DID THEY DESERVE IT?

Times critic Carina Chocano reflects upon Sunday’s acting award winners.

ACTOR

Daniel Day-Lewis: Yes

Like Marion Cotillard’s turn as Edith Piaf, Daniel Day-Lewis’ go-for-broke performance as greed-crazed oilman Daniel Plainview in “There Will Be Blood” seemed to come from a deeper and darker place than most actors can access. Like Javier Bardem’s assassin in “No Country for Old Men,” Plainview is an inscrutable villain whose motives and choices are still being hotly debated, but thanks in part to Paul Thomas Anderson’s remarkably intuitive directing style, Day-Lewis’ villain brims with emotions we almost recognize. He lures us with an approximation of humanity that turns out to be a mirage. It’s hard to think of a more difficult trick to pull off.

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ACTRESS

Marion Cotillard: Yes

The most technically virtuosic of the nominated performances, Marion Cotillard’s turn as Edith Piaf in “La Vie en Rose” had no rival. Playing Piaf from her teens through her ravaged middle-age, Cotillard is unrecognizable. It’s almost a cliche -- the beautiful actress undergoing a transformation that makes external her character’s inner turmoil and tumult -- but Cotillard’s performance went well beyond this, delving into the tragedy of Piaf’s life in astonishing, artful ways.

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SUPPORTING ACTOR

Javier Bardem: Maybe

Who is scarier than Javier Bardem in a pageboy? Nobody. Between the great taurine head, the menacing baritone, the chilling deadpan and the brutal cattle gun (what was with that, anyway?), Bardem made for an unforgettable villain. But the character of Anton Chigurh was as opaque and inscrutable as they come, and, ultimately, apart from his uncanny ability to be truly terrifying while resembling Little Lord Fauntleroy, the performance left me with a lot to puzzle over but very little to think about. Contrasted with Tom Wilkinson in “Michael Clayton,” whose operatic meltdown seemed to take the entirety of the capitalist system with it, or Philip Seymour Hoffman in “Charlie Wilson’s War,” whose angry, righteous diplomat crackled with every foreign policy absurdity, I’m not sure the win was deserved.

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SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Tilda Swinton: Yes

An incredible performance in an unusually strong category, Tilda Swinton’s interpretation of a corporate lawyer on the verge of emotional collapse in “Michael Clayton” was uncannily insightful. She performed the rare feat of making us empathize with perhaps the most unsympathetic character of the year, a craven corporate yes-woman and careerist so adrift that her conscience seemed to seep from her armpits and threaten to breach her control-top hose.