Oscar Got It Wrong!: Best Actor 1987

The Contenders:

William Hurt: Broadcast News
Marcello Mastroianni: Dark Eyes
Robin Williams: Good Morning, Vietnam
Jack Nicholson: Ironweed
Michael Douglas: Wall Street (winner)

Oscar Got It Wrong!: Best Actress 1987

The Contenders:

Sally Kirkland: Anna
Holly Hunter: Broadcast News
Glenn Close: Fatal Attraction
Meryl Streep: Ironweed
Cher: Moonstruck (winner)

Homeward Bound?

Film: Ironweed
Format: DVD from NetFlix on laptop.

I’d love to tell you that Ironweed is a fun-filled romp of joy and happiness, but it is completely the opposite. This is one of those movies I have dubbed a “misery parfait” in the past, a film in which nothing good happens to anyone, and there is little but layers of sadness and misery piled one atop the other. That it stars both Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep only means that the misery we witness is going to be acted about as well as it can be. It’s not going to make it any easier to experience, but it is at least going to be done well.

It’s evident right from the start that we are in for this sort of experience. Francis Phelan (Nicholson) is a bum who has wandered around the country for a few decades. Now, in 1938 around Halloween, he has returned to Albany, NY, his old home town. Over the course of the first act, we learn a few things about Francis. We learn that he was married and had children, but abandoned his family because he dropped his infant son, killing him.