by Nathaniel R
Big awards day, huh?!
Spike Lee's latest joint Da 5 Bloods has won both Best Film and Best Director (as well as Best Ensemble) from the National Board of Review. We must quickly point out that this does not mean that Chloe Zhao's remarkable critics-award complete sweep is broken. As I always have to remind everyone each year -- even those who should know better -- the NBR is not a "critics award". The National Board of Review, founded in 1909, is an anonymous collection of film enthusiasts, industry professionals, academics, students, and presumably a few critics though they never release the names of their organization. So they would be more accurately called an "industry honor" or a "juried prize" rather than lumped in with the 'what do film critics like?' discussion.
Minari and Sound of Metal were the only other films with multiple prizes. The NBR wins and top ten lists AND LOADS OF TRIVIA/STATS are after the jump...
Best Film: DA 5 BLOODS
This is the first time the NBR has ever chosen a film directed by a black person to win their top prize. 27 of the past 30 winners of this prize have gone on to Best Picture nominations. The exceptions were Quills, Gods and Monsters, and A Most Violent Year
Best Director: Spike Lee, DA 5 BLOODS
The NBR almost never chooses someone who isn't firmly in the Oscar conversation for this prize. But, here's the catch and it's interesting: they often choose people for this category who seem like they're going to get an Oscar nomination and who we remember having been nominated, but actually weren't! Recently that's happened to Ridley Scott for The martian, Clint Eastwood for American Sniper and Invictus, Bradley Cooper for A Star is Born, Kathryn Bigelow for Zero Dark Thirty, Ang Lee for Sense & Sensibility, Todd Field for In the Bedroom... and so on. So if you're superstitious this might not be a great omen for Spike. 15 of the last 30 winners have gone on to Oscar nominations (...but, to reiterate, about 25 of them looked like they were going to!)
Best Actor: Riz Ahmed, SOUND OF METAL
This is the third time an actor of Asian descent has won this prize. The previous examples were Ben Kingsley (Gandhi, 1982) and Victor Banerjee (A Passage to India, 1984) -- one went on to win the Oscar and the other was not nominated. 24 of the last 30 winners of this category have gone on to Oscar nominations. The most recent person to miss the Oscar nom after this prize was just last year when Adam Sandler won for Uncut Gems.
Best Actress: Carey Mulligan, PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN
This Carey Mulligan's second NBR win for Best Actress. She also won for An Education (2009). 25 of the last 30 winners of this category have gone on to Oscar nominations. The most recent people to miss Oscar nominations after landing this prize were Amy Adams in Arrival and Emma Thompson in Saving Mr Banks.
Best Supporting Actor: Paul Raci, SOUND OF METAL
An unusual pick for the NBR which almost always picks a famous actor for this prize. 26 of the last 30 winners of this category have gone on to Oscar nominations, although one of them (Anthony Hopkins) was promoted to lead for his Oscar nomination.
Best Supporting Actress: Youn Yuh-jung, MINARI
The NBR often steps outside of Oscar safety zone for this prize, but this choice is very not like them. Consider: unless you count Penelope Cruz's bilingual performance in Vicky Cristina Barcelona the only other time they went there was back in 1984 with Sabine Azéma's work in Bertrand Tavernier's A Sunday in the Country. So this win a big deal for Young. Yayyyy. 16 out of the last 30 winners of this category have gone on to Oscar nominations. The most recent person to miss an Oscar nom after landing this prize was Jessica Chastain in A Most Violent Year.
Best Adapted Screenplay: Paul Greengrass & Luke Davies, NEWS OF THE WORLD
Nice get for this film which hasn't been getting much attention but still has Oscar dreams.
Best Original Screenplay: Lee Isaac Chung, MINARI
Yay!
Breakthrough Performance: Sidney Flanigan, NEVER RARELY SOMETIMES ALWAYS
Flanigan still cleaning up. If this were a normal season with all the red carpet opportunities she would surely be a bigger threat to the televised awards shows since her profile would have risen a lot.
Best Directorial Debut: Channing Godfrey Peoples, MISS JUNETEENTH
Nice get for this film and Peoples which, apart from Nicole Beharie's leading performance, hasn't been talked about a lot.
Best Animated Feature: SOUL
Best Foreign Language Film: LA LLORONA (Guatemala)
Best Documentary: TIME
NBR Icon Award: Chadwick Boseman
NBR Freedom of Expression Award: ONE NIGHT IN MIAMI
NBR Spotlight Award: Radha Blank for writing, directing, producing and starring in THE FORTY-YEAR-OLD VERSION
The Spotlight Award is something they don't give out every year and it isn't necessarily for a multi-hyphenate work. The last time I recall them giving this out was to Gal Gadot and Patty Jenkins for Wonder Woman (2017)
Best Ensemble: DA 5 BLOODS
Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography: Joshua James Richards, NOMADLAND
Top Films (in alphabetical order):
Judas and the Black Messiah
It's always a bit weird that they do this as the "winner" is its own separate thing so really it's a top 11.
Top 5 Foreign Language Films (in alphabetical order):
Apples (Greece)
Collective (Romania)
Dear Comrades (Russia)
The Mole Agent (Chile)
Night of the Kings (Ivory Coast)
It's always a bit weird that they do this as the "winner" is its own separate thing so really it's a top six.
Top 5 Documentaries (in alphabetical order):
All In: The Fight for Democracy
The Truffle Hunters
It's always a bit weird that they do this as the "winner" is its own separate thing so really it's a top six.
Top 10 Independent Films (in alphabetical order):
Driveways
The Outpost