OVP: Actress (2021)

OVP: Best Actress (2021)

The Nominees Were...

Jessica Chastain, The Eyes of Tammy Faye

Olivia Colman, The Lost Daughter

Penelope Cruz, Parallel Mothers

Nicole Kidman, Being the Ricardos

Kristen Stewart, Spencer

My Thoughts: We're finishing off the 2021 acting races with Best Actress, a category that reads as kind of weird even though the actors themselves don't.  Three former winners, a multiple-time nominee, and a promising newcomer playing a princess is the bread-and-butter of this category, but if you look at the films, these are good actresses (and largely good performances) in somewhat forgettable movies.  Featuring some films that were relegated to streaming platforms, a lot of the majesty of this lineup feels a bit underwhelming even if the actual work at hand doesn't read that way.

A good example of this is Colman, who is in a fine film, and is giving a splendid performance in a movie, well, few people seem to have seen.  Colman is marvelous here, though, so I can't quibble with the choice itself (and generally I'm fine with Oscar picking obscurity, it just feels like every film was kind of "ehh" here in a way the other acting categories didn't).  She brings such pathos to her character, even when the character wouldn't want that, and does a marvelous job of giving us a complicated look at womanhood, maturity, and the unrealistic expectations we give to mothers.  One of our best working actors, hopefully this isn't her last outing with AMPAS.

Colman's movie is good, which you can't really advertise for Jessica Chastain.  The movie brushes by huge swaths of the real life Bakkers, particularly anything involving the complicated sexuality of husband Jim.  Chastain is the best part of the movie, and does her darndest to sell Tammy Faye, a walking cartoon who is hard to make fascinating because she's so devout & has such faith in the people around her, she reads as two-dimensional even if that's basically who she was in real-life.  But Chastain can only do so much in a movie that's not interested in some of her character layering, and she's working so hard in some scenes it feels like she's trying to make a bad movie good (and she's not going to do it).

Nicole Kidman, likewise, is much better than her movie.  Kidman was such an unusual choice to play Lucille Ball, but it largely works.  She doesn't do Ball's voice & she doesn't look like her, but she gives a decent performance as a woman who spent a decade trying to get what she currently has, and feels she constantly needs to prove to herself that she's worthy of her success, she's been trying to retain it for so long.  But the movie is dreadful, and she's saddled with huge speeches that go nowhere and do nothing...a script this poor is going to hurt any performance, and I think it sometimes makes too indulgent in later scenes.

Kristen Stewart is, for the record, a wonderful actress; in my mind she already had two nominations by 2021 for Clouds of Sils Maria and Personal Shopper.  But her work in Spencer is not good.  Some of that is based on Pablo Larrain (unlike Aaron Sorkin, Larrain has proven before he's a very strong director so this came as a surprise) not knowing how to ground this film in any sort of reality (even a fantastical one).  Stewart's accent work & observation of the real-life Diana's facial expressions are to-die-for (particularly given her LA roots), but she feels adrift in a movie that's largely rudderless.  The film (and her work) just can't find a center, and this becomes a missed opportunity as a result.

The best movie of this bunch is probably Parallel Mothers, though it reads more as a classic because Pedro & Penelope have made so many good movies that you could be forgiven for forgetting that this is only "pretty good" (the third act is filled with too many swings that don't connect).  Cruz is superb, though, hanging on during all of the soap opera moves that the movie gives her titular mother, and reminding us that she's capable of greatness when given the chance.  Like Colman, one of our best working actors, and I hope she doesn't make us wait another decade for a performance this stylized & moving.

Other Precursor Contenders: The Globes separate their nominations between Drama and Musical/Comedy, so we have ten women nominated for these awards.  For Drama we came very close to Oscar's lineup, with Kidman winning and the only new nominee being Lady Gaga (House of Gucci) instead of Cruz.  For Musical/Comedy, Rachel Zegler (West Side Story) won against Marion Cotillard (Annette), Alana Haim (Licorice Pizza), Jennifer Lawrence (Don't Look Up), & Emma Stone (Cruella).  SAG favored Chastain for their win, with Colman, Gaga, Kidman, & Jennifer Hudson (Respect) the remaining nominees, while BAFTA went totally balls-to-the-walls crazy by giving Joanna Scanlan (After Love) the win atop Gaga, Haim, Emilia Jones (CODA), Renate Reinsve (The Worst Person in the World), & Tessa Thompson (Passing), the first time since 1987 that none of the BAFTA nominees for Best Actress also got in with Oscar.  In sixth place was surely Lady Gaga, and honestly...what a relief that Oscar went with Stewart or Cruz over a performance as bad as hers.  Gaga, I'm sorry, has yet to give a decent acting performance (she's a very good singer & songwriter, but she's no thespian), and getting in for work as bad as Gucci...ooph, that would've been a bad look for Oscar (and given her precursor support, she might well have won!).

Actors I Would Have Nominated: The name that did show up quite a bit during precursor season that would've been a great choice would've been Alana Haim, who (like Gaga) is a singer who is in a storied director's vision, but she actually seems well-matched for it, and sells the unusual duet at the top of Licorice Pizza.

Oscar’s Choice: Due to the chaos of the year, and a quick-trending "overdue" narrative that surrounded Jessica Chastain late-in-the-race (even if it's not entirely clear that was super true), she won against Kidman & Cruz, Tom Cruise's exes competing for silver.

My Choice: In a very tight race, I'm going to go with Cruz over Colman, if only because I think Colman is held back by not feeling connected to Jessie Buckley's work as her younger self.  Behind these two are Chastain, Kidman, & Stewart, in that order.

Those are my thoughts, but now I want to hear yours!  Are you fine with Chastain getting her big moment, or would you have stood with me for a second round of Cruz?  Am I on my own in thinking this lineup is kind of a shrug even if it has some world-class actresses?  And am I the only person who doesn't get Gaga: Movie Star?  Share your thoughts in the comments below!

Also in 2021: Actor, Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, International Feature Film, Animated Feature Film, Sound, Original Score, Original Song, Production Design, Cinematography, Costume, Film Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup & Hairstyling, Previously in 2021

Past Best Actress Contests: 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020

Kristen Stewart & the Globes

One of the biggest questions headed into the Oscar nominations, which will be announced in ten days, is around the Best Actress field.  For quite a while headed into the season, five names had shown up as probable contenders: Nicole Kidman (Being the Ricardos), Olivia Colman (The Lost Daughter), Jessica Chastain (The Eyes of Tammy Faye), Lady Gaga (House of Gucci), & Kristen Stewart (Spencer).  These five were the contenders at the Golden Globes for Best Actress in a Drama, in fact.  But since that announcement, they've gone on a bit of a wild ride.  While Kidman & Colman feel like sure things (I suspect one of them is probably winning), Kristen Stewart, a figure whom many pundits assumed might win the trophy, now feels like a "nomination is its own reward" contender.  She missed out at the SAG Awards in favor of Jennifer Hudson (Respect), and didn't even show up on the BAFTA longlist, despite her film being about British royalty (usually a gimme nomination for a prestige picture at the BAFTA Awards).  Spencer has failed at virtually every one of the guild awards, indicating that Stewart, at best, is likely going to be the film's only nomination if it happens, but increasingly names like Hudson or Penelope Cruz (Parallel Mothers) seem to becoming more en vogue.

But Stewart's nomination at the Globes combined with one other factor makes me stubbornly keep her in my Top 5 predictions (coming out in the next week) despite a definite yen to want to cite Hudson or Cruz (both with more heat and former Oscar winners themselves).  That other factor is the fact that Kristen Stewart has never been nominated for an Oscar.  While AMPAS will oftentimes skip one of the Golden Globes nominees for Best Actress in a Drama (Best Actress is generally easier to get in for a Musical or Comedy than Best Actor, and of course there's more than five dramatic performances in a given year so Oscar can go off of the HFPA menu all-together), they're weirdly averse to letting the chance to honor a Globe-nominated actress in this category not end up with "Oscar nominee" in front of her name before the season ends.

In the past forty years, sixty times have actors have been nominated for a Globe and not gone on to be nominated for an Oscar that same year (I say it that way to count out both figures like Debra Winger, Nicole Kidman, & Kate Winslet, who got nominations for different films, and Bjork, who got a nomination in a different category, neither of which are an option for Stewart this year)-so about 70% of the Globe nominees ended up with an Oscar nomination, a very high percentage considering that's on par with just one miss a year.  This already basically puts Stewart's odds at about 4-in-5 that she'll get a nomination.  But if you further examine those sixty, 43 of them were former Oscar nominees or winners-less than a third of the time did it happen that Oscar ignored an actress they'd never cited before, and only one time in the past decade (Jennifer Aniston in Cake) did this happen.  When it comes to this category and first-timers, Oscar has a bad case of FOMO.

If you look at the kinds of performances that missed with Oscar, there's not a lot of consistency other than most of these films were not a big deal with the Academy (which, admittedly, Spencer seems to be headed that way).  Only four of their movies (Rachel Chagall in Gaby: A True Story, Courtney Love in The People vs. Larry Flynt, Evan Rachel Wood in Thirteen, & Maria Bello in A History of Violence) were nominated for other acting trophies, and none of their movies were cited for Best Picture.  A few dominated the tech awards (Emily Blunt in The Young Victoria & Zhang Ziyi in Memoirs of a Geisha), but by-and-large most of these movies were going at it alone, which is probably where Spencer is most vulnerable, though recent nominees like Andra Day & Vanessa Kirby prove you can make the AMPAS list even if you're the only part of your film in contention.

This is all to say that you shouldn't count out Kristen Stewart just yet, even if she's clearly vulnerable, as statistically someone like Gaga or Chastain feel more vulnerable as former nominees.  It's worth noting that if Kristen Stewart does miss with Oscar, it won't necessarily preclude her from ever becoming an Oscar nominee.  Of the seventeen performances that missed in the last forty years after a Globe nod, seven of them were given by people who would eventually be Oscar nominees, and a few of the women that remain in the "missed with Oscar" category are performers like Aniston, Wood, & Blunt, who still work in prestige film/television projects regularly, and could still get their Oscar moment.  So Stewart fans shouldn't give up yet, not until February 8th, and certainly not after-history is definitely on her side.

OVP: Spencer (2021)

Film: Spencer (2021)

Stars: Kristen Stewart, Timothy Spall, Jack Farthing, Sean Harris, Sally Hawkins

Director: Pablo Larrain

Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Actress-Kristen Stewart)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

For some reason, 24 years after her tragic death became the most-covered story I remember of my childhood until 9/11 (seriously, if you lived through Diana-mania, and I was there for the tale-end of it, it can't compare to literally any other celebrity coverage in the decades since-Bennifer & the Kardashians could never), Princess Diana is making a comeback.  There's a Diana-led musical on Netflix.  Emma Corrin is getting praise for her performance on The Crown, a role Elizabeth Debicki will be taking on in the next season.  And then we have Spencer, where Kristen Stewart, a quintessential Southern California actress takes on the blue-blooded British noblewoman who became the "People's Princess."  The film has attracted both grand praise for Stewart as well as some divisive reactions on Film Twitter (I hadn't read the reviews as I try to go into all films with an open mind, I'd just seen that the tweets were mixed).  So when I had the chance on vacation (I always try to see movies while I'm on vacation as I'm not a night life person & also I'm traveling alone so movies in new theaters feels the best approach to not just lounging in a hotel room after 6 PM), I was curious where I would land, particularly as someone who adored Lorrain's other film about a woman who the world "only wanted to be beautiful," Jackie.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film takes place over a three-day Christmas period at Sandringham Castle.  Diana (Stewart) arrives separate from her husband, and late, which is a perpetual theme of the film-Diana is always missing expectations, missing dinners, ending up in the bathroom dealing with her (true-to-life) bulimia.  She has only one friend in the house other than her two young sons, Maggie (Hawkins) a devoted dresser whom her husband Prince Charles (Farthing) is frequently trying to keep her from.  The movie takes on a supernatural element when Diana is haunted by the ghost of Anne Boleyn, whom she worries is a direct corollary to her current affair (Diana is even related to the late, beheaded queen through her older sister Mary Boleyn).  Diana worries that she's going to be replaced by Camilla, Charles true love, and whether she's losing herself in this world.  Ultimately, she leaves the castle & flees from royal life, headed to a KFC while singing "All I Need is a Miracle" with her two devoted sons in tow, hopefully freeing herself to a new life.

As you can imagine, this didn't actually happen in real life.  While there are definitely connections to real life (Diana's eating disorder, Charles' affair, the late princess's fondness for buying fast food for her children), the events in the film are presented as a fable, and play out that way.  Unlike the more realistic Jackie, Spencer takes on a different motif, a more fanciful one.  This theoretically should work.  Beautiful princesses are a staple of fairy tales, after all, and one haunted by ghosts feels all-the-more appropriate.

The problem is that Spencer never grounds itself in something real.  When you introduce such intense flights of fancy, you need more depth in the characters, and there's virtually none here.  It's a movie that wants you to treat Diana outside of what we know about her...but every other character is so inconsequential you can only rely upon your own Us Weekly-inspired shorthand.  Larrain doesn't owe us a complicated portrayal of the Queen or Prince Charles, and it's not inappropriate to view these two as villains in the Diana tale, particularly considering the tragedy that ended up befalling her (this movie has a happy ending, Diana's life did not).  But it also hurts your cause when you are making a point of giving a flesh-and-blood Diana while (on purpose) showing us nothing real in her two onscreen enemies.

This also hurts Stewart's performance.  I feel like reviews of Kristen Stewart always feel the need to defend her, but at this point we're beyond that.  Stewart's work in the Twilight movies was butchered at the time (in retrospect, if you watch the films it kind of works better as a stylized approach to schlocky fare).  But she has since turned in two Oscar-worthy turns in Clouds of Sils Maria and Personal Shopper (I'd have nominated her for both), and can give a lackluster performance without being labeled a "bad actress."  I think her accent & mimicry is to-die-for here-she has Diana down-cold, which considering she grew up in LA, is a testament to her abilities.  But she also feels adrift in a movie that oftentimes feels rudderless, and while that's more on Larrain & his story than Stewart, it also makes it harder for me to get behind this work (and I like dreamy movies like this as a rule...check out my reviews of Terrence Malick pictures).  It just can't find its center, and as a result this was a miss for me even if it was in my wheelhouse.

John's Top 10 of 2017

The Globes, Oscars, and pretty much every critic on the internet has weighed in with their Top 10 list of the year, and I figure it is time for me to do the same.  Yesterday I went through the Worst of the Year, and I can't leave you there for long, so let's dive into 2017 one last time.  I will admit up-front that this is arguably one of the least years I remember from the past ten years (the last time I only had six 5-star movies was 2006), but that doesn't mean it doesn't have some notable gems, particularly the below ten films (listed alphabetically, because why rank when I implore you to see all ten, and with more in-depth reviews linked for all of them, so go peruse):

Beach Rats (dir. Eliza Hittman)

In a year where queer cinema was hitting most of the biggest home runs, this is one that could have easily slipped past my radar.  However, with a spectacular debut from Harris Dickinson & a chilling look inside of a closet that won't open, Eliza Hittman shares an uncomfortable story that is beautifully lensed and impossible to shake.

The Big Sick (dir. Michael Showalter)

The romantic comedy is never actually dead, but it feels like it's in constant need of resuscitation.  This film did it not with a compelling leading lady, but instead two incredibly fun performances from Ray Romano & Holly Hunter as a worn married couple who are trying to cope with their daughter's ex-boyfriend being pushed into their lives.  Please give Kumail Nanijiani another movie, ASAP, but perhaps more importantly-give Romano & Hunter a TV series, as this chemistry should be bottled.

Call Me by Your Name (dir. Luca Guadagnino)

I've seen it twice, and it'll be thrice this week.  A beautiful, haunting movie that just unfolds with the confidence of a classic from its opening scenes, its central romance is forbidden, felt, and dead sexy.  Chalamet, between this and Lady Bird, is a discovery of seismic proportions.  One of those movies I know I'll be watching every year.

Coco (dir. Lee Unkrich)

It holds up on second viewing, and that's about as high of a compliment as I can give a picture I loved so fully.  Charmed with bouncy original music and a gorgeous palette of pink, tangerine, and violet, it also has plenty of heart and is proof that when they aren't churning out mindless sequels, Pixar is still the best game in town.

Dunkirk (dir. Christopher Nolan)

An anonymous, but never emotionless, look at war first-hand.  Astoundingly directed by Christopher Nolan (arguably his most ambitious task to-date), we see war on land, air, and sea in a cast of characters that share little of themselves but instead work as blank canvasses, representing in their stead the millions of men that have come before-and-since.  A triumph.

The Florida Project (dir. Sean Baker)

At once a sprawling documentary and an intimate drama, this film feels so raw and authentic you'll be forgiven for assuming that leads Bria Vinaite and Brooklynn Prince weren't just discovered in the shadow of Orlando.  Combined with a soulful, introverted turn from Willem Dafoe, The Florida Project is an honest look at poverty through the wonderful lens of a child.

God's Own Country (dir. Francis Lee)

Yes, it borrows from Brokeback, but the best films often feel possible because of what came before them.  And surely God's Own Country strikes its own path with its troubled leads, and the revelation of Josh O'Connor's Johnny discovering love, and more importantly, intimacy, for the first time in his life.

Jane (dir. Brett Morgen)

Special effects are fine and all, but perhaps nothing was more shocking this year onscreen than the magic of Brett Morgen's time machine documentary, which takes Dr. Jane Goodall back decades with a gold-hued camera as we discover her love of chimpanzees first-hand.  Few documentaries have been so jaw-dropping, and so devoted to their subject.

Lady Bird (dir. Greta Gerwig)

Actors-turned-directors' first efforts can occasionally feel like a waste of time, indulgent affairs for people whose editors are afraid of pissing off the movie star.  Thankfully Greta Gerwig had no such issues, creating a semi-autobiographical look at the world of mothers-and-daughters, grounded by great work from Saoirse Ronan & Laurie Metcalf.

Personal Shopper (dir. Olivier Assayas)

Part grief drama, part ghost story, all fascinating.  Olivier Assayas's devotion to actresses, and finding the small mountains that his lead characters can experience in the oddest of times, is on full-display as Stewart's Maureen deals with the death of her brother, and possibly his hanging-on as she attempts to move on in every capacity of her life.

Personal Shopper (2017)

Film: Personal Shopper (2017)
Stars: Kristen Stewart, Lars Eidinger, Nora von Waldstatten
Director: Olivier Assayas
Oscar History: No nominations, though Assayas took Best Director at Cannes.
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

Two years ago, I enjoyed one of the biggest surprises of 2015 (cinematically) very early on in the year with Clouds of Sils Maria, a beautiful treatise on aging, movie stardom, art, and the roles we play as we move throughout life.  It's a fascinating study, one that was directed by Olivier Assayas and featured as one of its stars Kristen Stewart, who has largely graduated from being the moody girl in Twilight to an actress well-celebrated by critics (she is consistently strong in work like On the Road, Still Alice, and best of all Sils Maria, which should have earned her her first Oscar nomination in my opinion).  When the two of them decided to reunite, I definitely wanted to seek out their picture, but poor timing on my part (and the inevitable "I have no money" tidings of March) reared their head, and so I haven't been able to catch Personal Shopper until this past weekend as I seek out the movies from 2017 I haven't watched yet in hopes of soon creating my year-end awards.  Considering how much I loved Sils Maria, I was interested to see what Assayas would bring out in Stewart with her taking the lead role.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie centers once again on an assistant, Maureen (Stewart), who is the personal shopper of a celebrity named Kyra (von Waldstatten), whose career doesn't seem to be important, which may be yet another insight by Assayas, who had a lot to say about celebrity in his last picture.  Maureen has recently lost her twin brother Lewis to a heart condition they both share, and as both are mediums who believe in the spiritual world, they had made a promise to each other that whichever died first would try and communicate from beyond the grave to the still living sibling. The movie, thus, sets up a situation where we can't entirely tell if there's a supernatural presence or whether the strange happenings are something that is a manifestation of Stewart's grief over losing her brother.  In many ways the movie borrows from pictures like The Babadook or The Whisperers or L'Attesa, sometimes outwardly showing that the spirit world is alive, but never quite to the definitive point of knowing whether or not Maureen is actually interacting with her brother (or someone else using her grief to communicate from the beyond) or whether she's truly gone mad.

This juxtaposition and ambiguity may have tried some viewers' patience (I think it was one of those booed than cheered situations during the Cannes screenings), but I loved it.  Assayas is a director/writer of big ideas, and while he can't answer them (in the case of knowing definitively whether there's a beyond, no one can), he doesn't shy away from them by giving us concrete answers.  Even the most literal of mysteries, like the man that Maureen is texting with and convincing her to engage in reckless behavior (and then kills her boss), is never explicitly identified, though it's largely implied it's the celebrity's ex-boyfriend Ingo (Eidinger) who in an early scene in the picture makes a job pitch to Maureen.  The film's central themes of grief, sadness, and searching for meaning are felt throughout, and I tended to love it even when it was frustrating.

As for Stewart, this is another success.  While she's hardly a character actor (she is always playing some version of Kristen Stewart...Jessica Chastain she ain't), that's never been a problem for the likes of Cary Grant or Bette Davis, and isn't for Stewart, whose aloof movie star persona works here.  We get her channeling a lot of inner-sexuality in the way she did during points of Sils Maria and On the Road, and the ending scene, where she attempts one last time to communicate with her brother, perhaps realizing that she's started to go mad, is a doozy and well-played.  This doesn't have the stand-offish enigma of her character in Sils Maria, perhaps because none of her costars are remotely as talented as Juliette Binoche, but it's still another success from an actress once written off by the collective film world for being just a scowling girl in love with a vampire.

Café Society (2016)

Film: Cafe Society (2016)
Stars: Jesse Eisenberg, Kristen Stewart, Steve Carell, Blake Lively, Jeannie Berlin, Parker Posey, Corey Stoll
Director: Woody Allen
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Years ago, I decided there were ten directors that I was going to see every film they ever made as a bit of a directors project.  Admittedly, I'm still working on all ten (does anyone else have a problem where they sign up for more projects than one human being can actually accomplish?), but one of them was Woody Allen, one of only four directors on the list who actually is still living and therefore continually adding to the list, so seeing Cafe Society was kind of a given for me.  I honestly don't even watch the trailers to Woody's films any more (which is strange because Allen is one of the only film directors around who still finds a way to be mysterious and not give away his secrets in the trailers) since I know I'm buying a ticket, and since I start cold, let's start cold for you too without any spoilers.

(Spoilers Ahead) Like most of Allen's pictures (perhaps all of them-I can't think of one that doesn't), we get our resident Woody Allen character, though in this case it's a proxy in the form of Jesse Eisenberg as Bobby Dorfman, a young Jewish man who is trying to find his way to fame and fortune in Hollywood, and has an in with his uncle Phil (Carell), a high-powered talent agent in the 1930's (yes, we're time-traveling, keep up).  While working there, he falls madly in love with Vonnie (Stewart), a beautiful secretary who once had dreams of becoming a starlet but now has settled for the quieter life, finding more solace in a quiet Mexican restaurant than the glamorous homes in Beverly Hills where Bobby has hopes of taking her.  The film progresses as we find out Vonnie has been having a love affair with Phil, and is also smitten with Bobby, and is forced to choose between the two.  Because this is an Allen picture, she ends up with Phil (Woody loves the bitter with the sweet), and both she and Bobby transform as a result.  Bobby ends up married to a glamorous model (Lively) and becomes a high-powered club owner in New York, while Vonnie gives in to the vapidness of California culture and becomes part of the moneyed class she once disparaged.

While the film ends with the two of them apart, both with partners who adore them but longing for perhaps something more, the movie itself is content to just end and not really commentate too harshly on the choices we make and how you either need to accept your decisions or spend life with a mountain of "what ifs."  The film itself has a strange and plodding subplot with Bobby's family involving the mob, and not even Corey Stoll (arguably the best part of the picture, but he's the best part of every picture) can make you care about it in comparison to the love story, and the subplot gets unnecessarily dark with Corey's character getting the electric chair off-screen for killing his sister's annoying neighbor.

Overall, the film is okay.  The love triangle somewhat works, and Stewart is now confident enough as an actress (she actually had to audition for the film, purportedly her first audition since Twilight) that she sells the glamour and sex appeal of her character without a lot of stoicism.  Her Oscar-nominated costars aren't nearly as good, however.  I honestly felt like Eisenberg vastly overplayed his character's obtuse intellectualism, drawing too much on a parody of Woody than on something organic for the screen.  Carell, who was so marvelous in The Office and Little Miss Sunshine but largely hasn't impressed me in recent work, fails to deliver.  His dialogue is fun (I loved the constant name-dropping, particularly since it's 1930's Hollywood so it's more Gloria Swanson and Joel McCrea and less Marilyn and John Wayne, so it isn't as done), but his character is obnoxious and it's never clear other than power what Vonnie sees in him, and he doesn't give us that.  Is she so lost that she just projects onto everyone, or does Carell undersell his character's appeal even when she's onscreen?  I tend to think the latter, and so I would say he's the biggest weak link in the picture.

Those are my thoughts on this short, but overall less-than-impressive entry in Woody's canon.  No one will confuse this with Annie Hall, or even Match Point or Blue Jasmine, but if you have seen it please let me know some opinions-what are your thoughts about the latest entry?  Who was your best-in-show (I'm torn between Stewart, Stoll, and the great one-liners of Jeannie Berlin)?  And do you think that Woody should have put up with the ego of Bruce Willis and kept him in the picture (I tend to vote yes-this feels like the sort of part that Willis, an underrated actor, could have brought something special toward)?  Share in the comments!

The Best Films of 2015

Whew!  I went on a bit of a movie-watching bender over the past 36 hours, trying to scoop up as many of the missing films of 2015 that I could, and am officially ready to announce my Top 10 for the year (I already announced my Bottom 5 a few days ago on the blog).  Like with the worst of the year I didn't put them in a ranked order (they're alphabetical), but I highly recommend that you investigate all ten of these if you like to laugh, cry, and most of all enjoy fine cinema.  You'll note that every single one of these films has a female protagonist, which is unusual for me (I've never done that before with a film year), but appropriate considering this was clearly the year of the female-driven film, even if Oscar disagrees when they eventually crown Spotlight or The Revenant.  Without further adieu...

45 Years (dir. Andrew Haigh)

A deeply moving look at the hierarchies and intricacies of love and marriage.  Andrew Haigh has proven himself, with Weekend and Looking, a sharp observer of relationships and here we get the devastation of second guesses and suppositions.  Both Tom Courtenay and especially Charlotte Rampling dominate this in subdued, marvelous acting.

Brooklyn (dir. John Crowley)

Romance, especially big, complicated, straight-dramatic romance had largely gone out of fashion at the cinema until 2015, when films like Brooklyn brought it back.  Saoirse Ronan graduates to adulthood with the same level of ease that she portrayed in Atonement, and it pays off with a coming-of-age story that feels fresh, modern, and yet fully in its time-and-place.

Carol (dir. Todd Haynes)

I have never loved, but only liked, the films of Todd Haynes.  Until now.  Carol is the movie that made me a convert, and it's not hard to see why.  The film is that rare romance where you genuinely can't figure out how it will end until the movie actually gives us that answer (props to Phyllis Nagy on the wonderful screenplay), though all along you're breathlessly hoping that Carol and Therese end up together as Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara make a beautiful pair.

Clouds of Sils Maria (dir. Olivier Assayas)

This is what great acting and writing can accomplish-truly moving mountains.  Juliette Binoche and Kristen Stewart create something breathtaking in this look at celebrity, relationships, and aging.  The film came out so early in the year you'd be forgiven for thinking its time has passed, but Clouds lingers and comes back at you as it's too perceptive to disappear.

Ex Machina (dir. Alex Garland)

This was a wonderful throwback to the Science-Fiction films of the 1970's, where instead of battling aliens or zombies, we instead find ourselves at battle with ourselves and our own hubris.  Domhnall Gleeson, Alicia Vikander, and Oscar Isaac create a terrific acting trio, frequently one-upping each other with second agendas and the introspection of forced claustrophobia.

I'll See You in My Dreams (dir. Brett Haley)

Age was a great supporting player in a lot of the best films of the year, and none more-so than I'll See You in My Dreams, a film that meditates on when we stop experiencing newness in our lives and when we pack up the adventures and risks of our youth.  Blythe Danner has never been better (and Sam Elliott never sexier) than in this romance about two people trying something learned and making it feel rich and unexpected again.

Mad Max: Fury Road (dir. George Miller)

The most vibrant action film I've seen in years.  Brimming with lush visuals (John Seale deserves a standing ovation to go with that Oscar nomination), the film is raw, humming with energy, and a complete shock after a year where Jurassic World brought a franchise's heat crashing down.  Everything works, and you find yourself eagerly awaiting every single impending scene.

Room (dir. Lenny Abrahamson)

Based on the amount of tears that came down my face, this was not the smartest date movie I've ever selected.  That's really the only complaint here, as Room is about as wonderful as movies can get, with a perceptive look into the world both of a sheltered, innocent child like Jack (Jacob Tremblay) and a magnificent turn as a woman who doesn't know what to do with her lost youth in Joy (Brie Larson, finally getting the kudos her career has been demanding for years).

Spy (dir. Paul Feig)

The funniest movie I've seen all year...the funniest movie I've seen in several years.  I literally could not stop laughing, and that only happens when you have Melissa McCarthy in top-form (and during the first half of the film, in a form I've never seen her embrace on the big-screen) and a supporting cast of Rose Byrne, Alison Janney, Miranda Hart, and (particularly surprising and delightful) Jason Statham all showing ridiculously well-honed comedic chops.

Testament of Youth (dir. James Kent)

When I keep internally saying the words "Waterloo Bridge" you are doing something right onscreen.  This is one of the most romantic and fully-felt films I've seen in years, with breathy and airy romantic gestures between Kit Harington and Alicia Vikander, who in a year where everyone was awed by her work in The Danish Girl and Ex Machina, won my heart personally forever with her Vera, so defiant and full of ambitions bursting to find their purpose.

And there you have it folks-my top ten of the year!  Share your thoughts on these films (and if you haven't seen any of them, it's time to start clicking that 'Add' button on Netflix) along with your Top 10 lists in the comments!

Clouds of Sils Maria (2015)

Film: Clouds of Sils Maria (2014/15)
Stars: Juliette Binoche, Kristen Stewart, Chloe Grace Moretz
Director: Olivier Assayas
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 5/5 stars

Big ideas, difficult messages, and intelligence are frequently in short supply at the movies.  When a prestige film comes out, it occasionally attempts maybe one of these goals.  This is because they are difficult to carry-out, and oftentimes polarize audiences.  The modern example of this is every time that Terrence Malick comes out with a film: The Tree of Life and To the Wonder got eviscerated by some critics while hosanna'd by others.  If a film does try to say something larger, it usually has to do it under a conventional guise, such as the movie Wild, which explored complicated looks at personal evolution and the fractures of time moving forward, but did it in the same arena as a survival film starring a major movie star.  While Clouds of Sils Maria does have the benefit of three big-name actresses and an initially familiar trope (famous actresses are always showing up as famous actresses in movies), the film ventures forward in different directions for a complicated, occasionally bitter, but in the end glorious movie-watching experience.  The film, which earned raves out of Cannes, is a mesmerizing character study surrounded by a brilliantly-layered script that will leave you wondering and pondering hours and days after the theater thinking about what you experienced.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film starts out with Maria Enders (Binoche) on a train to accept an award for a reclusive playwright (much in the same vein as Roman Polanski or Malick himself), accompanied by her assistant Valentine (Stewart).  On the way, she realizes that the playwright has passed away, completely changing the mood of the ceremony, and that a former lover of hers whom she hasn't spoken to in years and whom she has a curt and fraught relationship with will be showing up at the same ceremony.  Preceding the ceremony Maria is asked by a director to star in a play she did as a young woman, but instead of playing the ingenue who seduces an aging businesswoman, she will play the aging businesswoman.  She initially declines, but in a cut-away (the film is very direct about the changing of scenes, frequently using long black-screen transitions to shift over periods of time), we realize that working with the acclaimed director and the press involved is too much to resist, and she has entered rehearsals.

These opening scenes are breathtaking not just because of the way that we are peering into the life of a famous actress, but in the way that the film seems rounded in their approach to Maria, and really to all involved.  Whereas most movies play with extremes, trying to make someone be X, this film realizes that a person, even a major movie star, is sometimes X and sometimes Y, and we see the edges of Maria, and very slowly, Valentine.  Binoche makes her elegant and insanely magnetizing-she's used to the glare of cameras after decades in the spotlight, and is both an artist and someone who knows that she likes the spotlight.  I loved the way she faked liking a fellow actor or could turn on and off her sexuality at a moment's notice or the way that she seemed to have such an easy glamour, someone who knows exactly how to get a perfect photograph or angle or interview answer thrown out.  She's practiced, and not easily flapped.  So frequently in films about accomplished people we see someone who is going to fall apart who never really seemed to have the determination to get to success in the first place (this was my principle issue with La Vie en Rose, for example).  This isn't the case with Maria-she's grounded and ferocious enough to know how to be a success and to be famous, and smart enough to acknowledge that sometimes one can be more important than the other.

The film's next chapter takes place in the Alps of Switzerland, where Maria is practicing with Valentine for the role.  The film follows the two of them as they randomly start to train Maria, snippets of their own characters being forced into the conversations, like a play within a play, until we can no longer tell which of these two women is playing a part anymore.  This is one of the bolder elements in the movie-this has been used recently in a film with Binoche, in fact, called Certified Copy (also superb), so there was risk of been-there-done-that, but while there it feels like a trick for a while until the resolution, here that resolution becomes almost invisible, and the trick wears into something more pleasantly muddled.  The movie follows these two people as they slowly start to learn about each other and mimic the characters.  Maria keeps grossing on about the insufferable nature of Helena, the older woman who falls in love with a younger woman in the play she's doing, insisting she is still the younger Sigrid while we see that she has transitioned away, oblivious to the affection she has for her young assistant (whether sexual or not, it's hard to say, but there's clearly an amour sitting there).  The movie could so easily transition into a vanity speech here, with Binoche becoming Norma Desmond, but it isn't youth as an abstract that Maria is clinging to-it's relevance.  She still wants to be the newness, the adored, the girl with the valued opinions.  After what appears to be a rough night, where Valentine may have been sexually assaulted (the film strongly hints at this), we see her start to defy Maria and eventually call her out for her dismissive treatment toward her.  Maria tries to convince her to stay, but she disappears in the climactic title scene, forever out of the picture.

Here is the moment where the film takes its boldest leap by not ending the movie.  In the original play, this is how it ends, with Sigrid leaving and Helena left to go for a walk, presumably to die.  However, as we see foreshadowed earlier in the film (when we learn that there will be new pages coming for the play), we get more to the story.  Here we see Maria, still a star but perhaps less brightened and certainly overshadowed, playing opposite of the less adoring Jo-Ann (Moretz), her young costar.  The movie ends with ambiguity here-has Maria seen her career disappear, or what happens when you are a star, but not the brightest?  She continues to demand respect, but the play becomes Jo-Ann's story and the final moments open with Maria ready to take on Helena, sitting in a chair onstage as the performance is about to begin.  We're left wondering if she will see a new facet in her life after Valentine or whether or not she, like Helena, will fade into the background.

The film's script, as you might be able to tell, is thick and meaty, frequently relying on big ideas and artistic risks, but they nearly all pay off.  It helps that the movie has wonderful performances coming from the leads.  Critics have paid heed to Kristen Stewart's work, so natural and free of scenery-chewing or indulging, but just knowing work that always feels authentic.  Some have called this a breakthrough, but it's really more of a peak; with plum work in On the Road and Still Alice recently, she's proven to be far more than Bella Swan.  Binoche has earned her plaudits as well (though considering she has an Oscar and is considered one of the truly great working actors, far less surprise), and they are well-deserved.  She plays her Maria as a real person, someone who exists in a different world but not as a different species, which is refreshing for a film about a famed individual.  Moretz isn't quite in the same league as these two, but that's only grading on a curve, as I loved the way that she too found a real soul in the back of what could have been a caricature.  The richest thing about all three is that they all feel authentic-there's a realism to this film that is so refreshing.  We don't see big scenes or big moments like we do in other films, but instead smart, confident people-never heroes or villains, but people-who are determined to succeed and generally do.  It's wonderful to see that instead of success or failure, it's just degrees of each.

It's also worth noting that all three women play weird facsimiles of not only the characters in the play, but of themselves in real life.  It adds something to see Binoche playing a woman who has had great success in the art house (where she got her start at a young age, much like Binoche) but who occasionally goes into Hollywood (Godzilla, anyone?).  Chloe Grace Moretz does her best Lindsay Lohan in the beginning, but in many ways she's more Kristen Stewart-someone putting on a performance to pay the bills and gain opportunities, but who is aware enough to respect a celebrity that she may not even enjoy.  It's fascinating to see the way that they mirror themselves and other actors (Sigourney Weaver, Nicole Kidman, and Jennifer Lawrence are all clear influences) in a film that's essentially about mirroring what's onscreen.

All-in-all, this is a marvelous movie and way better than I anticipated even with high expectations headed into it.  Huge kudos go out to writer/director Assayas and the three women who occupy his script.  For those who have seen it, what were your thoughts?  Do you agree that this is mesmerizing, almost as if we are in a Bergman movie?  Share your thoughts in the comments!

OVP: Still Alice (2014)

Film: Still Alice (2014)
Stars: Julianne Moore, Alec Baldwin, Kristen Stewart, Kate Bosworth, Hunter Parrish
Director: Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland
Oscar History: 1 nomination/1 win (Best Actress-Julianne Moore*)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Considering that Julianne Moore has won everything but the Heisman, it seems prudent to get to her latest film on the blog, since I'm expecting she's about to have a dream come true on February 22nd.  I hit her film as part of a massive trip to the movies this past weekend (which included my first triple feature of the year!), and like what many people are saying about the film, left duly impressed by Julianne Moore, but a little underwhelmed by the actual motion picture that's housing her fifth Oscar-nominated performance (and potentially her first win).

(Spoilers Ahead) The film is about Alice Howland (Moore), a woman who is living a Nancy Meyers-style lifestyle in Manhattan.  She has the swanky job at Columbia as a linguistics professor and a trio of children so beautiful their parents could only be Alec Baldwin and Julianne Moore.  And she manages to be that sort of person we all aspire toward being: confident, learned, cultured, and yet somehow down-to-earth.  She's a truly remarkable woman reaping the fruits of decades of hard work.

And yet, right around her fiftieth birthday, we see that she's starting to forget things.  A woman of great intellect, she rationalizes and tests herself before finally learning that she has an extremely rare form of Alzheimer's disease, which has presented when she is still medically young.  Alice must not only cope with this loss of her mind, which is her shining star as a human being, but with the slow deterioration of the relationships she has with her husband and children.  Along the way we see the ugliness of not just disease, but also how people treat those they love who have a disease, and the way that we approach different illnesses.

There's a lot to discuss out of the film, particularly that it shows the really horrific effects of Alzheimer's because it's ravaging our mind, not our body.  There's a moment where Alice talks about how she wishes that she'd had cancer, because at least that's something that people understand how to sympathize with, and there's so much logic in that opinion, and it opens up a larger conversation about how we have a hierarchy of empathy for different diseases.  Just think of how, say, AIDS or Type-2 Diabetes are treated compared to breast cancer, or how, Alzheimer's, a disease that's a shot in the dark in terms of whether you get it, is handled with kid's gloves.  We see how people try to talk around Alice, assuming that whatever pops out of her mind is madness even when it isn't, and how even the most beloved of people become a burden when they don't jive with our own lives.

This last point may be the weakest aspect of the film, as both Kate Bosworth and Alec Baldwin play characters who are unrealistically cruel to Alice and her situation.  Baldwin clearly adores his wife at the beginning of the movie, and Bosworth is constantly communicating with her role model of a mother.  And yet by the end of the film, conveniently, it's the rebel of the family (Kristen Stewart) who ends up being the only one who can still connect with her mother.  It doesn't help with Baldwin's casting in particular that he's far too famous and far too defined of a public persona for the role; we all know that Alec Baldwin the person has a tendency to be callous and a bully, so it's easy to confuse his change in behavior with his public persona in a way that, say, Richard Jenkins or Dennis Quaid wouldn't have been so easily dismissed.

The film also keeps to a fairly predictable beat-there's nothing surprising about the eventual decline of Alice or about her family's relationships, and while the acting from Moore and Stewart is worth the price of admission, it's a pretty blank slate.  This helps while you're actually in the theater, principally because you can easily project on these fairly non-descript individuals your own fears and insecurities.  I spoke with my brother afterwards, and both of us sort of acknowledged that we are the same ages as Kate Bosworth and Hunter Parrish, respectively, and that our parents are roughly the same ages as Moore and Baldwin, and how that factor fed more into the tears than anything else (the "thereby the grace of God" sort of feeling).  Even if you aren't the same age as the children, you can still see yourself in Moore's or Baldwin's shoes as a spouse or a sibling or a child and seeing how that deterioration is petrifying.  This makes the film extremely effective in the moment, but as you leave the theater you realize that there's not enough to connect with these people onscreen, and not all the great acting in the world is going to make up for the fact that the script is very underwritten.

Those are my thoughts on this tough-sit of a movie that has been rocking the Best Actress prizes-what are yours?  Are you rooting for Juli on Oscar night, or do you have a Team Reese or Team Marion shirt lined up?  And what do you think of great performances lodged in lousy movies in general-do you find that with time the performance makes up for the poorness of the film, or does the lack of quality in the movie hurt your opinion of the film over time?  It's a thought worth discussing, and, in particular, sharing in the comments!

A Look at Women and the Box Office

Jennifer Lawrence's Catching Fire is poised to cross the $350 million domestic mark this weekend, becoming only the third film to do so this year, and putting it within shouting distance of Iron Man 3, which gathered $409 million this past summer.  This year has been a robust one for women at the Box Office.  In addition to Lawrence's success, Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy both headlined a pair of $100 million+ grossers at the box office, and Jennifer Aniston/Kristen Bell also were the leads in films of similar grosses.

That being said, being the Number One film of the year continues to be a "man's world."  Since 1980, only one film had a woman get equal/top billing and was also the highest-grossing picture domestically: Titanic's Kate Winslet (who is technically second-billed, but only due to the alphabet).  Otherwise literally every other film had a man as the definitive lead.  

This wasn't always the case.  While Box Office Mojo (the only site I trust explicitly in these sorts of matters) only goes back to 1980 in their grosses, films of the 1950's through the 1970's regularly had women such as Mitzi Gaynor, Natalie Wood, Elizabeth Taylor, Julie Andrews, Audrey Hepburn, Barbra Streisand, and Ali McGraw starring in the top-grossing film of the year.

So as a bit of fun today (and because it's cold out and I don't want to venture into the iciness), I thought I would track the past 25 years of cinema, and look to see what the biggest role for a woman in the top-grossing film is, as well as the highest-grossing film where an actress gets top billing.  Let's take a look (we'll skip 2013 since we've already gone there)!

1988

Top Grossing Film: Rain Man

Main Female Star: Valeria Golino, who is Tom Cruise's girlfriend and gets third billing

Highest-Grossing Film With a Top-Billed Actress: So, for those who are curious, I'm going with top-billed star or someone who gets a tie for top-billed, so even though, say, Winona Ryder might have the biggest part in Beetlejuice, Michael Keaton is still the champ there.  I'm also skipping Working Girl here, because in the posters I can find, Melanie Griffith is below Harrison Ford and Weaver gets second billing, proving that the billing isn't alphabetical.  Therefore, I’m going with Jamie Lee Curtis and A Fish Called Wanda, who gets alphabetical top-billing (shared with John Cleese, Kevin Kline, and Michael Palin), and was the twelfth highest-grossing film of the year.

1989

Top Grossing Film: Batman

Main Female Star: Kim Basinger as Michael Keaton’s girlfriend, and she gets third billing

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: I probably should have looked at how difficult it would be to pick out “top-billed” before I started this project.  One could argue that Kirstie Alley is the lead in Look Who’s Talking, but she gets second billing to John Travolta.  Morgan Freeman is before Jessica Tandy alphabetically for Driving Miss Daisy, but the way the poster is structured they don’t share top-billing.  Therefore, the crown goes to Meg Ryan who shares top-billing with Billy Crystal in When Harry Met Sally… in the eleventh highest-grossing film of the year.

1990

Top Grossing Film: Home Alone

Main Female Star: Christopher Guest favorite Catherine O’Hara plays Kevin McAllister’s mother, and gets sixth-billing.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Patrick Swayze outranks Demi Moore and Whoopi Goldberg on the Ghost poster, so that’s a no.  Therefore, thanks to our now patent-pending alphabetical clause, the award goes to Julia Roberts who shared top-billing in the fourth-highest grossing film of the year in Pretty Woman.

1991

Top Grossing Film: Terminator 2: Judgment Day

Main Female Star: This is one of the only films on this list that I haven’t seen, and it’s bumming me out because it has a female star in second billing (our first) and also one that kicks some ass-Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: In our first case of an actress not sharing the top billing (though she does share the title), Paige O’Hara, the voice of Belle in Beauty and the Beast takes the prize with the third highest-ranking film of the year.

1992

Top Grossing Film: Aladdin

Main Female Star: As the voice of Aladdin’s girlfriend Princess Jasmine (what does it say that we’re only five films in and the description “girlfriend of the main character” has been used thrice), voiced by Linda Larkin, lands third billing.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Everyone only remembers Michelle Pfeiffer in Batman Returns, but she gets third billing to Keaton and DeVito.  Demi Moore gets above-the-line billing on A Few Good Men, but the ranking isn’t alphabetical so she loses to Tom Cruise.  That leaves us with the seventh-highest grossing film of the year, Sister Act, and its star Whoopi Goldberg as our victors.

1993

Top Grossing Film: Jurassic Park

Main Female Star: Though really the stars are the effects and Steven Spielberg, Laura Dern as Dr. Ellie Sattler lands in the number two spot behind Sam Neill.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Our first actress to repeat is Meg Ryan, who shares top-billing with Tom Hanks in the number five grosser Sleepless in Seattle.

1994

Top Grossing Film: Forrest Gump

Main Female Star: As Forrest’s girlfriend Jenny, we have Robin Wright with second billing.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: It’s hard to imagine now, but Sandra Bullock wasn’t a big enough star in 1994 to outrank Keanu Reeves and Dennis Hopper for billing.  Jodie Foster was above-the-line for Maverick, but Mel Gibson still gets higher billing than her (and the above-the-line isn’t alphabetical).  That means we hit our lowest-ranking yet with 13^th place.  The victor is Susan Sarandon, who was Oscar-nominated for her work in The Client.

1995

Top Grossing Film: Toy Story

Main Female Star: Oof-all the way down in seventh place is cowboy Woody’s girlfriend Bo Peep, voiced by Annie Potts.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Whew-I thought for a second that Mel Gibson was going to get top-billing on Pocahontas, but thankfully that went to the title character, voiced by Irene Bedard, for the fourth highest-grossing film of the year.

1996

Top Grossing Film: Independence Day

Main Female Star: I was a little worried when I remembered this very male-dominated film at how far we’d have to go for a woman, but it was only fourth billing, with Mary McDonnell (playing the First Lady and wife of a main character) being the main female lead.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Oh so close-were it not for Independence Day, we would have had a female-led top-grosser, as Helen Hunt gets first-billing for the number two film of the year, Twister.

1997

Top Grossing Film: Titanic

Main Female Star and Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: In the only year that we’re going to cover where this happens, Kate Winslet shares top-billing with Leonardo DiCaprio for this romantic epic.

1998

Top Grossing Film: Saving Private Ryan

Main Female Star: This is probably the only time I’ve ever hoped for Armageddon over Saving Private Ryan, as women would have done much better there.  While there are bit parts played by female actors in this film, you have to go through dozens of men to get to them, so I’m not even going to bother finding out what the ranking was.  We’ll just say does not apply and move onward.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Thankfully Cameron Diaz was a big enough star to land a top-billed slot for (Number Three) There’s Something About Mary.  Otherwise we would have had to go well outside the Top 10 to land a female-led film.  Clearly 1998 was not a great “Year of the Woman” at the movies.

1999

Top Grossing Film: Star Wars Episode One: The Phantom Menace

Main Female Star: Here is where franchises really and truly start to take over the tops of the box office, and so we’ll see more repeats on these names.  Here we find third-billed Natalie Portman as Queen Amidala (she isn’t the “girlfriend” role until episode two, so we’re good for now).

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Our second actress to appear twice on this list, Julia Roberts doesn’t even need an alphabetical clause to get her top-billing for Runaway Bride, the ninth highest-grossing film of the year.

2000

Top Grossing Film: How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Main Female Star: So apparently for a while there films no one liked became the highest-grossing films of the year.  Jim Carrey’s gaudy misadventures had a young Taylor Momsen in second billing for her work as Cindy Lou Who.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Continuing the trend of films no one really likes anymore, we have the fifth highest-grossing film (and our third film to star a repeat actress on the list), What Women Want with Helen Hunt sharing top-billing with Mel Gibson.

2001

Top Grossing Film: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone

Main Female Star: This is genuinely hard to tell, because the credits don’t go in order of screen-time, per say.  I’m going to just go with conventional wisdom, then, and say that Emma Watson was in third billing, though it may well have been Maggie Smith for this particular installment.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: The romantic epic doesn’t have split billing, so Kate Beckinsale in Pearl Harbor is out-of-luck to Ben Affleck.  Therefore, we have to go to the twelfth-place film Hannibal, where our alphabetical clause probably gets Julianne Moore in on a technicality (Hopkins was clearly top-billed here), but they’re both above the line and even on the poster, so it counts.

2002

Top Grossing Film: Spider-Man

Main Female Star: Playing, once again, Spider-Man’s girlfriend is Kirsten Dunst.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: It’s arguable whether Hayden Christensen and Natalie Portman share top-billing on Attack of the Clones, but I’m erring on the side of no without a poster to back-me-up.  Therefore, the winner is the surprise hit of 2002, My Big Fat Greek Wedding and its star Nia Vardalos, who landed the Number 5 spot (can you imagine something like that happening even just ten years later?).

2003

Top Grossing Film: The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Main Female Star: Oddly enough, this is the only time the Tolkien series has made it to the top of the heap.  Like Harry Potter, the billing here is very off in relation to actual screen time, so the winner is either Miranda Otto, Cate Blanchett, or Liv Tyler, though only Otto gets a robust role in the film.  At least if it’s Otto it’s not the main character’s girlfriend (though she’s still in love with him).

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: The alphabetical rule blocks our second woman of color getting in here, as Queen Latifah is second-billed to Steve Martin in Bringing Down the House.  The same is true for Diane Keaton in Something’s Gotta Give.  Therefore we have to do our fourth double-appearance and our first ever tie with the 21^st (yes, that’s not a typo) highest-grossing film of the year Freaky Friday starring Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan in the dual top-billing.

2004

Top Grossing Film: Shrek 2

Main Female Star: Cameron Diaz plays Shrek’s wife in this film, and lands third billing for her efforts.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Drew Barrymore suffers from the alphabetical billing clause in 50 First Dates, which leads oddly to another 21^st place finish with another actress (similar to Lohan) who had a very brief period of box office success: Sarah Michelle Gellar in The Grudge.

2005

Top Grossing Film: Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith

Main Female Star: Natalie Portman, now decidedly in the girlfriend mode, gets second billing.  Also, in a side note-how odd is it that this film did SO much better ($90 million) than that year’s Harry Potter?  This is not something commonly thought of because of Harry’s spellbinding international grosses, but the Star Wars films perform much better domestically than the boy wizard.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Our second film on this list so far to get a woman into the second-highest grossing film, Tilda Swinton lead the field with The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe but could only manage the silver.

2006

Top Grossing Film: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest

Main Female Star: Pulling in third billing is Keira Knightley as, you guessed it, Orlando Bloom’s girlfriend (and the third leg of the Jack/Will/Elizabeth love triangle).

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Probably our eldest actress so far to get cited, in 17^th place (a mild improvement, though nowhere near where we were a decade ago), we have Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada, which won her a massive comeback and an Oscar nomination.

2007

Top Grossing Film: Spider-Man 3

Main Female Star: Again, this is one of the only top grossers I never got around to (which is odd, because I was seeing a lot of movies during this period).  Either way, we have Kirsten Dunst once more as Peter Parker’s girlfriend.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: The alphabetical clause discounts Katherine Heigl in Knocked Up as well as Jessica Alba in Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer (a film so little looked up, its video game pops up before it does in IMDB).  Instead, we have Amy Adams taking the prize for her Princess Giselle in Enchanted, coming in at twentieth place.

2008

Top Grossing Film: The Dark Knight

Main Female Star: Oh, it’s a comic book film so you just know that it’s a girlfriend role: Maggie Gyllenhaal playing Rachel with fifth place billing.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: And for the first time ever, we have a female-led film series.  Say what you want about Kristen Stewart and this cinematic series, but few other women in the past ten years can compete with her box office pulls.  Twilight gets us seventh place.  It’s also worth noting that 2008 was a surprisingly robust year for women at the Box Office: Sarah Jessica Parker’s Sex and the City, Meryl Streep’s Mamma Mia, and Angelina Jolie’s Wanted were all in the Top 20.

2009

Top Grossing Film: Avatar

Main Female Star: I was genuinely curious considering her lack of star power and the fact that Sigourney Weaver was a bigger name at the time, but Zoe Saldana (in second) did indeed get the top spot here.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: In fourth place, we have our second appearance by Kristen Stewart, though it’s worth noting that Sandra Bullock’s The Blind Side got in eighth place this year, meaning that after roughly a decade where women could barely scrape into the Top 20, here we had two films in the Top 10 that were female-led.

2010

Top Grossing Film: Toy Story 3

Main Female Star: Unlike fifteen years earlier, we didn’t have Annie Potts, but instead Joan Cusack as our top actress, and Cusack comes in as third with the rootenest, tootenest Jessie.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Despite being the title character, Mia Wasikowska was outranked by the movie star that is Johnny Depp for Alice in Wonderland.  That means for the third year in a row we have Kristen Stewart in The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (and another female-led film in Tangled, which rounded out the Top 10).  Eclipse ranked fourth.

2011

Top Grossing Film: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2

Main Female Star: Ten years after the question mark, this is still a bit up in the air, but it does appear that Emma Watson managed to slide into second billing for the final installment of the series.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Kristen Stewart continued her trend, with Breaking Dawn Part 1 being the third highest-grossing film of the year.  The next highest-ranking was The Help’s Emma Stone at thirteenth place.

2012

Top Grossing Film: The Avengers

Main Female Star: Well, at least she isn’t a girlfriend role.  In fifth place is Scarlett Johansson, playing one of the six avengers, the Black Widow.

Highest-Grossing Film with a Top-Billed Actress: Jennifer Lawrence supplants Kristen Stewart for the first time in four years, with The Hunger Games coming in third to Breaking Dawn Part II’s sixth place.  The highest-ranking woman not in a franchise (at least it didn’t seem intended to be a franchise at the time) was Kristen Stewart once more in Snow White and the Huntsman.

And there you have it, my friends-an exhaustive look at the box office and women’s roles in it.  It isn’t difficult to see the sexism on display-more than half of the principle roles in the highest-grossing films were women playing the main character’s love interest or girlfriend, and were it not for Bella Swan and Katniss Everdeen, female-led motion pictures would have almost no position in the Top 10’s of the past decade.  What about this list most surprised you?  What would it take for Hollywood to fix what is clearly a problem?  Why don’t people see more female-led motion pictures?  Share in the comments!