Ladies and gentlemen – The Leadometer!

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Reza
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Re: Ladies and gentlemen – The Leadometer!

Post by Reza »

HarryGoldfarb wrote:
Uri wrote: 8. The One Scene Wonder. (Maybe two, max). Or as it’s also known as, The Beatrice Straight.
Guess some other recent examples from this category may include Viola Davis (Doubt), Ruby Dee (American Gangster) and Dench (Shakespeare in Love).
And.....Hermione Baddeley (Room at the Top), Ned Beatty (Network), Anthony Quinn (Lust For Life), Gloria Grahame (The Bad and the Beautiful), Ingrid Bergman (Murder on the Orient Express) and Anne Hathaway (Les Miserables).....all under 15 minutes of screen time.
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Re: Ladies and gentlemen – The Leadometer!

Post by HarryGoldfarb »

Uri wrote: 8. The One Scene Wonder. (Maybe two, max). Or as it’s also known as, The Beatrice Straight.
Guess some other recent examples from this category may include Viola Davis (Doubt), Ruby Dee (American Gangster) and Dench (Shakespeare in Love).
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Re: Ladies and gentlemen – The Leadometer!

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Uri wrote:What Ladies? Anyway…

8. The One Scene Wonder. (Maybe two, max). Or as it’s also known as, The Beatrice Straight.
Another one that comes to mind is Geraldine Page in The Pope of Greenwich Village. Can't recall if she had more than one scene but the scene I remember is pretty much the only moment I recall from the film over 30 years later.
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Re: Ladies and gentlemen – The Leadometer!

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Uri wrote: 5. The MVP. These are the members of an evenly spread ensemble piece who seem to stand out, for some reason. They are the likes of David Niven, Glenda Jackson #1, McDormand #1 as well.
This is the group I find most interesting., and I find I have differing responses to them, partly due to when in life I encountered them.

Niven was already in the history books when I saw his film, on TV, while in high school. I didn't question his placement at the time -- he seemed the flm's standout to my 16 year old self. (I think, as Reza notes, he also benefited from being such a long-time star. I remember reading a post-Oscar quote in a 1959 Hollywood Reporter that said the voting for both him and and Hayward was "more like a census than a competition.")

I saw Women in Love while on Spring vacation my freshman year in high school. The film was well-praised, but not in any way a box-office hit. I was, like most, impressed with the then-mostly-unknown Jackson, but thought if she had any shot at the Oscars, it would be in the supporting category. What I hadn't calculated was that this would be the inaugural "there are no decent roles for women" year for the Oscars -- a development that would recur over the next decade (reaching its nadir in 1975). Give so few choices, the critics' groups went unanimously for Jackson, making her the prime challenger to (ugh) Ali MacGraw, who many were still betting on as awards night rolled around.

By the time of Fargo, I had become my fully aging self. I thought she was clearly the greatest thing about Fargo, but I still thought it was a stretch to label her lead. In the end, I'm happy she was, as my choice (Emily Watson) wouldn't have won an Oscar in a thousand tries, and the bumping of McDormand to lead gave us the never-matched Binoche-over-Bacall upset. But, in my mind, McDormand's win last year is her first fully legit best actress win.

My suspicion is, Olivia Colman will be added to this list in a few months, and I'll quibble about her, too.
Uri wrote:6. The Raison D’etre. It’s a limited in scale key character which seem to loom over the whole film it’s in. Redgrave in Julia and Hopkins in TSotL are prime examples of this type.
I don't think these two are quite equivalent. Redgrave, while the off-screen focus (and of course title character), really only gets the one (exceptional) scene in Julia, and is clear supporting. I know people have done stopwatches on Hopkins that say he had under 20 minutes...but those scenes between him and Foster are the core of the film, and they cast a far greater shadow than Redgrave did over her film. I heard people advocate for Hopkins as supporting back in '91, and it struck me that he would have had an insuperable advantage over any other candidate, because of the dominance of his role, which didn't seem fair. So, while I can see it's debatable, I never had a real problem with elevating Hopkins to lead there.
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Re: Ladies and gentlemen – The Leadometer!

Post by Uri »

Reza wrote:
Uri wrote:5. The MVP. These are the members of an evenly spread ensemble piece who seem to stand out, for some reason. They are the likes of David Niven, Glenda Jackson #1, McDormand #1 as well.
These particular three stand out not for "some reason" but for very specific reasons within the confines of the ensemble cast of their films.

Niven was a huge star and had been around since the 1930s so he was considered due and was also well liked by the Hollywood community and was here playing a dirty old man caught having his way with a woman in a cinema. Sort of cast against type although in private he had bedded a number of famous actresses in Hollywood most of whom probably voted for him :D

Jackson had the most flamboyant part in the D.H. Lawrence adaptation and had a number of nude scenes which made her stand out even though Oliver Reed clearly had more screen time.

Playing a pregnant detective with an accent made McDormand stand out in her film.

All three gave the impression (like Brando for # 2) of being leads in their films.
By "some reason" I didn't mean "for no reason" - as you rightfully mentioned, each of these wins did have its own reasoning, still, they are all at best borderline cases, which was my point.
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Re: Ladies and gentlemen – The Leadometer!

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Uri wrote:5. The MVP. These are the members of an evenly spread ensemble piece who seem to stand out, for some reason. They are the likes of David Niven, Glenda Jackson #1, McDormand #1 as well.
These particular three stand out not for "some reason" but for very specific reasons within the confines of the ensemble cast of their films.

Niven was a huge star and had been around since the 1930s so he was considered due and was also well liked by the Hollywood community and was here playing a dirty old man caught having his way with a woman in a cinema. Sort of cast against type although in private he had bedded a number of famous actresses in Hollywood most of whom probably voted for him :D

Jackson had the most flamboyant part in the D.H. Lawrence adaptation and had a number of nude scenes which made her stand out even though Oliver Reed clearly had more screen time.

Playing a pregnant detective with an accent made McDormand stand out in her film.

All three gave the impression (like Brando for # 2) of being leads in their films.
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Ladies and gentlemen – The Leadometer!

Post by Uri »

What Ladies? Anyway…

Reza told me to move on. So I did. Kind of.

Here I offer you a 10 levels scale, to end all the debates about category placement of performances.

1. The Character Study. A performance, a role, which is the sole purpose of the film it’s in. It’s all about the journey this character is having, and the narrative is all about it. Think Cagney in Yankee Doodle Dandy, Milland in the Lost Weekend, Hayward in I Want to Live or more recently, Gary Oldman.

2. The Double Act. A film which is all about the relationship of two equally important (and roughly equally sized, performance wise) characters. Gable and Colbert, MacLaine and Winger, Ledger and Gyllenhaal come to mind.

3. The Head of the Class. There might be other prominent characters which may have their own plotlines, but this one is clearly the center of its film’s universe. McDormand in 3BOBM is a perfect example.

4. The Star Turn. There is a very clear protagonist of the film, but it seems it’s all about the somewhat bigger than life presence of another character which has less screen time. From Brando in Pacino’s film through Douglas in Charly Sheen’s to Washington in Hawkes’.

5. The MVP. These are the members of an evenly spread ensemble piece who seem to stand out, for some reason. They are the likes of David Niven, Glenda Jackson #1, McDormand #1 as well.

6. The Raison D’etre. It’s a limited in scale key character which seem to loom over the whole film it’s in. Redgrave in Julia and Hopkins in TSotL are prime examples of this type.

7. The Good Old Supporting Player. That’s all. From McDaniel to Allison Janney, from Walter Brennen to Mahershala Ali. They do what they are asked to do in a film which is not about them.

8. The One Scene Wonder. (Maybe two, max). Or as it’s also known as, The Beatrice Straight.

9. The One Liner. A glorified bit player. Don't you remember Estelle Reiner in When Harry Met Sally? You do.

10. The Hitchcock. A recognizable extra.

The 9s and the 10s are not part of the game – they are not, nor should they be, considered for awards, regardless of the impact they make. 1 through 3 are leads and that’s were they should be placed. 6, 7 and 8 should all, and I mean all, regardless of the quality of the turn – bigger may be better, but better is not bigger – be places in supporting. That leaves us with 4 and 5. In my book, 4s are usually leads, 5s are mostly supports, but yes, it’s all about the year they are in, at the end, I guess.

You’re most welcome.
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