Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Did Nicole Kidman deserve her oscar?

Seven (or technicaly six,but whatever) years ago, Nicole Kidman won her first oscar for her performance as mentally troubled author Virginia Wolf in The Hours. Kidman had all the factors for a victory. 1. She plays a real person 2. She's a beautiful actress turned ugly (that nose!) 3. She had a previous nomination and loss for Moulin Rouge a year previously 4. she had won a number of key precusor awards,including the golden globe and the bafta and 5. The film was a highly respected best picture nominee that was unlikely to triumph anywhere else (it's other best shot at a victory was in the screenplay category but it lost). Kidman was in a neck and neck race with Chicago's Renee Zellweger who also won a globe award (but In the musical or comedy category) and mangaged to win the Sag Award over Kidman. However,voters probably felt that Chicago would get its due in other categories and that Zellweger's time would come. (It did. She would go win best supporting actress for cold mountain a year later). Before Kidman won the globe, the early frontrunner was Julianne Moore, who had won a staggering 16 critics prizes for her devastating portrayal of Cathy Whitaker, a 50's housewife who finds out that her husband is gay and falls in love with her black gardener in Far From Heaven. But Moore was also nominated in the supporting category for The Hours which caused her to split her votes,leaving her empty handed. She still had a chance to win, but it faded sadly. As for the other nominees, Diane Lane was both erotic and vulnerable as a woman who has an affair for no reason in Unfaithful, but the film was lukewarm with critics and recieved no other nominations. And Salma Hayek (whose performance I haven't seen) had be content with a nomination and had no shot at a victory. So, do you think that Nicole Kidman still deserved her oscar over Hayek, Lane, Moore, and Zellweger?

2 comments:

Andrew K. said...

Yes. Nicole deserved her Oscar. And thank you for asking so politely!

joe burns said...

Thanks for your comments!