...

Ellen Burstyn

in

Resurrection

Miracle worker :)

Final thoughts: Wow, this decision was not easy. For a while, I thought I would pick Ellen, because her performance was so unique, but I figured that Sissy's towering, enourmous performance is the one for the ages and Ellen falls into the Liza Minnelli/Diane Lane category. I LOVED Goldie and I really want to mention her, because if her movie was made in 1981 or 1975, she would be my pick, hands down. She's so utterly charming and I'm so happy that it found recognition. Some may not like that I ranked her above Mary, but that's it. Mary was fantastic as well, though this time she let me down a bit. Just like Ida Kaminska, but to a lesser extent. Gena was the weakest link in this otherwise great line-up: she suffered so much from that shitty movie she was in (one of the worst ones I have ever seen and its memory still haunts me). Anyway, some of the movies could have been contenders for the non-film awards: Resurrection for some spiritual, religous award and Gloria for the Nobel Prize for being the perfect medicine for insomnia (though it's quite bitter to swallow).

Omissions: 

• Ildikó Bánsági in Confidence *My Vote*
• Jane Fonda in 9 to 5
• Dolly Parton in 9 to 5 
• Lily Tomlin in 9 to 5
• Mari Kiss in Duty-Free Marriage 

I really look forward to the next year. I have wanted to do it for so long and there was a miracle and I can do it! YAY!

• Do you want a glass of milk? ;)
• MONEY, MONEY, MONEY!

What do YOU think? Any requests, thoughts, suggestions?

Mary Tyler Moore in Ordinary People

Mary Tyler Moore received her only Best Actress nomination to date for playing Beth Jarrett, a woman having a troubles with her son in Robert Redford's Best Picture winner, Ordinary People. Mary Tyler Moore (just like Geraldine Page in Interiors) is the victim of wrong campaigning. Had she been campaigned in supporting, she definitely would have won the Oscar in that extremely weak field. Although she won the Golden Globe for her performance, she did not have much of a chance against Sissy Spacek's huge performance in Coal Miner's Daughter. Mary was undoubtedly second, in my opinion.

Ordinary People is one of the most emotionally effective movies ever. It's so forceful and moving, and it is indeed a cathartic experience. It's not perfect though, as the exposition is a bit slow, but I still feel that it desereved Best Picture and it's among my favorite movies ever. Robert Redford is a very talented director in my opinion: he's always able to create such an emotional atmosphere (see Quiz Show, which is brilliant, too), that it totally captivates me every time. However, he also needed great actors: there are no big movie stars here (maybe only Sutherland), most of the actors are TV stars (Moore, Hirsch, Hutton), who are superbly talented and we are constantly surprised by their achievements.

I happen to be a fan of Mary Tyler Moore's show: although I slightly prefer Valerie Harper, I also love Mary very much and she's such a great actress. I don't really see why she remained on TV after Ordinary People: she could have become a real movie star. However, I don't really think that she would have won an Oscar anyhow. She's the "now or never" type. With Beth, she had the perfect role: much different from her own image, and it's a really complex and multi-layered character.

It's so hard to tell what I think about this performance. On the one hand, it's a stunning achievement and I'm a huge fan of it. On the other hand, I think that she's really supporting in this movie. She's co-lead at best. It's interesting that she has the effect of a lead performance on you, but her screentime is really working against her. She has about 30 minutes, which should be used properly without any waste in order to be effective. I think that Mary perfectly solved this very hard task. Although she's not on screen, I can still feel her presence there and I just want to see more of her.

Beth is so full of layers and Mary shows all of them: on the outside, she's the perfect housewife, but soon we begin to realize that she's just not able to connect with her son emotionally. In fact, Beth is not capable of showing emotions at all. Every time that somebody starts to open up to her, she quickly changes to subject. Beth has difficulites with basic human communication, except for chatting and smiling as if everything was perfect. Mary wanted to underline that Beth is not a bitch, but a victim, who refuses to be one. Beth just cannot accept that she's not perfect and she just can't look at her son.

There's one scene at the garden where we see that Beth tries to get close to Conrad, but she fails, because he stars talking about her dead son. Donald Sutherland says in the end that it seems as if Beth buried all her love along with Bucky, the person she loved more than anyone. When Bucky was around, Beth was a woman full of love and giving, but his death just defeated and hardened her. You can be shocked that she basically hates her son, but, in fact, somehow, I understood Beth's feelings. Mary was so great at expressing them, that sometimes she almost made me speechless.

I have a slight complaint, though. I said that she had a really lasting effect, but I have to also add that the effect is a bit uneven. Sometimes it goes a bit dangerously low and there was a point where I thought that I would lose my interest in Beth. Fortunately, Mary avoided, but I blame her a bit for this. It might be again, though, that her screentime was not enough for this character as she's very complex.

Still, this is a fantastic performance, which is extremely haunting and captivating. Mary is able to make Beth a breathing, understandable human being, for whom you really feel sorry. Thanks to Mary Tyler Moore, I was perfectly able to understand Beth's emotions and feelings and I understood that she's in fact a victim. Excellent work.

What do you think? The Final Conclusion comes soon. I have got a lot to think about.

Sissy Spacek in Coal Miner's Daughter

Sissy Spacek received her second Best Actress nomination (and to date) only Oscar for playing country legend Loretta Lynn in the movie Coal Miner's Daughter. I think there was no way in hell that she was not winning that Oscar. She had the best, most baity role of all, was a previous nominee, who lost for a buzzed performance, she sang Loretta Lynn's difficult songs, she swept the critics' awards. So that's called a lock. I think that Mary Tyler Moore was her only real competition, but it was also the snobism of the Academy towards TV actors that gave Spacek the edge probably.

Coal Miner's Daughter is a very entertaining movie, a fair biography that I thuroughly enjoyed. I think all the nominations were deserved (very much) and let me say that I HAD to watch this to forget Gloria as soon as possible. Although Coal Miner's Daughter is not a classic either, it's just great and I think we can all just agree on that. Tommy Lee Jones gives an excellent performance which is a supporting role, though he probably has not much less screentime than Spacek. A nomination would have been deserved for him.

Still, Coal Miner's Daughter is about Loretta Lynn and the actress who played her, the magnificent Ms. Sissy Spacek, who's a real chameleon: she can play any role she wants from the troubled, psychopath teenager to a grieving mother. She's so damn versatile that I always keep wondering: what's next? She has such a luminous, radiant personality that is so well-balanced, and by this her performances always seem to be effortless.

Loretta Lynn is a role to die for. I'm still a bit surprised that Sissy was chosen for the part. At first sight, there's not much physical resemblance between the two, but miraculously, this wasn't a problem with Sissy. She inhabited the personality of Loretta (I always want to write Young, damn, my actressing mind) so thrillingly, that you actually never see Sissy acting on the screen. She becomes this person and develops her character exceptionally. Also, she works brilliantly with Tommy Lee Jones: they make up a really great couple, they are really charming and loveable together and I just loved them.

There are so many faces of Loretta: first she's an intelligent, but very naive young girl, who's hard-working and loving. She tries her best to be a good mother and wife, despite being a child. First everything is terrifying to her: there's a scene which takes place at the wedding night of Loretta and Doo. Loretta starts screaming and crying when her husband wants to have sex with her. And that scream is so heartbreaking: do you realise that she's not even fourteen? I mean this reality is so shocking. And despite being much older, I never had a single doubt that Sissy was not 14. She showed the childish behaviour of Loretta very believably.

Sissy then shows us how Loretta becomes a mother, who's singing to her children at night. And boy, that voice is really awesome! I mean, I really don't understand how Sissy was able so sing so well despiite the fact that she's not a professional singer. If she made a country record, I would most definitely listen to it many times. Not only does she sing perfectly, but she also fills the songs with so many emotions. It was just awesome.

The strongest part of her performance comes when Loretta befriends Patsy Cline, the famous country singer. Beverly D'Angelo (robbed of the nomination for Best Supporting Actress) and Sissy Spacek work together so astonishingly that I became speechless at some of their scenes. For example, the one in the hospital: Loretta's extremely shy in the presence of a star and Patsy seems to be very casual and cool about Loretta. The chemistry between the two ladies is probably even stronger than the one between Sissy and Tommy Lee Jones.

Sissy also shows the star persona of Loretta: everything comes so fast in this movie, just like Loretta's life as she says. She becomes quite divaish and self-confident, much different from the shy girl in the beginning. I loved the scene where Loretta's waving to her fans from the bus: Sissy is so terrific at showing how new and lovely this situation is for Loretta, who's not used to such things. After all, she breaks down from the pressure of stardom in a heartbreaking scene, where Sissy is simply the best. It's one of the most subtly acted breakdowns in history, but it's very effective.

So after all, I was amazed by Sissy's brilliant performance in this movie. Sometimes I was so captivated by her, that I forgot that I was actually watching a movie. It's a really gripping, powerful performance, which is extremely subtle, but is full of layers, quiet emotions and brilliant singing. It's not a typical Spacek-performance, but a proof of the versatility of a performer.

What do you think? It's time to give your final predictions, people! :) Mary's review comes soon.

Gena Rowlands in Gloria

Gena Rowlands received her second Oscar nomination for playing Gloria Swenson, a mobster's girlfriend trying to save a child's life in John Cassavetes' movie, Gloria. Wow, I'm wondering how the Academy reacted to Gena's performance. I guess they liked her to a degree, because they nominated her. I doubt it that she received many votes, she might have even been last, but she could have been third as well. It's not really the type of performance that's recognised award shows.

I'm an official Oscar Nerd. Capital O and N. Gee, Gloria is a real torture for any mentally healthy human being who has a common sense. I mean, this movie is literally about NOTHING. There's nothing new, interesting or exciting about it, the story is as lame as possible, there's no point, everything is extremely repetitive, they check into thousands of hotels and so on. And I'm an Oscar Nerd because I did not stop watching, I dealt with the whole torture of the movie and an awful child performance, which was by the way a bit better than I expected. I was always hoping that Gena Rowlands comes with her enourmous talent and saves me from boredom. She didn't.

Gena Rowlands is a superbly talented and extremely interesting actress. There's so much to love about her and her performance in A Woman Under the Influence (despite being one of the most unpleasant works in history) is just mindblowing. I haven't seen Opening Night, though I'm eager to watch it some day. OK, to tell the truth, I did not have many expectations from her in this movie as I have read not very kind reviews about her, so I guess I was prepared. And yet secretly, deep in my heart I was hoping to love her.

Gloria is a very clichéd character that could have been written much better and I think that Gena would have been able to play a more complicated role. There's absolutely no depth in her, there's nothing that you can identify with, there's nothing interesting. I know that I sound awfully repetitive with this "There is nothing...", but this summarizes Gena's performance here perfectly: it's extremely lacking. And gosh, I so hate being disappointed by great actresses.

The first problem is that her line readings are so weak and exaggerated: she's like a dog that's showing its teeth to say "I'm gonna attack" and she's barking constantly. She always says "yoouuuuuu... PUNkssss... I mean what is this? What was it supposed to be? I think that Gena Rowlands is a brilliant actress but she's not enough to make me believe that Gloria is able to turn a car upside down with one shot. Gena always suffers from this backstabbing, idiotic screenplay that makes absolutely no sense. It's so horrible that you can only make at least tolerable. She made it tolerable and that's one of the real achievements of Gena here. If she hadn't been there, this trainwreck would have collapsed even more.

The developments in the character of Gloria are rather rushed: first, she hates children, in 5 minutes she gets to like this boy and in the end she feels like a mother. I so wanted Gena to show more of the vulnerable side of Gloria: Gloria's loneliness is so obvious, but neither the screenplay nor Gena realized that this could made the audience sympathize with her. I guess, Gena had some bright moments since towards the end, there are some really strong and even memorable moments with her. In the end, her big scene with the gangster is solved quite well by Gena, who put some emotion into it and I was a bit relieved and this really helped appreciate more. At least I saw the potential, though it never really came to life unfortunately. Too bad that it did not last a bit longer. I could have put up with a less tough and more vulnerable Gloria, who's a bitchier or at least entertaining.

So to sum up, Gena Rowlands (despite her great talent) is not able to save this trainwreck of a movie called Gloria, but at there are some short, but quite strong scenes that ingrained in my memory. I wasn't very disappointed to tell the truth (I knew what to expect), but it's painful to write so negatively about Gena. A failed effort (?).

Gee, I rarely give 3 Meryls.

What do you think?

Ellen Burstyn in Resurrection

Ellen Burstyn received her fifth Oscar nomination for playing Edna, a woman who has a healing power after experienceing afterlife for a brief time in the movie Resurrection. It's really entertaining to speculate about someone's Oscar chances. I wouldn't say that Ellen had much chance of winning that award. I'm pretty sure that she was the fifth in the voting: she was a previous Oscar winner, her movie wasn't much of a blockbuster and this is really not the type of movie that usually wins the Oscar.

This movie is so haunting. This movie (and I say Ellen's performance too) is so not for everyone. It really requires a certain way of thinking that's not very common. I say that if you love it, you really love it and if you dislike it, you will really dislike it. It was supposed to be a horror like The Exorcist was, but Ellen Burstyn was really against it and I'm so happy that this movie became what it is: a very unusually effective and extremely thought-provoking piece that you. Eva La Gallienne's nomination is a bit of silly as she doesn't do much in this movie, but I guess it was an honorary recognition.

OK, I'll admit again, but I guess you all know it well enough: Ellen Burstyn is really one of my favorite actresses: she just can't be bad (though I dislike Same Time, Next Year) and any movie in which she stars becomes better even by her presence. I was quite worried, though since many say that this is one of her weakest works and that her last scene ruins her whole performance (more on that later, I promise). However, I always trust Ellen and I was so right.

In the beginning, Edna seems to be a very ordinary woman, who has a simple, but normal life with her husband. Here, Ellen plays her with such ease and so effortlessly. Edna is a good wife, who saves money for a new car, which causes the death of her husband and herself. It's even stranger than you would think, but the scenes of afterlife are so incredibly thrilling. There's so much peace coming from there and everything is so relieving. However, when she wakes up, Ellen shows Edna's fear and desperation so hearwrenchingly. She's lying on the bed, crying in the sadness of her state.

These scenes of suffering and her extremely slow recovery are just breathtaking. The one where she's trying to walk but always falls on the ground made me speechless. I could feel the pain of this character so obivous and I felt everything along with her and it almost made me paralyzed, too. Ellen really hit me in my guts and even when I'm talking about her, I'm becoming so emotionally confused and puzzled. Ellen was able to move me to such a degree, that I almost hate this performance. I think that's why some people dislike her: she mixes the emotions and it can become really puzzling for some.

The real thrill in this performance is Edna's discovery of her supernatural powers. First, she doesn't completely understand everything, but she knows that she has a mission of healing as many people as possible. She's a real miracle worker and she always acts in the name of love and she wants nothing, but help. She delivers speeches to people and she acts so much like Jesus. Although she always denies that, she acts that way and I always had a feeling that Edna actually enjoyed the comparisions to Jesus. And Ellen's transformation in this movie is just superb and we can see how much she worked with the development of Edna. From a very ordinary woman, she became something that brings health and happiness to a small community. Nobody remains the same after meeting Edna.

There's a very long and extremely harrowing scene, which is quite probably one of the best ones I've ever seen from Ellen Burstyn: after an extremely scary examination (oh she's so incredible in that scene), she has to heal a permanently ill woman. Ellen put so much emotion into this single scene: her interactions with this woman are truly amazing. The expressions on Ellen's face show that Ellen totally inhabited this character. It was such an ecstatic moment.

The scenes with her family are also amazing: the tears in Ellen's eyes when she has to say goodbye to her grandmother are so effective. It was a really intense moment and it left a huge impact on me. However, after this, there's the much hated scene, when Edna is old. Hmm. I think it's a great scene which was excellently handled by Ellen and I think although her make-up was not perfect I felt the years one her face.

So to sum up, this performance was so healing for me. I loved every moment of it, though I doubt that love is the right word for it. It really made me re-think if The Exorcist is my favorite performance of Ellen. Ellen in Ressurection is thought-provoking, harrowing and unforgettable. She made me almost speechless.

I wonder how she will do in the ranking. I still have to think a lot about her. I don't know when I am able to finish this year. It might even be on 22nd January, so be patient and I'll do my best.

What do you think?

Goldie Hawn in Private Benjamin

The first reviewed performance of the year is...

Goldie Hawn received her second Oscar nomination for playing Private Judy Benjamin, a woman going through a big change in the comedy, Private Benjamin. It's always so much find to think about how the voting was going. I think that Goldie was third or fourth in the voting. She was a previous winner and she starred in a wacky comedy, but I think her popularity really helped gain some votes. I think that she did not win the Globe only because Coal Miner's Daughter was considered a musical, which is insane, I believe.

Private Benjamin is a fine, entertaining little comedy, which is a bit mixed: the first half of it is simply brilliant and hilarious, I so loved it and I hoped that the whole movie would be like the first 50 minutes. However, after they graduate, the whole thing becomes so weird as if it wasn't the same movie. It's so perplexing and I think it's mainly the screenplay's fault. I believe, though, that nom was richly deserved because of the first part. The acting is just great: Eileen Brennan gives a very memorable and funny supporting performance, which in my opinion was deserving of the win in that very weak field. The others are fine, too, but they don't get that much to do.

I have to confess: no matter what people say about her, I love Goldie Hawn. She's a terrific comedy actress, who is always able to make me laugh and despite the fact that she always plays annoying characters, I have never been annoyed by her because she makes them so adorable. I will go even further and now grab something so that you don't faint: I think she deserved her Oscar for Cactus Flower. She takes these annoying characters adds her charm to them and does miracles with the parts she's given. Too bad that nowadays she's only seen in the tabloid papers. :(

The thing I like about Private Benjamin the most is that she's not a really typical comedy lead. She's not the suffering loser in the army. She's a spoiled Jewish princess, who has only one desire: to live a fancy life in a fancy house with a rich hubby on her side. She's kind of like Rachel Green in friends: after doing basically nothing in life, she just has to face with reality alone without daddy's credit card. It's so hilarious, but also touching when she says that she never understood An Unmarried Woman, because she would have married Alan Bates at once. It's quite a short sequence, but I think it's the best line of the whole movie.

Goldie so perfectly showed how naive Judy is. Judy firmly believes that she can get the fancy life from the army, and she can even feel than that she worked for it alone. She thinks that this whole army thing is just a big fun, where you don't have to do much. She's so utterly hilarious in the scene where she gets her uniform and asks if there's one in a different color. I mean, it's such an awkward moment, but Goldie delivered that line so well.

Also, her scenes with Eileen Brennan are simply brilliant: the two worked together so thrillingly well. One is the perfectly looking, very feminine woman, the other one is bossy and masculine. They are so great together though when Goldie talks to her as if she was a hotel manager and she's complaining about her room. And then we see Goldie cleaning the toilets with her toothbrush and it's just hysterical. I mean the whole thing is so absurdly funny.

Goldie also nailed the scenes of the training. She's so adorably clumsy, she's always falling, she can't run, she's an extremely funny cliché. It's just perfect and the whole thing made her so loveable. And this is probably the greatest achievement of Goldie Hawn in this movie: she made me care about Judy, I loved her, I rooted for her and most importantly, I was constantly amused by her. It was just brilliant.

However, when the movie weakens considerably, Goldie's performance also slows down a bit, though not that much. She was still great and she did not lose her great screen presence, but I felt that I lost my interest in her. She tries to work against this, though, and in these scenes we see real development in Judy's character: she becomes a hard-working, strong, self-conscious woman, who likes her job, loves working and finds real passion. She's so hilarious in the scene where she has presumably great sex and says something like "I guess, this is what I was faking until now". She just said my thoughts and I just loved that.

The ending is thankfully just as strong as the beginning, and Goldie is really at the top there. The comedy is less wacky, but she's just great. We all know how important a good ending is and it was very memorable. I loved her.

So to sum up, Goldie gives a great and extremely hilarious performance in Private Benjamin, which might very well be her best work, though it's nothing for the ages. The most important thing is that I loved her and the character as well, and she entertained me so well. I loved her, that's it.

She's the definition of an extremely strong 4,5, it's almost a 5.

Wow, this piece became lengthier than usual.

What do you think?

The Next Year

1980

The nominees were:

• Ellen Burstyn in Resurrection
• Goldie Hawn in Private Benjamin
• Mary Tyler Moore in Ordinary People
• Gena Rowlands in Gloria
• Sissy Spacek in Coal Miner's Daughter

I'm so excited to do this year. That's it. :-) The predicting contest is naturally on.

I wish you all a very happy new year! May all your wishes come true!