‘Roma’ named best picture of the year by the Los Angeles Film Critics Assn.
The Los Angeles Film Critics Assn. announced its 2018 winners for the best in film Sunday with top honors going to Alfonso Cuarón’s “Roma.”
The black-and-white film, about a middle-class Mexican family and its live-in nanny, took home the award for best picture and best cinematography. Cuarón, who served as cinematographer as well as director, was also awarded runner-up recognition for directing the film and for editing with Adam Gough.
Barry Jenkins’ “If Beale Street Could Talk” was also shown love at the annual deliberations, taking home awards for supporting actress (Regina King) and best score, as well as recognition as runner-up for cinematography. (Elizabeth Debicki was runner-up as supporting actress for “Widows.”)
An adaptation of James Baldwin’s novel of the same name, “Beale Street” is expected to have legs well into awards season with three Golden Globes nominations including screenplay, supporting actress for King and drama picture.
The lead actor award went to Ethan Hawke for his performance as a pastor who spirals out of control in “First Reformed.” Hawke also won a New York Film Critics Circle Award for the role. Ben Foster was runner-up for “Leave No Trace.”
After some debate on whether to include her in the lead or supporting actress categories, Olivia Colman took lead actress for “The Favourite.” Toni Collette was runner-up for “Hereditary.”
“Leave No Trace” director Debra Granik beat out Cuarón for the director award. Granik is only the third woman to win for director after Kathryn Bigelow won for “The Hurt Locker” in 2009 and Jane Campion won for “The Piano” in 1993. The award follows criticism aimed at the Golden Globes for failing to nominate a single female director.
Supporting actor went to Steven Yeun for his role as a morally ambiguous Gatsby-type in Lee Chang-dong’s “Burning,” which also tied with Hirokazu Kore-eda’s “Shoplifters” for best foreign film and took home runner-up honors for best picture. Hugh Grant was declared runner-up in supporting actor for “Paddington 2.”
Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty won the screenplay award for “Can You Ever Forgive Me?” while Deborah Davis and Tony McNamara were runners-up for “The Favourite.”
The animation winner was Sony’s “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” with Disney’s “Incredibles 2” runner-up.
Hannah Beachler won for production design for her work on “Black Panther” with Fiona Crombie runner-up for her work on “The Favourite.”
James Laxton was runner-up to Cuarón for his cinematography work on “If Beale Street Could Talk.”
Joshua Altman and Bing Lu took the award for editing on “Minding the Gap.”
Nicolas Brittell took the award for music for the score of “If Beale Street Could Talk.” Justin Hurwitz was named runner-up for “First Man.”
Sandi Tan’s “Shirkers” won for documentary/nonfiction film with “Minding the Gap” runner-up. The latter film took home the statue at NYFCC, with both critics’ groups choosing smaller films over the year’s larger documentary hits “RBG,” “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” “Three Identical Strangers” and “Free Solo.”
The Douglas Edwards Experimental Film Award was given to Evan Johnson, Galen Johnson and Guy Maddin’s “The Green Fog.” Chloé Zhao, director of “The Rider,” won the group’s New Generation award.
Awards will be distributed during a ceremony Jan. 12. Japanese filmmaker and animator Hayao Miyazaki, co-founder of Studio Ghibli and the artist behind films such as “Howl’s Moving Castle” and “My Neighbor Totoro,” will be honored with the career achievement award.
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