The Greater Western New York Film Critics Association’s announced the nominations for the third annual end-of-year Film Awards. Leading the 2020 nominations are Sound of Metal (8 nominations), Nomadland (6 nominations), and Mank, Minari, Never Rarely Sometimes Always, and The Father (5 nominations each).
The Florida Film Critics Circle awarded its 2020 Best Picture prize to First Cow, Kelly Reichardt’s adaptation of Jonathan Raymond’s The Half Life. Los Fuertes, the Chilean drama about young men in love, won the Best Foreign Film category; and You Don’t Nomi, about the filming of the 1995 camp classic Showgirls, won Best Documentary.
“Nomadland” took top honors at the 2020 Indiana Film Journalists Association awards, winning four prizes including Best Picture, Best Actress for Frances McDormand and Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Director for Chloé Zhao.
The Chicago Film Critics Association (CFCA) announced their 2020 award winners with the top honors going to Chloé Zhao’s Nomadland, which earned a leading five wins: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress (Frances McDormand), Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Cinematography (Joshua James Richards). Never Rarely Sometimes Always earned two awards (Best Original Screenplay, Eliza Hittman; Most Promising Performer, Sidney Flanigan), while the rest of the Association’s honors were awarded to a diverse mix of the year’s best films.
Following the rejection of their first submission, 14 Days 12 Nights by director Jean-Philippe Duval, to will now represent Canada in the race for Best International Feature Film at the 93rd Academy Awards ceremony, taking place on April 25, 2021.
The Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA) today named “Small Axe” Steve McQueen’s anthology series, as Best Picture of the Year. Small Axe is an anthology series comprised of five original films set from the late 1960s to the mid 1980s that tell personal stories from London’s West Indian community, whose lives have been shaped by their own force of will despite rampant racism and discrimination. The title is derived from the African proverb, “If you are the big tree, we are the small axe.”
Funny Boy, by cowriter-director Deepa Mehta, originally submitted by Canada as the country’s entry for Best International Feature Film at 2021 Oscars, has been rejected because the film does not meet the Academy’s eligibility requirements for the International Feature Film category due to the amount of English dialogue in the film. The Academy mandates that a film cannot contain more than 50% English to be eligible. The film will now be submitted for consideration in the Best Picture and general entry categories for the 93rd Academy Awards®.
The New York Film Critics Circle on Friday announced the annual award winners with Kelly Reichardt’s First Cow receiving the honor of Best Film of 2020. The film is based on the novel “The Half Life” by Jonathan Raymond, and stars John Magaro as a cook who joins a group of fur trappers in the Oregon Territory. The cook befriends a Chinese immigrant (Orion Lee) and the two collaborate on a successful business, although its longevity is reliant upon the participation of a nearby wealthy landowner’s prized milking cow. First Cow also stars Alia Shawkat, Scott Shepherd, Toby Jones, and Ewen Bremner.
Ammonite, Francis Lee’s remarkable historical drama starring Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan, is the 2020 recipient of the SFFILM Sloan Science in Cinema Prize, an award that celebrates the compelling depiction of scientific themes or characters in a narrative feature film. Presented through a partnership between SFFILM and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, this annual award carries a $25,000 cash prize and shines a light on special achievement in rendering the worlds of science and technology through the language of film with a screening event and conversation with the film’s creators and experts in the scientific fields being depicted.
Former President Barack Obama revealed his favorite movies of 2020 which include Nomadland, Bacurau, Boys State, Martin Eden and, Crip Camp, the documentary produced by the Obamas’ company Higher Ground.
The Chicago Film Critics Association (CFCA) announced the nominees for their top film honors of 2020 with Chloé Zhao’s Nomadland leading the field with seven total nominations. Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods, Kelly Reichardt’s First Cow and Charlie Kaufman’s I’m Thinking of Ending Things each earned six nominations, while Mank and Promising Young Woman are each recognized with five. Chadwick Boseman posthumously earns dual acting nominations for Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and Da 5 Bloods.
