This year’s Critics’ Choice winners

The Broadcast Film Critics Association Sunday announced the winners of the 24th annual Critics’ Choice awards. Roma led the field with four awards. Black Panther and Vice followed, each winning three awards. As a member of the BFCA, I posted the Association’s nominees and now offer a list of the winners, including a surprise tie in the best-actress category (Glenn Close and Lady Gaga). This year's list also inlcudes a couple of anomalies: Roma won as both best foreign-language film and best picture and Christian Bale took double honors for playing Dick Cheney in Vice, winning in the best actor and best-actor-in-a-comedy categories.

The Broadcast Film Critics Association (BFCA), of which I’m a member, is the largest film critics organization in the US and Canada, representing more than 330 television, radio and online critics.

If you’re interested in Oscar prognostications, I think you’ll find that the BFCA is a better bellwether than most other year-end honors.

So here’s the list of BFCA winners:

Best Picture
Roma
Best Actor
Christian Bale, Vice
Best Actress, a tie
Glenn Close, The Wife
Lady Gaga, A Star Is Born
Best Supporting Actor
Mahershala Ali, Green Book
Best Supporting Actress
Regina King, If Beale Street Could Talk
Best Director
Alfonso Cuaron, Roma
Best Original Screenplay
Paul Schrader, First Reformed
Best Adapted Screenplay
Barry Jenkins, If Beale Street Could Talk
Best Cinematography
Alfonso Cuaron, Roma
Best Production Design
Hanna Beachler, Jay Hart, Black Panther
Best Editing
Tom Cross, First Man
Best Costume Design
Ruth Carter, Black Panther
Best Hair and Makeup
Vice
Best Visual Effects
Black Panther
Best Animated Feature
Spider-Man: Into he Spider-Verse
Best Foreign Language Film
Roma
Best Young Actor/Actress
Elsie Fisher, Eighth Grade
Best Acting Ensemble
The Favourite
Best Action Movie
Mission Impossible: Fallout
Best Comedy
Crazy Rich Asians
Best Actor in a Comedy
Christian Bale, Vice
Best Actress in a Comedy
Olivia Colman, The Favourite
Best Sci-fi or Horror movie
A Quiet Place
Best Song
Shallow, A Star is Born
Best Score
Justin Hurwitz, First Man

And while we're on the subject of year-end awards, let me give you the results of voting for the Denver Film Critics Society, a group to which I also belong. Some of the winners mirror those of the BFCA, some don't. Oscar nominations, due on Jan. 22, loom.
As always, feel free to join in with your choices.

Best Picture: Roma
Best Director: Alfonso Cuaron, Roma
Best Actor: Ethan Hawke, First Reformed
Best Actress: Olivia Colman, The Favourite
Best Supporting Actor: Mahershala Ali, Green Book
Best Supporting Actress: Rachel Weisz, The Favourite
Best Sci-Fi/Horror, a tie: A Quiet Place and Annihilation
Best Animated Film: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
Best Comedy: The Death of Stalin
Best Visual Effects: Avengers: Infinity War
Best Original Screenplay: A Quiet Place
Best Adapted Screenplay: BlacKkKlansman
Best Documentary: Won't You Be My Neighbor?
Best Original Song: Swallow
Best Original Score: Black Panther
Best Foreign Language Film: Roma

More from the awards front

You watched the Golden Globes? If so, you saw The Hollywood Foreign Press Association spread its love across a broad range of films. It named 12 Years a Slave as the year's best movie, while failing to recognize it in any other major category. Funny how some movies write and direct themselves.

Fortunately, the actual awards tend to be the least interesting part of the Globes, which are best known for their party atmosphere and as an opportunity for Tweeters everywhere (myself included) to indulge their inner snark monsters.

Oh come on, what the hell else are the Globes for?

This year's Globes didn't fail us: Tweeters and bloggers were given a steady supply of fertile material:

-- Jacqueline Bisset won an award for her work in the BBC drama Dancing on the Edge, and then proceeded to show why she needs someone to write her lines.

Diane Keaton ended her tribute to Woody Allen with a song that sounded as if it might have been more at home in Mr. Rogers Neighborhood than at the Golden Globes.

-- Leonardo DiCaprio won an award for his acting in Wolf of Wall Street, but seemed to puzzle about finding himself in the category, "Best actor in a motion picture, musical or comedy." (I can hardly wait for the right creative team to bring Wolf of Wall Street, the musical, to Broadway.)

-- Bono reminded us that he has a social conscience -- just in case we'd forgotten. (U2's Ordinary Love from Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom won best song.)

-- Emma Thompson (bless her) held on to her martini glass but threw away her Louboutins, which somehow struck me as an apt metaphor for the entire evening. (And, yes, I needed someone to inform me about the kind of shoes Thompson was wearing.)

As the winners made ridiculously long walks to the stage, you may have wondered why the nominees weren't seated in the same building as the awards ceremonies.

Enough snark. I'm already over the Globes.

If you care, you'll find a complete list of Golden Globe winners at the Hollywood Reporter web site.

But I digress.

The reason for this post has less to do with the Globes than with the Denver Film Critics Society, which has announced its winners. I vote in this election, and present the winners here, just in case you haven't had enough awards, 10-best lists or year-end encomiums.

By the way, the Broadcast Film Critics Association's Critics Choice Awards telecast airs on the CW network at 8:00 PM Eastern Time (check local listings) this Thursday, Jan. 16. I vote in that election, too.

The Oscars? Remember them? Nominations for the 2014 Academy Awards will be announced Thursday, Jan. 16.

Now for the DFCS winners:

Best picture: Gravity
Best director: Alfonso Cuaron, Gravity
Best actor: Matthew McConaughey, Dallas Buyers Club
Best actress: Cate Blanchett, Blue Jasmine
Best supporting actor: Jared Leto, Dallas Buyers Club
Best supporting actress: Jennifer Lawrence, American Hustle
Best animated film: Frozen
Best sci-fi/horror film: Gravity
Best comedy: This Is the End
Best original screenplay: David O. Russell and Eric Singer, American Hustle
Best adapted screenplay: Terence Winter, The Wolf of Wall Street
Best documentary: The Act of Killing
Best song: Let It Go, Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez, Frozen
Best score: Gravity, Steven Price
Best foreign-language film: The Grandmaster