MovieChat Forums > Erin Brockovich (2000) Discussion > was Julia the favorite to win the oscar?

was Julia the favorite to win the oscar?


was just wondering if Julia Roberts was the favorite to win the oscar? based on who did and didn't win all the major awards leading up to the oscars, was she the favorite? who were all the critics talking about concerning who would win? and if she didn't win, which of the other nominees had the best chance?

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Everyone and there mothers knows that Ellen Burstyn should have won for her depiction of Sarah Goldfarb in Requiem For A Dream. Its been theorized that Julia Roberts won because this will was and always will be her best performance she has done. The same thing happened with Sandra Bullock when she won for the Blindside. Measuring someones talents based on whether they won an Oscar or not is dumb. Stanley Kubrick never once won an Oscar and well hes considered one of the best Directors of the 20th century,

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@necrophobia Yes, Ellen Burstyn did the better performance, but we're talking about the Oscars here, so we know there's more to it than that.:)

I think Roberts won because her role was that of a real person, which is the sort of role which tends to get noms and wins.

And of course, if Erin had some sort of mental or physical condition, then she would've been a lock.

Shouldn't Ellen Burstyn have been nominated for a Best Supporting Actress for RFAD? It's not like she was the lead actress.

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Yes, Ellen Burstyn should have been nominated for Best Supporting. Ask the average person who saw RFAD what is about and they will say "A movie about some young kids doing a lot of drugs, oh and the mom of one."

I love the movie, but she wasn't a leading character. Especially with Jennifer Connelly's character in the film.

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i think that ellen burstyn's performance was top notch but i think the academy decided that a) she had already won and oscar and b) julia's BODY of work, especially her performance in erin brokovich, deserved the oscar win.

i don't think it was down to individual performances that year simply because if it was ellen would have snatched that oscar up like a fat kid at a free donut stand.

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She was considered a shoo-in that year even before the nominations were announced. I also remember reading in Entertainment Weekly the week before the Oscars (a section where they analyzed every nominee's chances) every nomineee other than her had "she's nominated with Julia" as a strike against them.

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All the Ellen-Burstyn-fans can bitch as much as they want (don't get me wrong, I, too, think she should have won) but Julia Roberts was one of the surest wins ever! Not only all the industry awards went to her, she also scored big with the critics (everybody seemed to agree that the Oscar was hers the moment her movie opened), her movie was a hit and nominated for Best Picture and it simply was her moment.

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From what I remember, Julia Roberts was one of the safest bets for an Oscar win that year. Erin Brockovich was a huge hit with both critics and audiences. It was the peak of her career. In fact, Julia didn't only win things like the Oscar or the Golden Globe, she also got the Los Angeles Critics Awards , which usually goes to rather high-brow choices. There was no way she was going to lose the Academy Award.

Funnily enough, Ellen Burstyn was never considered the biggest competitor. Requiem for a Dream got a rather mixed response from critics back then and the movie was slapped with an NC-17 rating, so very few people saw it. Throughout the years, the film became some sort of cult classic. I remember Laura Linney was probably the one who was behind Julia in terms of likelihood at winning the Oscar but her movie was very small and it was her first acclaimed lead performance, while Julia was already on her third nomination.

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Julia Roberts one because she's a good earner, that simple. yeah Oscars ar popularity contests and if someone's got the big name in the studio to throw the dollars behind their Oscar campaign, they win. Lots of actors who don't deserve it win; it's not uncommon. What is uncommon is that one of the greatest performances ever by an actress was disrespected by giving the Oscar to Julia Roberts that year

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Burstyn should have been nominated for Best Supporting and won that.

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