La Vie En Rose

La Vie En Rose reeks of competence. If you have seen a movie, you've seen this movie. If you have seen an Oscar-winning lead performance, you've seen this one. The Academy rewards actors who transform themselves into someone else. If that someone else is an historical figure that we can recognize, all the better, since we can look at the performance and say definitively whether or not they "got it right." Maybe that's why best make-up and best actor go hand in hand.

Julie Christie had the most daring performance this year. She is an aging beauty and she played an aging beauty. You could see the actress in the performance and that's a good thing. Who said, "everyone can play one great role--themselves," some director did (help me out many readers). The great actors can play many great roles and all of them are themselves. Ellen page seemed to play exactly herself in Juno. Joe Mantegna points out that Al Pacino wins the oscar for yelling loudly as a blind man whereas when he tells Sonny "I'll kill them both" it is in Pacino's regular speaking voice. Its him talking, not someone else, and that makes it all the more chilling.

With the nominations of Julie Christie, Laura Linney, Ellen Page, George Clooney, Casey Affleck, and Tilda Swinton's win, it seemed like this year the academy was looking favorably at performances of characters that are not unlike the actors portraying them.

But in one of the most unpredictable oscar years yet, Marion Cotillard's win cements the academy's love of loud performances that hide the actor instead of revealing her.

Here's How It Should Have Gone:
Actor- Daniel Day-Lewis (There Will Be Blood)
Actress- Julie Christie (Away From Her)
Supporting Actor- Stephen Graham (This Is England)
Supporting Actress- Olympia Dukakis (Away From Her)
Director- Coen Brothers (No Country)
Cinematography- No Country For Old Men
Film Editing- No Country
Sound Design, Mixing, whathaveyou- No Country
Makeup- Away From Her (for not using any)
Visual Effects- I Am Legend
Screenplay, orig- This Is England
Screenplay, adapt- Away From Her
Best Picture- Away From Her