AFT Awards: Best Actress in a Supporting Role

This is the fourth category of the 9th Annual AFT Film Awards to be announced. The AFT Awards are my own personal choices for the best in film of each year and the best in television of each season. The AFT Film Awards include the traditional Oscar categories and a number of additional specific honors. Nominees are pictured in the order I’ve ranked them and drawn from a pool of approximately 122 films. Click here to see previous years of this category.

Honorable mentions:
Alicia Vikander (Ex Machina), Analeigh Tipton (Mississippi Grind), Aundrea Gadsby (People, Places, Things), Camila Mardila (The Second Mother), Caren Pistorius (Slow West), Doga Zeynep Doguslu (Mustang), Dolores Fonzi (The Film Critic), Elisabeth Rohm (Joy), Elit Iscan (Mustang), Ellen Page (Freeheld), Gia Gadsby (People, Places, Things), Hailee Steinfeld (Ten Thousand Saints), Helen Mirren (Trumbo), Ilayda Akdogan (Mustang), Isabella Rossellini (Joy), Jessica Chastain (The Martian), Jessica Williams (People, Places, Things), Judith Godrèche (The Overnight), Julia Garner (Grandma), Julianne Nicholson (Black Mass), Karine Teles (The Second Mother), Sienna Miller (Mississippi Grind), Tatiana Maslany (Woman in Gold), Teresa Palmer (Kill Me Three Times), Tessa Thompson (Creed), Tugba Sunguroglu (Mustang), Virginia Madsen (Joy)

Runners-up:
Andrea Savage (Sleeping with Other People)
Charlotte Gainsbourg (Misunderstood)
Helena Bonham Carter (Suffragette)
Regina Hall (People, Places, Things)
Charlotte Le Bon (The Walk)

The winner:
Olivia Cooke (Me and Earl and the Dying Girl), the last part of her film’s title, provided a singular energy that made her (almost) instantly everything to the main character, full of life despite her certain prognosis and not ready to say goodbye to the world without living life her way.

Other nominees:
Stephanie Allynne (People, Places, Things) played so well off Jemaine Clement as his eternally perplexing ex-spouse, always so into whatever she is saying or arguing despite its inherent strangeness or incongruity. Kate Winslet (Steve Jobs) could have melted into the background of her film, but instead she was an ardent, essential part of it, managing the life of her partner and boss as best she could without living it for him. Kristen Stewart (Clouds of Sils Maria) astronomically transcended expectations of her acting abilities with this nuanced, calm performance as an assistant fully immersed in her job as her life. Jennifer Jason Leigh (Anomalisa) earns special mention not for the performance that earned her an Oscar nomination but for the film-defining voice filled with bright energy turn in this picture of absurdity that saw her as the only bright light in one man’s monotonous life.