Oscar Got It Wrong!: Best Actress 1989

The Contenders:

Isabelle Adjani: Camille Claudel
Jessica Tandy: Driving Miss Daisy (winner)
Michelle Pfeiffer: The Fabulous Baker Boys
Jessica Lange: Music Box
Pauline Collins: Shirley Valentine

Mid-Life Crisis

Film: Shirley Valentine
Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on The Nook.

There are a number of movies on NetFlix that are available streaming but not as discs. That means that getting this movies watched is at a premium for me; there have been a few that have moved from “available on streaming” to “shit, now where do I find it?” status for me. Shirley Valentine is one of those films. So, just to make sure that it doesn’t happen here, I watched Shirley Valentine today, not expecting much but a check in another box and one more movie off the list.

Imagine my surprise when Shirley Valentine turned out to be one of my favorite new-to-me movies of this month. This is a movie about a middle-aged Liverpudlian woman having a spiritual rebirth and discovering who she really is. It sounds incredibly dreary and dreadful, but it’s actually quite good. Not the least of the reasons for this are the engaging screenplay (based of a one-woman play by Willy Russell) and the truly masterful performance by Pauline Collins.