In a 1.23 Alliance of Women Film Journalist piece called “Oscar-Worthy Women’s Work, 2009 Edition,” Eleanor Ringel uses the terms “achingly desolate” and “beautifully bleak” to describe…Revolutionary Road? Okay, fine, but when I first read these four words as a pull quote I naturally assumed Ringel was talking about Kristin Scott Thomas‘s performance in I Loved You So Long.

Which, by the way, Ringel doesn’t mention at all in the piece. Everyone else in the ’08 sorority — Melissa Leo, La Streep, Viola Davis, Sally Hawkins, Anne Hathaway, Marisa Tomei, etc. — makes the cut, but not Thomas, who arguably delivered the year’s most delicate, searing, stone-solid female performance. Why am I pointing this out and not Ringel? What is this?