Five Women Director’s that Deserve Oscar Nominations for 2011 Films
Plus Overlooked Performances.
The Academy Awards are on tonight, and blogs and magazines are full of scathing editorials about overlooked nominees, so I figured I’d add my two cents.
The truth about the Oscar Ceremony is that it’s all pageantry and always has been. The Academy only has weight in its awards ceremony if we actually believe what they’re telling us about the quality of movies is the truth. Nothing about the Oscars is about how good a movie is; everything about the Oscars has to do with press, publicity and Hollywood agents doing their jobs. So, rather then complain about who didn’t get nominated, it’s always better instead to point people in the direction of overlooked movies or film makers that didn’t get recognition, but rightfully deserve it. Plenty of people are doing that, but have you noticed that almost everyone on people’s Oscar snub lists are men?
The easiest (and laziest) way to expose the Academy as a sham is to point out all the great master filmmakers who never won (Hitchcock, Kubrick, Kurosawa). But as several recent smart bloggers have noted, that only underlines a more troubling problem; women and minority directors hardly ever get nominated. It’s simply not the case that women aren’t making great movies (I’d take all of the movies listed below over eight of the nine movies nominated for best picture), so this is just another confirmation of Hollywood’s biggest problem; it’s old, it’s stodgy, it’s out of touch and it’s systematically sexist and misogynistic.
So here are five directors that deserve a nomination for making outstanding movies in 2011. If you haven’t seen these films, please check them out (I myself haven’t seen one of them, but plan to). If all the Academy does nothing else, it should at least get us talking about movies and filmmakers; especially the overlooked ones.
1. Clio Barnard —- The Arbor
There were a lot of great documentaries nominated for Oscars this year, but The Arbor deserves a nomination and Clio Barnard does as well. I’ve never seen a documentary (nor a movie) like it, and Barnard takes risks with her material, beautifully approaching the subject matter of troubled playwright Andrea Dunbar with a fractured hall of mirrors that tells us everything and nothing at all simultaneously.
2. Kelly Reichardt —- Meek’s Cutoff
Long after my initial viewing, Meek’s Cutoff has stayed with me as a powerful allegory concerning America’s original sin. Lost on the Oregon trail, settlers following a too-confident frontier guide begin to suspect that he doesn’t know the way at all. Will following a captured Native American help them? Reichardt uses great subtlety to brilliantly hint that it doesn’t matter; there’s no way American’s, still unsettled centuries later, can ever not be lost. Because in truth, this is not our land and we never had anyone to show us the way, we just insisted we knew it all along.
3. Miranda July —- The Future
I can think of few other modern writer-directors taking as many risks as Miranda July. Naturally, people hate her for it (and inexplicably describe her style as “twee”) but The Future is a consistently visionary, bold and compelling take on complex adult themes dealing with fears of growing older, finding our place in the world and what kind of legacy we’ll leave behind or give to another generation. I wish people would stop approaching it as a “Miranda July movie” and just see it for the refreshing piece of cinema it is.
4. Celine Sciamma —- Tomboy
Sciamma takes complex themes of gender identity and sexual maturity and makes it all look easy. She delicately crafts Tomboy so that it balances a compelling story about a young girl who moves to a new town and introduces herself to everyone as a boy while asking difficult questions. None of it ever feels forced or comes with a false sense of importance; the story and characters always comes first, but that doesn’t make it any less thoughtful or challenging. A masterful high-wire act of writing, directing and acting.
5. Lynne Ramsay —- We Need to Talk About Kevin
Truth be told, I haven’t seen We Need to Talk About Kevin yet (it hasn’t popped up in the Boston area), but Ramsay is a challenging filmmaker and everything I’ve heard about this divisive film sounds like it demands to be seen, discussed, argued about and analyzed. What other sign of a great movie could you ask for?
Overlooked Performances:
Michelle Williams in Meek’s Cutoff: I know she’s nominated, but for playing a vamped up caricature of a sex bomb. Her role her is much less glamorous but far more interesting, especially when it concerns standing up to a patriarchal figure and system.
Yun Jung-hee in Poetry: A touching, moving performance from Jung-hee as a doting grandmother who suspects her grandson of terrible, possibly violent, behavior. Her connection with a dead classmate of her grandson’s grows as she struggles to write a poem for a class she takes on a whim. In the end, her connection to life (and death) intensifies and you can see the sad wisdom growing in Jung-hee’s face.
Juliette Binoche in Certified Copy: Simply put, Binoche has never been better and there was no better performance last year. This role forces her to flex acting muscles most performers would either run screaming from, or attempt and fail. She makes it all look easy, and her impressive range moves from wounded sadness to proud determination; all within a story that asks us whether she’s acting or whether her emotions are real (the answer quite possibly is both). Despite Certified Copy’s mind-bending structure that forces us to ask what is real about relationships, Binoche and acting partner William Schimell ground it in humanity that suggests what isn’t real about relationships.
Charlize Theron in Young Adult: It’s easy (and fun) to play nasty people, but when nasty people are the main protagonist of a movie, how do you pull off a compelling performance without pulling any punches? I’m not sure, but Theron does it in Young Adult she makes it look effortless (much of the credit should also go to Diablo Cody, who has written her best, most mature script to date and probably deserves a writing nomination too). Theron delights in playing a wreck of a human being and we never tire of being fascinated by her while simultaneously repulsed. You know people like this, but chances are you’d never want to see a movie about them. Theron is so good, she just might change your mind.
Kirsten Dunst in Melancholia: Melancholia only half worked for me (the first half, to be specific) but that doesn’t mean Dunst doesn’t deserve recognition for some of the best acting in her career. Often criticized as a bad actress from fan boys who dismiss her in the Spider-Man movies of all things, Dunst actually has considerable range, and her regression from happy new bride to depressed doomsayer in Melancholia is quite frankly the reason to see the movie. The compelling nightmare of the first half of the movie wouldn’t work without her spiraling depression.
Honorable mention: Monica del Carmen in Leap Year. A difficult movie and a challenging performance that should be rewarded for its bravery. People freaking out over Michael Fassbender in Shame should sit through this instead. This is what bold film making about sexual obsession really looks like and del Carmen’s performance is grounded in brutal, stark reality, not over-reaching theatrics.
(via feministfilm)
