30 Days of Oscar: Day 15 - Paper Moon

Movie: Paper Moon

Year: 1974

Nominations: Best Supporting Actress (Tatum O'Neal), Best Supportin Actress (Madeline Kahn), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Sound

Wins/Snubs: At the time Tatum O'Neal was the youngest recipient at 10 years old.  She has a lot of dialogue for a young actor, and would probably win over most of the other young nominees throughout time.  

Moses Fry (Ryan O'Neal at his young and cutest) goes to a woman's funeral where the local people are trying to get the woman's 9-year-old daughter to Missouri, during the Depression.  He and the daughter, Addy (Tatum O'Neal) look quite similar and there's a chance Moses is Addy's father, and somehow gets saddled with her.  Fortunately, he likely is her father, they have the same streak for hustling and conning people.  Fry is a bible salesman (he reads the obituaries, goes to the widow's home and says her late husband bought a deluxe bible for her before he passed) and Addy manages to improve his con, sizing up the wealth of widows better than Fry himself. 
One day they go to a carnival, and Moze becomes obsessed with Miss Trixie Delight (Kahn) an "exotic dancer".  She joins the pair, along with her maid Imogene (P.J. Johnson), traveling around.  Trixie would love to have the now well-off Moze be her sugar daddy.  Of course, things in their relationship go south, with a LOT of help from Addy and Imogene conniving to get what they want.  

Tatum O'Neal is really terrific.  She's mouthy, brash, smokes, heaps attitude upon her father, and yet breaks your heart for a second when she thinks Moze is going to give her up for good.  She definitely deserved the Oscar.  Unfortunately, who knows how much making this movie and getting so big so young influenced the rest of her life.   And just like the first time I saw Sean Connery as James Bond, this was one of those experiences where an old man's voice I'm familiar with was coming out of a young, handsome guy - Ryan O'Neal was super cute.