Soapdish (1991)

Film: Soapdish (1991)

Stars: Sally Field, Kevin Kline, Robert Downey, Jr., Cathy Moriarty, Whoopi Goldberg, Elisabeth Shue, Teri Hatcher, Carrie Fisher

Director: Michael Hoffman

Oscar History: No nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on Sally Field: click here to learn more about Ms. Field (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

Despite the mammoth success of Steel Magnolias, it was Field's costar Julia Roberts who got the biggest boost coming out of the film (and the cast's only Oscar nomination), and not Field, who would have a bumpy turn in the 1990's.  Though she'd have some leading work (including today's "camp classic" Soapdish), she'd largely spend the coming decade getting increasingly throwaway parts.  Whereas she was once playing Tom Hanks' love interest in Punchline, she was now playing his mother in Forrest Gump.  Indeed, her biggest movies in the 1990's were either playing second banana to male leads with better parts (Forrest Gump, Mrs. Doubtfire) or having to make way for younger actresses as a supporting role (Where the Heart Is, Legally Blonde 2).  You can see a little bit as to why in Soapdish, a film where Field is giving it her all, but the script only cares about her age.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie is a sendup of the soap opera craze which had dominated the 1980's (it's hard to comprehend now, but at one point everyone in America knew who the main characters on most daytime soap operas were).  Field plays Celeste Talbert, a Susan Lucci-style figure who wins awards, but is deeply unhappy in her personal life, in the opening scenes getting dumped by her married boyfriend.  We also meet David Barnes (Downey), the show's producer, who is sexually obsessed with Montana Moorehead (Moriarty), a young supporting player on the show who won't sleep with him until he makes her the star of the show (and gets rid of Celeste).  This culminates in a series of ruses that just continue to make Celeste more popular, including making her a murderer on the show, bringing back her offscreen/onscreen lover Jeffrey Anderson (Kline), and having her admit that Lori (Shue), a new hire on the show, is actually her real-life daughter.  The movie ends with Lori, David, & Celeste becoming a family on-and-off the camera, and Montana being outed as a transgender woman, and thus becoming unemployable in this universe, as revenge for trying to sabotage Celeste.

The movie's ending has gained a lot of critiques in recent years, and while it's probably not much better than anything else you'd watch from this era in terms of transgender representation (the surprise gender reveal is literally the same stunt pulled in Tootsie, albeit in that movie the character isn't actually transgender, and of course the audience is in on the reveal), but it reads as pretty dated and almost certainly wouldn't be how they'd end the movie today.  

The film is beloved otherwise, though, by gay male audiences who lap up the campiness & humor, which is admittedly quotable, and the actress-heavy cast (I didn't even mention Whoopi Goldberg, Teri Hatcher, Kathy Najimy, & Carrie Fisher are also in the picture).  The movie wasn't a big hit when it was released, and watching it now I kind of see why.  I wanted something more than what we were getting here-it's funny, but given the call sheet it should be funnier.  The jokes should pop more, and it doesn't feel like they're using some of the supporting cast (specifically Downey, Fisher, & Hatcher, all ace comic actors when given the chance) to the fullest extent they could.  Field's role is also a bit "ehh" and underwritten.  She is written as someone who is both angry about being treated as old, and yet spends much of the movie trying to give away her career.  It's as if the audience, even though Field is in her mid-40's and therefore at least a decade away from normal retirement age for a woman in 1991, is being told that the only thing that a woman after 40 can care about is her daughter & making the world better for her, rather than Celeste's own (impressive) career.  Thankfully it doesn't end on that sentiment (Celeste stays on the show), but this is a good reflection of how Hollywood executives seemed to think of Field in the 1990's.

Thankfully she would rebound from this, getting a late-career part as Nora Walker in Brothers & Sisters, a role that would win her an Emmy, and focus on a mother-of-five who decides to get out of her late husband's shadow after she finds out he cheated on her.  She'd start to get the respect she deserved in the 2010's, including a third Oscar nomination (for 2012's Lincoln), a Kennedy Center Honor in 2019, and the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award in 2023. 

OVP: Murphy's Romance (1985)

Film: Murphy's Romance (1985)

Stars: Sally Field, James Garner, Brian Kerwin, Corey Haim

Director: Martin Ritt

Oscar History: 2 nominations (Best Actor-James Garner, Cinematography)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on Sally Field: click here to learn more about Ms. Field (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

Coming off of her second Oscar, Field felt a bit of the "Best Actress Curse" when it came to her career.  She continued to get lead roles, but not hits.  Both Punchline with Tom Hanks and Surrender with Michael Caine fell flat with critics, and her only mild success was Murphy's Romance, our film today, one that got her costar an Oscar nomination, not Field herself.  By the end of the decade, Field needed a win, and she got one in one of the most unlikely of places: an ensemble film starring a group of aging women.  In 1989, this wasn't a thing that happened very often (all-female ensembles were rare at the movies, and even rarer to be big hits), but Steel Magnolias was a runaway success.  In a year with Batman and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade ushering in a new era of blockbusters, Steel Magnolias made a very sizable $83 million, putting it in similar company to The Little Mermaid and When Harry Met Sally.  Field would not win an Oscar nomination for it (in fact, that would go to her costar Julia Roberts, who was about to usurp her crown as America's Sweetheart), but it was a much-needed hit for the actress.  As I have seen Steel Magnolias before, we won't review it today, but know that that was the movie that Field had been praying for in the late 1980's.

(Spoilers Ahead) Instead we'll talk Murphy's Romance, a movie about Emma Moriarty (Field), a divorced mother trying to make ends meet on an Arizona ranch where she raises & trains horses.  She's broke, and can't get a loan given her status as an unmarried woman, but also has moxie, which catches the admiration of the local pharmacist Murphy Jones (Garner).  The two strike up a relationship, one that might be romantic despite the age difference, but it's interrupted when Emma's ex-husband Bobby Jack (Kerwin) enters the picture.  This sets up a love triangle between the respectable-but-aging Murphy, and the age appropriate-but-irresponsible Bobby Jack, one that is ended when Bobby Jack's 18-year-old girlfriend shows up with his twin sons.  As he leaves, this allows Emma & Murphy to end up together before the credits roll.

I'm not against the concept of the May/December romance onscreen (I'm not a prudish Gen Z-er who thinks that women can never reach autonomy with a man older than them), so that isn't my problem here.  My problem is more with the way that the script is written.  Field's Emma is poorly drawn, as if she's changing her entire personality from scene-to-scene.  In some moments she's an adult who understands the compromises that come with life, and in the next scene she's acting like a petulant child, willing to throw away all of her gains for no reason.  She and Garner have chemistry, but her character is so inconsistent that it's hard to care.

The film won two Oscar nominations, one for the cinematography (occasionally fun & dusty, but too inconsistent, and it reads like Oscar wanted to go back to the many farm pictures it honored in 1984), and one for Best Actor.  James Garner is not noteworthy in this movie...he's honestly not even that good.  The nomination was the only one in his career, though, and it's hard not to think of this as a career nod for an aging actor who by all accounts was a pleasure to work with (most actors who worked with him spoke highly of him, including Field who called him the best onscreen kiss of her career), but come on-in 1985, there must've been better.

OVP: Absence of Malice (1981)

Film: Absence of Malice (1981)

Stars: Paul Newman, Sally Field, Bob Balaban, Melinda Dillon, Wilford Brimley

Director: Sydney Pollack

Oscar History: 3 nominations (Best Actor-Paul Newman, Supporting Actress-Melinda Dillon, Original Screenplay)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on Sally Field: click here to learn more about Ms. Field (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

During the early 1980's, Sally Field became what she'd clearly always dreamed of becoming: a serious actress.  We talked last week about Norma Rae, the movie that launched her onto this platform, and won her her first Oscar, against actresses like Jane Fonda & Jill Clayburgh who were taken more seriously than the former Flying Nun.  Field kept the pedal-to-the-medal on trying to change her image in the coming years, appearing in commercial fare (Hooper, Smokey and the Bandit II), movies that upended her cutesy image like the hard-swearing Black Roads with Tommy Lee Jones, and more dramatic roles.  She would win a second Academy Award for her work in Places in the Heart in 1984, when she'd infamously utter the lines "right now...you like me!"...lines that would come to haunt her & in many ways underline the spunky actress she was trying to shed.  During this time, one of the dramatic films that she made was Absence of Malice, a serious film starring one of the biggest names of the era, and a guy who (unlike Field) was still in the hunt for his first Oscar: Paul Newman.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie follows newspaper reporter Megan Carter (Field), who is given a tip from Rosen (Balaban), who works in the US Attorney's office that they are investigating liquor wholesaler Michael Gallagher (Newman) for the disappearance of labor leader Joey Diaz (never seen, but if you can't tell they're making him seem like a Jimmy Hoffa-type figure during this time frame, you need to study your history more).  Carter publishes this based on a file on Rosen's desk, which was clearly planted for her to publish, but it upends Gallagher's life.  They don't actually have any evidence of the connection, but with the paper now saying "he's connected," he can't get out of it.  Gallagher is the son of a former crime boss, but is generally living a clean life...until Carter forces him to act dirty.  This comes to a head when Teresa Perrone (Dillon) provides an alibi for him-that he was taking her to a doctor to have an abortion.  But Perrone is devoutly Catholic, and when Carter's bosses insist they have to publish her name & that she had an abortion, Perrone kills herself.  This sets off a chain-of-events where Gallagher shows he learned something from his father, using a romantic relationship with Carter and implicit bribery of a US Attorney to get off...and to get their careers fried in the process.

Absence of Malice sounds better than it actually is when I describe it above.  It reads like an ambitious, greedy reporter wanting to make a name for herself, who sacrifices her soul and in the process has a man who had lived an honorable life go back to his criminal roots to punish her and those around her who destroyed the life of Teresa, the only truly innocent person in the picture.  That's not what it is though.  The writers desperately want us to care about the romantic relationship between Field & Newman, but you don't...because you realize that Megan is not a good person, even if she's played as bubbly & sweet in Field's hands.  The film could've ended on Megan admitting she was involved with Gallagher but knew nothing about him, but instead ends on a conversation between the two, potentially setting up a reconciliation.  But why?  They should hate each other, particularly him hate her...what's there, given so much of what came before was fake?

This hurts the performances.  Field is badly miscast here .  Field was in that "I can do anything" part of her career in 1981, but she is not right for this-you need an actress who can play fragile-but-brittle, and she is not a brittle performer (you kind of think someone like Susan Sarandon might've been better off with this part).  Newman is better, but again-this is a great character until the writers come in the way (you see hints of what might've been decades later when Newman would play a similar character in Road to Perdition), and you feel like you only get half a performance.  Melinda Dillon got her second-and-final Oscar nomination for her work here, and she does create a shadow over the film (her confession scene, where she tries to convince Megan not to publish that she had an abortion, knowing that she'll end up killing herself if she does but not having the guts to say it, is really well-done); again, though, much of the work in the back-half of the film takes air out of her performance by cheapening it.  Wilford Brimley, honestly, is pretty good in his one extended scene, giving the film some life, but at that point, it's too late-the script has already wrecked the promising premise.

OVP: Norma Rae (1979)

Film: Norma Rae (1979)

Stars: Sally Field, Ron Leibman, Beau Bridges, Pat Hingle, Barbara Baxley

Director: Martin Ritt

Oscar History: 4 nominations/2 wins (Best Picture, Actress-Sally Field*, Adapted Screenplay, Original Song-"It Goes Like It Goes"*)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on Sally Field: click here to learn more about Ms. Field (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

Sally Field's career began in television, and was inspired by another America's Sweetheart we profiled this year, Sandra Dee.  Field was the titular girl-next door in the television version of Gidget, but the show only lasted one season due to poor ratings (it would do better in syndication).  Field then took on what would end up being the biggest early success of her career and a setback for Field in the long run, playing Sister Bertrille in The Flying Nun, a hit for ABC that lasted three seasons.  Field couldn't escape the role, though, and was cast in a series of cutesy parts and girl-next-door roles.  It's possible that this is where Field would've stayed, but under the mentorship of Lee Strasberg (and thanks to the insistence of Joanne Woodward, her costar), she was able to land the lead role in Sybil, a TV movie that won her acclaim and an Emmy Award (beating not just Woodward, but other "reputable" actresses like Jane Alexander & Julie Harris).  Field alternated in the late 1970's between commercial fare like the box office smash Smokey and the Bandit and serious-minded cinema, including today's film, which won her her first Oscar, Norma Rae.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie takes place in a southern community (it's never confirmed, but you get an Alabama/Mississippi vibe from the surroundings), where Norma Rae Wilson (Field) works at a cotton mill and is frequently speaking out to management about the treatment of the workers, particularly her parents, who also work at the mill.  She meets a union organizer named Reuben (Leibman), who is pushy but well-informed, and trying to get the textile mill to unionize to fight back against the low wages & unfair treatment.  During this time, she meets and marries Sonny (Bridges), a sweet-but-simple (think himbo energy) coworker of hers, and they combine their families.  Norma Rae eventually joins Reuben's crusade, fighting for union rights for the textile workers, even though it's putting her life and reputation at risk.  Despite pitfalls, including a lot of pain to her marriage and her father dying from exhaustion, she is able to create the union, and hopefully in the process make her town better.

There aren't a lot of Best Actress-winning performances that I've never seen (I checked-I've caught 88% of the winners at this point), and this is one of the most-heralded that I have left.  I was curious how it would abide, and I was pleasantly surprised.  Field is excellent as Norma Rae.  I figured she'd play against type, trying still to shed the Flying Nun veneer, but she also grounds this work.  Her Norma Rae is not everything you'd expect.  She's defiant, but also quite charming and gregarious...it makes sense that a union organizer would be someone people genuinely like (otherwise why would they join her...JD Vance aside, politicians tend to be likable), but that doesn't usually happen in movies like this.  She grounds her work, making her feel like someone who gets things wrong, but isn't ashamed of being a sinner.  I think she takes this in different ways that other actresses would've and indeed Field wasn't the first choice here.  Jane Fonda, Jill Clayburgh, and Marsha Mason all turned down the role...and all famously lost at the Oscars to Field when she beat them (something that had to particularly sting for Clayburgh & Mason, who would never win an Academy Award).

The movie's most famous scene is the one where Field stands up in the factory, and holds up a placard saying "UNION" in big bold letters.  I have seen this still picture so frequently, and yet the actual scene itself played fresh.  Again, this is a testament to the filmmakers who understand subtlety, but the way that it slowly, steadily, uses the sound design of each machine turning off, the workers taking a stand next to her as they understand she's giving up everything to give them a better life, and it's time for them to stand with her, is incredibly moving.  The film is very much a product of the 1970's (the lovely song theme, the way the camera wants to show realism, the sexual politics at play), but that scene with the "UNION" is for all-time, a reminder that we never can give up the fight to ensure that the dignity of work is protected and respected.

Saturdays with the Stars: Sally Field

Each month of 2024 we are taking a look at an actress who bore the title "America's Sweetheart" during the peak of her film fame, and what she did with the title (including when it was passed on to the next Hollywood princess).  Last month, we talked about Mary Tyler Moore, an actress who had an impressive side career in film while dominating the television landscape for more than two decades.  This month, we're going to talk about an actress who, like Moore, got her start in television.  Unlike Moore, though, this didn't lead to critical acclaim but instead personal derision and mockery in the industry.  It wasn't until a 1976 miniseries that she was able to reestablish herself not as a "girl next door," but a serious actress, and soon, a two-time Oscar winner.  This month's star is Sally Field.

Field was born in Pasadena, California, the daughter of actress Margaret Field (best known for her work in the camp Sci-Fi classic The Man from Planet X).  She was a cheerleader at her Van Nuys high school, and soon after was cast as the titular role in the ABC sitcom Gidget.  While this was not a success, her next series was.  The Flying Nun was a big hit, but it was a problem for Field's young career, as the ridiculous premise of the show (a nun whose hat allowed her to fly) meant that she wasn't treated seriously in casting calls, and throughout the early 1970's Field struggled to find meaningful work.  That all changed in 1976, when she starred opposite Joanne Woodward (whom Field has publicly stated went to bat for her to help her get cast) in Sybil, a miniseries about dissociative identity disorder which won her an Emmy.  

For the next couple of decades Field would go from a the "girl next door" style of America's Sweetheart to an actress more in the mold of Audrey Hepburn, one whose work was frequently light, but taken seriously.  She would win two Academy Awards, star with (and romance offscreen) one of the biggest names of the era, Burt Reynolds, and eventually return to television in an Emmy-winning part in ABC's Brothers and Sisters.  Field's career is unusual because it never entirely shook the "sunshine & rainbows" aspects of Gidget & The Flying Nun, but this month we're going to take a look at her long career, and examine the ways the actress tried to step out of her initial typecasting, and became one of the most lauded screen stars of her generation.

The Cinematic Life Achievement Triple Crown

This past week two screen legends received news that their already extensive awards hardware collection would be adding some great new baubles.  Tom Hanks will be winning this year's Cecil B. DeMille Award from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (given out at the Golden Globes), while Dame Julie Andrews will take the AFI Life Achievement Award.  While Andrews win is a bit unexpected (we spent a long time profiling contenders, but only had her as an Honorable Mention since the AFI is stingy when it comes to giving trophies to non-American stars, even if they're of Andrews' fame & caliber), it's hard to imagine how Hanks avoided winning the DeMille through the years, as he's been nominated for 9 Golden Globes and won four (for Big, Philadelphia, Forrest Gump, and Cast Away).  Hanks' victory, though, gives us the newest member of one of my favorite blog pet projects: the Cinematic Life Achievement Triple Crown.

The Cinematic Life Achievement Triple Crown (which is a term I use here but almost no one else does, unless this blog's reach is further than I anticipated) is a term I bestow on someone who has won the Cecil B. DeMille Award, the AFI Life Achievement Award, and the Kennedy Center Honor.  These are arguably the three highest honors for life achievement in the cinematic community, and so I lump them together. One could make an argument that the Honorary Oscar should qualify, but that typically goes to people who haven't won competitive trophies, so it's a weirder list, and the SAG Life Achievement Award (which should be announced in the next week or so) skews to both film & TV, rather than being predominantly cinematic, and seems to be a little more inclined to political actors or actors with a humanitarian streak (think someone like Betty White or last year's recipient Alan Alda).  As a result, I group the DeMille/AFI/Kennedy together, and with his victory this year, Hanks has taken all three.

We haven't checked in on the status of who is getting close to completing the Triple Crown in a few years, so I figured with Hanks & Andrews starting to round the bases this year, it was time to re-investigate.  It's worth noting that frequently if you win one of these awards, you'll win most of them.  Hanks is one of fifteen living winners who has taken all three trophies.  Considering this goes out once a year (and with the exception of the Kennedy Center Honors, there's only one victor a year), it says something about how monotonous the awards' bodies get that there are actually 15 victors of all three awards still around.  Below you'll find a look at all of the names that are headed toward the Triple Crown (and a sampling of the legends who haven't started yet).

Living Triple Crown Winners: Tom Hanks is just one of a number of living Lifetime Achievement Award Winners.  As I mentioned above, if you're going to start this journey, it's likely you're going to finish it if you live long enough, since film only has so many legends.  The other fourteen living victors of all three are Kirk Douglas, Sidney Poitier, Jack Nicholson, Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese, Dustin Hoffman, Barbra Streisand, Robert de Niro, Meryl Streep, Sean Connery, Al Pacino, Warren Beatty, Morgan Freeman, and Shirley MacLaine.

Minus DeMille: Julie Andrews was an early victor for the Kennedy Center Honors, which are less shy about giving trophies to non-Americans than the AFI (it's in the name), and also likely due to Andrews' work on stage & television, as the Kennedy Center Honors go with people who are in the performing arts, not focused solely on film (like the other two trophies).  That said, one wonders if she could pull off the DeMille at some point considering her solid history with the Globes (14 nods, 5 wins).  Other figures that have won both the Kennedy Center Honor and the AFI include men who are behind-the-scenes (might not be as inclined for a trophy at the star-loving Globes as even Spielberg & Scorsese had to wait a while to win here): John Williams, Mel Brooks, and George Lucas.  Perhaps the most likely person after Andrews could be Steve Martin, who'd give a brilliant speech & has five Globe nominations but no trophies yet.  If he's going to win the AFI with his comparatively thin filmography (certainly compared to some of the people we listed as current Triple Crown Winners above), you'd think the Globes would be fine going for him.

Minus Kennedy: The Kennedy Center Honors can usually pick 1-2 film figures, though it seems slightly less-inclined to "popular" movie stars than DeMille or AFI, and more likely to make them wait a bit for the trophy.  This might be why this is the missing leg for the likes of Harrison Ford & George Clooney, though in the latter's case it seems it could be that his politics might be untenable in the era of Trump (it's probable that Trump doesn't have a lot of say in who is picked considering some of his sharpest critics like Cher & Norman Lear have won during his presidency, but you can never tell) or at 58 he's just too young.  Denzel Washington seems almost certain to take the Kennedy Center Honor at some point, though I wonder if the ship might have sailed for Michael Douglas, who has both of the other awards but is routinely beaten for the Kennedy Center.  His father won it, but that was years ago and the younger Douglas's fame has started to deplete in recent years with neither he nor his wife making films (focusing more on television).  I could still see him making it, but it's odd that they haven't taken the opportunity already.

Minus AFI: There are now just two living people who have won the Kennedy Center & the DeMille but not taken the AFI.  This is always the shortest list, which is weird because the AFI feels like it's the hardest to come by (since not as many people win the Kennedy Center & the DeMille has been around longer).  The first of these two is beyond a mystery to me.  We detailed this in my link above for the AFI, but how Robert Redford didn't take this award in the past decade considering his work as a multi-hyphenate movie star/filmmaker, as well as the founder of the Sundance Film Festival, is so odd.  The mystery of how Redford has avoided this honor is one of those random "awards season enigmas" I ponder from time-to-time.  The only other person who is in this same camp is Oprah Winfrey.  Winfrey's win at the DeMille's happened before the launch of the Carol Burnett Award (focused more on TV than film) and one wonders if she would have won the DeMille had the Burnett Award already existed, since Winfrey's biggest contributions have been in television.  I suspect, even with her moving into film at a more aggressive clip with movies like A Wrinkle in Time and Selma in recent years that Winfrey won't be able to take the AFI at any point in the future with such a thin cinematic resume.

Kennedy Only: We now move to people who have only won one leg of the awards, and it's a good reminder that the Kennedy Center Honors pick recipients based on not just film (like the Globes & AFI), but all of their contributions to the performing arts.  This means that there are figures like Cher, Rita Moreno, Angela Lansbury, Lily Tomlin, Cicely Tyson, & James Earl Jones who definitely have a cinematic background and could conceivably win one of the other two awards, but are more associated with TV, music, and/or the stage & simply don't have the credentials to win the AFI or the DeMille.  Really there's just two people who have the Kennedy whom one would indisputably associate with the movies: Joanne Woodward & Sally Field.  Woodward won the same year as her famed husband Paul Newman (who like his Butch Cassidy costar won the Kennedy & DeMille but never picked up the AFI), but her ill health likely precludes her from taking any other trophies (she supposedly suffers from Alzheimer's Disease).  Field, on the other hand, seems a probable contender in the future for the AFI or DeMille, as she's still very active in cinema and has enough popular hits to make it for either award.

DeMille Only: Looking at the DeMille Award winners who never caught on with the other two bodies, I'm seeing names that could definitely translate to the Kennedy or AFI, but I wonder how many actually will.  Gene Hackman has completely retired from cinema and public life, and as a result it's doubtful that they ever go for him again (perhaps, like Doris Day, he's refused such an honor or doesn't want to go out and get the trophy).  Woody Allen's filmography certainly warrants at least the AFI, but his personal problems pretty much guarantee he'll never win an award like this again.  Sophia Loren is a living legend, but her most important film work is in a different language, and that hurts her chances, particularly with the AFI.  The best bets to get another of the trophies would be Anthony Hopkins, Jeff Bridges, and Jodie Foster, all of whom work still in mainstream projects and have rounded-enough filmographies for the other awards (Hopkins won his DeMille 13 years ago, so it's odd he hasn't taken the other prizes yet as they don't usually make you wait so long, but Foster & Bridges both won their DeMille's relatively recently and could easily grab the next leg of their Crown soon).

AFI Only: Since the AFI is the hardest award of these to win, it's odd that there are two living women who have won the trophy but no other leg in their Triple Crown.  Well, one of the two is odd-it makes total sense that Jane Fonda hasn't taken the Kennedy Center Honor considering there are still pockets of the American populace who loathe her for her political activism in Vietnam (perhaps NBC is raising the flag on not wanting Fonda to have a broadcast TV platform at the Globes...one has to wonder).  Diane Keaton, on the other hand, has also taken the AFI but no other trophies.  She gave the speech at the Globes for her friend Woody Allen when he won the DeMille (but in typical Woody fashion refused to accept it)-perhaps they assume she's already won as a result, but she at least deserves to take the Kennedy Center Honor at some point.

Not Yet Started: Of course, as Sally Field proved this year, there are always going to be people starting their journey for the Cinematic Life Achievement Triple Crown Award.  Field's actually relatively old to be starting to sweep these awards-actors like George Clooney & Jodie Foster have recently made a play for the awards in their fifties.  While not all of these people will make it to even one of these awards, here's a sampling of some of the living film legends who could be contenders for future honors (in case these bodies need any ideas) as well as their ages: Brad Pitt (55), Goldie Hawn (73), Robert Duvall (88), Spike Lee (62), Michael Caine (86), Will Smith (51), Ron Howard (65), Eva Marie Saint (95), Glenn Close (72), Jessica Lange (70), Samuel L. Jackson (70), Tom Cruise (57), Julie Christie (79), Maggie Smith (84), Faye Dunaway (78), Ian McKellen (80), Judi Dench (84), Ellen Burstyn (86), Bette Midler (73), Christopher Plummer (89), Helen Mirren (74), Catherine Deneuve (75), Angela Bassett (61), Sandra Bullock (55), Sissy Spacek (69), Vanessa Redgrave (82), Kathy Bates (71), Norman Jewison (93), Ridley Scott (81), Liza Minnelli (73), Sylvester Stallone (73), Annette Bening (61), James Cameron (65), Daniel Day-Lewis (62), Whoopi Goldberg (63), Holly Hunter (61), Kim Novak (86), Emma Thompson (60), and Michelle Pfeiffer (61).

Who Will Win the 2020 AFI Life Achievement Award?

A few weeks ago, we did a look at who might be the next American to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, and since I had a lot of fun creating the list, I thought it might be enjoyable to take a look at a different upcoming major career recognition honor, the AFI Life Achievement Award.  This past summer, Denzel Washington was the recipient of the distinction, arguably the highest career honor in American cinema, but the organization actually doesn't wait long to announce its next winner, and if history teaches us anything, the victor will be proclaimed in early October, so we're only a few weeks away from learning the winner of the 2020 trophy.  As a result, I thought it'd be fun to take a look at a Top 10 list of who might be selected as the next honoree.

Before we get to the list, it's worth name-checking a few things that previous winners have had in common, so as to deduce who might be most likely to win this year.  47 film luminaries, ranging from John Ford in 1973 to Washington last year, have taken the trophy, so we have a bit of data to mine for clues as to whom next year's honoree might be.

Age: The average age of a winner is 69, though that's definitely an average (Steve Martin is the only winner to have actually been 69 when he won).  19 of the winners have been in their 70's, which is by far the most common age group to have won in, and no victor has been older than 90 (top in age was Lillian Gish) or under 46 (Tom Hanks was the youngest, and that win was criticized enough that I doubt they go for someone that young again).  So this probably means someone like Olivia de Havilland is out, as is someone like Leonardo DiCaprio.  As a result, bonus points to anyone somewhere between about 65 and 79, though obviously they could and have leaned outside that age range.

Occupation: The award is open to anyone in the film industry, but like most honors, it's more geared toward movie stars.  70% of the winners have been principally known for acting, and all but one of the remaining victors have been film directors (the sole person who was neither was John Williams, and there's really no living behind-the-scenes person who could rival Williams in terms of public perception, so it's going to be a movie star or a director).  The film directors who did make it are extremely well-known, just as famous to the public in recent years as a movie star (think George Lucas, Martin Scorsese, and Steven Spielberg), so don't count on aging directing superstars like Norman Jewison or Ridley Scott, as they likely aren't famous enough.  They're also not American which brings us to...

Geography: This is the American Film Institute Award, and while that title doesn't preclude anyone, it sure helps if you're American.  94% of the winners were Americans upon the time they won (this includes people who enjoyed dual citizenship like Elizabeth Taylor and Sidney Poitier), which is potentially why foreign-born icons like Charlie Chaplin, Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, & Laurence Olivier never won, and likely why figures such as Julie Andrews or Sophia Loren (who otherwise would have been shoo-ins) haven't taken the honor yet.  The three foreign-born figures who did win (Sean Connery, David Lean, and Alfred Hitchcock) don't really have a lot in common, so it's hard to find some commonality to one person getting in if they aren't American.

Oscar History: If you're going to be taking the AFI title, it helps (a lot) if you're an Oscar winner.  77% of all of the honorees were at the time of their victory winners of at least one competitive Academy Award, and another ten were nominees (two of which, Henry Fonda & Martin Scorsese, would win competitive Oscars post their AFI ceremony).  The only person to have never been nominated for an Oscar and still win the AFI is Steve Martin, someone you'd be hard-pressed to find an obvious corollary to today.  This pattern has gotten even stronger in recent years-85% of the past twenty recipients were Oscar winners (excluding Martin, George Lucas, & Harrison Ford).  So it's likely that the next person to take the AFI will have won a competitive Oscar.

Gender: The ceremony seems to be trying to correct this in recent years, but it's still very much a boy's club at the AFI.  81% of all winners have been men, and the ceremony has never honored a woman who was solely or principally known as a behind-the-scenes figure (women like Shirley MacLaine, Barbra Streisand, and Diane Keaton have all directed films and won the AFI, but all three made their names in movies as actors).  The last two winners have been male, but history has shown that doesn't necessarily mandate that we'll be seeing a woman here in 2020.

DeMille/Kennedy: There are at least two other awards (other than Oscar) that are a strong indicator of whether or not someone will take the AFI trophy-the Cecil B. DeMille Award and the Kennedy Center Honor.  62% of all winners of the AFI were also DeMille winners and of those who were alive to receive it (the Kennedy Center Honors started last of the three honors, in 1978, so John Ford was dead by the time they rolled around despite having already won the AFI), 69% of the AFI Award victors also won the Kennedy Center Honor.  23 people have pulled off all three.  While the AFI has occasionally led the field (ie someone won it there before they picked up other honors, like Steven Spielberg or Elizabeth Taylor), it's a pretty strong indication if you're primarily known for film and you win one of these trophies that you're going to win one (or both) of the others.  One could make a sincere argument that the list of people who have taken the DeMille or Kennedy Center Honor without also having an AFI is particularly short right now, so AFI may be forced to add a new name to the roster next year.  Of the 16 DeMille and/or Kennedy Center victors (without an AFI) who have meaningful cinematic contributions, almost all of them have something stopping them from taking this leg of the Cinematic Life Achievement Triple Crown (I started calling it that years ago...and it has not caught on).  There are several non-Americans (Sophia Loren, Julie Andrews) or Americans more commonly known for citizenship in a different country (Anthony Hopkins, Angela Lansbury).  There are figures with major contributions to cinema but who are more known for TV (Cicely Tyson, Lily Tomlin, Rita Moreno), music (Cher), or the stage (James Earl Jones, Lansbury again), and then there are a few figures due to health or antipathy to such things might not show up at all (Joanne Woodward, Gene Hackman, Woody Allen).  That actually only leaves four figures who could be considered real contenders that AFI hasn't picked yet, and all four will be listed below so I won't spoil the fun just yet.

Fame: This is a hard one to quantify, but all of the winners have to be famous, and tend to still be extremely well-known when they won.  This has become even more pertinent in recent years.  Arguably the last time someone who wouldn't have been a household name still the year they won was Robert Wise in 1998, and in the past few years we've seen actors who are very active in modern filmmaking like Diane Keaton, George Clooney, and Denzel Washington take the trophy, so I suspect that the winner this year would either be still revered or quite frankly be someone whom you'd expect to be getting top billing on your local marquee.  This means that names like Ellen Burstyn, Sissy Spacek, Gena Rowlands, Julie Christie, Faye Dunaway, Mia Farrow, or Francis Ford Coppola, names that probably have earned this kind of distinction but aren't really household in the same way as Clooney, Keaton, & Washington, are going to struggle to get a citation without some sort of revival.  This ceremony is funded by advertising revenue, and as a result they need a bigger name for ratings.

With all of that said, here are my guesses as to who the Top 10 contenders for the trophy are.  Sound off in the comments if you have predictions as well!

Honorable Mentions: Lots of options here, but Goldie Hawn, Robert Duvall, Spike Lee, Brad Pitt, Will Smith, Julie Andrews, and Michael Caine are all people that wouldn't surprise me, but all have at least some debits that would preclude them (age, geography, and fame being factors to at least some degree depending on the artist).  However, they're close enough to being real threats that I figured I needed to at least CYA myself by mentioning their names.

10. Ron Howard

Age: 65
Geography: American (born in Oklahoma)
Oscar History: 4 nods/2 wins
DeMille or Kennedy?: Not yet
Why Him: Howard is the rare American director who hasn't won this award that has the sort of name recognition (thanks to his previous years as an actor) and populist films (Cocoon, Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind) that might win him a citation someday.  He's also well-liked by other directors who would have some influence in the selection such as George Lucas & Steven Spielberg (not to mention his movie star daughter could push for him & would make a glamorous, sentimental host for the evening), and he's nearly the right age for the win.
Why Not Him: Howard, though he does have a pair of Oscars, isn't really in the same pioneering league as the other directors from a critical perspective.  His closest corollary among the winning directors would be Lucas, and he's never made anything remotely as important to Hollywood as the Star Wars franchise (even though, ironically, he has made a film in the Star Wars franchise).  Howard makes a lot of sense in theory, but I wonder if they'd pull the trigger for him or wait for a director like Quentin Tarantino to be old enough before they pick another behind-the-scenes figure.

9. Glenn Close

Age: 72
Geography: American (born in Connecticut)
Oscar History: 7 nominations
DeMille or Kennedy?: Not yet
Why Her: Close recently had a bout of incredible press, first from her finally making a play for her Oscar trophy, and then a round of public sympathy for not actually winning an Oscar most assumed was in the bag.  She's well-known to audiences (everyone's heard of her) but still has critical hosannas in her corner to make this feel like a classy choice, and would be near the average age for a winner.  Could she be chosen as a way of the industry saying "yes, you're a legend" after she was denied that claim a few months ago?
Why Not Her: I mean, if she couldn't win the Oscar, it's hard to imagine that she'd take this trophy (like I said-it's very hard to win this if you aren't an Oscar winner).  Close seems a better fit for the Kennedy Center Honors considering she's nearly as well-known for television and stage as she is for film, and it's not like she has a lot of massive hits under her belt in the way that Denzel Washington or Tom Hanks does.

8. Jessica Lange

Age: 70
Geography: American (born in Minnesota)
Oscar History: 6 nods/2 wins
DeMille or Kennedy?: Not yet
Why Her: Lange has been having one of those great, late career renaissances that occasionally gets you to sweep awards like this.  In many ways it recalls Morgan Freeman, who wasn't particularly famous until much later in his career, and then suddenly he was greeted with an onslaught of awards. American Horror Story and Feud have earned her a new generation of fans, and if Keaton & Streep are going to win this trophy, it feels like Lange should join them as an 80's movie queen who stayed a household name decades later.
Why Not Her: Lange had a robust cinematic career, but other than Tootsie there aren't a lot of widely-remembered classics on the list.  More importantly, Lange's late-career renaissance has been for television, not for the movies in the way that Freeman's was.  She would get them ratings, and in some ways this might be what finally got Jane Fonda her trophy, but Fonda is way more iconic than Lange is in terms of her cinematic pedigree (even though they have matching Oscar counts), and Lange would be a harder sell for AFI without another great movie role.

7. Samuel L. Jackson

Age: 70
Geography: American (born in DC)
Oscar History: 1 nomination
DeMille or Kennedy?: Not yet
Why Him: Jackson is the highest-grossing actor in terms of Box Office draw ever.  He's worked with literally everyone (I wouldn't be stunned if even I've made a film with him at this point) and has been both a critical muse (Scorsese, Spielberg, Tarantino, & Paul Thomas Anderson have all worked with him), as well as the star of major franchises like Jurassic Park, Avengers, Star Wars, and The Incredibles.  He's almost exactly the average age for the honor, and few figures in the past thirty years have been in as much American film as Jackson.
Why Not Him: The problem is that Jackson's made a lot of tripe along with all of those major paychecks.  Notice that Michael Caine has also never won this trophy, and almost certainly Johnny Depp is going to struggle to take it as well.  This is because Jackson's ubiquity hasn't necessarily translated to quality.  Every AFI winner has made a couple of stinkers, but Jackson's name isn't necessarily synonymous with quality, but rather quantity.  That's a problem if you're going to get the highest honor in American cinema.  Plus, even with all of those movies he's still never won an Oscar.

6. Tom Cruise

Age: 57
Geography: American (born in New York)
Oscar History: 3 nominations
DeMille or Kennedy?: Not yet
Why Him: Cruise is a bit young for the award, but few actors can boast his consistent movie star appeal.  Nearly 40 years after he became a headliner, he's still a leading man in major blockbuster movies, and has made a lot of the people who regularly sit in the AFI audience rich beyond their wildest dreams.  He's had quality films (those three Oscar nominations), and has enough movie moments through Jerry Maguire, Mission Impossible, and Top Gun to guarantee a built-in audience for the awards show.  All-in-all, this is a pretty solid bet for someone the AFI will want to claim...one of the few undisputed modern movie stars who can always land a picture.
Why Not Him: Cruise is a bit on the young side, and hasn't won an Oscar (or the DeMille yet, and I think that would come first for him considering the Globes love of celebrity).  More importantly, Cruise's public behavior since his 90's heyday makes this award come with some controversy.  Forgetting the Scientology aspect for a second (and that's a big thing to disregard), he's been erratic as a public figure & his films have taken a serious detour in quality since the early-aughts.  At this point he's more Sly Stallone & Liam Neeson than he is Tom Hanks or Denzel Washington, and Stallone/Neeson aren't anywhere near an AFI Life Achievement Award.

5. Sally Field

Age: 72
Geography: American (born in California)
Oscar History: 3 nods/2 wins
DeMille or Kennedy?: Field will receive the Kennedy Center Honor later this year
Why Her: Field's recent Kennedy Center Honor is a big deal, as it elevates her to the same echelons of people like Lauren Bacall, Joanne Woodward, and Myrna Loy (three other actresses who got the Kennedy Center Honor but never AFI) rather than any number of 70-something actresses who were once headliners but now frequently come in as supporting players or in TV cameos.  The list of true film stars who get the Kennedy Center Honor and not the AFI is small, and Field comes with two Academy Awards, as well as a number of still iconic hits (Smokey and the Bandit, Steel Magnolias, Forrest Gump) and recent success (My Name is Doris, the Spider-Man movies) that could make this an easy sell from a fame perspective.
Why Not Her: Field probably wouldn't be a great choice in 2020, since she just won the Kennedy Center Honor (it's uncommon, though not unprecedented, for someone to get two such awards so close together).  One would think they'd wait a year or two before picking her.  That said, we're likely due for another female victor, and unlike the next two women, she's much closer to the age of the average recipient so I wouldn't discount her; Field represents a jump from "good guess, and maybe someday" to "I could truly see it happening in 2020."

4. Julia Roberts

Age: 51
Geography: American (born in Georgia)
Oscar History: 4 nods/1 win
DeMille or Kennedy?: Not yet
Why Her: Roberts is going to win this award at some point, as long as she lives long enough.  She's exactly the sort of figure who scores the AFI-popular, enduring, beautiful, a leading woman even when her star started to dim, and someone who scored an Oscar at the peak of her fame, so there's critical cache to go with the many, many hits.  Honestly, so confident am I that Roberts will win this, and win it soon, that I didn't even list Sandra Bullock on this list, despite me also thinking she could take this at some point as well (since Roberts will get this before Bullock, in the same way Meryl Streep was always going to win here before Diane Keaton).  It's not "if" but "when" for Julia Roberts.
Why Not Her: Roberts is the youngest person on this list, and while she wouldn't be the youngest victor ever (Hanks may have that record forever, unless the AFI goes for Leo DiCaprio in the next year or two), she'd be the third youngest after Hanks & Spielberg if she took it.  She regularly makes movies, and there's no rush.  Why not give it to her when she's approaching Clooney's age (he was 57)?  I think that will be the thought process for the AFI, at least.

3. Jodie Foster

Age: 56
Geography: American (born in California)
Oscar History: 4 nods/2 wins
DeMille or Kennedy?: Foster memorably took the DeMille at the 2012 ceremony
Why Her: Unlike Clooney, Foster is approaching Clooney's age (she'd be exactly his age if she was the 2020 victor), and she's one of only two people on this list who has taken the DeMille/Kennedy distinction AND has enough distance to that award that it wouldn't llok like they were copying the Globes.  Foster is an iconic star, iconic enough that even without a lot of recent film hits she could still feel like a relevant winner, and she's probably going to win this eventually.  The past two years have shown a propensity for picking actors that were a little young for the award, but were certainly going to take the trophy at some point-could that continue with Jodie?
Why Not Her: Aside from the age aspect, there's the lack of a lot of recent roles, and her tendency to be more political & press-shy than your average winner.  They have strayed in a way the Kennedy Center Honors have not (look at how Jane Fonda has the AFI but not the government-sanctioned Kennedy Center award), but her filmic resume in the past two decades is pretty thin for someone who would be winning a trophy that oftentimes comes at the tail-end of your cinematic career, not when it's largely been dormant for a decade.

2. Jeff Bridges

Age: 69
Geography: American (born in California)
Oscar History: 7 nods/1 win
DeMille or Kennedy?: Bridges took the DeMille earlier this year.
Why Him: He's exactly the right age for this, and like some other recent winners, he's been a constant movie presence for decades, but certainly a constant force in the last decade.  Bridges won his Oscar less than ten years ago, and has scored two citations since then, as well as a lot of renewed affection for being one of the best actors of his generation.  Everyone seems to love him (he'd have great speeches), and this has probably graduated to the "inevitable" at this point for AFI to pick him.  I can't really think of a better time to appreciate him with such a major honor, can you?
Why Not Him: The only thing holding me back from picking him is that he just won the DeMille.  Unlike the Kennedy Center Honors, the DeMille winner has to give a speech, so the AFI could risk all of their best material having gone to that Globes' speech that could still be in their memory rather than Bridges giving a fresher one at the AFI.  That's about the only reason I can think of not to pick him-he was my dark horse guess for this next year until he won the DeMille, and I suspect I'll be predicting him in 2021 if he doesn't take it next year.

1. Robert Redford

Age: 83
Geography: American (born in California)
Oscar History: 4 nods/1 win (as well as an Honorary Oscar)
DeMille or Kennedy?: DeMile in 1993 and Kennedy Center Honors in 2005
Why Him: One of the great mysteries of awards show nerddom, to the point where I always have to double check that I'm not wrong, is how Robert Redford hasn't won the American Film Institute Life Achievement Award.  He's a film icon with a number of classic movies under his belt (he's worked with everyone from Marlon Brando to Paul Newman to Jane Fonda to Meryl Streep), he's an actor-director (Warren Beatty, Clint Eastwood, & Orson Welles can all attest that's a good way to win this), and he's also well-known for his celebration of smaller American film through his work with the Sundance Film Festival.  Should he not win, he'd be one of the biggest names to never take the honor, and one of the more regrettable.
Why Not Him: I genuinely don't know.  He's considerably older than the average winner, and it's hard to imagine that someone hasn't pitched this idea before.  Is he refusing to accept (this doesn't seem like Redford-he showed up for the Honorary Oscar and the Kennedy Centers relatively recently so why refuse the AFI specifically)?  I've never gotten the impression he's a jerk off-screen (and it's not like that's stopped them before-I mean, Dustin Hoffman has won this award).  Honestly, I can't think of a real reason that he hasn't won, and will be perplexed by him not winning until he dies or finally gets the trophy-his recent retirement surely makes a strong case for giving him this, right?  As a result, I'm going with the obvious answer here even though I've predicted Redford before for this honor.

OVP: Smokey and the Bandit (1977)

Film: Smokey and the Bandit (1977)
Stars: Burt Reynolds, Sally Field, Jerry Reed, Jackie Gleeson, Mike Henry
Director: Hal Needham
Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Film Editing)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

With the recent death of Burt Reynolds (in a fast-moving world, I still think "within the last year" should qualify as recent), I caught for the first-time ever a retro screening of Smokey and the Bandit.  As someone who has seen a few of Reynolds's pictures, but not most of his most important ones, I wanted to do a retrospective of Reynolds at the time on the blog, but never got around to it.  In an odd conundrum, if you look at our most recent articles about Reynolds, you'll see we've discussed his strange associations with two unusual Hollywood deaths more than we have his films in 2019.  Though I don't think I'll have time to get to a Reynolds retrospective again this year (he'd make a great future Star of the Month), I did want to get my thoughts out about one of his most famous film roles, the Bandit, in the much-loved 1977 car-chasing flick.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie is about Bandit (Reynolds), a local driving legend, who is recruited to drive a truck full of bootleg Coors to a party in Atlanta, Georgia (truly random fact I didn't know before I saw this film-Coors Beer was illegal to distribute east of Oklahoma before the mid-1980's, making it something of a high-end commodity on the East Coast at the time).  Bandit has to make it across the country in 28 hours in order to secure his payment of $80,000, and works with his partner Snowman (Reed), who will drive the truck while Bandit stays in front in his Trans Am, ready to distract any police officers who might try and pull over the vehicle & confiscate its illegal contents.  Along the way, Bandit runs afoul of Buford T. Justice (Gleeson), a bombastic Texas sheriff whose son Junior (Henry) was meant to marry Carrie (Field), who has by happenstance been picked up as a hitchhiker/runaway bride by Bandit.  The movie progresses with our heroes (Bandit, Snowman, & Carrie) continually outwitting Buford and Junior as they successfully get to Atlanta, beer-in-tow.

The movie is about as subtle as a jackhammer, and is not for those who are hoping for high cinema (I find it mildly amusing that we're having Cleo from 5 to 7 and Smokey and the Bandit featured in back-to-back reviews this week as you couldn't find two movies more divergent).  The film is silly, slapstick fun, and feels at home in the same vein as Animal House or Airplane!.  This is decidedly not my cup-of-tea, and I'm not compelled to see the sequels (which are famously atrocious...Field herself called the follow-up the worst movie she ever made), but it's not a bad movie.  Reynolds & Field have a natural chemistry that works in the picture, her down-home champagne and him bootleg whiskey.  Gleeson, a comic legend for a reason, stands out in his supporting role as Buford T. Justice more in-hindsight because every 80's villain would borrow from this picture, but I will admit that it was Field & Reynolds I enjoyed the most in the film.

The movie surprisingly won one Oscar nomination in its era, for Best Film Editing, and I get where this is coming from even though some of the other movies that year (Star Wars and Close Encounters) were landmarks in editing instead of just enjoyable.  The car chase sequences are a delight-combined with a rip-roaring soundtrack (particularly Jerry Reed's "East Bound and Down"), The well-structured chases do not seem repetitive, making the action just good, easy fun.  The politics of the film are atrocious (racial & sexual, in particular), to the point where you almost want to knock off most of the points that are earned by the chemistry between the two leads, but unlike Airplane! I didn't feel like they overwhelmed the movie.  Smokey inspired an endless parade of terrible sequels and ripoffs, but the original is pretty amusing, and an indication as to how Reynolds became such a big star in the first place.

Hello, My Name is Doris (2016)

Film: Hello, My Name is Doris (2016)
Stars: Sally Field, Max Greenfield, Beth Behrs, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Stephen Root, Elizabeth Reaser, Tyne Daly
Director: Michael Showalter
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Sally Field, for those youngsters out there, didn't always just do Boniva commercials and have the occasional side role as Peter Parker's aunt.  She was once a major movie star, throughout the 1980's, in fact, and only transitioned to side roles when she randomly got cast as Tom Hanks mother even though she's only ten years older than him (Tina Fey got a great line about that in an Inside Amy Schumer sketch, pointing out the absurdity).  As a result, this is her first headlining role in a decade, and that alone should be worth celebrating, as Field is a fine actress and one who recently has had a run of good luck between Doris and her Oscar-cited work in Lincoln.  Still, the trailers for Hello, My Name is Doris didn't jive with the reviews, and I was a little concerned I was going to get into a film that showed a goofy lady suddenly finding her own path in a condescending way in Doris.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film doesn't entirely relinquish that concept, but it doesn't become simply a "she's suddenly hip at sixty" sort of situation as well.  The film shows Doris (Field), who in the twilight of her career and approaching retirement and all that comes with that, still wanting to experience life and join in with something new and thrilling.  She falls for her younger costar John (Greenfield), and suddenly finds herself trying to mimic him, stalking him in some cases, in hopes of making the May/December romance happen.  As the film progresses, we see her learn to love herself and actually enjoy the things that she is pretending to love, but still doesn't quite understand the generational gap and the demons she carries around from years of being disappointed in her life and from people not appreciating her sacrifices.

These moments ring the truest to me, and it might be unfair at this point to say it, but we all love movies for specific personal reasons, and in this way I could in some ways relate to Field.  She's twice my age, but the idea of being single and wondering about past regrets and past mistakes and thinking about where your life could have been is something that any person without a ring on their hand (or, I suspect in some cases, any person with the ring on their hand) thinks back upon and wonders.  There are two scenes late in the film where Field just nails the hell out of them.  One is where she's telling John about an engagement she had many years ago, but didn't do because her mother needed her and her fiance wanted to move, and a later scene is where she chastises her brother for not taking care of their mother because he went out and found a family.  The first scene is devastating because Doris, desperate for something better in her life, you can tell hasn't told this story in years or been this open with someone new in years, and you can see the shifts in Doris' reactions as she ponders a life she could have had, filled with a husband and children, but gave up out of trying to please her mother (something rarely discussed in movies where parental sacrifice is more popular, but as we get older we give up things that we wouldn't have if it weren't for parental approval long past childhood).  It's such a focused scene, told matter-of-factly without too much indulgence, but a very real look into a truth Doris doesn't want to evaluate.  When it comes spilling out later in the film, when she points out to her brother that she gave up her youth and life for their mother and then has to find a way to cope with the next 20-30 years of loneliness, it's a reminder of how unfair the world can be to single people in the way that they are expected to pick up the pieces that need to be tended, but married people can't handle due to taking care of the next generation.

The problem the film has is that it can never quite give us this sort of honesty with John and with all of the Generation X/Y-ers that show up in the film.  There's so many scenes with side characters, particularly John but others where they suddenly show not only the truth of ageism toward older people (younger generations frequently at best think of them as curiosities, and at worst think of them as something to be dismissed or forgotten), but also they make the younger generation look like idiots or something to be mocked.  There's a scene where Doris has to encounter a series of hipsters, and while occasionally hipsters are ridiculous, outside of Goose Hollow they are aware of people of other generations and are not so terrificly cloistered that they don't understand that their attitudes could be different from those of a different generation.  They have their own parents, after all.  This is played for laughs, but it feels twee and inauthentic to me, and dismisses all of the care that they put into Doris at the center, a creation that escapes cliche and actually is a really cool part that Field nails.  Supporting player Tyne Daly is also good, it's worth noting before we go, but neither Field or Daly is so excellent that they actually save the movie, which relies on gimmicks and relatively predictable plot points when there's clearly something fascinating going on there in its approach to the way society treats older people, particularly older single people.

Those are my thoughts-how about yours?  The film was relatively popular, so I'm up for some debate in the comments!  Where do you hope to see Field or Daly go next in their careers, and what aging actress do you hope joins Field (and Blythe Danner & Lily Tomlin) in this most welcome of "see, they can still act" trend?  Share in the comments!

Oscar Trivia: The Quest for Six Decades

An Oscar nomination is a truly amazing moment in an actor's career.  For many, it's the moment they have dreamt of all of their lives-the culmination of years of work, determination, and a little bit of luck when just the right fates align and nab them their career high point.

And for most Oscar nominees, that's it.  If I remember my statistics right, it's about 65% of all Oscar nominees for acting will only get that one nomination, that one moment in the sun that will be in the first two lines of their obituary.  And that's great-we'll get to all of you in the OVP (or we've already gotten to you, in which case don't get greedy).

But for other actors, that one Oscar nomination is hardly enough, and they want more.  Some of these actors enjoy quick bursts of nominations like Renee Zellweger or Russell Crowe, but we're going to focus today on people who have managed to sustain decades of Oscar stamina.

It's actually extremely rare to be able to be nominated at least one time in four different decades, and even rarer to pull it off consecutively.  Since we're about to hit the decade's halfway point (can you believe that?!?), this is the perfect time to see who is on-track to continue their streaks and who might be in trouble.

Before we start, let's go through the people who have passed on and are no longer in the running but hit 4 or 5 decades (as the title alludes to, no one has hit six...and yes, this is a trivia article so if I missed an actor, share in the comments below).

Five Decades in a Row: Laurence Olivier (1930's-70's)
Five Decades Non-Consecutively: Katharine Hepburn (1930's-1980's, no 70's), Paul Newman (1950's-00's, no 70's as well)
Four Decades in a Row: Bette Davis (1930's-60's), Jack Lemmon (1950-80's), Geraldine Page (1950's-80's),
Four Decades Non-Consecutively: Mickey Rooney (1930's-70's, no 60's), Peter O'Toole (1960's-00's, no 90's)...both of whom never won competitive Oscars though they both won Honorary ones

Again, it's a short list, and one that has gotten considerably longer as the stars of the 1960's have stuck around further than was typical with stars of yore.  We'll start out with those actors that are still living and have already hit three decades.

Waiting for the Fourth...

Of the thirteen living actors who have been nominated in three separate decades for acting awards (and for the record, the year the film came out is the beginning of the decade-none of this "Google Search Driving Miss Daisy won the 1990 Oscars" crap), some actually have to wait a few more years before they can try again as their third nomination came in the 2010's and they can't get another decade under their belt for a few more years.  Most of these actors did this in the 1990's, 2000's, and 2010's: Brad Pitt, Judi Dench, Cate Blanchett, and Annette Bening all have nominations in each of the past three decades (it's worth noting that Bening is the only one of these four actors who doesn't have an Oscar, and is one of only two actors who have hit more than three that is still alive without an Oscar-I'm just saying AMPAS, but keep that in mind in a few years when you're handing out Honoraries and Bening is still empty-handed).  The only non-consecutive actor who has scored this decade would be Sally Field, who took a 28-year gap between her second and third nods, and did this oddly with only three nominations (Lincoln, her most recent nod, is her only loss to date).  And though it's hardly worth listing all of the actors who have two decades behind them, at least a trio of theoretical threats this year (Julianne Moore, Hilary Swank, and Marisa Tomei) could potentially join this list.

There are eight other actors, however, who could well reach their fourth decade citation in upcoming years.  Most promising of the bunch would be Robert Duvall, who is actually on most people's projections for a nomination later this year with The Judge (though Duvall has come extremely close to grabbing a nomination before with Get Low in 2010 and came up short so he may miss again).  Duvall is in the majority in not having consecutive decades: he's joined by Jodie Foster (who hasn't been nominated in twenty years), Sissy Spacek (who skipped the 90's), Ellen Burstyn (who also skipped the 90's), and Al Pacino (who skipped the Aughts).  All of these actors work fairly consistently, though Burstyn is more about television these days and Pacino is more about cashing in on his once grand legacy as an actor.  Still, though, if Robert de Niro can randomly get nominated for Silver Linings Playbook, anyone can come out of awards show retirement.

Only three actors are working on the slightly more impressive four consecutive decades: Ben Kingsley, Morgan Freeman, and Holly Hunter.  Freeman and Kingsley work consistently and constantly, and Kingsley in particular is the sort of actor who gets nominated every time there's something prestigious about his work (he also has that feel of an actor who may score one last supporting win to get two trophies).  Hunter has long since been relegated to television (she got her third-in-a-row for a supporting role in Thirteen in something of a comeback, and you only get so many of those).  Still, these are actors to be on the lookout for in coming years to see if they can continue their respective streaks.

Waiting for a Fifth...

Once again, we can start out with five actors who have already scored their 2010's hit and are now just biding their time until they can try again.  Two of these actors have done five decades (shockingly) non-consecutively (which means they very well could have been in the running for six if they'd had a little more luck in a certain year).  Jeff Bridges skipped the 1990's (missing for The Fisher King) and Robert de Niro missed the Aughts (probably getting closest for Meet the Parents...though admittedly not too close).  The other three actors, though, have hit every decade since the 1980's consecutively: Julia Roberts, Denzel Washington, and Daniel Day-Lewis (all, oddly enough, nominated in 1989), and have already gotten this decade crossed off.  Day-Lewis has notably won in three of those four decades.

Another twelve actors have scored four decades and are on the search for a fifth.  They range from actors who are constantly churning out films to actors who have largely retired from the cinema but are thankfully still kicking.  Though many of these actors scored their nominations consecutively, only one of the dozen is currently on a streak: that would be Diane Keaton, who has scored a nomination every decade since the 1970's (and only one nomination per decade, it's worth pointing out).  Keaton rarely challenges herself since Something's Gotta Give, but she's the sort of actor who bides her time until something brilliant randomly comes along and everyone remembers how much they love her.

Other working actors that could make it include busy actors such as Jon Voight (who skipped the 1990's despite constantly making movies since his big break in Midnight Cowboy), Shirley MacLaine (who, had she scored for Postcards from the Edge as she was expected to, would be a column down), Vanessa Redgrave (her botched campaigns for Atonement and Coriolanus actually mean that she could well have had the record by now!), Dustin Hoffman (who continues to make enough films often enough that he should be able to pull this off in a surprise supporting role, despite missing the Aughts), and of course Dame Maggie Smith (who skipped the 1990's, but came roaring back in the past ten years as a genuine box office draw and nearly won a citation for The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel a couple of years ago).  The only one with a legit shot this year appears to be Smith, who has what could be a sleeper hit later this fall in My Old Lady (in a weak Best Actress year her name could be enough, and she's my dark horse contender for a nomination).

Other actors who are looking for a fifth don't work as often or are notoriously curmudgeonly about working again.  Joanne Woodward (not nominated since 1990, but extending all the way back to the 1950's with her streak, the earliest nomination for a living person in this article) rarely works anymore, and Gene Hackman (who missed for The Royal Tenenbaums due to category confusion, costing him his fifth consecutive citation) is happily retired.  Albert Finney (who missed the 1990's) hates the Oscars and only does bit parts these days, though he's the other actor (aside from Bening) who is living and has hit the 3+ decade counter, so he'd also be a decent contender for an Honorary Award (that he'd never show up for it in a million years).  Warren Beatty keeps claiming that he'll make another movie (that long-rumored Howard Hughes biopic is the stuff of cinematic legend), but I'll believe it when I can hold a ticket for the film (my plan is to see it as a double feature with Flora Plum)-he missed the Aughts but made it back to the 1960's with Bonnie and Clyde.  And finally there is Julie Christie, who has resumed working if not necessarily in major cinematic work.  She skipped the 1980's and bizarrely has only received one nomination in each decade she's been cited in (much like Keaton).

Waiting for a Sixth...

As the stats above corroborate, getting a sixth is damn hard work, as there's a reason no one has done it.  Kate Hepburn probably could have had she done more significant film work in the 1970's, but she spent most of that time on the stage, and she's probably the only one who has come close until now.  Three living actors have pulled off five decades in a row, and one in particular seems determined to break yet another of Hepburn's records (not settling for a tie).

Meryl Streep is the only actor who has managed to pull off a 2010 nomination already and have five in a row.  Streep, it's worth noting, is also the only actor to have more than one nomination in five different decades (Olivier getting Rebecca made a year too late), a record that may stand for infinity (of all of the living actors we've profiled, Robert Duvall is the only other actor who has gotten more than two in each of his eligible decades, and he's twenty years behind Streep and is 83-years-old).  Streep will need to continue her current stamina to hit the goal, but at this rate she could well take it in the 2020's (she'll only be in her seventies).

That is if one of the two other living actors don't go for the title first.  Both have received consecutive nominations since the 1960's, and at least one is still working.  Michael Caine, an actor you don't always think of for such lists, got his first nomination in 1966, then got cited in 1972, 1983, 1986, 1999, and 2002, and despite being 81, continues to work constantly (he'll be in the highly-anticipated Interstellar later this year) and has made no secret about his desire to win a third Oscar for a leading role.  Just one nomination would land him the record, and put Streep in a difficult position-2030 is a long way to go to actually beat this title outright.

The other person is the recently retired Jack Nicholson, who made his last film four years ago and claims he is done with cinema.  I don't want to call Jack a liar, but part of me wonders if his best friend Warren Beatty couldn't talk him out of that self-imposed exile to do a showy supporting role in that long-gestating Hughes biopic (surely Beatty's final film?) and get one last nomination.  Either way, it's hard to deny he's had a spectacular career.

And there you have it folks-a morning's dose of Oscar trivia.  Do you think that Streep, Caine, or Nicholson could take the record?  Who will be the next person to score four or five decades' worth of nominations?  Share in the comments!