The 2009 TFO Awards: Acting Awards

Just scroll down to see my picks. I’d update this page per category. 🙂

The categories here are:

Best Actor in a Leading Role

Best Actress in a Leading Role

Best Actor in a Supporting Role

Best Actress in a Supporting Role

Best Ensemble Work

Best Romantic Couple

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Best Actress in a Leading Role

Here are my nominees (click photo to enlarge):

Melanie Laurent – Inglourious Basterds

• Gives the humanity in this gigantic piece of a movie with a picturesque view of a woman’s return for vengeance.
• Best Scene: The dinner with Landa

3rd Place Carey Mulligan – An Education

• Proving that the casting was perfect, Mulligan was able to bring a confident and heartwarming soul in this movie that only a very few young actresses can do.
• Best Scene: Confrontation with the Headmistress

Gabourey Sidibe – Precious

• Provides a wounded woman’s genuinely affecting journey with complete emotional nakedness. She bares it all!
• Best Scene: “Nobody loves me!” scene

2nd Place Meryl Streep – Julie and Julia

• It’s a comedic performance, but she’s not trying to make us laugh. The joy that we have from her is from her naturally vibrant attack in this role. And the technical part is flawless!
• Best Scene: Receiving her first copy of the book

1st Place Tilda Swinton – Julia

• I can’t imagine any actress taking this role. Full of madness and yet, compassion, the role is tricky enough, but Swinton is great enough for me to believe in this doomed woman.
• Best Scene: Her nervous spying at the station

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Runners-up:

Helen Mirren is the ultimate diva in THE LAST STATION | Penelope Cruz proves that she’s a natural in BROKEN EMBRACES | Hilarious as she is, Meryl Streep is also heartwarming in IT’S COMPLICATED | Her movie is joyous, but Michelle Pfeiffer completes CHERI with sensitivity | THE BLIND SIDE isn’t giving her big help, but Sandra Bullock made it watchable and dignified | Emily Blunt maybe subtle to a fault, but she definitely embodies royalty in THE YOUNG VICTORIA | THE LOVELY BONES is over-the-top, but Saoirsie Ronan‘s intense subtlety is completely fit for the character |

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Best Actor in a Leading Role

Here are my nominees (click photo to enlarge):

George Clooney – Up in the Air

• It’s a perfect role for him. He gets to have the slick nature of the character but inside of it is the core of his character: vulnerability.
• Best Scene: His quiet reaction after learning the truth

1st Place Colin Firth – A Single Man

• Every minute of this delicious film will always be owed to this extraordinarily subtle yet intensely affecting performance. Do I need to explain this?
• Best Scene: The phone call. Overflowing sorrow…!

2nd Place Joseph Gordon-Levitt – (500) Days of Summer

• What we can see underneath this hilarious yet tragic story is the undeniable presence of sadness that’s no way two-dimensional.
• Best Scene: Seeing Summer’s engagement ring

Viggo Mortensen – The Road

• His eyes certainly does the most work. He’s cared for his life and for his son, but inside it is the fighting spirit of a man longing for life.
• Best Scene: The shootout, desperation personified

3rd Place Jeremy Renner – The Hurt Locker

• He never bursts into a scene of tears, but the overflowing sensation of hopelessness and adrenaline perfectly combined is amazing to watch.
• Best Scene: Removing the bomb from the kid’s body

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Runners-up:

War is never seen in THE MESSENGER, but the mark in Ben Foster‘s performance is indelible | Michael Fassbender‘s performance in HUNGER is mostly physical, but the emotional side is breathtaking to see | DISTRICT 9 not only gives Sharlto Copley action, but a perfect character to play. And he does it very well | Max Records proves that kids can act and bring natural subtlety in the table with WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE | Maybe I think Jeff Bridges is overrated in CRAZY HEART, but the bruised Bad Blake is a very believable one | Michael Stuhlbarg brings A SERIOUS MAN to a higher level with his seriously comedic performance | You don’t need to be over-the-top for you to have an illness. As Hugh Dancy in ADAM |

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Best Actress in a Supporting Role

Here are my nominees (click photo to enlarge):

2nd Place Marion Cotillard – Nine

• It’s such a thinly written stereotype but you never notice that simply because she adds life and believability in it.
• Best Scene: The screen testing scene

Penelope Cruz – Nine

• Again, it’s a stereotype. But Cruz, with her oozing sexuality and undeniable talent, creates a fascinating victim of circumstances.
• Best Scene: Hotel lobby scene

1st Place Anna Kendrick – Up in the Air

• She’s best in handling the smart and fast line deliveries which completely creates her character. But her quiet moments are also to be witnessed.
• Best Scene: Hotel lobby scene (another breakdown!)

Mimi Kennedy – In the Loop

• Establishes a formidable foundation of humor in the film. Her passive but undeniably authoritative presence is wonderful.
• Best Scene: Meeting scene where her bleeding is nonstop

3rd Place Diane Kruger – Inglourious Basterds

• Kruger’s a natural. Those words only need only one thing to completely work: line delivery. She’s got that.
• Best Scene: Removing the bullet

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Runners-up:

Vera Farmiga may be underwhelming at first, but second watching of UP IN THE AIR reveals the mastery | Monique‘s explosive masterpiece in PRECIOUS may be inconsistent or lacking, but it’s not really her fault | CRAZY HEART isn’t really giving her much of a full character, but Maggie Gyllenhaal makes her Jean Craddock someone I care for | In her brief time in AN EDUCATION, Emma Thompson definitely makes a mark | Simple yet hard-hitting are the words for Samantha Morton in THE MESSENGER | Billie Frenchette in PUBLIC ENEMIES is an incomplete role, but Marion Cotillard is such an expert that she carries some of the best acted scenes of 2009 | Julianne Moore expertly crafts a tragic symbol of divorce, aging, and depression covered in fake joy in A SINGLE MAN|

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Best Actor in a Supporting Role

Here are my nominees (click photo to enlarge):

3rd Place Peter Capaldi – In the Loop

• What’s so surprising is that he’s shouting almost throughout the film, but he never becomes annoying. Talk about expert acting.
• Best Scene: Okay. Who could choose? Maybe his message: “Bye, bye, f***ity bye!”

2nd Place Woody Harrelson – The Messenger

• He’s playing the guy who cannot express what he needs to because of the war. Tough but deeply wounded. That’s what he miraculously does.
• Best Scene: Telling what he needs to do in his job to Ben Foster

Anthony Mackie – The Hurt Locker

• Another tough guy. He never actually bares his vulnerability until his last scene, but it all builds up on it. His final scene was heartbraking.
• Best Scene: As I have said, the last scene 🙂

Peter Sarsgaard – An Education

• Arguably a co-lead, Sarsgaard boasts a tremendous amount of sensitivity and subtlety in his mysterious character.
• Best Scene: Reaction to Jenny’s reaction in the car

1st Place Christoph Waltz – Inglourious Basterds

• He’s a ticking time bomb. He’s exciting to see anytime he’s in, but when he explodes? Oh, he’s the most charming creep in the world. And how thrilling was it to see a very calculated performance!
• Best Scene: Scene at the farm house, trying to manipulate the landowner to murder

Runners-up:

Alfred Molina‘s a bit noisy in AN EDUCATION, but it all leads up to tenderness | Given a very big cast beside him, Michael Fassbender proves that he can stand out in INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS with suave acting | THE LAST STATION somewhat limits what he can do, but Christopher Plummer‘s subtlety is wonderful | In THE LOVELY BONES, all of the over-the-top in that movie is annoying except for Stanley Tucci who was able to bring genuine terror to the house | With two more noticeable men ahead of him, Brian Geraghty adds a lot of power to THE HURT LOCKER’s emotional core | People sometimes imitate icons to irritate me. Not Christian McKay, who was slick in ME AND ORSON WELLES | His role in JULIE AND JULIA is pretty simple, but Stanley Tucci proves that he can do miracles in acting |

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Best Ensemble Work

Here are my nominees (click photo to enlarge):

3rd Place An Education

• Carey Mulligan, Olivia Williams, Alfred Molina, Cara Seymour, Peter Sarsgaard, Dominic Cooper, Rosamund Pike, Emma Thompson, Sally Hawkins, Matthew Beard

The Hurt Locker

• Jeremy Renner, Anthony Mackie, Brian Geraghty, Guy Pearce, Ralph Fiennes, David Morse, Evangeline Lilly Christian Camargo

2nd Place In the Loop

• Peter Capaldi, Gina McKee, Tom Hollander, Chris Addison, Zach Woods, Mimi Kennedy, Anna Chlumsky, James Gandolfini, David Rasche, Paul Higgins, ALex MacQueen, James Smith, Olivia Poulet, Joanna Scanlan, Samantha Harrington, Eve Matheson, Steve Coogan

1st Place Inglourious Basterds

• Brad Pitt, Melanie Laurent, Christoph Waltz, Eli Roth, Michael Fassbender,Diane Kruger, Daniel Bruhl, Til Schweiger, Gedeon Burkhard, Jacky Ido, BJ Novak, Omar Doom, August Diehl, Denis Menochet, Sylvester Groth, Martin Wuttke, Mike Myers, Julie Dreyfus

Nine

• Danie Day-Lewis, Marion Cotillard, Penelope Cruz, Judi Dench, Nicole Kidman, Kate Hudson, Fergie, Sophia Loren, Ricky Tognazzi, Giuseppe Spitaleri

Runners-up:

Precious | Star Trek | The Men Who Stare at Goats | Duplicity | Up in the Air | A Single Man | State of Play |

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Best Romantic Couple

Here are my nominees (click photo to enlarge):

Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel – (500) Days of Summer

Carey Mulligan and Peter Sarsgaard – An Education

Colin Firth and Matthew Goode – A Single Man

George Clooney and Vera Farmiga – Up in the Air

Emily Blunt and Rupert Friend – The Young Victoria

3rd Place: The Young Victoria

2nd Place: A Single Man

1st Place: (500) Days of Summer

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So, what’s left? The picture categories! I might present to you the remaining awards after the OSCARS, as I would be busy predicting the winners. And 2007 is still waiting!