MOVIES: Best of 2011 -- Supporting Actress

The runners-up:

• Elle Fanning, Super 8
• Sarah Paulson, Martha Marcy May Marlene
• Vanessa Redgrave, Coriolanus
• Octavia Spencer, The Help
• Shailene Woodley, The Descendants

The nominees:

• Jessica Chastain, The Help -- the best of her work in a remarkable year was found here, in a performance that was both broadly comic and subtly heartbreaking.
• Viola Davis, The Help -- yes, I said supporting; the movie is about Emma Stone's personal growth, and the maids are merely props to that story. But Davis made Aibileen the most fully rounded, richly human prop a movie could want.
• Janet McTeer, Albert Nobbs -- the best performance in a dull movie (that will be a theme this year, folks); McTeer's cross-dressing was convincing in a way that Glenn Close's never was.
• Kim Wayans, Pariah -- Audrey is so cruel a mother that we can't ever really sympathize with her, but Wayans does help us to understand the fears that control her.

And the winner:

• Dagmara Dominczyk, Higher Ground -- a lively, delightful performance that becomes something very different (but equally fine) when Annika's circumstances change abruptly midway through the movie.