In a 10.19 London Times piece, Kevin Maher has written that “come February 24 next year, there’s a very real possibility that Elle Fanning…will be among the nominees for Best Actress, thanks to her role in the drama Ginger & Rosa — a win would make her the youngest recipient of the award.”

Ginger & Rosa star Elle Fanning.

I don’t think so. Fanning is sufficient but not great in Ginger & Rosa, and, as I said in a brief Telluride Film Festival review, the film is only so-so. Will Fanning be nominated for a Best Actress Oscar within the next five or six or seven years? Probably. She’s got it, all right. It’s just a matter of her lucking into the right role, the right film and the right director at the right moment.

It wasn’t Ginger & Rosa that convinced me of this, but a brief moment in JJ Abrams‘ Super 8. Here’s how I put it on 5.27.11:

“There’s a moment when Fanning, who was good but mostly passive and nonverbal in Sofia Coppola‘s Somewhere, begins performing some dialogue for a zombie movie that her friends (one of whom is played by newcomer Joel Courtney, who’s also quite good) are shooting. And something just clicks when she lets go with that special vibe or deep-well charisma or whatever it is that some actors just have. The instant she begins saying the lines…pocket drop. A feeling of being anchored and practiced and on a certain level older than her years, and the camera knowing this. I said to myself, ‘Wow, she’s getting there fast.'”

Note to Maher: Should Fanning receive a Best Actress nomination for Ginger & Rosa, it would first be known on January 10th, 2013.