Oscars: Best Actress

     The wonderful ladies that have been nominated for this award are Jennifer Lawrence for Silver Linings Playbook, Quvenzhane Wallis for Beasts of the Southern Wild, Naomi Watts for The Impossible, Jessica Chastain for Zero Dark Thirty, and lastly Emmanuelle Riva for Amour.
     As many now, records for the nomination have been broken. Quvenzhane Wallis has been the youngest at nine years old, to be nominated for Best Actress while Emmanuelle Riva is the oldest, at eighty-five, to be nominated. Nonetheless, these actresses both deserve the nomination. Thus, we'll be discussing Emmanuelle Riva's acting in the French drama, Amour. 
     So from IMDb, I have gathered that Riva has a good seventy-eight titles under her name but Amour is the one that she is most known for.

     Riva plays one part of an elderly couple, as Anne Laurent. The basis of this movie is that her character suffers a stroke and as a result, her health begins to decline. The couple are both retired music teachers, their daughter lives abroad, and Anne's paralysis only adds to their strain. Overall, the movie is about love (duh) and how sometimes its enormous strain can be. How that strain causes us to do things. Things that would not make sense to anyone else but do to Georges and Anne. And since I don't want to spoil the movie for you guys, I'll try my best to vague about the ending.

     Amour... I feel a strange connection with this movie because well, it seems to have an uncanny resemblance to what my grandparents had also went through. It's eerily similar for the most part, the not wanting to go to the hospital, the wheelchair, the health condition. So I've had real life experience with how one actually feels ands acts when they are in that debilitating state and seen how one tries everything for their significant other. What really pushed that emotion over the edge and actually made me feel heartbreak even more were the characters. In this case, I felt like all the actors and actresses allowed you to connect with their character. That connection is what allows this movie to impact you emotionally.
     Nonetheless, Geroges had to do something radical and we do not necessarily hate him for it as an audience. Why? Because of Anne, aka Emmanuelle Riva. She made us understand his actions as well as everyone else's. Riva's character was the one that shone brightly in this film and the one with the most impact. Whether if it was subtlety or not, her acting was top notch. The wheelchair scenes, just in general when she always had to overcome the feat of going on one, had that silence that allowed you to focus on her actions. Her breathing changes, her mouth and hand seem as if they really are paralyzed.
     When Emmanuelle Riva begins speaking in unintelligible phrases or words, you can see her suffering. She emotes it to the audience. She gives her character strength with an attitude which makes it more disheartening to hear her mumble. It's strange how many things this actress allows you to feel with her character just by her actions and such.
     Regardless, I am really glad that Emmanuelle Riva has gotten nominated. I believe it is well deserved. He performance was breathtaking. If you watch this movie, thinking you know what you're getting into, it twists it and makes you something else-- if that makes sense. Just watch it, and enjoy her performance. It is a romantic drama, and it might not be your cup at tea at first, but if you stick around to watch it, it might surprise you. Just might. Plus, it will be her 86th birthday on the day of the Oscars.