Least Deserving Best Actress Academy Award Winner

Halle Berry.

Julia Roberts by a mile.

How many fucking times are you gonna make the same thread? Again, this is becoming embarrassing

It's a tie between Julia and Jennifer Lawrence.

Since 2000? Probably Bullock, even though I love her. But I like some wins that get a lot of heat here, like Lawrence and Larson.

Ever? Probably Helen Hunt.

Halle Berry followed by Jennifer Lawrence. The former won for a diversity quota and the latter won for sleeping with Weinstein and his cronies.

R5 Grace Kelly was far less deserving than Helen Hunt.

[...]

Julia Roberts was outstanding as Erin Brockovich not that any of you bitches would empathize with a single mother. When she was told she was taking things "too personal" and shrieked "you're damn right I am" I believed it totally.

And now he’s replying to himself. This is so so sad. Wow.

Goldie Hawn - Cactus Flower

Helen Hayes - Airport

Jennifer Lawrence was great in Silver Linings Playbook. She didn’t sleep with Weinstein. He was dropping her name to get into an unknown’s pants.

Julia Roberts.

How many of these had Weistein behind them?

I agree that Streep didn’t deserve the Oscar for Iron Lady but she should have won for The Devil Wears Prada over Helen Mirren for The Queen. Mirren was great, but Streep’s performance was iconic. That movie still plays over and over again on cable, while The Queen is all but forgotten by now.

Grace Kelly for The Country Girl

Elizabeth Taylor for Butterfield 8

[...]

I totally agree with r5. I thought Lawrence and Larson were well deserved. I’ll always think the best in Thai period was Swank. Cate Blanchett is peerless, but I would rather have seen Bullock win for Gravity that year than the Blind Side previously.

Ah yes, the Thai period. What a glorious time for movies that was!

What really shocks me is how few of the movies I’ve seen. I guess I’m just not interested in movies that yield best actress Oscars.

Lady Gaga will be in the list of winners for this decade.

[quote]What the fuck did Emma Stone ever do in her career to earn her trophy for an aggressively forgettable, nothing performance?

I really like Emma and thinks she’d be a deserving winner at some point, but I’m still pissed Amy Adams wasn’t even nominated and didn’t win for Arrival.

Ms. Blanchett, of course. She was phenomenal.

Julia Roberts also deserved her AA. As did Cotillard and Halle Berry.

Halle Berry.

Sandra and Reese both stand out for me as having given performances that didn’t really require them to do a whole lot.

*My response is for recent DESERVING Best Actress Academy Award Winner.

Felicity Huffman deserved the Oscar over Reese that year. Or even Rachel Weisz if she hadn't committed category fraud to win her Oscar in the supporting category.

what a lame ass thread to start

Emma stone

If Gaga gets cast in joker she will win her Oscar

Hillary Swank is a good actress but frankly, if any schlub was asked to play a trans or a female boxer they could have done a decent job of it.

Emma Stone was the only bright spot in that Lala bullshit.

The movie was garbage but she was fabulous. Why does Gosling still have a career?

OP, who do you think should have won the Oscars in each of those years?

R31 Because he's a Ken doll.

Helen Mirren. Judi Dench definitely deserved Best Actress for Notes on a Scandal.

R31 true, but worth an Oscar?

R21, I haven’t thought of Arrival in years, it definitely seems forgotten. I’ll have to find it and rewatch it.

Berry, Streep, Bullock

Nicole Kidman. She was barely in the movie, it was a supporting role, not lead.

[quote]I haven’t thought of Arrival in years, it definitely seems forgotten.

There’s a reason for that.

#overrated

Olivia Coleman.

Streep basically gave a drag performance in The Iron Lady. Unwatchable movie.

Portman was fucking dreadful in Black Swan.

Bullock was great - for a Lifetime movie.

Roberts won for making a lot of money for Hollywood. The performance itself was a big nothingburger.

Stone has an Oscar? Wow.

This thread is repeated all the damn time. Can we just agree that Meryl Streep is THE most overrated and rewarded actress in film history? She's given three very good performances in 45 years. The rest of her work is worthy of either tiny claps, huge eyerolls or guffaws.

So don't pick on Julia or Halle or Emma Stone. They deserve their Oscars.

all the ones M got

I've never bought into the belief that just because someone has been in the industry a long time, they deserve to be rewarded. Julia Roberts is the prime example of this, but frankly it's usually the male counterparts who have been given this leeway more often. Brad Pitt, Leonardo diCaprio, and now most infamously Will Smith all won not based on talent but on name alone.

Julia won for best performance by a push-up bra. She was not more than adequate in the role.

I don't begrudge Julia that Oscar...it's her "Mildred Pierce" role. Big, showy and award bait. She's hammy as hell but at least the performance has energy.

TBH, I haven't seen most of these. I gave up on "prestige" movie watching 15 years ago.

I haven't seen Monster's Ball (just clips) but I find it hard to believe that Halle Berry was really that brilliant since she's been awful in everything else I've ever seen her in.

Mirren was ok in The Queen...I like Mirren, a lot, but that movie is a bit of a snooze.

I also liked Colman in The Favourite but...it's not really a lead. I'd argue that Rachel Weisz's character was the actual main role.

Theron was great in Monster but I really hate it when pretty actors ugly up in order to win awards.

As Angela Bassett said, Halle's performance in Monster's Ball was just her flashing her tits.

[quote]I've never bought into the belief that just because someone has been in the industry a long time, they deserve to be rewarded. Julia Roberts is the prime example of this....

Julia Roberts was 33 years old when she won the Academy Award. It was not some pity lifetime achievement prize. She also won the Golden Globe, BAFTA Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award for the same performance.

Julianne Moore 'won' a you've been nominated a lot pity Oscar for "We all Forgot Alice." Arguably her worst film and her most paint by numbers performance. Yikes bad.

Emma Stone was wonderful in LALA LAND!!!

Charlize was great in Monster, but she was a total asshole in all her acceptance speeches. Theron knows what it's like being a murderer all too well - so she never once mentioned Aileen Wuornos.

[quote] Theron knows what it's like being a murderer all too well

What is this a reference to? Her South African heritage?

Do you just hate women OP you’ve named almost female every Oscar winner as least deserving.

I don't think OP's post was about saying all those actresses were undeserving. OP was listing out all the actresses from the last two decades for us to discuss (any performance from the 2000s onwards).

No R50. Theron is Lana Turner's daughter. She killed her own abusive father and her mother took the fall.

Stone was better in "Birdman" in a supporting role; I preferred that to her in "La La Land". Olivia Colman's role was really supporting. The two ladies trying to win her favour had bigger roles and more screen time.

Helen Hunt won? Almost like Will Smith won?

Helen Hunt won because she was the only American actress nominated in a year where the other four nominees were all British.

R52. It’s anyone’s guess since he was not all that clear.

Julia's Oscar should have Ellen Burstyn's name on it. She won many other best actress awards for Requiem for a Dream. I recall walking out of the theater after watching it and my friends and I were all stunned by her performance.

Portman did everything that was required of her for Black Swan but her performance winning Best Actress and that film winning Best Picture was a joke.

R58 Black Swan didn't win Best Picture. It was just nominated.

R58, Black Swan didn't win Best Picture. Jeez.

Black Swan would’ve been a better winner than what did win that year, though.

Black Swan was a steaming pile of dog shit. OMFG I hated that movie so much!

It was a very physical performance and I can admire it but Jennifer Lawrence was miles more truthful and better in Winter's Bone.

R19, Ellen Burstyn has always been the alternative people choose as the actress who should have beaten Julia, but I I have a suspicion that people might not be as enthusiastic about Requiem for a Dream as much as they were when it was released. It is by Aronofsky, the same guy who did Black Swan and mother!, and it’s not like it doesn’t share those movies’ excesses. The game show stuff, the “ass to ass” scene, everything with Jared Leto.

It’s one of those movies I haven’t really revisited, partially because it’s such a tough movie to watch, partially because I suspect it might not hold up. What was shocking and harrowing in 2000 might seem campy and laughable two decades later.

Sorry, I meant R57. I have no idea how I ended up with R19, so let’s blame it on hallucinations brought on by diet pills.

Burstyn was genuinely amazing in a movie I suspect R64 may be right about. I haven't seen it in 2-3 years. But no one no how was ever gonna beat Julia that year. Hollywood wanted to honor her and that movie seemed hand picked to do it.

Emma Stone basically won an Oscar for playing herself. Isabelle Huppert should have won that year

Rene's Madame Tussauds type replication of Judy Garland in the downer movie 'JUDY'.. And the vocal replication was all thanks to auto-tune.

I thought the same as R51, then I realised it was what R52 said, then I said to myself, "THIS should have been a fucking POLL, only to realise OP is a troll.

There is no objective measure of talent, OP, so this thread is useless. They all deserved to win.

R64, your comment is ridiculous. Try actually watching the movie again, rather than spouting nonsense. Burstyn's performance holds up, so do those of Connelly and Leto. Burstyn can do little wrong on screen.

Jennifer Connelly was devastating. Her Oscar is in part for this performance.

Zellweger did no replication of Garland's voice, R68. She did her own kind of thing even if it was without much interest. But she worked hard to increase her resonance and stamina and to realize vowel sounds that would better approximate Garland's phrasing. Renee does not sound like Judy Garland - but she sang BETTER than her at that time in Garland's life. RZ has sung in films before and she is competent. For years she was signed to play Janis Joplin. Autotune is a very recognizable feature and it was used not at all in JUDY. Renee sang live. Zellweger sang all of Roxie Hart in Chicago as well. Listen to Uzo Aduba sing. She is amazing. Or Kate Winslet. Many actresses can really sing. (NOT meryl)

Michael Buble now uses pro tools and autotune on all his recordings as does Ariana Grande. Neither need it. They are both beautifully adept vocalists. But you can't sell a popular recording without it.

Renee Zellweger is honestly one of those actors you wouldn't know can actually also sing and dance. Amy Adams too. She has a very strong voice.

R69 There have been polls in the past for each decade of Best Actress winners, which works out perfectly since you can only fit 10 choices in each poll. I don't think there was ever one for Best Actress of the 2010s though.

Nicole Kidman's replication of Lucille Ball's voice in Being the Ricardo's was done with 'help' as well. Or to put it another way you won't be hearing her doing that imitation on talk shows. Nor will Rene' being appearing in supper clubs singing like Garland.

I was robbed.

Lawrence stole your Oscar for a performance she gave a year before. She did nothing but suck off the Weinstein Co in SLP.

With a small number of exceptions (Blanchett, Moore, Roberts, Swank, Colman, Stone, McDormand - in the shitting in the bucket film & Mirren) this is very sorry list of winners.

Halle Berry She wasn't just un-great. She is awful in all her movies. ALL. Remember her trying to cry for her role in Monster's Ball? It was like watching a little kid work up fake tears to get out of trouble. Awful. Getting naked and playing a bitch took some guts, yes. I have to give her that. She was brave to take that bad mom role and all the graphic full nudity with a male actor.

That's the thing. I was forgetting again, but I realized it a few years ago. Sometimes, the Oscar goes to the brave ones, not the best performance.

Roberts deserved her Oscar. Maybe not at the expense of Burstyn. But Hollywood had to honor her. She actually should've won AOC. Or Closer in supporting.

Pretty Woman opened one week too late for Julia to have won for Steel Magnolias. She was the co favorite after the Golden Globe win.

Reese Witherspoon- I didn't feel anything for her, she didn't seem real.

Mirren's performance was good for a TV movie which is what "The Queen" was originally produced as, but it's what any of a dozen British actresses would have done with the role.

Dench or Streep would have been far more deserving winners that year. Mirren is a good actress but the Academy has always had a hard on for anyone with a posh British accent and not to mention Lillibet herself. Mirren could have stunk up the joint in the role and they would still have raved about her and given her every award.

At least she wasn't as awful as Streep playing Bitch Cunt Thatcher....

Is it the same person saying Emma Stone deserved an Oscar? WTF she was one of the worst winners.

Emma is easily the worst of that list. That movie is terrible and does not hold up.

Whoopi Goldberg should've won for The Color Purple.

Sandra Bullock was the least deserving of anyone on that list. I bet Sandy herself would say so. Yes, she kind of deserved it for Gravity in any other year, but for me personally, Cate Blanchett gave the Best Actress performance of the decade in Jasmine.

Least Deserving of all time? It might be Luise Rainer for The Great Ziegfeld, second only to Luise Rainer in the Good Earth. Her performances in both were neither great nor good.

Jennifer Lawrence, bad casting she was too young for the part.

R88 Harvey & David O. Russell beg to differ.

[Quote]Reese Witherspoon- I didn't feel anything for her, she didn't seem real.

Is Jake posting here now?

Only a yank would ever criticise Marion Cotillard or La Vie en Rose. B....b...b......but it has subtitles and no one over here has ever heard of Edith Piaf. She's no Lucy Ball that's for sure.

White girl/faux Negro Halle Berry owns this thread. THE END

r44 M only got 2

[quote]Cate Blanchett gave the Best Actress performance of the decade in Jasmine.

LOL, she was making faces, which is not acting.

Sally Field's "You like me" is usually held up as the paragon of Oscar acceptance speech cringe, but it has absolutely nothing on Helen Mirren holding up her Oscar while proclaiming, "Ladies and gentlemen, the Queen!"

Least deserving of all time is Louise Rainer, both times.

Grace Kelly was a fluke, I believe, but her performance is not bad. She's quite good, just not as good as any of the other nominees that year.

Glenda Jackson is a fine actress, but her second Oscar for "Touch of Class" is insane. It's the dullest movie in the world, and her performance is fine, but nothing special.

Grace Kelly only won because she was considered so "brave" for dressing down and not playing a glamorous role...which doesn't mean much since she only made about 12 movies.

On top of that, the Academy has always loved rewarding young ingenues like they did with Judy Holliday a few years before. If you look at the Best Actress race, there have been plenty of actresses in their early 20s who have won but it's much harder to win the older you get (looking at you Glenn). That's a marked contrast from the Best Actor race where the youngest recipient is 29 and it's more common to be able to win an Oscar even as you age.

Just like with Bette Davis and Gloria Swanson, the Academy was loathe to award Judy for all her antics over the years and basic lack of goodwill. Grace was the new young thing and they wanted to promote her career the way they did with Judy Holliday. She won because of studio politics alone, not because of any real talent or bravery.

Luise Rainer had the support of Thalberg as long as he was alive. It's no coincidence that with his death, Luise left MGM. Her phone call scene is generally considered to be what won her the Oscar for The Great Ziegfeld despite the fact that in about a 3 hour movie, she doesn't have much screentime and is more of a supporting character.

I haven't seen The Good Earth, and the movie isn't well known compared to Stella Dallas or Camille, but I've heard people who've actually watched it that Luise is amazing.

Reese Witherspoon. THERE WAS NOTHING THERE.... Lost on that one. My next pick would sadly be Emma Stone... Hated that film and she was overrated as well..

I despise Berry, Roberts, Lawrence as people... but I cannot say their awards were underserved (even if Burstyn should have won)

Reese wins for a bullshit performance and for just being such a fake bitch. Do you know who I am? Well your about to!

And the worst film of all the nominees was by far , Still Alice. That movie was atrocious.

But Reese by a mile.

gwyneth paltrow

R99, does anyone even remember Walk the Line? Such a forgettable movie. Johnny Cash deserve a better movie.

Joaquin was worse than Reese. She was unmemorable but he was just terrible. He really miscalculated his performance.

R101- Absolutely. This was Johnny Cash.

I found the film and Reese like a high school play.

I did not hate Joaquin though.

I really liked Reese in Walk the Line. She sang well, had great chemistry with Phoenix and was the emotional center of the film. Her “this is your chance” monologue deserved a nomination all by itself.

Besides Bette Davis in "All About Eve" (and to a lesser extent Anne Baxter -- who I think others should see through her charade as well as Thelma Ritter's Birdie does early on), plus Gloria Swanson in "Sunset Blvd" and the rather criminally underrated Eleanor Parker in "Caged", Judy Holliday's performance in "Born Yesterday" is probably the most sustained hilarious Best Actress comedic performance in Academy history. She's touching as well as funny, and while such a high standard of actresses were nominated that year, the naysayers to her getting the award just still point out how doing a great comedic performance is underrated.

I'm not a fan of Reese W, but she was good in Walk the Line, she was actually the best thing of the movie. I agree that Joaquin Phoenix miscalculated his performance, he's usually excellent though, but his Johnny Cash was a misfire.

On top of everything else, biopic a feeble genre of film.

Emma Stone was the weakest of the listed performances I've seen, but I can't really say that any of her competitors did a better job that year. I'd have taken any of the main actress' performances in Hidden Figures over the whole Best Actress field if they'd been eligible for the category.

I suspect that Jennifer Lawrence in Silver Linings Playbook was far less deserving, however. She's been awful in every film I've seen her in.

r9 cher-lite

[quote]I haven't seen The Good Earth, and the movie isn't well known compared to Stella Dallas or Camille, but I've heard people who've actually watched it that Luise is amazing.

I have actually watched it, and she is not amazing.

Charlize Theron - Monster

Are you INSANE? This is one of the best female performances that I've seen.

R111, I think OP was merely listing all the winners since 2000 as a list from which to choose the least deserving.

Jean Smart's version of Monster was first and better than Charlize's.

Stop trampling Luise Rainer's O-Lan! She looks so different than she did in "The Great Ziegfeld" the year before though. I think she's perfectly fine, but they should have given the "Good Earth" role to Anna May Wong.

From Best to Worst IMO:

1. Blanchett 2. Colman 3. McDormand (3BB) 4. Theron 5. Roberts

6. Cotillard 7. Moore 8. McDormand (Nomadland) 9. Portman 10. Kidman

11. Chastain 12. Stone 13. Mirren. 14. Zellweger 15. Bullock

16. Berry 17. Witherspoon 18. Winslet 19. Lawrence 20. Larson

21. Streep

22. Swank

I said this at the time she was nominated. Now years have passed, and I still believe it to be true:

Wasn't Olivia Colman supporting? I saw the movie and I just didn't get it. Emma Stone was the lead. The movie was called The Favourite. Emma Stone WAS the title character, she had the most screen time, and she was also the bigger of the three stars as she had just won her Oscar the year before. I would say Rachel Weisz was co-lead, and Colman supporting.

Am I nuts?

R116, no, you're not nuts. I think all three were leads, though. But, the studio had to make choices and be strategic. They couldn't all go lead. And because the story was about the characters of Weisz and Stone battling over the affections of Colman and her lording over the two of them, I think the justification there was that Colman was at the centre of it all. Kind of like (but not really) Kidman in The Hours. Kidman had the least screen-time, but the movie revolved around Virginia Woolf (she figures into all three stories), etc (even though all three primary females were leads).

It makes me wonder what a studio would do to Thelma & Louise today. I imagine they would have altered the script some and set the movie to be clearly told through Thelma's eyes, since she was the one with the biggest arc (kind of like Chicago). That way, come campaign-time, they'd know how they'd split the actresses up by categories.

[...]

Kidman wouldn't have won without that fake nose. She shouldn't have won in any case. She's given more better performances.

R119 She won to make up for losing for Moulin Rouge the year before.

Kidman was fascinating in The Hours. It's a performance of great subtlety and emotional highs and lows. It's unsurprising that some DLers can't realize it.

Jennifer Jones in The Song of Bernadette!

I mean, I know it was 1944 and the darkest year of WWII, but still.......

Thread closed.

[quote]She won to make up for losing for Moulin Rouge the year before.

LOL! Um, no.

Halle Berry deserved her Affirmative Action Academy Award for African American Actors, sponsored by Alcoholics Anonymous and AAA.

Somebody had that thought, found it funny, and posted it on DL.

R124 Berry is a faux Negro. She was the wrong race to get a pity Oscar for the blacks. Viola Davis might be an insufferable cunt but nobody can deny she really is black.

Couldn’t care less.

R6 that's your fucking discriminatory perspective. I said what I said. There are far less deserving Oscars than Halle Berry's, so get off her pussy. There may have been a quota, according to you, but it forced people like you to look beyond their initial biases and vote for someone who was not a Bette Davis or Jane Fonda clone

Julia Roberts fucking stole Ellen Burstyn’s Oscar for Requiem for a Dream.

I think this is the scene that won Theron her Oscar. I saw this in the theater and when she nods as if to say it’s OK, I forgive you, I burst into tears.

R9 nobody cares about your frau cunt take on life.

R131 Thank god white frau cunts are getting huge hate from everyone right now. Gay men especially loathe these fucking cunts.

R117 the way Olivia Colman tells it, the studio let the actresses decide the categories everyone would be submitted in. Weisz and Stone decided together to go supporting and give center stage to Colman.

Julia Roberts - Erin Brockovich

Halle Berry - Monster's Ball

Nicole Kidman - The Hours

Charlize Theron - Monster

Reese Witherspoon - Walk The Line

Sandra Bullock - The Blind Side

Natalie Portman - Black Swan

Meryl Streep - The Iron Lady

Jennifer Lawrence - Silver Linings Playbook

Cate Blanchett (watch your step!) - Blue Jasmine

Julianne Moore - Still Alice

Brie Larson - Room

Emma Stone - La La Land

Frances McDormand - Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Renee Zellwegger - Judy

Frances McDormand - Nomadland

Jessica Chastain - The Eyes of Tammy Faye

R58, I felt that Mila Kunis outshined Portman in Black Swan. I do like Portman though.

R74 here is the poll we did of the Best Oscar winners of the 2010s

R136 Thank you, I'm glad JLaw was dead last.

R116, I can’t believe you listed Swank as the worst! That was my number 1 choice for this list. I don’t buy that any actress could have done what she did. That scene in the diner over pie? That would have been a maudlin mess in anyone else’s hands.

When I read that she was paying a boxer in a movie called “Million Dollar Baby” my eyes rolled so far back in my head I thought they may never get unstuck. Stupid title, skinny actress playing a pro boxer? No way! But she was simply amazing.

R138 No she was not, ya muff diving lezzie.

[quote][R138] No she was not, ya muff diving lezzie.

Hey now! I’m cock worshipping cumslut! Those are my pronouns and I ask that you please respect them!

Swank was great but she should have been beaten by Bening or Winslet, to even things out.

Fuck YOU, Leslie!

R141, the Oscars do not exist to "even things out" unless a person of color is involved.

What a silly notion! I could slap you!

R144 you're a piece of shit. In your eyes a non-white person will only win because the Academy is trying to "even things out", not because of their impressive work. Your fucking racism will prevent you from seeing anything as such. Such a pathetic, hateful old queen you must be.

Elizabeth Taylor- "Butterfield 8". She won because of a tracheotomy.