The New York Film Critics Circle Honors TAR, Cate Blanchett, Colin Farrell, Ke Huy Quan, Keke Palmer, and S.S. Rajamouli!

Posted on December 2, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

And awards season is here!

Today, the New York Film Critics Circle announced their picks for the best of 2022! The NYFCC is one of the many critics groups that will be announcing their picks over the upcoming weeks. The NYFCC is considered to be one of the better precursors out there so a win is definitely a big deal. (Last year, for instance, the NYFCC started the movement that eventually led to Drive My Car picking up a Best Picture nomination.)

Here are the NYFCC winners for 2022:

Best Picture: TAR

Best Director: S. S. Rajamouli, RRR
Best Actress: Cate Blanchett, TAR
Best Actor: Colin Farrell, After Yang and The Banshees of Inisherin
Best Screenplay: Martin McDonagh, The Banshees of Inisherin
Best International Film: EO
Best Cinematography: Claudio Miranda, Top Gun: Maverick
Best Supporting Actress: Keke Palmer, Nope
Best Supporting Actor: Ke Huy Quan, Everything Everywhere All at Once
Best Non-Fiction Film: All the Beauty and the Bloodshed
Best Animated Feature: Marcel the Shell With Shoes On
Best First Film: Aftersun

SPECIAL AWARD 1: Jake Perlin, curator, distributor, publisher, in recognition of his indispensable contributions to film culture.

SPECIAL AWARD 2: dGenerate Films, For their invaluable work bringing independent films from China to a wider audience

SPECIAL AWARD 3: Jafar Panahi, for his dogged bravery as an artist, and for the humanity and beauty of a body of work created under the most oppressive circumstances.

The New York Film Critics Circle Honors First Cow

Posted on December 18, 2020 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Earlier today, the New York Film Critics Circle (NYFCC) announced their picks for the best of 2020!

And here they are:

Best Film
First Cow

Best Director
Chloé Zhao – Nomadland

Best Screenplay
Eliza Hittman – Never Rarely Sometimes Always

Best Actress
Sidney Flanigan – Never Rarely Sometimes Always

Best Actor
Delroy Lindo – Da 5 Bloods

Best Supporting Actress
Maria Bakalova – Borat Subsequent Moviefilm

Best Supporting Actor
Chadwick Boseman – Da 5 Bloods

Best Cinematography
Small Axe (All Films)

Best Animated Feature
Wolfwalkers

Best Non-Fiction Film
Time

Best Foreign Language Film
Bacurau

Best First Film
The Forty-Year-Old-Version

Special Awards
Kino Lorber, for their creation of Kino Marquee, a virtual cinema distribution service that was designed to help support movie theaters, not destroy them.
Spike Lee for inspiring the New York community with his short film “New York New York” and for advocating for a better society through cinema.

New York Film Critics Circle Honor The Irishman, Banderas, and Nyong’o!

Posted on December 4, 2019 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The New York Film Critics Circle just voted on and announced their picks for the best of 2019! (It took about four and a half hours, which is quick by NYFCC standards.) The Irishman winning Best Picture isn’t a shock but just check out some of the other winners! The Safdie Brothers for best director! Lupita Nyong’o and Antonio Banderas for best lead performances! Check out all the love given to international films!

Now, just because a critics group embraces a film or performance, that doesn’t mean the Oscars will do the same. (Last year, for instance, Regina Hall was deservedly named best actress but was snubbed by the Academy.) Still, these awards will keep these names in the conversation and both Banderas and Nyong’o — who, despite their acclaimed performances, have been overshadowed by Adams Driver and Sandler and Renee Zellweger — will probably see at least a little renewed interest as a result of these wins.

Here are the NYFCC winners!

Best Picture: The Irishman
Best Director: The Safdie Brothers for Uncut Gems
Best Screenplay: Quentin Tarantino for Once Upon A Time In Hollywood
Best Actress: Lupita Nyong’o in Us
Best Actor: Antonio Banderas in Pain & Glory
Best Supporting Actress: Laura Dern in Marriage Story and Little Women
Best Supporting Actor: Joe Pesci in The Irishman
Best Cinematography: Claire Mathon, Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Best Non-fiction Film: Tamara Kotevska, Ljubomir Stefanov, “Honeyland” (NEON)
Best Foreign Language Film: “Parasite” (South Korea)
Best Animated Feature: Jérémy Clapin, “I Lost My Body” (Netflix)
Best First Film: Mati Diop, “Atlantics”
Special Award For Career Achievement: Randy Newman
Special Award: Indie Collect

The New York Film Critics Circle Honors Roma, Hawke, and Hall!

Posted on November 29, 2018 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The New York Film Critics Circle announced their picks for the best of 2018 earlier today. The victories for Roma, Regina King, and Richard E. Grant are not surprising, as all three of them have been getting awards buzz for months.

Ethan Hawke’s victory for First Reformed is a bit more surprising because, even though his performance was widely acclaimed, I think a lot of people assumed that First Reformed came out too early in the year to be an awards contender. (That’s proving to not be the case, which is a good thing because Hawke’s performance definitely deserves consideration.)

The biggest surprise was Regina Hall’s victory for Support the Girls, a film that I haven’t seen yet, Is this going to lead to Oscar glory or is this going to be one of those fluke awards that occasionally happens during awards season? Time will tell but it’s unexpected awards like this that make me love this time of year.

(And yes, I will be watching Support the Girls as soon as I can. That’s another good thing about awards season. It can inspire you to take a chance on movies that you might otherwise have missed.)

BEST PICTURE: “Roma” (Netflix)
BEST DIRECTOR: Alfonso Cuaron, “Roma” (Netflix)
BEST ACTOR: Ethan Hawke, “First Reformed” (A24)
BEST ACTRESS: Regina Hall, “Support the Girls” (Magnolia Pictures)
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: Richard E. Grant, “Can You Ever Forgive Me?” (Fox Searchlight Pictures)
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Regina King, “If Beale Street Could Talk” (Annapurna Pictures)
BEST SCREENPLAY: “First Reformed” by Paul Schrader (A24)
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY: Alfonso Cuaron, “Roma” (Netflix)
BEST ANIMATED FILM: “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” by Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman (Sony Pictures Animation)
BEST NON-FICTION AWARD: “Minding the Gap” by Bing Liu (Hulu)
BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM: “Cold War” by Pawel Pawlikowski – Poland (Amazon Studios)
BEST FIRST FILM: Bo Burnham, “Eighth Grade” (A24)
SPECIAL AWARD: David Schwartz, stepping down as Chief Film Curator at Museum of the Moving Image after 33 years AND Kino Classics Box Set “Pioneers: First Women Filmmakers”

The New York Film Critics Circle Embraces Lady Bird

Posted on November 30, 2017 by Lisa Marie Bowman

On Thursday, the New York Film Critics Circle announced their picks for the best of 2017! For best picture, they selected Lady Bird. If nothing else, that’s a relief to those of us who were scared the entire precursor season would be dominated by The Post.

Here are the winners:

Best Film – “Lady Bird”
Best Director – Sean Baker, “The Florida Project”
Best Actor – Timothee Chalamet, “Call Me by Your Name”
Best Actress – Saoirse Ronan, “Lady Bird”
Best Supporting Actor – Willem Dafoe, “The Florida Project”
Best Supporting Actress – Tiffany Haddish, “Girls Trip”
Best Screenplay – Paul Thomas Anderson, “Phantom Thread”
Best Animated Feature – “Coco”
Best Non-Fiction Film – “Faces Places”
Best Foreign Language Film – “BPM (Beats Per Minute)”
Best Cinematography – Rachel Morrison, “Mudbound”
Best First Film – Jordan Peele, “Get Out”
Special Achievement Award – Molly Haskell

La La Land, Moonlight, and Manchester By The Sea Wins With The New York Film Critics Circle

Posted on December 1, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The New York Film Critics Circle met today and announced their picks for the best of 2016! The awards were pretty evenly divided between the three films that are rapidly emerging as the early Oscar front runners — Manchester By The Sea, Moonlight, and La La Land!

Here are the winners!

BEST FILM: “La La Land”
BEST DIRECTOR: Barry Jenkins for “Moonlight”
BEST ACTRESS: Isabelle Huppert for both “Elle” and “The Things to Come”
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Michelle Williams for both “Manchester by the Sea” and “Certain Women”
BEST FIRST FILM: (TIE) “The Edge of Seventeen” and “Krisha”
BEST SCREENPLAY: Kenneth Lonergan for “Manchester by the Sea”
BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM: “Toni Erdmann”
BEST ANIMATED FILM: “Zootopia”
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR – Mahershala Ali for “Moonlight”
BEST ACTOR – Casey Affleck for “Manchester by the Sea”
SPECIAL AWARDS: One for editor Thelma Schoonmaker, the other for Julie Dash’s “Daughters of the Dust” 25th Anniversary Restoration

Carol Wins In New York!

Posted on December 2, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Earlier today, the New York Film Critics Circle announced their picks for the best films and performer of the year! And the big winner was … Carol!

Best Picture
Carol

Best Director
Todd Haynes, Carol

Best Screenplay
Carol

Best Actor
Michael Keaton, Spotlight

Best Actress
Saoirse Ronan, Brooklyn

Best Supporting Actor
Mark Rylance, Bridge of Spies

Best Supporting Actress
Kristen Stewart, Clouds of Sils Maria

Best Animated Film
Inside Out

Best Foreign Film
Timbuktu

Best Non-Fiction Film
In Jackson Heights

Best Cinematographer
Ed Lachman, Carol

Best First Film
Son of Saul

SPECIAL AWARD #1: Posthumous Award honoring the legacy of William Becker and Janus Films

SPECIAL AWARD #2: Ennio Morricone, Composer

Here Are The New York Film Critics’ Circle Winners!

Posted on December 1, 2014 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Oscar season is upon us! December is the time of month when critics across the nation attempt to influence the Oscar race by announcing their picks for the best of 2014!

Up first, the New York Film Critics’ Circle! They announced their picks earlier today and, while no one is surprised to see Boyhood take best picture, a lot of observers (including me) were surprised for the awards for Timothy Spall and Marion Cotillard. Spall, of course, had been an early contender for his performance in Mr. Turner but, as of late, he had been overshadowed by Michael Keaton and others. As for Cotillard, she was on hardly anyone’s radar. It’ll be interesting to see if her win here is a fluke or if it’s the start of a successful nomination campaign.

Here are the winners!

BEST PICTURE
“Boyhood”

BEST DIRECTOR
Richard Linklater, “Boyhood”

BEST ACTOR
Timothy Spall, “Mr. Turner”

BEST ACTRESS
Marion Cotillard, “The Immigrant” and “Two Days, One Night”

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
J.K. Simmons, “Whiplash”

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Patricia Arquette, “Boyhood”

BEST SCREENPLAY
“The Grand Budapest Hotel”

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Darius Khondji, “The Immigrant”

BEST ANIMATED FILM
“The Lego Movie”

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
“Ida” (Poland)

BEST NON-FICTION FEATURE
“CitizenFour”

BEST FIRST FEATURE
Jennifer Kent, “The Babadook”

SPECIAL AWARD
Adrienne Mancia

The New York Film Critics Circle Has Spoken

Posted on December 4, 2012 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Yesterday, the New York Film Critics Circle weighed in on the Oscar race. The NYFCC is one of the oldest and most respected of the professional critic organizations. As far as the state of the Oscar race is concerned, the NYFCC actually wields some influence. In other words, the NYFCC help to build the bandwagon that all the other little toadsuckers will eventually jump on.

Here are the winners:

Best Picture: Zero Dark Thirty

Best Director: Kathryn Bigelow, Zero Dark Thirty

Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis, Lincoln

Best Actress: Rachel Weisz, The Deep Blue Sea

Best Supporting Actor: Matthew McConaughey, Bernie and Magic Mike

Best Supporting Actress: Sally Field, Lincoln

Best Screenplay: Tony Kushner for Lincoln

Best Cinematography: Greg Fraiser, Zero Dark Thirty

Best Foreign Language Film: Amour

Best Animated Film: Frankenweenie

Best Documentary: The Central Park Five

On a personal note, I apologize for the delay in getting these results posted to the site. However, last night, I was pretty busy teaching my very first dance class. Yay me!

Who the Hell Are These People?

Posted on December 13, 2010 by Lisa Marie Bowman

With the Golden Globe nominations set to be announced on Tuesday, I figured now would be a good time to recap which films and performances have already been honored by the various critics groups.

One thing that I discovered as I researched this is that there are a lot of critics groups out there! I don’t know who half these people are and most of them probably won’t have any bearing at all on who is actually nominated come Oscar time. But since I’m a lover of trivia and lists, there you go.

The following films and performances were honored by either The National Board of Review, the D.C. Film Critics, the Boston Society of Film Critics, The New York Film Critics Online,The Los Angeles Film Critics, The Indiana Film Journalists, The Southeastern Film Critics, The New York Film Critics Circle, or the San Francisco Film Critics.

Best Picture:

The Social Network (All. That’s right, it’s a clean sweep for an above average film.)

Best Director:

Darren Aronofsky for Black Swan (S.F)

Olivier Assayas for Carlos (LAFC)

David Fincher for The Social Network (BSFC, DC, NBR, NYFCC, NYFCO, SEFC, S.F.)

Christopher Nolan for Inception (IFJ)

Best Actor:

Jesse Eisenberg (BSFC, NBR)

Colin Firth for The King’s Speech (DC, LAFC, NYFCC, SEFC, S.F.)

James Franco for 127 Hours (IFJ, NYFCO)

Best Actress: