JOAN ALLEN

     What do Mira Sorvino, Juliette Binoche and Julia Roberts have in common (other than being fine actresses)? All three snatched an Oscar from the more deserving hands of the wonderful Joan Allen.  Well, Joan Allen's day will come. You heard it here first.

     As The Contender (2000) Ms. Allen hit it out of the park as a vice-presidential candidate who refuses to even discuss what she may have done as a slightly wild college kid.  This film is a cautionary tale for our time, and Joan Allen makes it go.  It asks some ultimate questions and the answers are not easy ones.

     Ms. Allen splendidly played the long-suffering Pat Nixon in Oliver Stone's Nixon (1995). The film is a fascinating hatchet job that makes no pretense of fair play and is all the more interesting because of that.  Ms. Allen practically steals the movie from Sir Anthony Hopkins, not an easy task.  So what did Pat Nixon really think about all that carrying on? Joan Allen shows a probable answer in a stunning performance.

       Joan Allen was the only good thing in the dreadful remake of The Crucible (1996). I can't really argue against Juliette Binoche winning for The English Patient in'96. But in 1995 she lost to Mira Sorvino for Mighty Aphrodite and in 2000 she lost to Julia Roberts for Erin Brokovich. Ms. Allen was robbed!

      There is no one better at playing slightly square, well-meaning Moms than Joan Allen.  Check her out in Pleasantville (1998), or The Ice Storm (1997), or the wonderful Searching For Bobby Fisher (1993), or the underrated In Country (1989).

     Another somewhat slighted film is Ethan Frome (1992), based on Edith Wharton's outstanding novel and very true to it. Joan Allen has a nifty change-of-pace as Liam Neeson's whiny invalid wife.  She makes you hate her for her neediness and her ability to cloud the sunniest day.

     A nice early effort by Joan Allen, as the somewhat overly protective Mom of Kathleen Turner, is Peggy Sue Got Married (1986). Nicholas Cage pushes a little too hard as the teenage boyfriend and philandering husband, but Ms. Turner and Ms. Allen are just fine and the film is loads of fun. 

     All of the films in this article are available on DVD and for streaming.  All are okay for 12 and up.