As promised yesterday, here are the winners of the annual Florida Film Critics Circle Awards. This writer became chair of the group this year, and this still image from The Favourite can’t represent better how self-important these results make some of us feel. If you are following awards season and other critics groups and such organizations, you will note that the much hyped Roma only got one award from us. These aren’t your run-of-the-mill awards winners.
The results are quirky for our diverse group, which is spread across a huge state and whose active members have diminished with end of full-time film criticism at most of the state’s major publications. I would have loved to have seen all my choices win, of course, but to see all the films and people I chose as final picks appear on the final list, including runners up, is something beyond good fortune. Below you will find a complete list of the winners. I’ve noted my choices in parenthesis. there are a few among the runners up.
Before you check out the list, let me make a special mention about our Golden Orange winner. “Agua Viva,” by Alexa Lim Haas, a short film I chose to highlight in my selection of the Best of Borscht, last year (Borscht is Dead: the short films, part 2). My colleague at the FFCC and the Miami New Times, Juan Barquin, brought up how the short was missing from some sort of shortlist or other (The Oscars?). So I figured why don’t we give Haas our prestigious Florida award, The Golden Orange. I lobbied other critics for a vote and all but one agreed. You can watch the full short at the end of the post.
BEST PICTURE
The Favourite
Runners-up: No clear runner-up
BEST ACTOR
Joaquin Phoenix – You Were Never Really Here
Runners-up: No clear runner-up
BEST ACTRESS
Melissa McCarthy – Can You Ever Forgive Me?
Runner-up: Toni Collette – Hereditary
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Steven Yeun – Burning
Runner-up: Richard E. Grant – Can You Ever Forgive Me?
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Sakura Ando – Shoplifters
Runner-up: Claire Foy – First Man
BEST ENSEMBLE
The Favourite
Runner-up: Support the Girls (my choice)
BEST DIRECTOR
Alfonso Cuarón – Roma
Runner-up: Lynne Ramsay – You Were Never Really Here (my choice)
BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Boots Riley – Sorry to Bother You
Runner-up: Bo Burnham – Eighth Grade
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Nicole Holofcener, Jeff Whitty – Can You Ever Forgive Me?
Runner-up: Barry Jenkins – If Beale Street Could Talk
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Łukasz Żal – Cold War
Runner-up: Alfonso Cuarón – Roma
BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Annihilation
Runner-up: Avengers: Infinity War
BEST ART DIRECTION/PRODUCTION DESIGN
The Favourite
Runner-up: Paddington 2
BEST SCORE
Justin Hurwitz – First Man
Runner-up: Nicholas Britell – If Beale Street Could Talk (my choice)
BEST DOCUMENTARY
Shirkers
Runners-up: No clear runner-up
BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
Shoplifters
Runner-up: Roma
BEST ANIMATED FILM
Mirai
Runner-up: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse (my choice)
BEST FIRST FILM
Eighth Grade – Bo Burnham
Runners-up: No clear runner-up
BREAKOUT AWARD
Elsie Fisher – Eighth Grade
Runner-up: Thomasin McKenzie – Leave No Trace (my choice)
GOLDEN ORANGE
