Movieline‘s Kyle Buchanan: “You have your ingenue (Carey Mulligan), your unknown (Gabby Sidibe), and you have Meryl Streep doing a character role, but The Blind Side‘s Sandra Bullock brings star power, and she’s never been nominated for Best Actress. My question to you is, do you think she deserves it?

Movieline‘s Stu Van Airsdale: “I actually do. It’s a very difficult role in the first place. There’s the accent, the swagger, the tenderness, and a benign sort of dogma that she gently tosses around, making it Christian catnip without alienating the secular audience, which is all this film wants to do in the first place. Moreover, she makes everyone around her better.”

In other words, the Academy actors branch needs to nominate Bullock because (a) it’s good for ratings and therefore good for business — no matter how they feel about The Blind Side — because a Bullock nomination will lure the hinterlanders, and (b) because actors who really get it aren’t the ones who hog the spotlight but make the film work as best they can, any way they can. As Meryl Streep said last night at the Gotham Awards, “Every actor in a supporting actor.”