All 3 Frances McDormand Oscar Wins, Ranked
Throughout an admirably long career, Frances McDormand has given continually great performances, as demonstrated by earlier movies of hers like Blood Simple and Mississippi Burning, the latter of which earned McDormand her first Academy Award nomination. Since then, she’s received five more Acting nominations, and of her six nominations in total, she’s won three Oscars. That is an undeniably strong track record, since another winner of three – Jack Nicholson – did so with 12 nominations in total. Daniel Day-Lewis, to his credit, also has three wins from six nominations. He just so happens to have been born in the same year as Frances McDormand: 1957. Maybe there was something in the water?
Or maybe that’s going too far in trying to pick up some kind of pattern. What really matters, for current ranking purposes, is that trio of wins Frances McDormand has had, the first of which happened in the 1990s and the most recent of which occurred right at the start of the 2020s. McDormand is committed to every role she takes, it seems, and the fact she’s also pretty discerning about the roles she takes (at least lately) means you can generally expect something high-quality if her name’s attached to it. Those three movies in which she truly exceeded expectations, according to Oscar voters, are ranked below. And it has to be stressed that all of these are great movies. They are genuinely hard to rank, whether you want to do so according to how good McDormand is, or how good the film is overall.
3
‘Nomadland’ (2020)
Directed by Chloé Zhao
Like CODA, Nomadland is one of those Best Picture winners that’s been forgotten surprisingly fast. It is a quiet and unassuming film, so maybe that’s not the most surprising thing in the world. Also, the early 2020s was a time when movie releases were impacted by certain events on a global level, so there were fewer movies in general, and with that, less competition. Still, there remains something impressive about Nomadland, which was both a Best Picture winner and a film that made Frances McDormand a three-time Oscar winner. There’s very little plot here, and instead a relatively raw attempt to capture a certain way of life, and force you to feel such a way of life for a feature-length runtime.
McDormand’s character is a woman in her sixties who’s struggling in the wake of the Great Recession, eventually adopting a lifestyle that involves getting by as a modern-day nomad of sorts. She goes about her life, and though it’s not super exciting, Nomadland is oddly absorbing if you’re willing to be patient and sit with something that could, on some level, be seen as a little dull. It’s an admirable approach to take for a drama film, and more things in Nomadland work than don’t, in the end. What matters most is that McDormand is a commanding screen presence throughout, and that Chloé Zhao’s Oscar-winning direction was also great. Additionally, since both McDormand and Zhao were producers on the film, they ended up being among the people who shared in Nomadland’s Best Picture win.
2
‘Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri’ (2017)
Directed by Martin McDonagh
2017 was a good year for movies; so good, in fact, that Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri didn’t end up winning Best Picture. The Shape of Water was the film that did, but honestly, that film, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Dunkirk, Call Me By Your Name, Get Out, Lady Bird, and Phantom Thread all would’ve been worthy/understandable winners that year. Some years really are just better than others. Anyway, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri still did quite well, all things considered, seeing as this movie won Frances McDormand her second acting Oscar, all the while Sam Rockwell also won a very deserved Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role in the film.
As for the narrative of Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, it’s about a distraught mother (McDormand) trying to pressure her local police department into continuing to investigate the murder of her daughter. She takes drastic steps because of her desperation, and the town is small enough that everyone feels some sort of repercussions, as a result. It’s very much a slow and sad film, though it’s undeniably effective in the way it explores a whole host of exceedingly serious issues. Though it’s sometimes darkly funny and even a bit thrilling, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri functions best as a drama, and McDormand really is the anchor that helps so much of it work as well as it ultimately does.
1
‘Fargo’ (1996)
Directed by Joel Coen
If 1996’s Fargo can be included in some sort of ranking, it’s probably got a better-than-average chance of appearing right at the top, and so here we are. Fargo was the first movie for which Frances McDormand won an Oscar, and it remains her signature movie close to 30 years later. This is an undisputed highlight of the 1990s, balancing crime, thriller, drama, and comedy genres expertly well, as you might expect from the Coen Brothers at the height of their powers. The plot here involves a kidnapping scheme that turns deadly, with various incompetent individuals all letting a messy situation fall apart, resulting in some scenes that are uncomfortable, some that are funny, and some that are genuinely quite suspenseful.
McDormand plays the film’s hero, Police Chief Marge Gunderson, who begins to unravel the mess the criminal characters have gotten themselves into. It’s not so much about whether she will, but how she’ll do it, and just how many people can be spared before she does. Fargo is the sort of film that’s easy to take for granted, given it’s been around for so long and is so widely accepted as being a great film, but nah… it really is that phenomenal, and deserves to be regarded as such. The series it inspired might be pretty good overall, too, but Fargo (1996) is still unbeatable, as far as crime movies with this kind of comedic slant go, and McDormand’s performance here is also one for the ages, without a doubt.
