Best Actress 2013: Helen Hunt / Samantha Morton, Decoding Annie Parker

Cinematographer Steven Bernstein directed and cowrote the screenplay Decoding Annie Parker with Adam Bernstein and Michael Moss about the real life Anne Parker (Samantha Morton) who is yet another member of her dwindling family to be struck with cancer.  She has an irrepressible spirit that pushes her through her illness allowing for her to finally benefit from the years of research conducted by geneticist Mary-Claire King (Helen Hunt) who established a ground-breaking connection between the disease and DNA.  The film sounds like it may have a co-lead situation, with, I imagine, weight being thrown to the baitier title role (Morton) for lead, but I really have no idea.  The crew includes editor Douglas Crise (Babel).  Filmed in Whittier, California, later 2011, Parker is supposed to release in March.

Now, Hunt is one of many Best Actress possibilities this year with a lead Oscar already under her belt.  There is enough of her company to choke a horse starting with 1982 winner Meryl Streep, to Shirley MacLaine, Emma Thompson, Julia Roberts, Nicole Kidman, Marion Cotillard, Kate Winslet, Sandra Bullock, and, now, Jennifer Lawrence.  But, how many of them can get realistically nominated this year.  It's pretty common for there to be at least one previous lead winner in the category.  The numerous times Streep has been nominated in the last three decades has been a big help in that department.  Two previous lead winners was actually pretty common after the occurrence first started in 1935 with Claudette Colbert and Katharine Hepburn in the mix.  There were two more times in the 1930s (1937, 1938), a bunch of times in the 1940s (1940, 1942, 1944, 1945, 1948, 1949) and the 1950s (1952, 1954, 1956, 1959), with 1951 offering the first year there were three: Hepburn, Vivien Leigh, and Jane Wyman.  It continued through the 1960s (1962, 1964, 1965), ending the decade with two years of a majority previous winners (1967 and 1968).  In the seventies, there were two years with two winners (1971, 1977) and two years with three (1973, 1978), with the phenomenon of the latter to have never occurred again since.  Two continued to be common in the 1980s (1981, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1986) through to 1990.  Since, it has only happened twice: 1995 and 2009 (Streep and Mirren).

This year, it seems next to certain that there will be at least two, if not possibly three.  I would bank on Streep and Kidman, for starters.  After that, it could be anyone's game.  Remember how close Marion Cotillard and Helen Mirren got for 2012?

Check out more Best Actress 2013 contenders