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Throughout this month, I've decided to do a series of Oscar-related articles in anticipation to tonight's 89th Academy Awards ceremony, which I am going to see live on television. Yesterday, I presented you my top 15 favourite Best Actor-winning performances , so today I thought I would do the same, but for Best Actress winners instead. As I have said before, please bear in mind that this is my own personal opinion, which of course is limited to the films I have seen so far.     15. Joan Crawford in Mildred Pierce (1945)   Mildred Pierce (Joan Crawford): I was always in the kitchen. I felt as though I'd been born in a kitchen and lived there all my life, except for the few hours it took to get married.     14. Joan Fontaine in Suspicion (1941) Lina McLaidlaw Aysgarth (Joan Fontaine): I must go now or I'll be late to luncheon. Anyway, if my father saw me come in both late and beautiful, he might have a stroke.   13. Elizabeth Taylor in Who's Afraid of...

To celebrate Judy Holliday's 95th birthday, which was on Tuesday, this week on «Film Friday» I bring you the film for which she is best remembered, the one that gave her the Academy Award for Best Actress. This also happens to be one of my favourite films of all time. Directed by George Cukor, Born Yesterday (1950) begins when wealthy, but crooked, junk dealer Harry Brock (Broderick Crawford) and his brassy girlfriend, former showgirl Billie Dawn (Judy Holliday), arrive at a swanky hotel in Washington, D.C. Harry proceeds to instruct his attorney, Jim Devery (Howard St. John), to buy votes in the U.S. House of Representatives to get a bill passed that will save him millions of dollars in federal taxes. For Harry's protection, Jim puts his business holdings in Billie's name and asks her to sign all of his legal documents, which she does without questioning. Jim also warns Harry to marry Billie since, legally, wives cannot testify against their husbands in a court of law. ...

Gloria Swanson with José Ferrer, the Best Actor winner for Cyrano de Bergerac (1950), and Judy Holliday, Best Actress for Born Yesterday (1950).   Claire Trevor prepared to give Humphrey Bogart a kiss after presenting him with the Oscar for Best Actor for The African Queen (1951).   Harry Cohn presents Vivien Leigh with the Oscar for Best Actress for her work in A Streetcar Named Desire (1951). Leigh was unable to attend the ceremony that year, so the award was given to her in London. Fredric March congratulates Shirley Booth after presenting her with the Oscar for Best Actress for Come Back, Little Sheba (1952). Gloria Grahame received the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for The Bad and the Beautiful (1952). Cecil B. DeMille poses with his Oscar for Best Picture for The Greatest Show on Earth (1952) and the Irving G. Thalberg Award for «consistently high quality of motion picture production.» Audrey Hepburn proudly holds her Oscar for Best Ac...