Re: Boston Critics Awards
Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2017 6:50 pm
In addition to Boston, a number of second- and third-tier groups (Toronto, San Francisco, Philadelphia, NY Online) made choices today. Some observations based on the totality of them:
Best film awards so far have been given to The Post, Lady Bird, Call Me by Your Name, Get Out, The Florida Project, Mudbound and Phantom Thread. The Florida Project actually leads, with 3 1/2 wins (the 1/2 a tie from the online claque) -- this a film that has sputtered to a less-than-$5 million gross so far. I can easily imagine something NOT in that group -- Dunkirk or The Shape of Water -- winning best drama at the Globes. Sadly, I think our early hopes for Three Billboards might have gone awry -- the film possibly needed a different kind of year to pull ahead. But since my overall conclusion is, best picture is a wild muddle, it may be safer to never say never.
Best director is about the same/in sync. Eight different directors have won prizes to date. Wide-open season.
Best actor has similarly gone bonkers -- I'd expected the regional critics to be part of the fall-in-line for Oldman, but only DC and the online folk have so far acquiesced. Chalamet's haul is limited to the two prestige spots (NY & LA), but other places have chosen Daniel Day-Lewis, Daniel Kaluuya, James Franco, and San Francisco went to the extent of honoring Andy Serkis! This could all in the end be good for Oldman, as opposition splinters. But it sure underlines the idea that he exists more as some platonic ideal of an Oscar winner more than as a popular choice.
Best actress is also split, but this makes sense, given the rich offerings on display. All five of the actresses many have as the likely slate have won prizes somewhere. Sally Hawkins and Frances McDormand have won the most (three each), but Hawkins' haul includes prime LA & sorta-prime Boston, where McDormand's are all second-tier. There have been other years where an actress race has looked wide-open and narrowed suddenly, and that can always happen if the TV three make a uniform call (as they did with Brie Larson). But, for the moment, this looks like a really fun race.
Supporting actor is the only place where the critics have to date completely extracted the fun from the race, as Willem Dafoe has won 8 of 10 prizes given so far (the other two, from minor groups, were split between Rockwell and Harrelson for Three Billboards). I'm dumbfounded by this, but maybe it's something like 1994, when the critics lined up for the similarly box-office-challenged Martin Landau in Ed Wood, despite what should have been strong competition from Samuel L. Jackson in Pulp Fiction and John Turturro in Quiz Show. (My first thought was, of course Landau had been around much longer -- but then I realized Dafoe's first nomination was 31 years ago, so, no, he's just as grizzled a veteran at this point.) The TV awards can still change this trajectory -- Florida Project is such a wee thing, and may be more a critics' movie -- but, for the moment, this category looks like it could lock in.
A number of critics' groups have tried the same for Laurie Metcalf, but Janney has managed at least a few of the lesser-tier, and the TV awards could be prime territory for her (people who are used to voting for her for The West Wing). That race remains alive for now.
Get Out is doing surprisingly well in the screenplay slot, with Lady Bird maybe its strongest competition. Three Billboards has been disappointingly absent in critics' voting, and it may be the racial and gender issues raised by the other two are trumping Billboards' less direct appeal. In any event, this is at least a two-film race, and it could always expand as we go on.
Best film awards so far have been given to The Post, Lady Bird, Call Me by Your Name, Get Out, The Florida Project, Mudbound and Phantom Thread. The Florida Project actually leads, with 3 1/2 wins (the 1/2 a tie from the online claque) -- this a film that has sputtered to a less-than-$5 million gross so far. I can easily imagine something NOT in that group -- Dunkirk or The Shape of Water -- winning best drama at the Globes. Sadly, I think our early hopes for Three Billboards might have gone awry -- the film possibly needed a different kind of year to pull ahead. But since my overall conclusion is, best picture is a wild muddle, it may be safer to never say never.
Best director is about the same/in sync. Eight different directors have won prizes to date. Wide-open season.
Best actor has similarly gone bonkers -- I'd expected the regional critics to be part of the fall-in-line for Oldman, but only DC and the online folk have so far acquiesced. Chalamet's haul is limited to the two prestige spots (NY & LA), but other places have chosen Daniel Day-Lewis, Daniel Kaluuya, James Franco, and San Francisco went to the extent of honoring Andy Serkis! This could all in the end be good for Oldman, as opposition splinters. But it sure underlines the idea that he exists more as some platonic ideal of an Oscar winner more than as a popular choice.
Best actress is also split, but this makes sense, given the rich offerings on display. All five of the actresses many have as the likely slate have won prizes somewhere. Sally Hawkins and Frances McDormand have won the most (three each), but Hawkins' haul includes prime LA & sorta-prime Boston, where McDormand's are all second-tier. There have been other years where an actress race has looked wide-open and narrowed suddenly, and that can always happen if the TV three make a uniform call (as they did with Brie Larson). But, for the moment, this looks like a really fun race.
Supporting actor is the only place where the critics have to date completely extracted the fun from the race, as Willem Dafoe has won 8 of 10 prizes given so far (the other two, from minor groups, were split between Rockwell and Harrelson for Three Billboards). I'm dumbfounded by this, but maybe it's something like 1994, when the critics lined up for the similarly box-office-challenged Martin Landau in Ed Wood, despite what should have been strong competition from Samuel L. Jackson in Pulp Fiction and John Turturro in Quiz Show. (My first thought was, of course Landau had been around much longer -- but then I realized Dafoe's first nomination was 31 years ago, so, no, he's just as grizzled a veteran at this point.) The TV awards can still change this trajectory -- Florida Project is such a wee thing, and may be more a critics' movie -- but, for the moment, this category looks like it could lock in.
A number of critics' groups have tried the same for Laurie Metcalf, but Janney has managed at least a few of the lesser-tier, and the TV awards could be prime territory for her (people who are used to voting for her for The West Wing). That race remains alive for now.
Get Out is doing surprisingly well in the screenplay slot, with Lady Bird maybe its strongest competition. Three Billboards has been disappointingly absent in critics' voting, and it may be the racial and gender issues raised by the other two are trumping Billboards' less direct appeal. In any event, this is at least a two-film race, and it could always expand as we go on.