Just the other night Joachim Trier was talking all about Elle, as in Elle Fanning, listed as a first-time Academy Award nominee Thursday for her performance in Trier’s Sentimental Value, a Norwegian family drama of the kind Henrik Ibsen, and even Arthur Miller, would’ve approved. The Neon film garnered nine Oscar nominations overall Thursday including for Best Picture and Best International Feature.
The film’s Renate Reinsve, Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas and Stellan Skarsgård received nominations for Leading Actress, Supporting Actress and Supporting Actor, respectively.
Fanning was the surprise. But not for me.
In the movie, Fanning’s cast as Rachel Kemp, a Hollywood actress that Skarsgård’s filmmaker character, Gustov Borg, brings in to play lead in a movie he’s planning. His actress-daughter Nora (Reinsve) has already declined the part.
Trier remarked to me that he was “curious whether people see how sophisticated and subtle [Fanning] is as Rachel … Remember, Elle has as much experience as an actor in their 40s, I mean she’s been acting since she was a tiny toddler. She was in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button when she was like, 7 years of age, and before that she was in a dozen films. I Am Sam when she was 2! And so she has a knowledge of the craft and the life on set and stuff. I think what was beautiful was that I think she really took a risk with a lot of this and just said, ‘Okay, let’s do this.’ It was super easy to work together. She was extremely open and I’m grateful.”
Oscar nominees Stellan Skarsgård and Elle Fanning in ‘Sentimental Value’
Neon/Everett Collection
During the writing, Trier said, he and screenplay partner Eskil Vogt were careful not to turn Fanning’s Rachel into a caricature of a Hollywood star. ”That would be too silly. We don’t want that. What she’s playing is a human being. The star stuff is pushed aside.”
One of the film’s key emotional punches comes when Rachel questions Gustav about her suitability to star in his movie. Why would she play the role and not speak Norwegian, she asks?
In that instant, we’re hooked by Rachel and Fanning’s interpretation of her. It’s about her believability and sensitivity, and it’s so unexpected.
That Fanning nailed it shouldn’t have been unexpected because she did the same thing last year with her portrayal of Bob Dylan’s composite lover in A Complete Unknown. The scene where she and Timothée Chalamet’s Dylan have a moment as each stands on either side of a wire fence was shattering. I notice that it’s a performance that has stayed with me.
Skarsgård told me that he “adored” working with Fanning and that he thought her “outstanding” in both Sentimental Value and A Complete Unknown.
I had a long chat with three friends who, as it happens, are all members of the Academy, and we chatted through the nominations headlines. Each of them, with no prompting from me, raised the subject of Sentimental Value — and Fanning.
(L-R) Elle Fanning and Renate Reinsve
“Don’t underestimate that she’s a great screen presence — and she’s a grownup! That’s the important thing to remember,” one of my friends said.
Grownup is a good way to describe my sense of today’s nominations.
The inclusion of Sentimental Value and The Secret Agent in both the Best Picture and Best International Feature Film categories is thrilling, although I also had a flicker of hope that It Was Just an Accident and Sirāt might’ve scored double hits as well.
No matter, because in any case it’s as if the Academy’s shouting out for all to hear: that filmmaking knows no barrier. You know, movies get made outside of the United States.
Even over here in my homeland of England. Folk here are jumping up and down (presumably with glee?) about Hamnet.
The film did well, but its exclusion from the Film Editing category exposes a vulnerability. And the fact that Paul Mescal didn’t land a Supporting Actor nomination for portraying William Shakespeare could also be a negative. There’s a club of Oscar voters who believe it was a travesty to make the Bard of Stratford-upon-Avon a secondary character.
There’s an even bigger club who felt that Wicked: For Good’s reward was collected at the box office. As a huge [at times overexcited] fan of both Wicked and its half-sibling, it took me awhile to fathom that others were over it; Glinda’s bubble had burst.
From what I can gather from voters, as much as some felt Wicked: For Good was better made than Wicked, it lacked, they believed, the latter’s array of good songs, especially those who were wowed by Cynthia Erivo’s spectacular performance of “Defying Gravity.”
I figured that at least Ariana Grande would be recognized for her remarkable display of comic timing in Wicked: For Good, but she was shut out, as was the film in every category.
That’s harsh. However, my Academy voting friends revealed that Wicked: For Good rarely came up in conversation, rather it was all about One Battle After Another, Sinners, Sentimental Value, The Secret Agent, Frankenstein and Train Dreams.
“My contention was that the heat was never there for Wicked: For Good,” another voter said. Then they added: “You, and everyone else who loved it, weren’t in the majority at the Academy. They already gave their love to the first one. And isn’t Sinners this year’s musical? It sort of is, but it’s got vampires too.”
Julia Roberts, when I interviewed her recently about her great performance in Luca Guadagnino’s underrated After the Hunt, idly asked “who decides” early on which films and performances will go on to make the cut? We talked about it for ages without coming up with a definitive answer.
Except to observe: No one f*cking knows.
On that note I’ll leave you with this: There’s a heck of a lot of love out there for Kate Hudson in Song Sung Blue.
Jessie Buckley (Hamnet), Rose Byrne (If I had Legs I’d Kick You), Reinsve (Sentimental Value) and Emma Stone (Bugonia) better be ready.
Kate Hudson and Hugh Jackman in ‘Song Sung Blue’
Sarah Shatz/Focus Features