Best Supporting Actress 1993

[bizarre]

Subsequent performances prove that she's not a very fluid or naturalistic actress.

Someone hasn't seen Margaret...

Her work in Margaret is not fluid or naturalistic at all, but it succeeds because she is playing a character who lives her life as if acting in a school play. She's incredibly, cannily well-cast but it isn't a breakthrough of naturalism after a career of strained Acting.

[ksrymy]

Subsequent performances prove that she's not a very fluid or naturalistic actress.

Someone hasn't seen Margaret...

[mayukh]

I'm not predisposed to hate on child actors, but I really hate Anna Paquin in The Piano. I think she's every bit as grating as that child in The Blind Side or that girl in Mrs. Doubtfire. (I think she's a terrible adult actress too.)

This. I'm perplexed by the love for her performance, which I found messy and coincidentally effective at best rather than incredibly insightful. Subsequent performances prove that she's not a very fluid or naturalistic actress.

Winona Ryder is luminous in The Age of Innocence. She is indeed a limited performer but I've always felt there was something so appealing and empathetic about her presence, and here she completely illuminates her character's intentions without necessarily vilifying her. It's a very sensitive portrayal of a (morally) complicated character. An easy choice.

[ksrymy]

Paquin by a mile. Pérez infuriates me in anything she does. I think Age is Scorsese's most overrated movie and while Ryder is actually quite goo she doesn't come near Paquin level. As has been said, Thompson could do this in her sleep and Hunter was, indeed, a hoot but nothing really special.

When I evaluate a female child performance it has to reach Patty Duke level; this is where it pleases me but makes me feel "meh who cares?" about it. If it passes that it has to hit Paquin level where I feel "that was fantastic and beyond what I could expect from a child." The male equivalents are Brandon de Wilde in Shane and Haley Joel Osment in Sixth Sense levels.

And how could you not vote for the girl who responds to "Where's your mother? Where's she off to?" with "TO HELL!!"?

1. Anna Paquin - The Piano
2. Gong Li - Farewell, My Concubine
3. Embeth Davidtz - Schindler's List
4. Lily Tomlin - Short Cuts
5. Julianne Moore - Short Cuts

[Snick's Guy]

Anyone but the oh-so-overrated Ryder (glad her career has fizzled over the last decade)

Voted for Paquin

[dws1982]

I'm not predisposed to hate on child actors, but I really hate Anna Paquin in The Piano. I think she's every bit as grating as that child in The Blind Side or that girl in Mrs. Doubtfire. (I think she's a terrible adult actress too.) I toss her out immediately. I also toss out Winona Ryder. I like her a great deal sometimes, but I think she's just unbearably stiff and lifeless in The Age of Innocence. Holly Hunter is decent enough in The Firm, but doesn't merit consideration as a winner. Thompson and Perez are both excellent, but between the two, I went with Perez. A recent re-viewing puts me in the camp that believes that Rossellini is even better, but Perez is excellent, I think. It's not hard to see why she didn't really have much of a subsequent career, but this was a shining moment.

[FilmFan720]

Like others have said, this is not nearly the inspiring line-up that I seem to remember it being. Emma Thompson is fairly forgettable in In the Name of the Father. Rosie Perez is an actress I like, but I find her parts of Fearless to be the least interesting parts of the film. Anna Paquin is certainly good in The Piano (a movie that I need to revisit), but it isn't a performance I love. I remember liking Winona Ryder a lot, but it is another movie I need to revisit (especially after some of the reactions here).

I will be the sole vote, however, for Holly Hunter. I don't love her turn in The Piano as much as most (and didn't vote for her in the Best Actress poll), so I don't feel the need to award her there. The Firm is something of a guilty pleasure for our household, and I think her performance (much more than 2 scenes) is a lot of fun. Not her greatest work, but I have no problem awarding it.

As for other possibilities, Short Cuts has been mentioned here already, and I would have nominated both McDowell and Stowe from that cast. I will also throw out Christina Ricci in The Addams Family Values (in terms of mature-beyond-their-years preteens, I'll take her comedic take over the eventual winner), and to a lesser extent, Sigourney Weaver in Dave and Joan Allen in the underrated Searching for Bobby Fischer.

Damien -- Just when I think I have you somewhat figured out, you go and throw a curveball...Rene Russo in In the Line of Fire certainly threw me for a loop



Edited By FilmFan720 on 1288391975

[Mister Tee]

Wow -- this may be our most evenly split verdict ever.

I agree with elements of what almost everyone has already said. I, too, saw Darlene Cates and Madeleine Stowe as overlooked, should-have-made-the-list candidates. I, too, preferred Isabella Rossellini to Rosie Perez in Fearless; liked Perez more the previous year in White Men Can't Jump; and found Fearless an uneven but often thrilling effort -- as someone wrote at the time, "A great opening and close, with wobbly steps in between" -- with Jeff Bridges' finest work.

To the nominees:

I love Emma Thompson, but thought this her third-best performance on the year (Much Ado was easily number one for me), and I resented her bigfooting into this category and denying a genuine supporting actress the slot.

I was less resentful of Hunter, because I found it a truly engaging performance in a movie that needed it. (She, Strathairn and Hackman provided the acting around the black hole of Tom Cruise) I especially recall a line reading when someone mentions her eyes, and she says, "That's not even my best feature". Given the general oddball nature of most of the films nominated in this group -- Sabin is right: Age of Innocence was substantially disliked, Fearless was hardly popular, and The Piano was far more art-film than many in the Academy favored -- I honestly thought at the time had Hunter not been such a prohibitive favorite for lead actress, she might well have replicated the Tomei victory by being in the one popular film.

I guess I've already dealt with Rosie Perez. I never got what people responded to so strongly in her work here; I don't think she made her problematic role entirely work. And if people complained about her voice, it wasn't some racist thing -- it was annoyance at her exceedingly lazy diction (much the same issue I have with Patti Lupone). As I said, I preferred the Rossellini performance, which was, for me, almost like having Ingrid Bergman back as a young woman for two hours.

I think Italiano and others are correct: the fact that Ryder's career has so slipped -- pretty much from that night she lost an Oscar all the Hollywood pros were telling her she'd win -- tends to obscure the fact that she was considered a very cool, up-and-coming talent at the time of Age of Innocence. Part of this was of course the directors and projects with which she'd been associated -- Beetlejuice and Heathers alone were enough to mark her hip as hell -- and, as I said in an earlier thread, I was quite taken by her NBR-winning Mermaids. And she does a solid job in a stretch of a role here in Age of Innocence (though one does have to admit in retrospect that the screen brightens far more whenever Miriam Margoyles appears on-screen). I wanted Ryder to win at the time (in part as tribute to a film I loved and thought way under-appreciated by the Academy). But, honestly, I wasn't surprised she didn't.

I was, however, surprised it was Paquin to whom she lost. I'd overlooked Paquin because I thought voters wouldn't want to honor someone so young, and also because I thought, despite the Weinstein push, The Piano wasn't like to win over Academy hearts and minds. As I've said here on numerous occasions, I'm not the fan of The Piano so many here are. I find its storyline derivative of They Knew What They Wanted, Wild is the Wind, even Desire Under the Elms, and think the contrast between the starched-collar minister and the close-to-the-earth Maori is trite in the extreme. For me, the film is a triumph of directorial vision over utterly unimpressive story-telling...

but...one thing I said immediately upon emerging from the theatre was, The kid was sensational. She absolutely took command of the screen, and was, for me, the most mesmerizing character on display. So, now, with the perspective of years, I'm ready to vote to confirm that fact. I can't say this is a group I particularly love, but Anna Paquin's work is what stands out clearly from the pack.



Edited By Mister Tee on 1288395339

[Kova]

Hunter's nod was the surprise; Thompson's less so, if only in retrospect (she had a big, well-delivered speech during the film's climax, and her film was an overachiever with Academy voters). Neither had any shot of winning, which might explain their reactions of sheer delight when Paquin was named the winner.

I love Perez, and she certainly has a meaty role in Fearless. I not-so-fondly recall, though, the Oscar episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show that year when an audience member stood up and announced she wouldn't vote for Perez even if "she stood on her head and spat out nickels," leading to some rather disturbing comments regarding her Puerto Rican accent. My guess is that a number of xenophobic voters felt the same way.

Ryder was the early favorite, but I remember Paquin generating some late-in-the-campaign buzz. I voted for Ryder, mostly because I'm fond of her unorthodox screen presence, and because The Age of Innocence is one of the few Scorsese films I genuinely love.

[Sabin]

There certainly was a period of time where Winona Ryder was one of the more respected, promising young actresses in Hollywood. I don't think anyone would have guessed that her career was about over come the time of this nomination, or that she would end up as one of the more forgettable two-time nominees in history. Her loss has less to do with the fact that she is a pretty limited actress (as several have won before or since) but rather that this was not a terribly beloved film. I look online and I am astonished to see that a Martin Scorsese costume drama failed to receive even a Cinematography nomination.

I think this was a race that was similar to 1992's. With the lack of a clear, embrace-able front-runner, voters just voted for what they really liked. When faced with a smallish role in a BBC production, a smallish role by an anti-Zionist hoodlum in a bigger BBC production, a smallish role in a naughty foreign film, or memories of an ex-wife in a dizzying film by a naughty pedophile, I think denizens of the retirement homes voted for the performance that made them laugh, that they could remember, and that didn't scare their dick. This year, they didn't like The Age of Innocence and didn't buy into the hype of Ryder as the future (maybe if she had a knock-out song like Jennifer Hudson - "And I Am Telling You, I Am Not Going [Unless Dictated So By Contemporary Societal Customs]").

I have to believe that Rosie Perez also scared voters' dicks. Maybe because it's one of the roles where a woman deals with grief in a fairly realistic fashion that fails to offer uplift. I would argue that if played by a white woman, this role would have won. But Rosie Perez is also one of the performers who people cannot believe was nominated. She is a loud, occasionally obnoxious woman, who was put to better use the year before in White Men Can't Jump. I'm a little astonished that Fearless didn't do better, especially considering that Jeff Bridges gives IMO his best performance to date (or at least I thought so a few years ago). It's a Peter Weir film that is actor bait. But I can understand why Perez did not win.

And I can understand why Holly Hunter didn't. There was no need. She was the heaviest front-runner in the category of Best Actress since Jessica Tandy. And I can see why Emma Thompson didn't. She had won the year before and there was no need to reward her twice in a row. South Park did a fantastic bit recently about a superhero named Captain Hindsight that flies around and instead of helping people in a moment of crisis, merely explains why it happens. I think we're all somewhat in his Super Friends on this board. I can't say I would have known that Anna Paquin would have won but it does make quite a bit of sense. She is adorable in a role of depth, does not appear to be acting, and she had the Miramax machine behind her. It's hard to look at The Piano and think that it was seen as the film with the strongest underdog upset odds because it is the kind of art film that caused a lot of decision about its message (it has none) and like a Woody Allen film became largely about the artist's need to create. But Anna Paquin's win was a welcome incident of accidental bandwagon, one of the more endearing moments in Oscar history, and a very deserving winner. What's not to love?

I'm a little surprised that Darlene Cates was not nominated. Not to mention several other women this year. I'm surprised to learn that the Golden Globes matched the lineup outside of choosing an even weaker nominee (Penelope Ann Miller, Carlito's Way) in lieu of Hunter.

[rudeboy]

For me this is one of the most uninspiring line-ups ever in this category. Not a single performance that does much for me. Ryder I found wooden and dull; Hunter barely registers; Thompson's eccentric act is merely tedious, especially when compared to her magnificent, career-best work in The Remains of the Day that year. I didn't care for The Piano at the time (have been meaning to give it another chance for so long now) and was not impressed with Paquin's mannered performance (I adored her a few years later in A Walk on the Moon, for which she was certainly award-worthy).

So I vote for Perez, who at least overcomes the handicap of that infuriating voice to create a believable character. Although even she was outdone by Isabella Rossellini in the same film.

[OscarGuy]

Emma Thompson was nearly at the top of her acclaim, so it comes as little surprise that she was nominated for a competent if unexceptional performance. Winona Ryder was my choice then and it's hard for me to remember a reason not to support her. She bore the weight of the cruelty of the film, so it's not hard to be sympathetic towards her character.

I like Anna Paquin in The Piano and after watching it again recently, there a few juvenile actor ticks that bother me, but there was a clear display of talent that has proved itself in later years (one of the few child actors to emerge as a forceful presence as an adult actor). But, I still end up giving it to Ryder over Paquin.

[mlrg]

Voted for Rider, although form me it's almost a tie between her and Perez

[ITALIANO]

Holly Hunter's nomination was, as far as I remember, the big surprise of that morning. It wasn't a very good movie and hers was a short, if nice, role, but she clearly was the actress of the year, so the Academy missed the chance of honoring, in her place and only for the second time in its history, a more deserving supporting actress for a foreign-language movie, the talented Gong Li.

I love In the Name of the Father so I was glad that Emma Thompson was nominated for that, too. And big courtroom monologues are the kind of scenes that the Academy traditionally falls in love with. But of course Thompson has had more difficult characters to deal with in her distinguished career.

Fearless is a deeply flawed but very ambitious movie - "interesting" is the word one usually applies to efforts like this. Perez had a good role and did well with it, though I wouldn't say that she completely overcame the problems of a far-from-perfect script; otherwise her performance could have been emotionally more effective.

Now it's easier to see her limitations - and she HAD limitations as an actress; a certain lack of spontaneity for example. But in those years Winona Ryder was really considered the best young actress of American cinema, and a potential (or even a certain) future superstar. And it's true that even those limitations were very well used by Scorsese and Ryder herself for the character of May in The Age of Innocence. She was lucky - it was a great character of course; but it was also a difficult character, and in this case (and unlike, say, in Little Women) her considerable amount of technique (considerable, I mean, for her young age) was perfect for it. A good performance, and justly nominated, but not the best of the year.

Because honestly, Uri, if not Anna Paquin, who? Yes, I know, in Europe we've had wonderful performances from child actors, but if we only consider English-language movies this is certainly, if not the best, at least one of the best ever. It's not just that she was so believable - and this is already something unusual in itself - but the role was also so subtle in its portrayal of childhood's confused, contradictory emotions, and the terrible pain of not understanding the complicated world of the adults, that the final result can only be considered a major triumph - and by far the best of these five. Comparing her to Tatum O'Neal is a bit unfair; not only because Paquin's is a truly supporting role, but also because nothing looks or sounds forced, artificial in her performance - it's so complex, yet so natural at the same time - just like childhood itself. And yes, of course she was helped by the screenplay and the director - it's not like the movie was written and directed by Anna Paquin - but this happens always and for any actor, young or old, including Meryl Streep. One of Oscar's best choices, and a very pleasant surprise when it happened.



Edited By ITALIANO on 1288347947

[Precious Doll]

As deserving as Anna Paquin was in The Piano, I thought her co-star Kerry Walker was more deserving.

If I recall Winona Ryder correctly, Ryder was predicted to win, however as Anna Paquin's performance goes hand-in-hand with Holly Hunters, much like Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke in The Miracle Worker, so I thought it was glaringly obvious that she would win. Also Ryder wasn't even the least bit deserving of a nomination, much less a win.

My choices are:

1. Katrin Cartlidge for Naked
2. Maggie Smith for The Secret Garden
3. Kerry Walker for The Piano
4. Rosie Perez for Fearless
5. Julianne Moore for Short Cuts

Also of note aside from Anna Paquin, were Genevieve Lemon in The Piano and Miranda Otto in The Nostradamus Kid.



Edited By Precious Doll on 1288345141