The Final Conclusion - Best Actress 1975

1975

So the much anticipated ranking is:

5. Ann-Margret in Tommy

Shame on the Academy. I'm sure this performance has its share of fans but I'm a staunch naysayer to this one. Not only is it ridiculous at some points, but it's also unbearably boring. The best thing that I can say about this performance that it's certainly unforgettable though in this case being forgettable would be way better.

4. Glenda Jackson in Hedda

I'm just as stunned about this as you are. While I expected her to become my pick, I was really disappointed by Glenda Jackson in Hedda. The movie itself had a lot to do with that but still. Althuogh this performance also has its share of fans, I'm not one of them, either. Personally, I would expect more from Glenda.

3. Carol Kane in Hester Street

You might be surprised that she's only third as I seemed reallly fond of her in my review. To tell the truth, I would have praised any great performance to graces after Ann-Margret. Still, Kane is really good as Gitl, her presence is just lovely and I really cared about her and was interested in what comes to her next.

2. Louise Fletcher in One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest

I used to be stunned by the fact that she won but right now I'm not that shocked considering her competition. Although she's supporting, she still pulls off a great performance as the evil Nurse Ratched and she indeed created an iconic character. It's just that I wasn't that blown away by her work in this movie.

1. Isabelle Adjani in The Story of Adèle H.

The saving grace. The shining light. My only hope. If it wasn't for Adjani's performance, I would stop reviewing after this horrid year. Thankfully, Adjani is just astonishing as Adèle Hugo, giving one of the most interesting and unique performances that I've ever seen. She's so full of passion, drama and romance that it's a real emotional joy to see her. Her beauty and talent shines through the movie and makes it even better than it already is.

So I can proudly announce

the winner is...

Isabelle Adjani

in

The Story of Adele H.

Easy win.

Final thoughts: Horrible year, arguably the worst one ever. Only Isabelle Adjani was really, truly worthy of the Oscar, the others... Wow. Fletcher, Kane and Jackson were all good, I just wasn't amazed by them. The ranking could have been any way. I don't even want to talk about Ann-Margret. I guess my thoughts on this year weren't exactly loved, to put it delicately, sorry about that.

About the next: this year was requested by the winner of the last predicting contest and it's full of romance and grief.

What do you think? Any thoughts on your mind?

Isabelle Adjani in The Story of Adèle H.

Isabelle Adjani received her first Oscar nomination at the age of 20 for playing Adèle Hugo, the troubled daughter of the famed French author, Victor Hugo, in Francois Truffaut's movie, The Story of Adèle H. Adjani caused a real sensation with this performance of hers and I think that she would have won the Oscar if Louise Fletcher had been nominated in the supporting category (where she really did belong). Adjani was the critics' favorite, she was young, she was beautiful and had a great chance of winning that year. I guess the fact that she was relatively unknown and she was in a French movie prevented her from winning the Oscar. I still believe that she was much closer to winning than some would assume.

The Story of Adèle H. is a really great movie and I'm quite surprised that it wasn't nominated for Best Foreign Language Film. Dersu Uzala (the one that won) was better, I think but a nod would have been deserved for this one, in my opinion. Truffaut was a brilliant-brilliant director and he shows his talents in this movie, too. There's so much tension in this movie and I really felt as if I was reading a romantic French novel. It's full of passion and excitement and it most certainly impressed me. French movies are so great and this piece is just another proof of my theory.

The story is about Adèle Hugo, the daughter of Victor Hugo who falls for a handsome soldier who rejects her all the time and treats her like an animal. This is a really tragic, sad story and once you read it, you immediately think about Isabelle Adjani. In my humble opinion, Adjani was born to do this part. Adèle is a mentally unstable, fragile woman and Adjani's just brilliant at playing this kind of characters. I'm just thinking about her work as Camille Claudel. That's a really weird character (in a weird movie) and yet Adjani injected so much passion into her and the result was something immense. Adjani represents what I love about French cinema in general. She's so unique and she doesn't fall into any categories. She has an own category.

Very much like her performance as Adèle as Adjani is just fantastic as Adèle Hugo. This work is very hard to write about and mostly because of its really unique nature. It's neither subtle nor over-the-top and it's so full of hidden layers. I guess my only complaint could be that it started out a little bit slow but that could have been due to the fact that Adjani wanted to show all the layers of Adèle very carefully and in detail.

Adjani's performance is just like music. The emotions are flowing and you cannot really interpret those feelings because there are so many of them. She's so thrilling and she's never out of tune. There's perfect harmony in her performance even when we see Adèle falling apart. Watching that process is not very easy or pleasant but it is indeed a thrill. The development of Adèle is so fantastic. Adjani went from point A to at least point Z (she covered the whole alphabet and went beyond that). It was a really mindblowing journey for me to see her.

Adjani goes beyond that and she's so haunting in some of the scenes. Adèle's dead sister, Leopoldine haunts her in nightmares. We can see a girl drowning and those are really scary images and Adjani makes them even more terrifying. I guess these must have worsened Adèle's mental state and Adjani shows all this beautifully.

There are scenes where Adèle is begging her love not to leave her and marry her. Interesting enough, what I felt for her was not exactly pity, I was actually quite fascinated by her passion and love. She may have only been in love with the love for the guy but it doesn't really matter as Adèle's emotions seem to be so pure and true. It was really beautiful and it never became a cheap romance. It was as romantic as the renowned French novels themselves. I certainly had the same feeling while watching her that I felt while I was reading the French classics. It was just brilliant.

All in all, Isabelle Adjani is just amazing as Adèle Hugo, giving one of the most interesting and unique performances that I've ever seen. She's so full of passion, drama and romance that it's a real emotional joy to see her. Her beauty and talent shines through the movie and makes it even better than it already is. It's really wonderful, haunting and unforgettable work by a great actress.

What do you think? Watch the movie HERE.

The Next Year

1975

So the nominees were:

• Isabelle Adjani in The Story of Adèle H.
• Ann-Margret in Tommy
• Louise Fletcher in One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest
• Glenda Jackson in Hedda
• Carol Kane in Hester Street

Since I still don't have In America, I'll do this year that's said to be really weak but I haven't seen four of them yeat so it will be very interesting for me, at least.

What do you think? What's your ranking? What do you predict for my ranking?

The Final Conclusion - Best Actress 1989

About the year: I really-really enjoyed doing this year and to tell the truth this was the one in which I had the most pleasure, so it was the best (though 1974 has 0.5 more Meryls). I have ended a long fight in myself and I finally joined one of the camps. #1 was quite easy for me (I soooo wanted to resist her, but I just couldn't as she was so utterly great), and placing the others was very-very easy too. I'm quite happy with the ranking. I love #2 and #3 too and in weaker years they would get my vote (especially #2, who was just brilliant), but the others were not that bad either. So the ranking:

5. Isabelle Adjani in Camille Claudel

After all, I can say that I saw a very confusing and uneven, but strangely effective, which might have weaknesses, but there are such electrifying, brilliant and unforgettable scenes, that you forget your complaints while watching them. It is not a perfect job, but there is some greatness in it. Good work.

4. Jessica Tandy in Driving Miss Daisy

It's very subtle and nice work, which may not go that deep, but is able to entertain, please and move the viewer and she makes it very sure that you never forget her. She's like a good book that you love to read even for the twentieth time. Nice, charming work.

3. Jessica Lange in Music Box

This is a very good performance, which is extremely subtle, but there is some silent strength in it. It could have been more emotional as this way it's a bit underplayed, but I cannot argue that Lange was able to show the emotions and the guilt of this confused character, who wants nothing, but the truth.

2. Pauline Collins in Shirley Valentine

This is a delightful and funny work by an actress who should be much more famous and well-known. Collins' Shirley Valentine is a loveable, life-like, beautiful character and Collins gives probably the most enjoyable performance I've reviewed so far. Beautiful, moving and amazing all around, a real threat for Michelle.

1. Michelle Pfeiffer in The Fabulous Baker Boys

I can understand what people see in this performance: it's brilliant, strong, powerful, sexy, charming, vibrant, sad and loveable. She shows so many emotions and faces of this exciting character and created something very memorable, which continues to impress the viewers. She could have done it more easily, but it was brilliant the way it was.

So I can proudly announce

that my winner is...

Michelle Pfeiffer 
in 
The Fabulous Baker Boys

How will you thank me, Michelle? :)

Omissions:

• Sally Field in Steel Magnolias

So my next year: it's a very rarely talked about year, since most people seem to agree on the winner, whose performance has become iconic or at least extremely popular. I don't waste time but say the one clue, from which you will INSTANTLY find out.

• Who is whose #1 fan?

So what do you think? Do you have any questions requests or any thoughts on your mind?

Isabelle Adjani in Camille Claudel

Isabelle received her second Oscar nomination to date for playing a tortured sculptor, Camille Claudel in the very weird movie, Camille Claudel. I'm quite sure that Adjani's nomination itself was a surprise (it's always surprising unfortunately when a foreign language role is nominated) and she was the fifth in the final voting. I think her character was unlikeable and the movie itself was quite artsy for the Academy members to embrace it as they should.

Camille Claudel is a great movie. I expected it to be boring, slow and forced, but it was surprisingly impressed. I may even say that it was the best movie of the Best Actress nominees that year. I know it's very weird and over-the-top, but there are such strong and unforgettable scenes in it. You can easily see that it was directed by a cinematographist. There are beautiful pictures in it. I think even if I turned the volumed off and watched only the images, I would have been equally impressed. Gerard Depardieu gives an excellent and strong performance as Rodin.

Isabelle Adjani is however so damn difficult to rate. Sometimes she is out of place, but occasionally she is so unbelievably storng that if she kept that strength up, she so would have beaten all the other nominees that year. But since her work here is very uneven, it did not happen and yet I just cannot say anything bad about her.

In the beginning, her character is not particularly, but there is something about her unique and strange presence after a while because of which I was NOT able to take my eyes off her. I have to admit though that it is not the best part of it. There was something missing which was there later, but there the lack of this thing was a bit distracting and therefore Adjani was not really strong.

Isabelle Adjani injected so much passion into this performance and she made such an effort, that it is unbelievable. However, it was not forced (OK, maybe sometimes I felt it). Camille is a stubborn, headstrong woman who lives for only one thing, her art. And Adjani perfectly shows how much this means for Camille. Camille has this one thing at the centre of her life, and everything is just additional, including her love affair with Rodin, which is first pure, passionate love and eventually burning hatred.

Adjani also shows the intimate relationship and tender love (not incest!) between Camille and her brother, Paul, who is probably the only true supporter of Camille until the very end. When he leaves for America and Isabelle runs after him, Adjani shows so many emotions, that she almost broke my heart. That is one of those brutally great moments, which made her performance so much better.

Adjani sometimes exaggerated the insanity of Claudel, her big screaming in front of the house of Rodin is a bit too much, and yet in an odd way it works somehow. We do not know Claudel’s personality, but this over-the-topness of Adjani matches it. Adjani has the secret, which makes this very uneven performance a great one.

Another strong scene comes when she is lying in the water, drunk, and broken down. We feel her suffering so much, it just becomes obvious. It was probably my favorite sequence of the movie and it is ingrained in my memory.

In the end, when she is sent to an asylum and there is so much pain right there. Her voiceover is just heartbreaking: she uses her voice so well to express how much the world is falling apart for this tragic character. I really said WOW.

After all, I can say that I saw a very confusing and uneven, but strangely effective, which might have weaknesses, but there are such electrifying, brilliant and unforgettable scenes, that you forget your complaints while watching them. It is not a perfect job, but there is some greatness in it. Good work.

It is very difficult to say anything about this performance properly.

So what do you think? I can give NO official predictions now, but I am interested in your thoughts. The Final Conclusion comes in two hours.

The Next Year

After a little bit of tedious drama with the movies, I can finally start this very exciting and interesting year, to which I am really looking forward to. There will be one decisive Michelle vs. Jessica battle? Which one of them will emerge victorious? Or will it be another person? Let's see!

1989

So the nominees were:

• Isabelle Adjani in Camille Claudel
• Pauline Collins in Shirley Valentine
• Jessica Lange in Music Box
• Michelle Pfeiffer in The Fabulous Baker Boys
• Jessica Tandy in Driving Miss Daisy*

So what's your prediction for my ranking? I really cannot wait, I hope you feel the same. The predicting contest is on. So let's have fun! :)