Best Actress – Page 7 – This Had Oscar Buzz

149 – The Prize Winner of Defiance, OH

Can you believe it’s only our third episode discussing Julianne Moore? This episode we’re diving into the mid-00s period between nominations for Moore with 2005′s The Prize Winner of Defiance, OH. Starring the eventual Oscar winner in the true story of Evelyn Ryan, a mother of ten who supported her family through sweepstakes contests and jingle writing, the film looked to hit the actress’s sweet spot with a plum prestige role. But due to the financial woes of Dreamworks Pictures, the awards prospects died when the film was given a release too miniscule to draw attention.

The film marks the end of two eras: Dreamworks’ solo output and Moore in the period housewife mode. This episode, we get into Moore’s downturn period between nominations, including such misses as Freedomland and The Forgotten. We also discuss the career of director Jane Anderson and what makes the film worth more than the tiny release it received.

Topics also include the Golden Satellites, Toys R Us shopping sprees, and The Chumscrubber.

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145 – Lust, Caution (Focus Features – Part Three)

We’ve come to the midpoint of our Focus Features miniseries with a work from a modern master, 2007′s Lust,Caution from Ang Lee. An erotic thriller set in Hong Kong and Shanghai during the Japanese occupation, Lust, Caution follows a breakthrough Tang Wei as Wong Chia-Chi, a woman who joins an assassination plot where she must seducce the target, played by icon Tony Leung Chiu-Wai. Lee earned a back-to-back Golden Lion win for the film at Venice after Brokeback Mountain, but several factors likely played into Oscar overlooking the film: its NC-17 rating, Lee’s recent Brokeback success, and Oscar deeming the film ineligible for Best Foreign Language Film.

This episode, we go deep on the minutiae regarding the Foreign Language / International Feature elibigibility and nomination process in recent years, including 2007 as a beginning to Oscar adapting procedure for the category. We also look at Tang Wei’s brilliant performance, the film’s international assemblage of talent behind the camera, and Lee’s history of exploring sexual themes.

Topics also include Focus Features’ sizzle reels, the 2007 Venice Film Festival, and the surprising Focus film that unites our three THOB miniseries so far.

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135 – The House of the Spirits

By today’s standards, this week’s film stands out for its gobsmacking cast of Meryl streep, Gleen Close, Jeremy Irons, Antonio Banderas, and Winona Ryder. But back in the 90s, The House of the Spirits caught attention as both an adaptation of Isabel Allende’s beloved novel and the biggest acquisition Miramax had ever landed. Set over decades in Chile with mild mysticism and political revolution, the film whitewashed and condensed the novel into a poorly received epic long forgotten by year’s end – with Miramax enjoying their biggest success yet in Pulp Fiction.

The film was the follow-up to back-to-back Palme d’Or wins for director Bille August, after The Best Intentions and the Oscar-annointed Pelle the Conqueror. This episode, we look to Palme d”or winners for a round of Alter Egos as we discuss the film’s many problems. We discuss the false narrative of Streep vs. Close among Oscar obsessives, Ryder as a quintessentially 90s star, and Streep’s early 90s roadblocks.

Topics also include “an abundance of juices”, Irons’ expanding set of false teeth, and Close’s Oscar chances this year.

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134 – Big Eyes (with Jorge Molina)

After years of cast announcements, a biopic of painter Margaret Keane escaped development hell thanks to director Tim Burton and Oscar hopeful Amy Adams with 2014′s Big Eyes. A departure from Burton’s late-career big-budget preexisting IP efforts, the film promised a showcase for Adams that could earn her that elusive Oscar after her previous five nominations. This week, writer and Just To Be Nominated creator Jorge Molina joins us to talk about the film’s underwhelming insight into Margaret Keane and its wild miscasting of Christoph Waltz as her scheming husband that took credit for her work.

This episode we look at the diminishing returns of Tim Burton’s career, from a filmmaker formative to the taste of a generration of young cinephiles to the forgettable spectacle that fills his current era. We also discuss how close Adams might have been to a win in her nominations, the biopic screenplays of Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski, and the sparse lyrics of Lana Del Rey’s Globe-nominated title song.

Topics also include the year of Alejandro González Iñárritu, Alfonso Cuarón, and Guillermo Del Toro arrived as a lasting Oscar narrative for Mexican filmmakers, previous nominations for Burton films, and when they handed out craft category Oscars in the aisles.

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131 – Tea with Mussolini

No matter how hard we tried, we couldn’t keep pushing this movie aside – and Tea with Mussolini breaks through for this episode for you! The film is one of Cher’s few post-Oscar films and stars the icon opposite acting legends Maggie Smith, Judi Dench, Joan Plowright, and Lily Tomlin – all cast as ex-pat women raising a young man during WWII Italy. While the film was an arthouse hit in the early summer and earned Smith a Supporting Actress BAFTA prize, this costume drama was left forgotten come Oscar time.

This week, we’re unpacking the reemergence of Cher in the late 90s, from If These Walls Could Talk to the megasmash success of “Believe” to her iconic Grammy Record of the Year competition. We also get into the 1999 Supporting Actress and the Globes Musical/Comedy field, the only absent dame from Tea With the Dames, and director Franco Zeffirelli.

Topics also include Cher shouting about her Picasso, movies that use “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes”, and the trauma of AOL Instant Messenger.

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129 – When A Man Loves A Woman

For our third episode on Meg Ryan, we’re going back to 1994 with When A Man Loves a Woman. One year after her megasmash in Sleepless in Seattle, the film stars Ryan as a woman entering recovery for alcoholism and Andy Garcia as her husband struggling to find normalcy. Though the film was a critical and box office success, an early summer release and scattered Best Actress year kept Ryan from her elusive first Oscar nomination.

This episode, we talk about how the film subverts romantic drama expectations by not letting the male lead off the hook when it shouldn’t. We also talk about Tina Majorino and Mae Whitman in their child star days, Meg Ryan’s Lead Actress nomination from SAG in their inaugural awards, and Andy Garcia as eternally hot.

Topics also include the MTV Movie Awards’ Most Desirable categories, movies from the 90s that exist only as titles or posters, Lauren Tom when she broke up Ross and Rachel.

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127 – Conviction

This episode, we’re looking at 2010′s Conviction starring Hilary Swank as Betty Anne Waters, a real life Massachusetts woman who earned a law degree to fight for the innocense of her brother wrongly convicted of murder. With a cast that includes Minnie Driver, Peter Gallagher, and Sam Rockwell as Betty’s jailed brother Kenny, the film received a middling festival reaction and fizzled at the box office before getting buried among Fox Searchlight’s bigger contenders. Though Swank and Rockwell respectively earned SAG and Critics Choice nominations, the film disappeared quickly.

Perhaps Conviction’s biggest stamp on Oscar culture was Swank’s appearance in that year’s formative Hollywood Reporter Actress roundtable. This episode, we unpack what makes that year’s roundtable a high bar for actress obsessives and go deep on the history of the THR Actress Roundtable. We also get into Rockwell’s unfortunate recent typecasting and the brief and impressive performances by Juliette Lewis and Clea Duvall in the film.

Topics also include Melissa Leo’s Oscar-triumphant 2010, the Oscar history of Swank vs. Bening, and Helena Bonham-Carter becoming one with her many bangles.

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Mailbag Fishing In The Yemen

Happy New Year, listeners! To close out 2020, we’ve compiled all of your questions for this special mailbag episode! We kick things off by surveying the state of the current, pandemic-delayed Oscar race including First Cow’s win with New York critics. the New York Times’ 25 Greatest Actors of the 21st Century list, and how the sparse release calendar might affect the potential This Had Oscar Buzz Class of 2020. With Oscar history, we look back at Elia Kazan’s lifetime achievement award, the upcoming Academy museum, and the ripple effects of certain Best Actress races. We also discuss such THOB staples as Flora Plum and TIFF, decide which of the Four Realms we would be, and fancast our future blockbuster heist film starring actresses of a certain age titled Who Doesn’t Like Money?. Thank you listeners for all of your brilliant questions for the episode and all of your support in the past year!!

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124 – Suffragette

In 2015, the ongoing efforts to champion stories told by and about women placed large awards expectations on Sarah Gavron’s Suffragette. A fictionalized telling of the women’s suffrage movement in Britain, Suffragette stars Carey Mulligan as Maud, a laundress who begins as a passive outsider and becomes a passioned activist. But once it debuted at the Telluride Film Festival, its initial harsh reviews squashed audience urgency to head to the theatre when it opened nearly two months later.

This episode, we discuss Mulligan’s many great performances that have yet to yield a follow-up nomination to her breakthrough nomination for An Education – and we praise her upcoming work in the daring Promising Young Woman. We also discuss the heavy competition of the 2015 Best Actress race that failed to honor Mulligan among the major precursors.

Topics also include Meryl Streep’s much-buzzed performance as Emmeline Pankhurst (that ended up being little more than a cameo), the chaos of the current Globes comedy race, and another round of Alter Egos.

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117 – Melancholia

This episode, we’re bringing you one of our most requested films starring one of our most requested performers. In 2011, Kirsten Dunst triumphantly returned from a short break to work with a director notorious for lauded and tumultuous collaborations with actresses, Lars Von Trier. With Melancholia, the actress stars as a woman afflicted with severe depression as the end of the world looms, landing Dunst the best reviews of her career. But after the film’s rapturous premiere, Von Trier’s glib comments regarding Hitler and Nazism immediately tainted the film and perhaps his star’s awards potential, as well.

Dunst would win Best Actress at Cannes along with some critics prizes, but Von Trier’s banishment from the establishment kept the film from more mainstream consideration. This week, we look back at Kirsten Dunst’s underrated work, including her collabborations with Sofia Coppola and her versatile comedy trifecta in 1999-2000. We also discuss Lars Von Trier’s fraught history with actresses from Björk to Nicole Kidman.

Topics also include how 2011 was a great year for Best Actress despite an underwhelming set of nominees, the history of small distributor Magnolia Pictures, and the gender dynamics of “Actress Gets Consumption” movies.

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