Vicky Krieps, “Corsage”
Empress Elisabeth of Austria, nicknamed Sisi, is still so beloved in Austria her likeness is sold as souvenirs all over the country. In Marie Kreutzer’s bombastic biopic “Corsage,” star Vicky Krieps smashes her stately portrait like a wrecking ball, building a complex, flawed, funny, often cruel, but always real woman in its place. Krieps consistently brings a fierce intelligence to her performances, and her Sisi is no different. Internal conflicts constantly boil over and simmer off as her charm and her rage battle for dominance. Her rebellious spirit, caged like her ribs, struggles against the narrow path she finds herself set. Beguiling as she is prickly and off-putting, Krieps does all this while acting through restrictive costumes and an immense wig replicating Sisi’s illustrious locks. Krieps finds an authenticity at the heart of the overly-manicured monarch, daring all those around her—and the audience—to bravely seek their truths, too. – MG (Our review of “Corsage”)
Jennifer Lawrence and Brian Tyree Henry, “Causeway”
It’s hard to pick just one of the two lead performances in Lila Neugebauer’s soulful, stripped-down drama, “Causeway,” because both of them are so good, and it’s a two-hander where two great artists are feeding one another. The film centers on Lynsey, a U.S. soldier (Jennifer Lawrence) who suffers a traumatic brain injury while fighting in Afghanistan and struggles to adjust to life back home in New Orleans. Brian Tyree Henry (“Atlanta”) plays James, a local and quiet mechanic, who offers her kindness because he recognizes a similarly wounded counterpart. At first, it may seem like he’s going to be her savior, the one that helps her get back on her feet. But James, who lost a leg in a car accident and bears even deeper traumatic scars, just needs salvation. “Causeway” essentially becomes a story of two lost and shattered people who find kindness, compassion, and understanding in each other’s friendship. Both performances are deeply naked, intimate, vulnerable, and raw. Henry’s sensitive and super-exposed turn arguably makes him the MVP if you want to look at it that way, but it’s not a competition. It’s two open, honest, brave, unguarded artists who are lifting each other up by being available and empathetic to one another—much like the characters. The emotional intelligence in the movie is off the charts, and it’s because Lawrence and Henry, never overcooking any moment, are generous and unafraid of revealing the broken pieces of their humanity. – RP (Our review of “Causeway”)
Lashana Lynch, “The Woman King”
There are many thrilling performances and dramatic feats in Gina Prince-Bythewood’s “The Woman King,” about the all-female Agojie warriors who protected the kingdom of Dahomey in the 1800s. But we want to highlight the multi-faceted work of Lashana Lynch, whose character Izogie works underneath the powerful leader played by Viola Davis but who holds our attention just as much. Prince-Bythewood’s story provides a surrogate into this experience (Thuso Mbedu’s Nawi), who learns a great deal about being an Agojie warrior from Lynch’s Izogie. But it’s striking and so moving how Lynch is equally stern and playful amid everything (“The first rule of training, always obey Izogie. I am Izogie,” she says), without one quality overwhelming the other. Instead of being only the comic relief, or only one of the film’s most badass women, she gives us both. Her will to fight is made that much more formidable because of it. – NA (Our review of “The Woman King”)
Keke Palmer, “Nope”
Keke Palmer’s natural charisma–her genuine salesperson razzmatazz–provides a crucial ballast for the comedic tone of Jordan Peele’s insightful, dark, but giddy monster movie “Nope.” It’s all about how she enters the film, reciting a passed-on monologue about her family’s long history of working with horses in Hollywood. She’s the brightest bulb on the latest film set, hiring her family’s business. From here, she provides a vivid contrast to her less-wordy brother (played by Daniel Kaluuya). Palmer’s Em is the live-wire, light-hearted spirit of Peele’s awe-inspiring adventure, as when she becomes the greatest advocate for getting “The Oprah Shot” of the sky monster later referred to as Jean Jacket. She helps make “Nope” even more of a blast than its mysterious plotting. That Em gets the final hurrah in the movie makes her even more of an unforgettable hero for Peele’s film. – NA (Our review of “Nope”)
Park Ji-Min, “Return to Seoul”
In a much earlier chapter of her life, Freddie (Park Ji-Min) was a young piano player in France, a child adopted from Korea and given many things for her to define herself. Many years later, we meet her as she rearranges people at an intimate restaurant in Seoul to her amusement and talks about sight-reading sheet music. She is on an uncertain quest to understand more about the parents who put her up for adoption, the family she did not have; she’s instead more familiar with reading people and getting what she wants from them. Throughout the long chapters of Freddie’s life in Davy Chou’s “Return to Seoul,” we constantly get a sense of her elusive nature from Park Ji-Min’s performance; her life hardly becomes more harmonious when she receives a few more answers about her biological parents. As the center of Chou’s exploration, Park alternates between vulnerable and certain, manipulative and genuine. Park is immensely knowledgeable about how to build an enigma from which you can’t look away. – NA (Our review of “Return to Seoul”)
