to the members of the academy

I saw "There Will Be Blood" last night.

SPOILER ALERT:
There was blood.

The more I think about it, the more I like this movie. Like just now, when I went to fetch an image of the poster, I stumbled upon the Official Site, where I was met with the unnerving violin-swelling music and was all, "Oh yeeeeaaaaah, that was good."

You've probably heard by now that it's Daniel Day Lewis' performance that makes this movie so incredible and by all accounts, he is impressive. But it got me thinking about what makes a great performance/actor. Is it the ability to cry with real tears? No, because Julia Stiles does that all the time and I still want to punch her in the neck. Is it a convincing accent? An angry lovemaking scene? What must an actor do if he/she ever wants to earn the nomination for "Best Performance of the Century," as DDL did in TWBB?

The answer: spit/drool.

I submit that every incredible and convincing performance in the last century has called for spitting and/or drooling. You know it's freaking REAL when you see the saliva. A man is crying hysterically over the grave of his dead son and as he's cursing the heavens and screaming about the injustice, a thin line of drool escapes his bottom lip. OSCAR!

Think about it:

Will Smith: cry-drooled in The Pursuit of Happyness
Al Pacino: spit-shouts in almost every movie
Robert DeNiro: salivated in Cape Fear
Leonardo DiCaprio: Two words: Gilbert Grape
Keanu Reeves: HAS NEVER SPIT/DROOLED. EVER.

You do the math.

Needless to say, there was some spit in this movie. And blood. And oil. But the spit was the clincher.