Best Actress in a Supporting Role: Jennifer Jason Leigh in The Hateful Eight

Jennifer Jason Leigh received her first Oscar nomination for her performance as Daisy Domergue in The Hateful Eight.

The Hateful Eight is an excellent movie about eight potentially dangerous strangers who meet in a cabin while seeking shelter from a blizzard. I wouldn't say it's Quentin Tarantino's best movie (I still prefer Pulp Fiction and Inglorious Basterds) but it's an extremely entertaining movie that is such a fun ride during its whole running time. The script is excellent, in fact it would be my personal winner for Best Original Screenplay. The cinematography, costumes and the score are all great and award-caliber, particularly the score which is just terrific. The acting is strong all around: Samuel L. Jackson gives a great, entertaining performance, Kurt Russell is fantastic and badass and Walton Goggins is downright amazing. The other cast members might not fare quite as well but they're all good, particularly Tim Roth's entertaining performance in a role that seems tailored for Christoph Waltz. 

The first time I saw The Hateful Eight I have to admit I was disappointed by Leigh's performance: I was impressed by her performance in the last act but I thought she did next to nothing in the rest of the movie. On a rewatch, though, I saw this performance in a completely new light and started to notice all the small details that makes hers such an amazing piece of work. For quite a big part of the movie, Daisy isn't a very threatening or dangerous character actually: we know she's a murderer but she's chained and under John "The Hangman" Ruth's watch so she seems like she's under control, and instead of serving as a truly menacing character she is given more the purpose of a comic relief: Leigh is terrific as every single, small reaction of the character is at the same time both disgusting and funny in a very dark and twisted way. Daisy is mostly written as a stereotype: she's an ignorant, racist, loud, vulgar woman and Leigh portrays this qualities of the character perfectly without ever making Daisy simply a joke. She achieves the amazing feat of creating a truly despicable and repulsive character while making it utterly watchable and even somehow extremely entertaining. Unlike Hans Landa and Calvin Candie, Daisy is not a suave villain but a very crude one and Leigh embodies incredibly well this character's nature and she is never afraid to make her character ugly - while always being so oddly and utterly charismatic. As I said, Daisy is not a particularly menacing presence for the first half of the movie, and even the other characters of the movie don't seem to fear her that much as they mistake her lack of refinement for dumbness - instead, Leigh does a terrific job in showing a smart, cunning and ruthless soul under her façade and she makes Daisy a woman that always seems to be calculating the next move, which makes her performance absolutely compelling and unpredictable. 

As the movie progresses, Leigh does a phenomenal job in slowly bringing to light Daisy's extremely dangerous and downright deranged personality, perfectly building up to the last act. I particularly love the scene in which Daisy plays the guitar while singing: there's something so tense about this scene as Leigh is amazing in almost showing the wheels turning into Daisy's head. And when she finally ends the song by saying "And you'll be dead behind me, John, when I get to Mexico" she delivered it in such an evil, quietly threatening way that I felt chills down my spine. And later on as she witnesses (spoiler) John's death after poisoning him, she again is just deeply disturbing and subtly terrifying, and her line-delivery of "When you get to hell, John, tell them Daisy sent you" couldn't be more perfect (spoiler off). But as I said before, Leigh is at her absolute best in the final act as she finally unleashes Daisy's merciless and manipulative nature (also credit to the make-up artists who underline the slow revelation of Daisy's true self by making her look more and more disgusting as the movie progresses). Leigh's acting in the final act of the movie is the best over-the-top acting possible, as she doesn't hold back anything in her performance yet she never becomes hammy: she's pure dynamite and in those ten minutes or so she literally steals the movie from everybody else and controls the screen like no other. 

Ultimately, Jennifer Jason Leigh delivers a flawless, amazing and unforgettable performance that probably deserves more than one viewing in order to be truly appreciated in its entirety: she makes every second count in her performance and through every small, reactionary moments she realizes one of the most unique and interesting characters in recent years - and whenever she has the chance to shine, she does. It's brilliant work from a truly great and underrated actress.

5/5