The Best Costumes of 2000

by Cláudio Alves

Before we say goodbye to 2000 and move forward to the next Smackdown year, 1946, I'd like to take a look at the Best Costume Design Oscar race. Take it as a digestif to our coverage. In any case, this specific lineup offers a remarkably comprehensive overview of some of the category's favorite elements and most glaring blind spots. As always, period work dominates, though there's also space for fantasy and contemporary narratives, intersections of fashion and costume, as well as a non-English-language movie. The nominees were… 

• Anthony Powell, 102 Dalmatians
• Rita Ryack, How the Grinch Stole Christmas
• Jacqueline West, Quills
• Janty Yates, Gladiator ★
• Tim Yip, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

First up, let's look at the period films and, more specifically, our victor.

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Happy 50th to The Lovely Laura Linney

Laura at the airport in a rare sighting in 2013You guys. I keep an elaborate spreadsheet of important dates for blogging and I somehow missed that today was The Lovely Laura Linney's 50th birthday. How could I? Don't you miss her?

Laura has kept a low profile these past few years (apart from headlining Showtime's The Big C), and an extremely low profile -- like no profile at all -- this past calendar year, largely we assume because of her stealth pregnancy. No one even knew she was pregnant and then she was suddenly giving birth at 49!

So a very happy birthday to a one of a kind actress. And to think I thought she was a little bland when I first saw her on Tales of the City (1993) as Marianne. How wrong I was. I blame the apple-cheeked suburban beauty which threw me. She was the perfect Marianne, really, and she only got better from there. How glad I was to be wrong. One of my favorite Oscar nominations of the past decade, like easy top 5 favorite, was her surprise nod (which I predicted - go me) for Wendy Savage in The Savages (2008) which is my favorite of her performances though the one-two punch of her stealth hatefulness in The House of Mirth (2000) and that indelible sibling warmth in You Can Count On Me (2000) is when the fandom truly hit me. 

Philip Seymour Hoffman and Laura Linney in "The Savages"

What's your favorite Laura Linney role and when did you first fall for her? Jason gives his answer at My New Plaid Pants. Yours?