Yeoh with the good timing
Friday, January 20, 2023 at 1:57PM by Nathaniel R
Michelle Yeoh in "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon"
How's this for campaign timing? While Oscar nominations are announced January 24th (next Tuesday - final predictions right here tomorrow) Voting on the actual winners doesn't take place until the first week of March (Oscar night is March 12th). In that crucial month inbetween the nominations and the ceremony, look what's coming back to theaters -- CROUCHING TIGER HIDDEN DRAGON (2000) in a 4K restoration! That's right. Michelle Yeoh's other Oscar-worthy Lead Actress performance will be back in theaters on February 17th. Cate Blanchett (TAR) will be hard to beat in Best Actress this time around but this can't exactly hurt the cause to make history in voting for Michelle Yeoh (Everything Everywhere All At Once); awards races never happen in vacuums and feelings about whole careers and historical precedent also often enter the room. No Asian actress has ever been nominated for Best Actress and thus no Asian actress has won*...
Ang Lee's 2000 wuxia masterpiece is tied with Bong Joon-ho's Parasite and Ingmar Bergman's Fanny & Alexander as the most Oscar-winning non-English language film of all time; They each won four Oscars in their year. It also shares the record of most Oscar-nominated non-English language film (with Roma) with 10 nominations in its year. Crouching Tiger's record breaking honors don't end at the Academy Awards. It remains the highest grossing "foreign" film ever released in the US with an astonishing $128 million from US theaters in its initial run. If you've never seen it on the big screen, trust us: do not miss the chance.
Michelle Yeoh's performance alone is enough of a reason to seek it out if you somehow have never seen it but the rest of the film is spectacular, too. In all directions.
Merle Oberon in DARK ANGEL (1935)
*The asterisked exception to Yeoh's history-making nomination (should it come to pass) is 1930s star Merle Oberon who was Best Actress nominated for Dark Angel (1935). Oberon was not known to be of Asian heritage at the time (her mother being mixed race). The 1930s were of course a far different time and actors regularly concealed or lied about any number of things about their life for reasons both frivolous (creating exciting personas) and deadly serious (racism).
Reader Comments (15)
I still think the momentum is with her and her film and she will push ahead of Cate,I have all my hotdog fingers crossed for her.
On the podcast Keep It! Michelle Yeoh talked about the difficulty about acting in fighting sequences on EEAAO, and how she had to train herself to make faces that weren't confident, since she has trained herself over the years to do that , as she plays characters who fight regularly.
The thing I love about her Crouching Tiger performance is how much face acting she does in the fight scenes. You really get a sense of when she's feeling challenged and overwhelmed. She's always great in the enlightment scene and conveys years of built up emotions.
I text my partner about this yesterday, after watching the trailer in front of Corsage. I’ve never seen it, and have been meaning to, so I’m so, so excited to watch it for the first time in a theater!
Michelle Yeoh, my favorite Bond girl, with my favorite Bond. I hope she wins the Oscar.
Yeoh for the win!
Perfect campaign timing.
Cate already has three BAFTAs, and Michelle was actually nominated for Lead Actress at the BAFTAs for Crouching Tiger, so I hope that gives her the edge there and helps propel her further towards the Oscar.
I feel like SAG will go with Michelle as well. But then again, I'm rooting for her, so I might be a bit biased.
I also think Cate's non-attendance at the Globes and her speech at the Critic's Choice are her way of swaying it Michelle's way. She's not gonna say 'no' to another Oscar, but I don't think she necessarily wants it either.
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The closest as Asian woman has come to Lead Actress had to have been Gong Li for Memoirs of a Geisha, right?
Whoops, meant ***Zhang Ziyi
I watched Crouching Tiger in theaters back when it first came out in 2000. Looking forward to seeing if I can find a theater to watch it again.
I'm so excited for this! I haven't seen this movie on the big screen!
Also a Yeoh Oscar win would be SO sweet. I really, really hope it happens.
As much as I think Michelle is worthy, I think that’s Cate’s performance in Tar is one of the greatest acting performances of all time and she is undeniable. She is Tar and as we’ve seen with Streep, McDormand, Day Lewis, Hepburn, Nicholson etc. when they like you they really like you and Cate is in that group.
I think I was in 5th grade when I saw CROUCHING TIGER in theaters and while I’ve seen it several times since, I can’t wait to see it again on the big screen.
@Gary Alford exactly. It's an actress they worship with Streep levels of zeal giving a towering performance in one of the year's most acclaimed dramas. It's tough to imagine them going another way.
She should win.
Let's not push the race/glass ceiling narrative too much or the average white voter will vote for Blanchett.
Cate knows the race to perfection and is clearly pointing at Yeoh's direction to voters, for a while. She doesn't need a 3rd (yet) and it's high time for Yeoh and Asians in general...
Oh to see Crouching Tiger for the first time! Those women fighters and that music. And Chang Chen without his shirt on. ;-)
And Pam, I totally agree about Michelle Yeoh being the best Bond Girl ever. She makes all the others look so lazy!
@jesus alonso. That may be the wish but not the reality as we’ve seen for many years. To be honest Cate is just too good in Tar.