Best Actress Ranking - Update

Here is a new update. The newly added performance is highlighted in bold. 

If five performances from the same year are included, the winning performance is higlighted in red.

1. Vivien Leigh in Gone with the Wind (1939)
2. Jessica Lange in Frances (1982)
3. Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard (1950)
4. Olivia de Havilland in The Heiress (1949)
5. Maggie Smith in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969)
6. Anne Bancroft in The Graduate (1967)
7. Janet Gaynor in Seventh Heaven (1927-1928)   
8. Jill Clayburgh in An Unmarried Woman (1978)
9. Glenn Close in Dangerous Liaisons (1988)
10. Geraldine Page in The Trip to Bountiful (1985)

11. Susan Sarandon in Thelma & Louise (1991)
12. Katharine Hepburn in Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)
13. Edith Evans in The Whisperers (1967)
14. Norma Shearer in Marie Antoinette (1938)
15. Greta Garbo in Ninotchka (1939)
16. Faye Dunaway in Bonnie and Clyde (1967)
17. Hilary Swank in Million Dollar Baby (2004)
18. Cate Blanchett in Elizabeth (1998)
19. Nicole Kidman in Moulin Rouge! (2001)
20. Kate Winslet in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

21. Simone Signoret in Room at the Top (1959)
22. Bette Davis in The Little Foxes (1941)
23. Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music (1965)
24. Rosalind Russell in Auntie Mame (1958)
25. Glenda Jackson in Women in Love (1970)
26. Joanne Woodward in The Three Faces of Eve (1957)
27. Elizabeth Taylor in Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)
28. Renée Zellweger in Bridget Jones's Diary (2001)
29. Barbara Stanwyck in Ball of Fire (1941)
30. Sissy Spacek in In the Bedroom (2001)

31. Halle Berry in Monster's Ball (2001)
32. Lee Remick in Days of Wine and Roses (1962)
33. Annette Bening in American Beauty (1999)
34. Emily Watson in Hilary and Jackie (1998)
35. Judi Dench in Iris (2001)
36. Julie Christie in Away from Her (2007)
37. Shelley Winters in A Place in the Sun (1951)
38. Audrey Hepburn in Wait until Dark (1967)
39. Meryl Streep in The Devil wears Prada (2006)
40. Ingrid Bergman in The Bells of St. Mary’s (1945)

41. Julie Walters in Educating Rita (1983)
42. Anne Baxter in All about Eve (1950)
43. Judi Dench in Mrs. Brown (1997)
44. Helen Hayes in The Sin of Madelon Claudet (1932)
45. Jane Fonda in Coming Home (1978)
46. Greer Garson in Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939)
47. Doris Day in Pillow Talk (1959)
48. Meryl Streep in One True Thing (1998)
49. Joan Crawford in Sudden Fear (1952)
50. Deborah Kerr in From Here to Eternity (1953)

51. Katharine Hepburn in Guess who’s coming to dinner (1967)
52. Marsha Mason in Chapter Two (1979)
53. Jane Wyman in The Yearling (1946)
54. Martha Scott in Our Town (1940)
55. Teresa Wright in The Pride of the Yankees (1942) 
56. Jennifer Jones in Love Letters (1945)
57. Ellen Burstyn in Same Time, Next Year (1978)
58. Susan Hayward in My Foolish Heart (1949)
59. Jeanne Crain in Pinky (1949)
60. Eleanor Parker in Detective Story (1951)

61. Vanessa Redgrave in Mary, Queen of Scots (1971)
62. Diane Keaton in Marvin's Room (1996)
63. Louise Dresser in A Ship comes in (1927-1928)
64. Loretta Young in Come to the Stable (1949)  
65. Mary Pickford in Coquette (1928-29)
66. Sissy Spacek in The River (1984)
67. Shirley MacLaine in The Turning Point (1977)
68. Irene Dunne in Cimarron (1930-1931)
69. Ruth Chatterton in Madame X (1928-29)
70. Diana Wynyard in Cavalcade (1932-1933)

71. Bette Davis in The Star (1952)

Julie Walters as Susan "Rita" White in Educating Rita

Julie Walters’s performance in Educating Rita does have its fair share of admirers and I have seen many Oscar bloggers who actually give her the win for 1983. I cannot say yet where she will be placed in my 1983 ranking since she’s the first from that line-up to be included, but you can already see from the position now that I am not totally convinced here. I get why people are so charmed by her – she is a completely natural and lovely screen presence and her character development is the kind of personal journey you just love to watch and are happy to see triumph in the end. I personally see some shortcomings which more result from the script than from her performance but she sometimes added to them, too.

I have not read the play Educating Rita but from what I learned on the Internet, it is actually a two-person-play that takes places entirely within Frank’s office. The movie version opened the play up, introducing various secondary characters and letting different scenes take place in other locations. This concept was both successful and harmed the movie – because on the one hand it gave the movie an interesting flow and made the plot better suited to the big screen (a play can easily take place in one location with two people but a movie usually needs to include a bigger vision) but on the other hand, it made the plot rather repetitious (as we now see certain scenes with secondary characters and then have Frank and Rita talk about it again) and also took away the focus from the movie’s greatest strength – having Frank and Rita simply sitting together in his office, talking.

So let me start with saying where Julie Walters fails in her work or rather, where her material fails her. The introduction of her character is probably the best example – Rita (actually Susan) cannot open the door to Frank’s office and pushes against it from the outside before flying in his office and starting to talk with him with her unique voice and distinct accent, starting a stream of consciousness that immediately displays her personality and her goals for Frank and the viewer. As written, she resembles the pixie manic dream girl, but without the “dream” and without any romantic attachment but with the obligatory ever-changing conversations, the unconventional behaviour and the strong determination but sometimes written too on-the-nose (when her husband re-builds their living-room and Rita takes the hammer, is anyone surprised that she will cause the whole wall to collapse?).

That introductory scene probably works well on the stage and is the kind of introduction you expect for a character like hers but in the movie, we have already seen Rita coming to Frank’s office and see her pushing against the door from outside and it simply lessens the impact of this first, quick moment. Again, this is not the fault of Julie Walters but the movie constantly seems to hold her back. This failure is repeated later when Rita, after having gotten a new bohemian friend, comes into his office with a new wardrobe and a new behaviour – it’s a scene that is similar to Ellen Burstyn suddenly turning into a hippie in Same Time, Next Year but again, in the movie version we have seen Rita’s new friend and therefore the effect of Rita adapting to this lifestyle is no surprise (and since Maureen Lipman playing this bohemian friend gives an out-of-this-world awful performance – shockingly BAFTA-nominated –, it also doesn’t make any sense for Rita to be so completely in awe of her).

Furthermore, the script of Educating Rita often doesn’t allow Julie Walters to play any notes beyond a very small template – the first half of the movie basically consists of the same scene, in some slight variation, over and over again: Rita complains about her situation as it is and wants to “discover meself”, to achieve something beyond what society has determined her life to be, she argues with Frank about books and her essays and is determined to go on and learn. It doesn’t matter if Rita is still curious to meet Frank, angry about feeling humiliated or upset because of her broken marriage, the pattern is always the same and begins to feel repetitious very soon. Educating Rita is a movie that is clearly very proud of every word it contains but doesn’t allow its character to grow by themselves – every step, every decision, every thought that has to be over-explained again and again, leaving Julie Walters little room to explore her character and add any dimensions. Also, once Rita has “discovered meself” in the second half, the movie seems rather lost about what to do with her – when Rita and Frank grow momentarily apart, it becomes obvious how strongly her performance depends on her relationship with Michael Caine and how both Rita and Julie Walters suffer when he is not around.

These are aspects of her movie that lessen the impact of Julie Walter’s work but she also adds to some missteps in the characterization. The main problem is that, while Julie Walters perfectly embodies Rita in a completely authentic and natural way, she never truly answers the question what exactly drives her – why is she so eager to learn and why literature specifically? Of course the movie doesn’t answer this questions either but it would have been nice to see Julie Walters concerning herself more with the reasons for Rita’s decisions instead of simply presenting them. Furthermore, Julie Walters clearly knows Rita and her relationship to Frank based on her experience in the stage production – but not the backstory of Rita that was added in the movie. I can imagine Julie Walters on the stage, talking effectively about her family and her husband, but the scenes in the movie, that show her with these people, never truly work – Julie Walters has no chemistry with the actor playing her husband or other members of her “former” life and she also seems rather helpless in the scene when Danny is burning her books, again being significantly better in the next scene when she talks about the experience, again underlining that her stage experience helped her to create in the part in a way that reflects on her life instead of experiencing it (something that is again repeated when Rita doesn’t dare to enter Frank’s party and later tells him about it). It does make sense that Rita feels lost around her family as she is moving on but she gives no reason why she was ever involved with a man like Danny in the first place and again doesn’t answer the question why she feels the need to develop in a different direction.

Ok, this was a lot of negativity for a performance that, even though not perfect, still offers a lot to admire. First of foremost, Julie Walters has to be applauded for being the single reason why Rita, even within her limits, succeeds at all. As stated above, the character’s writing is very flawed but Julie Walters so completely embodies this role in a good-natured spirit that you can’t help but be won over – she seems to be a performer who really enjoys her work, who loves being Rita and who clearly thought about her characterization and line-reading but never seems to over-think them. Comedy and drama both come extremely easy to her, neither her bright smile nor her sad eyes ever seem forced. She also believably shows all the steps in Rita’s transformation – her character at the end is still the same woman as she was in the beginning, simply with a different look on life and a new understanding of herself. Rita is a character that is clearly written to be liked but she also has her flaws and edges and Julie Walters isn’t afraid to point them out – but she never loses her charm and likeable personality while doing so.

And beyond that, Julie Walters has impeccable chemistry with Michael Caine – which is the key to the whole movie. Their relationship never feels sexual but is one of mutual respect and friendship and both actors work very hard to establish these feelings – without ever making it seem hard. Both Michael Caine and Julie Walters are very natural in their behaviour towards each other and Julie Walters also shows the steps in this friendship – while her personality makes it clear right away that Rita is a perfect match for Frank, Julie Walters still shows a certain level of uncertainty around him but never lets Rita feel inferior. Julie Walters beautifully shows how Rita slowly develops herself, how she experiments and gets lost and how she finally becomes more satisfied with life and herself - and how this affects her relationship with Frank. 

So, I have overall mixed feelings about this performance but it’s hard to deny the unique charm that Julie Walters brought to this clichéd role.