Barbara Hershey in THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY (1996) - Supporting Actress Sundays

At long last, the final entry for the Suppporting Actresses of 1996. And, yes, StinkyLulu's well aware that today's not Sunday. But it's almost the same thing. (See, in one of his earliest comments on StinkyLulu's Supporting Actress Sundays project, Nick likened the Sunday morning entries to a kind of worship, church-going for the movie enthralled...Amen. Truer words ha' ne'er been spoke. And it only follows that, since true evangelicals tend to also get serviced on Wednesday as well, Wednesday's almost the same as Sunday...)

But, really, who needs an excuse to exult in the divine radiance of...

...Barbara Hershey in The Portrait of a Lady.

Jane Campion's brooding adaptation of the beloved Henry James novel is an admirably bold venture. Discerning critics have observed that Campion's directorial take is almost a "reading of" the James original, more than a straight-up adaptation, & that seems to describe just how Campion-ish this film is. It's got all the hallmarks of Campion's idiosyncratic genius: a melancholy, at once lugubrious and exultant; a visual acuity of uncommon intelligence (at least in popular film); unparalleled investment in cinematically exploring the complicated lives, desires and experiences of women; a thematic fearlessness; and -- StinkyLulu's favorite -- a genius for casting. (Shelley Duvall and John Malkovich as siblings? Viggo Mortenson as a character named Caspar Goodwood? Nicole Kidman in a mercenary marriage to a controlling man of intense but limited charisma, the marriage itself in service to a crackpot aesthetic/spiritual ideal?)
Genius.

And perhaps the most satisfying stroke of Campion's genius for casting can be seen in Barbara Hershey's resplendent, luxurious, malevolent, desperate performance as Madame Merle.

Campion's film explores the terrifying erotics of intimacy -- not just sexuality, mind you, but the thrill of knowing another and the terror of being known... And so far as such things go, Barbara Hershey's Madame Merle is a worldly woman. Her first glance to Kidman's Isabel so envelops the younger woman with the promise of such knowing that Isabel's fluttering excitement is nearly palpable. Of course, as Campion reveals the soul-buckling power of Gilbert Osmond's (Malkovich) delicate tyranny, Hershey's Madame Merle also embodies the ravages of that heady intimacy, a barely living example of its potential toxicity. And through it all, it's Hershey's voice -- not her exceptional beauty -- that captivates. Hershey's vocality is like few others in American film: a textured womanly sound, breathy yet full, with little frippery or actressy tricks. And it's with this voice that Hershey breaks StinkyLulu's heart in The Portrait of a Lady.

It's one very simple scene that gets Lulu good: A chance encounter between Merle and Isabel, not long after Isabel has been told of the depth of Merle's deception. Isabel turns her back to Merle. Merle, the exhausted but expert social strategist, fills the heavy air with social banalities when -- all at once -- her breath seems to be forcibly sucked from her belly as she realizes that Isabel knows. Her voice strangles itself as she gasps for the words to complete her sentence and, as the camera leaves her, she struggles to remain standing.

"You not only dried up my tears. You've dried up my soul."

Hershey's is an extraordinary performance -- a magnetic menace for the ages -- because the actress invests an exceptional humanity into this damaged, beautiful villain (an investment supported at every turn by Campion's singular form). Truly great work from an almost iconoclastic actress. Indeed, the kind of work the category's made for...

Even more, Hershey's Madame Merle is perhaps StinkyLulu's ideal kind of Supporting Actress role: a fully actualized character who serves the narrative in instrumental but unqualifiedly secondary ways. Unlike other 1996 nominees (Binoche & Jean-Baptiste), there's never a thought that A Portrait of a Lady's gonna turn out to really be about Hershey's character. Nonetheless, her work is so fully realized that it permits the giddy fantasy that Barbara Hershey's Madame Merle could be the star of some other, imaginary, possibly more thrilling movie -- if only the camera would just follow her instead of Nicole/Isabel.

Two tickets for Madame Merle - The Untold Story, please...

Just a day or so before the Supporting Actress roster for July is announced!
It's turning out to be quite the horse race, so be sure to...

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(for July's Supporting Actress Sundays)

Supporting Actress Smackdown - 1996

The Year is 1996...
And the Supporting Actress Smackdowners for June are NICK of Nick's Pick Flicks and TIM of mainly movies. To acquaint yourself with the nominations for 1996, StinkyLulu's worked up the animated flimlet below in homage to 1996's Supporting Performances (an admittedly pale proxy for Nathaniel's already legendary clipreels).

For best results, let the entire video load (press pause or sumpin') before viewing...

And 1996's Supporting Actresses are...
(An aside about format: Each Smackdowner's comments are listed in ascending levels of love. A summary comment from each Smackdowner arrives at the end. Click on the nominee's name/film to see StinkyLulu's Supporting Actress Sunday review.)

Joan Allen in The Crucible
StinkyLulu Sez
"There's so much to admire here. Allen's characteristically strong in Oscar's favorite kind of role (devoted helpmeet). Yet it's strange that there's so little left to love... A much-warranted nomination but not too too interesting a performance."
Tim Sez
"It's a mark of the film's failings that Elizabeth Proctor's even considered a supporting role; thank goodness Allen's here to dignify it so impeccably, bringing a fierce and harrowed conviction to her two crucial scenes."
Nick Sez
"Allen's combination of steeliness, reticence, and luminescence both anchors and elevates this weirdly undisciplined film. Her attentive, generous responses enable Day-Lewis' equally impassioned performance, but she also fashions a stalwart, subtly devastated woman of her own."

Lauren Bacall in The Mirror Has Two Faces
Nick Sez
"Give me a damn break. Bacall was inexplicably overrated for her entire career, though never by Oscar, 'til 1996. Her just desserts were to be nominated, sentimentally, for a mechanic performance in a lame part, and then, mercifully, to lose."
StinkyLulu Sez
"It's not that Bacall's awful. It's just that the performance coasts on Bacall's charisma and persona, inadvertently highlighting the limitations of both."
Tim Sez
"Imperious hauteur is basically what's asked of Bacall in The Mirror Has Two Faces, along with a past-it flirtiness and one tiny moment of introspection. She ticks all the boxes but they're not challenging ones, and if ever a nomination screamed 'Sorry!', this one does."

Juliette Binoche in The English Patient
StinkyLulu Sez
"Binoche displays her actorly intelligence astutely here, anchoring the film's epic sentiment & romantic grandiosity within an emotionally plausible reality. Yet, while her performance is the vehicle for The English Patient's emotional impact, the particulars of her Hana tend to get lost amidst the film's overwrought imagery."
Nick Sez
"As usual with Binoche, her talents are largely limited to beatific close-ups and limpid outpouring of sympathetic emotion. She achieves both of these gloriously, in a part tailor-made for her, but she's just not as crafty as her competition."
Tim Sez
"A lovely lissom perf in an essentially reactive part. Binoche's face is a sounding-board for the movie's tones -- anxious, enchanted, desperately moved -- and she's never seemed looser or more versatile. I still think the character's a little wispy, though."

Barbara Hershey in The Portrait of a Lady
StinkyLulu Sez
"A resplendent, luxurious performance -- Hershey's Madame Merle's a magnetic menace for the ages, voracious and vulnerable, bedazzled but bereft...yet always palpably human."
Nick Sez
"So often a godsend to nervy directors trying to cast difficult parts, Hershey plumbs deeply and yields both the naked, highly wrought emotional states that are Campion's expertise and the opaque mysteries required by James. A master class."
Tim Sez
"Before our eyes, Hershey simultaneously ties up and untangles the knot of bitter contradictions in Madame Merle, who is both benefactress and sadist, friend and foe. Letting us into a lifetime's terrible regrets, she becomes one of the saddest villains in movies."

Marianne Jean-Baptiste in Secrets and Lies
Tim Sez
"Smashing, vicacious work in what could have been a thin, functional role. I love how set Hortense is: she's one of the few Leigh characters who isn't just the sum of her bundled tics and problems, and Jean-Baptiste crafts her with equally rare tact."
Nick Sez
"Jean-Baptiste is most instrumental to the beginnings of this story, consummately etching out her character before receding to her third-act positioning as the watchful, uncomfortable bystander. It remains a pitch-perfect performance, but less key to the film."
StinkyLulu Sez
"Hortense is possibly the hardest of parts to play: an intrinsically decent person. Jean-Baptiste maneuvers the pitfalls of cliche to craft one of the most honestly human 'good guys' in cinema, who -- by the by -- instigates an entire family's redemption. A marvel of muted hope & true feeling."

Oscar awarded Juliette Binoche...

But the SMACKDOWN gives it to:
Barbara Hershey!
Oh don't be so surly, Babs. The Smackdowners love you...

And now some "Final Thoughts" from our intrepid SMACKDOWNERS:

StinkyLulu Sez: "It's almost another theme year in the Supporting Actress category: Still Waters Running Deep, Suddenly Rerouted. Each of the Supporting Actress characters is sublimely competent at being who they've always been yet the story presents them with a daunting challenge -- one that both reveals more of themselves to themselves while also threatening to break them to bits. It's -- almost to a one -- a thrilling set of journeys to watch. And while Allen and Binoche anchor their films' respective emotional orbits, and while Hershey's unmooring is both captivating and thrilling, it's Marianne Jean-Baptiste that routes the most profound, uncharted emotional journey. Hers is a marvel of a performance..."

Tim Sez: "A banner year, clearly, as AMPAS recognised by denying Bacall her predicted honourary win. There was too much competition: Hershey's my pick, because the conception of the character, the way she inhabits it, and the way they both fit Campion's dramatic scheme take the breath away. But you can hardly begrudge Binoche, who won for her tremulous way of listening and making a complex narrative emotionally understood. In another year, Allen or Jean-Baptiste might have deservedly taken it for being the best things their movies have to offer, and even Bacall is far from the least enjoyable fifth wheel you could ask for. For such a young vintage, this category's not just instantly impressive; it's aging beautifully too."

Nick Sez: "Bacall notwithstanding, this field remains one of the most substantial and discerning in the category's recent history. Allen, Hershey, and Jean-Baptiste are all so good that I would have loved a three-way tie; I tend to be most impressed with whomever's performance I have seen most recently. Elizabeth Proctor's doomed appearance before the kangaroo court and Madame Merle's confession and near-disintegration in the rain are pivotal, electrifying scenes for two characters who have lurked on the sidelines up to those points, and both actresses summon deep wells of feeling into their movies without simply hijacking them or overplaying their big moments. Hershey, perhaps, has the greatest distances to travel within her characterization, and the fewest connecting scenes in which to lay all the groundwork, so I suppose in those ways her performance strikes me as the most remarkable. (Slam that door, girl! Tell Osmond what's what! Realize what vipers you both are!) But truly, I'd have been ecstatic with any of these three as a victor—and frankly, as winners go, even the lovely but more predictable Binoche is fully acceptable."

So, lovely reader, tell the Smackdowners what YOU think! Join the dialogue in comments. And -- while you're at it -- be sure to...

VOTE HERE - VOTE NOW
(for July's Supporting Actress Sundays)

And if you would like to join the fun/insanity/obsessiveness of a future smack down, just email StinkyLulu...

Marianne Jean-Baptiste in SECRETS AND LIES (1996) - Supporting Actress Sundays

It may come as a shock to some of you, lovely readers, but Secrets and Lies is the single film from the 1996 roster that StinkyLulu saw in its original release. (See, sometimes the googaplex just becomes a bit much & -- it comes in cycles -- but StinkyLulu just falls out of the habit of the cinema. Never out of the habit movie-watching, mind you, just cinema-going.)

But 'twas certainly a treat to revisit...

...Marianne Jean-Baptiste in Secrets and Lies.

Mike Leigh's film is astonishingly simple, detailing the damage done by "secrets and lies" in an (surprisingly) extended English family. Yet within Leigh's cinematic universe, the slings and arrows suffered by these utterly typical people becomes the stuff of uncommon profundity. Petty cruelties of daily life. Desparate estrangements in the most intimate relationships. Devastating heartbreak echoing in idle patter. Why can't these characters just connect? Just say what's so clearly in the sound of their voice, the flicker of their face, the pain of their silence... The unspoken injuries accumulate into such a constellation of tension that -- for the audience -- the first 2/3 of the film becomes an unremitting experience of frustrated empathy. But that's part of Leigh's art. When the relief comes -- & it does, thank heavens -- boy howdy does it make some good movie watching... And the instrumental force in the effectiveness of this film comes from Marianne Jean-Baptiste's performance as Hortense.

Upon the death of her adoptive parents -- compelled for reasons that seem uncertain even to her -- Hortense finds and makes a palpable connection with Cynthia (Brenda Blethyn in an Oscar-winning performance). That Cynthia's white, while Hortense is black, diminishes in import as the two women encounter starker differences on their way to each other. Hortense embodies genuine competence and sufficiency, emotionally guarded but entirely alive. Meanwhile, Cynthia's a blithering mess of unwelcomed love, loathed by the daughter she raised and pitied/feared by the brother she adores. Hortense speaks carefully; Cynthia's every utterance is a gory shriek of need. Both women, however, are lonely in ways almost emotionally apocalyptic & their discovery of each other becomes an unqualified -- if complicated -- blessing.

Marianne Jean-Baptiste plays Hortense as a young woman of uncommon clarity and integrity who knows enough about disappointment to keep her expectations muted. (And as the only principal black character, Hortense could lapse into the easy righteousness, banal nobility, or soulful inspiration so typical of "the magical negro" school.) But the grace of Marianne Jean-Baptiste's performance comes in the way she plays Hortense's "patience" (a trait that is both tested & displayed throughout the film). As but one example: when a chattery social worker fluffs the air with therapeutic homilies & then unceremoniously dumps into Hortense's lap the overstuffed file containing her pre-adoptive life, Jean-Baptiste -- nearly wordlessly -- conveys the entire experience (the fear, the hope, the fury, the agony, the sadness, the giddiness, etc etc) in half-smiles and indirect glances. The character's a tough one to play & Marianne Jean-Baptiste makes it seem like she's not acting at all...

An effective and affecting performance sublimely worth the re-visit...

Be sure to tune in shortly for the
1996 Supporting Actress Smackdown!
(Should be up not much later than noon eastern.)

In the meantime...

VOTE HERE - VOTE NOW
(for July's Supporting Actress Sundays)

Joan Allen in THE CRUCIBLE (1996) - Supporting Actress Sundays

StinkyLulu confesses to being more than a little shocked to discover just how contemporary The Crucible would feel in 2006, more than fifty years after its original theatrical staging and ten years since its first major Hollywood production. Yet, Arthur Miller's social allegory of American political hysteria/hypocrisy retains a shockingly contemporary relevance. With lines like "You are either with this court or you are against it"... With dramatic sequences in which a presiding judge finagles legal rules of evidence and testimony because of the extraordinary nature of the "threat to this court"... Suffice it, in 2006, The Crucible ain't just about McCarthyism anymore...

Indeed, for the purposes of Supporting Actress Sundays, it's all about...

...Joan Allen as Elizabeth Proctor in The Crucible (1996).

Arthur Miller structures the world of The Crucible -- both in his 1952 stage play and his 1996 screenplay -- fairly simply. Colonial Salem becomes -- by brute force of accusation -- a community cleaved into three groups, hopelessly at odds. As the narrative progresses, these groups form increasingly distinct ensembles: the accusers (the young women & girls enflamed with extraordinary passions), the accused (the mostly mature women accused of witchery and consorting with the devil), & the adjudicators (exclusively male public authorities -- landowners, clergy, lawyers, politicians -- charged with asserting the divine truth). Only John Proctor (Daniel Day-Lewis) really travels among all of these ensembles, and it's the intimate triangle of Abigail Williams (Winona Ryder), John Proctor (Day-Lewis) & Elizabeth Proctor (Allen) that creates the emotional (as opposed to social) dramaturgy of the piece.

Joan Allen as Elizabeth Proctor anchors the most interesting of these three opposed ensembles, the mostly mature actresses offering vivid and precise performances as -- in most cases -- the variously accused. This ensemble includes: Frances Conroy, as the desperation-riven Ann Putnam; Elizabeth Patterson (as Rebecca Nurse) and Mary Pat Gleason as (Martha Corey) who see the madness coming and stand resolute amidst its fury; & the legendary Ruth Maleczech (in a rare screen appearance) as Goody Osbourne, among the first accused and first hanged. (Even Charlayne Woodard contributes a welcome cynicism in the thankless role of Tituba). Among these women, as Goody Proctor, Joan Allen displays the strange accumulation of strengths -- the porcelain façade girded with steely integrity; plausible plainness despite extraordinary beauty; uncorseted contemporary intelligence/humor, even in "period" roles -- that have made her one of Oscar's most reliable contenders (unable to avoid unfortunate pun).

"Suspicion kissed you when I did... It were a cold house I kept."
Perhaps Lulu's most favorite line from an Arthur Miller play

Allen's performance is clearly the stand-out among the principal performances, perhaps also the only one to truly stand up ten years later. It's a curious thing to watch. Reknowned theatre director, Nicholas Hytner -- in this, only his 2nd film -- directs with a garish enthusiasm for wacky camera angles. It's up Winona's nose here, atop Daniel's head there, bitch-smacking Bruce Davison again and again. And then -- screech -- stand-still stop for Paul Scofield's ponderous sublety. It does becomes silly after a time. Yet, through it all, Joan Allen's always doing just fine -- the camera never catches her wrong. She's never doing too much or too little, & her unusual features convey whatever's necessary from whatever angle. From far away, she's heart-stopping; right up close, she's wrenching. And she's never off-pitch in this movie which seems ever in search of its tone. This might possibly be Allen's greatest gift to any project. The rest of the production might just tear away, but somehow Allen's always got her corner of the tent securely grounded.

All that being said, with so much to admire in Joan Allen's work here, it's strange that there's so little left to love. It's characteristically strong work from one of the most reliable actresses of the last two decades in precisely the kind of role (devoted helpmeet) that Oscar tends to notice. (Is that "faint praise"?) So, while much warranted, the nomination remains somehow not too too interesting. Curious, that...

VOTE HERE - VOTE NOW
(for July's Supporting Actress Sundays)

Apologies for any photo-problems. Sunday morning seems to be a tough time for Blogger; it's having "issues" again.

Lauren Bacall in THE MIRROR HAS TWO FACES (1996) -- Supporting Actress Sundays

There's an embarassing story that StinkyLulu must tell (before Criticlasm / Reddish68 tells it on Lulu): At the time of the 1996 Academy Awards, Lulu was stuck in a movie-going lull. Didn't see much, didn't want to see much. And when it came time for the Oscar broadcast, StinkyLulu wore as a badge of pride the fact that Lulu had seen few nominated films. That, of course, did not stop Lulu from having wildly impassioned opinions about who should win. Which -- for Supporting Actress -- StinkyLulu was adamant that Lauren Bacall should win for her work as...

...Hannah Morgan in Barbra Streisand's The Mirror Has Two Faces, this week's featured Supporting Actress Sunday performance.

Lulu hadn't seen the movie, o'course. Just willing to opine promiscuously about it. Indeed, Lulu was "somewhat" livid when that Juliette Bin-who? person snagged the trophy. (As best as Lulu can recall, the line of reasoning was something like -- Bacall's never won, Supporting is as much a cumulative category as a performance-specific category, her many performances trump any individual, blahblahblah, call it the Palance/Ameche effect...)

It's not that Bacall's awful. Not entirely. She might just be the best thing about this movie. But -- like everyone in this misguided, utterly implausible & criminally bland pseudo-Cinderella story -- she's just entirely underwhelming (& completely overshadowed by an impossibly annoying central character).

Bacall plays Hannah Morgan, the imperious former beauty who "has raised two daughters and buried a husband" & who now finds herself (and her life) on a curious holding pattern. Hannah and her elder duckling daughter, Rose (Streisand who also directed who also co-wrote who also...well you get the picture), live in a shockingly well-appointed Upper West Side apartment. There, Hannah simultaneously indulges & antagonizes each of Rose's many neuroses. Superficially, Hannah's an interesting polyglot of several stock characters: NY Jewish Mother + Fading Beauty + Monster Mother... The problem is that neither the film nor Bacall develops Hannah as a multi-faceted being. Bacall's performance becomes an accumulation of (occasionally great) line readings, delivered via that signature ashtray of a voice (& with all the emotional clarity of a FancyFeast commercial). It's "Hannah & Her Three Personalities" rather than a palpably grounded force of misguided maternal nature (ala Gladys Cooper).

Indeed, the performance -- rather than highlighting the unacknowledged genius of Bacall's acting -- underscores how much Bacall coasts on charisma & persona. Most unfortunately, Streisand seems to revel in this aspect of Bacall's acting (in contrast to -- say -- Von Trier, who toys with & sometimes exploits it). It's too bad, really. In the hands of a different director, this might well have been the great performance Lulu (on that high horsey back in '96) imagined it to be. But as it is, even Bacall's nomination becomes an odd miscarriage of Oscar justice, especially considering how rich 1996 was in the way of potential nominees in this category.

Apologies for the photo-problems. Blogger's having "issues" again.
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Juliette Binoche in THE ENGLISH PATIENT (1996) - Supporting Actress Sundays

The first Sunday in June commences a new month of Supporting Actress Sundays, addressing the least "past" year yet: 1996.

And StinkyLulu's opted to start things off with the performance that won the prize:

Best Supporting Actress Juliette Binoche in Best Picture The English Patient (1996)

But first, a question: why was Binoche nominated as Best Supporting Actress while Kristen Scott Thomas (with no more screentime, possibly less) was nominated Best Actress? Because -- make no mistake -- Binoche's performance as French Canadian nurse, Hana -- friend, caregiver & salvation for the crispy critter that is Ralph Fiennes -- provides the soul to this strange & beautiful movie. So. Why -- for a role that provides both the narrative frame and emotional grounding for the film's bloated epochal romance -- did Juliette Binoche get the "JackTwist"? Was it Miramax marketing? Ant-Frenchy sentiment? Whut?

The film begins with Binoche's Hana as an angel in a nurse's habit -- dispensing pain-relieving drugs (and kisses) to wounded soldiers in field hospitals and transport brigades somewhere in Italy at the height of World War II. In quick succession, Hana's boyfriend & her best friend each get killed, leaving Hana with the irrationally sensible belief: "I must be a curse." Hana -- possibly afraid of more loss, possibly just really tired of it all -- decides she's had enough of the hospital transport &, as the primary caregiver for one especially burnt up, anonymous charge (known only as "The English Patient"), determines that it's dangerous & cruel to keep moving him at the whims of war. Binoche's Hana then demands to see her patient to his death in the relative peace of an abandoned monastery in the Italian countryside.

At the monastery, in the movie's most sustaining emotional arc, Hana salves her own as well as her patient's wounds. She cuts her hair. She plants a garden. She wears pretty farm dresses. She starts reading to "The English Patient," in the hopes of stirring his memory. And, as happens when pretty women take up residence in ramshackle Italian buildings, a curious assortment of random guys -- some creepy, some kind -- start hanging around. One of these men -- an Indian/Sikh bomb expert named Kip -- stirs the very feelings & sense of human connection that Hana sought to avoid by holing up. Tentatively, they find their way to each other. And then, in the film's most exultant set-piece, Kip whisks Hana away on his motorbike to do what U.S. audiences have come to expect pretty French Canadian types to do: fly through the air beautifully (via suspension rigging) while performing an elliptical erotic aerial ballet to generically bombastic symphonic accompaniment. (Oh the Zumanity!)

It is sorta wierd (in a meta way) that the actor playing Kip (Lost's Naveen Andrews) started dating Binoche's fellow '96 Supporting Actress nominee, Barbara Hershey, a year or so after the ceremony. Does Naveen Andrews provide a secret link among this month's nominees? Conspiracy theories welcome.

Of course, by discovering love with Kip, Hana also finds herself back on the emotional minefield from which she initially sought escape. (The metaphors in this flick do run a little thick.) But, as luck would have it, this provides Binoche's most heart-crumpling scene. It's a morning after. Kip & Hana have enjoyed an evening of great long-hair sex in a barn. Hardy -- Kip's bombsniffing partner -- pounds on the door. Hana answers. It's urgent. Bomb. Need Kip. Hana steps back inside to get him. When she steps back out, Binoche's face is red, puffy. She beseeches Hardy -- does he have to go? do you need him? Kip assures her: "It's what I do." But Binoche's tantrum continues, her serene nurse face dissembling into that of a terrified child, wheezing, selfish, & pathetic with fear. It's a remarkable moment. For it underscores the actress' deftness in inhabiting this sketchy paragon of a woman. Director Anthony Minghella's expert screenplay gives Hana's exposition in quick, strong swipes & that's it. Binoche steps right in & makes her real. And even as the film tends to revel in the uncommon beauty of Juliette's face, it's Binoche's uncanny actorly intelligence that anchors the film's epic sentiment & romantic grandiosity within an emotionally plausible reality. Her performance makes the film. (And, honestly, Binoche's performance makes the film tolerable. Because, truly, StinkyLulu will crycrycry like a widdle girl at the romance of -- say -- The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants but big 2-vhs historic romantic tragedies like this one just make Lulu wanna hurl Goobers at the screen.) Indeed, Binoche's Hana provides the film's truly redemptive arc: As Hana recuperates her capacity to experience & (most significantly) witness love, she herself lifts the "curse" she believes/fears herself to be. Binoche plays this simply & beautifully, her performance becoming the vehicle for the movie's actual impact.

Which, again, raises the question: how is Binoche's a supporting performance? (And, to be sure, this will come up again in discussion of '96 Nominee Marianne Jean-Baptiste in Secrets & Lies.) It's the one thing about the category that gets Lulu all riled. What makes a supporting performance? (Of course, Lulu really could give a poop about the other characters in this particular film, so it may be sheer bias toward the kind of female characters on the fringe of big movies.) That's an open question, lovely reader. Curious to hear your thoughts.