Welcome to the final installment of Oscar Actors In Retrospect, a four-part series wherein Roommate Joe and I revisit the Oscar-winning performances from 1990, 1995, 2000, and 2005 and see how they stand up to historical scrutiny.
Today, I’ll be taking you through our reactions to Best Actor and Best Actress from 2005. To look at how we ranked the supporting categories, just visit Joe at Low Resolution. In all cases, let us know your rankings as well.
And don’t forget to watch the Oscars on Sunday. In five years, will we judge them kindly? Stay tuned! For five years!
BEST ACTRESS
1. Reese Witherspoon — Walk the Line (WON OSCAR)
2. Felicity Huffman — Transamerica
3. Keira Knightley — Pride and Prejudice
4. Charlize Theron — North Country
5. Judi Dench — Mrs. Henderson Presents
Mark: Her performance as June Carter Cash didn’t do much for me—especially compared to Felicity Huffman’s layered, hilarious turn as a trans-woman in the undervalued Transamerica—but I can’t deny that it secured Reese Witherspoon’s chair at the table of Big Deal Actresses. She’d been dining there for several years, but box office success in charming comedies doesn’t quite bring the respect of a major dramatic role. And once she actually took home the Oscar, there was no denying Witherspoon’s ascendancy. It’s odd, of course, that she hasn’t had a hit since she played JCC, but this role is still defining her as a talented marquee name.
I’ve got Huffman in second place because everyone treated her performance like the revelation it was, and looking back, it still stands out as one of those turns that shoves an actor to new prominence in our minds. And speaking of that… I didn’t see Pride and Prejudice, but Knightley’s Oscar nomination made me take her much more seriously as a performer. In retrospect, this accolade—even if it’s for a movie that didn’t make much of an impression—seems like an appropriate precursor to her serious work in Atonement and Never Let Me Go.
Next we’ve got Joan Allen’s spectacular turn in The Upside of Anger. Oh… wait. We don’t. We should, but we don’t. For my pesos, Allen was better than Witherspoon, even, and at least even with Huffman. But did her work get noticed? No. Because when Academy voters were looking at piles of overlooked films, trying to find two more names for their gruel-thin list of potential Best Actress nomInees that year, they overlooked her in favor of two safe bets who had already won. Did it matter that Theron, though fine, was in a film so poorly written that its final courtroom scene essentially had Woody Harrelson singing “I Am Woman” at the top of his lungs without anyone objecting? No! Because a few years before that, Theron kicked ass in Monster, so… nomination!
And did it matter that Judi Dench was (I’ve heard) mugging her way through a tarted-up television special? No! Once you tap her for Chocolat, she basically gets on the shortlist for anything. I didn’t seen Mrs. Henderson Presents, so it might be great… but it hasn’t even made a ripple on the pond of her career. People remember Notes on a Scandal with relish and Iris with deep respect. Most of us, though, think this movie is a variety show hosted by TV’s original Carol Brady. The thought that either of the final two performances could be honored ahead of Allen’s is still pissing me off to this day. Overall Grade in Retrospect: D
Joe’s Response: Three breakthroughs and two afterthoughts in this category. It’s interesting that of your top two (which seemed like the top two at the time as well), neither Witherspoon nor Huffman managed to capitalize on their Oscar moment. Reese picked a succession of poor projects (and continues to do so, if Water for Elephants turns out as bad as it looks), while Huffman made Georgoe Rule and … nothing. I wasn’t as fond of Huffman in Transamerica either, so I might actually bump her down to third for Keira Knightley, whose nomination here really was a turning point as she stepped into the shoes of Hollywood’s go-to skinny British lass.
BEST ACTOR
1. Heath Ledger — Brokeback Mountain
2. Phillip Seymour Hoffman — Capote (WON OSCAR)
3. Terrence Howard — Hustle & Flow
4. David Strathairn — Good Night, and Good Luck
5. Joaquin Phoenix — Walk the Line
Joe: It is, unfortunately, impossible to write about this category and its legacy without considering the matter of Heath Ledger’s death. But I firmly believe that even if he hadn’t passed away so young, his Brokeback Mountain performance would have retained its reputation as one of the great ones not to win. That was pretty much the perception at the time of the awards — nothing against Phillip Seymour Hoffman, of course; he was amazing in Capote and it’ll always be one of his defining performances — and as the years have gone on, both Ledger’s personal legend and Brokeback Mountain‘s cultural esteem have grown.
Elsewhere in the category, I have to say this is a strong bunch, even if the reputations of actors like Terrence Howard and Joaquin Phoenix have drifted some since these nominations came down. Howard may have spent the intervening years building up a reputation for being fussy and unpleasant, both onscreen and off, but Hustle & Flow retains that found-object quality that made so many people flip for it back then. Plus, in all honesty, the fact that “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp” has retained such cultural cache actually helps Howard in this regard. As for Joaquin, his Johnny Cash performance has two strikes against it in that it’s gotten overshadowed by Reese Witherspoon’s Oscar-winning role as his onscreen wife AND by his recent I’m Still Here shenanigans.
I may be alone here, but I feel like David Strathairn’s success with Good Night and Good Luck is one of the all-time great examples of a steadily-working character actor finally being given the one perfect role for him and knocking it out of the park. It’s tough to say how well that movie will be remembered in, say, ten more years. But right now, I still feel like Strathairn was bordering on iconic. Overall Grade in Retrospect: B+
Mark’s response: Intriguingly, I’d bump Phoenix to third place for one of the reasons you’ve got him in fifth: I think his recent shenanigans have actually made us more aware of Walk the Line (and Gladiator, as I mentioned last week), because they remind us of what used to be. If Phoenix had always been a douche-y pomo wanker, then his recent stunts wouldn’t be worth mentioning, but because we can compare them to his exciting earlier work, they merit a reaction. That knocks Strathairn to fifth, but I agree that this is his perfect role. In a weaker field, he’d be much higher on my tally sheet.
12 responses so far ↓
1 Nick Davis // Feb 23, 2011 at 12:04 pm
Can I just say this whole feature has been a treat? Really fun brain-teaser, and you guys are both hilarious. I think I’m with Joe on the Actor rankings and on Knightley > Huffman, but then again, I teach in an English Department, where any Austen adaptation produces ten years of overly ardent debate.
2 ferretrick // Feb 23, 2011 at 1:19 pm
Huffman is on TV every week in a show that, while its status as a watercooler show has certainly faded, is still pretty damn successful. That’s hardly nothing. Maybe you are limiting this to just movie careers, but Huffman was primarily a TV actress before Transamerica, and still is. And for better or worse, I think Desperate Housewives will have as permanent a cultural relevance to the Aughts as Dynasty had to the 80s, so I say Huffman ranks #1.
3 gina // Feb 23, 2011 at 1:31 pm
TransAmerica was about a trans woman not a trans man.
But I agree with you that Witherspoon’s performance was nothing special and she didn’t deserve an Oscar (right up there with Gwyneth Paltrow’s absurd win for Shakespeare in Love). Moreover, I thought Toby Jones was better as Capote than Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Infamous was a far superior film to Capote.
4 Mark Blankenship // Feb 23, 2011 at 1:38 pm
Thank you, Nick! We’ve loved writing them, and I’m really glad you’ve enjoyed them!
Gina — Thanks for pointing out the trans-man/trans-woman flub, which I’ve corrected. And while I’m not sure I support Jones over Hoffman, I certainly think Infamous is a great, underrated film.
Ferretrick — I can see that argument for Huffman, but since I’ve never watched DH, the show just hasn’t impacted me that much. Blatant subjectivity for the win!
5 Michael // Feb 23, 2011 at 2:16 pm
Harrumph. I still see you guys shifting the grounds of your ranking between “whose performance seems artistically excellent from this distance in time?” and “who’s gotten or stayed famous or Hollywood-powerful?” Am I being a dick for insisting that that’s a worthwhile distinction?
Keira Knightley’s Lizzie Bennett, for example, was the weakest ever recorded if you love the role–glamour aplenty, great lips and eyes and skin dished up in in ENDLESS closeups, but she couldn’t broadcast the character’s sharp, satirical intelligence to save her life. (Much, much better with the same director in Atonement, where she was more credibly cast.) To me, she can’t be imagined in the same rank as Huffman if acting is the standard. (No disagreement on Theron and Dench, though–routine work, up to a professional standard, but NBD.)
And maybe it’s because I’m somehow immune to Brokeback Mountain, but Ledger’s performance, iconic if you say so, as a clench-jawed Marlboro man repressing his contradictions just doesn’t give him the same level of challenge that Hoffman had in playing Truman Capote in a subtle, self-unraveling crisis, dead-center screen for the whole film. Again, if the acting achievement is the standard, I think Hoffman deserved it. But I didn’t see Strathairn, and I would normally pay to hear him read seed catalogues aloud, so–
6 Roommate Joe // Feb 23, 2011 at 3:21 pm
“Harrumph. I still see you guys shifting the grounds of your ranking between “whose performance seems artistically excellent from this distance in time?†and “who’s gotten or stayed famous or Hollywood-powerful?†Am I being a dick for insisting that that’s a worthwhile distinction? ”
I won’t comment on the latter, but as to the former, I feel like we can all be mature and discuss these performances in a way that appreciates the level of performance itself while also taking into account how said performance (and role, and movie, and actor) sits within the overall Hollywood mythology.
I don’t think it has to be an either/or proposition at all, and I also don’t think that personal appraisals of Knightley or Ledger that run counter to our posts — while totally valuable and worthy of discussion — strip the post itself of value.
7 Michael // Feb 23, 2011 at 6:07 pm
Roommate Joe, for clarification: ["I . . . don't think that personal appraisals . . . that run counter to our posts-- . . . strip the post itself of value."] I didn’t mean to suggest for a moment that adding my opinions to the discussion would strip the original post or later posts of their value. This is a blog, not a debate. I think we both understand that–and if I sounded in some way dismissive or disdainful, I apologize for the tone.
I did mean it when I said that I thought the standards were shifting within posts and from one post to another. I thought that was worth noting for the sake of understanding what we were actually talking about. And as to it being an either/or, of course it normally wouldn’t be, but when I offered my opinion, I noted (only) two cases where I thought it actually was something of an either/or–where the iconicity or fame the actor had achieved was stronger than the quality of that particular piece of acting. That’s not a useful addition to the conversation?
8 Mark Blankenship // Feb 23, 2011 at 6:23 pm
I’d like to diffuse any potential stress about these comments by saying that I’m glad we’re all participating in the debate, and I don’t think any comment strips any other comment of value. Let’s all keep talking.
As to Michael’s specific point: I’m writing these posts on instinct… I think Keira Knightley’s status as a big star actually has made that performance far more important in retrospect, regardless of how good it is, and I think that the excellence of Felicity Huffman’s performance is what has made her performance last. The ultimate criteria in these posts is a question of lasting historical resonance (a highly subjective thing), and I try to take both excellence of performance AND level of fame into consideration. But it’s mostly approximations and disagreements are inevitable. (And they make it more fun.)
At the end of the day, I hope the posts get us all thinking about what makes us carry performances with us over years.
9 benvolio // Feb 24, 2011 at 10:58 pm
I agree that Ledger’s perf is the one that will go down in history. Hoffman’s is great, but let’s face it, Toby Jones’s turn in basically the same material (released a year later) was just as swell — it’s a jewel of a role that demands an actor rise to the occasion. Ennis Del Mar, however, is a role that could have been chewed up and spit out, and Ledger’s compressed, repressed, understated turn was just freaking dazzling. This is the movie that made him a movie star. Hoffman was a well-regarded character actor who continues to get good parts and do good work, so it’s a wholly different trajectory.
I wanted Huffman to win so bad. I too wonder why she didn’t spread her film wings after this, seeing as she’d already had a meaty tv role on SportsNight. Sure, DH is high profile, but Huffman’s isn’t the glamor gig there.
I didn’t see the Witherspoon (but I have a soft spot for her first role in The Man in the Moon), and it’s the kind of role that AMPAS loves. I thought (and still do) that the Knightley nod was pro forma, in that the field was sparse and they needed more costume-drama women to fill it out. Seriously, North Country? Gah.
And even if you haven’t seen Mrs. Henderson Presents, you’ve totally seen it. Dench by correspondence course.
10 Mark Blankenship // Feb 25, 2011 at 12:22 am
Hi Benvolio! I love the idea of a Judi Dench correspondence course. I’m British… but only by mail!
I agree, too, about Huffman. I hope she gets meatier film work in the future.
11 Lynne // Feb 27, 2011 at 12:43 pm
I’m a huge fan of the 2005 adaptation of Austen’s Pride & Prejudice. And there is a piece of writing that stands through the ages, right? Kiera’s performance was excellent – subtle, intelligent, witty. She should have won an Oscar alone for her glorious rain-drenched, stone-gazebo rant, “From the first moment I met you, your arrogance and conceit, your selfish disdain for the feelings of others made me realize you are the last man in the world I could ever be prevailed upon to marry”.
She brought so much to this character, but not having seen her later films, I think I became more of an Elizabeth fan than a Kiera fan, if that makes sense. One could argue, though, that this is the ultimate appreciation of fine acting – falling in love with the character (or falling in hate, as with Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs).
I thought Heath Ledger’s turn was excellent as well. It takes great skill to successfully pull off a complex but understated/introverted character. Could Sean Penn have been as effective an Ennis as Ledger?
12 Mark Blankenship // Feb 27, 2011 at 4:13 pm
Hi Lynne,
Your question about Sean Penn as Ennis actually clarified how much I like Ledger’s performance… because I can’t imagine Penn (or anyone else) in the role.
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