Boyhood won four awards – including best picture, actress and director – from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association today. The Grand Budapest Hotel and Polish film Ida each won two more, though the critics group sprinkled the rest of its awards widely in a day-long selection process that included such surprises as Tom Hardy winning best actor for Locke and Ida’s Agata Kulesza winning best supporting actress.
“Originality was honored in this year’s awards from LAFCA, with several prizes going to Richard Linklater’s twelve years-in-the-making Boyhood, and other important awards for the imaginative Grand Budapest Hotel, the groundbreaking cinematography of Birdman, and the tour de force performance by Tom Hardy in Locke,” said Stephen Farber, the association’s president. “Our group again honored a range of films from around the world and an impressive array of emerging and veteran talents.”
Patricia Arquette of Boyhood won best actress over Julianne Moore‘s much-touted Still Alice performance. Boyhood writer/director Richard Linklater took the director prize over Budapest’s Wes Anderson, who won for best screenplay. Linklater famously shot the film a few days at a time over 12 years, following the maturation in real time of Ellar Coltrane, a 5-year-old boy, as he grew into adulthood.
The New Generation winner was Ava DuVernay, the former publicist turned director who made Selma. The organization previously announced that it would honor actress Gena Rowlands with its 2014 Career Achievement Award.
LAFCA’s year-end list is among the earliest of the awards season, following by a few days the National Board of Review and the critics in New York. The Boston Society of Film Critics earlier today also heaped plenty of love on Boyhood, giving it best picture, director and three other awards.
Birdman only received one one award from the L.A. critics group, for Oscar winner Emmanuel Lubezki‘s cinematography, but it has been a frequent winner in other early announcements, winning four awards from the Boston critics, for instance.
Here’s the complete list of winners and runners up:
And below if the entire live blog from during the selection process:
Sandra Adair, “Boyhood,” wins for best editing, ahead of Barney Pilling in “The Grand Budapest Hotel.”
Now they’re moving on to supporting actor. Who’s your pick?
J.K. Simmons wins best supporting actor for “Whiplash.”
Ed Norton in ‘Birdman’ is runner up
Now they’re diving into best production design. Some really gorgeous films this year. Any nominees you’d put up?
“Grand Budapest Hotel” wins for production design by Adam Stockhausen
Ondrej Nekvasil was runner up for ‘Snowpiercer’
Now for one of my favorite “smaller” categories, best music score. So important for setting the tone of a film and a scene, but so often overlooked, I think.
Musical Score is a tie between Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood, for ‘Inherent Vice’ and Mica Levi for ‘Under the Skin’
On to Animation. After 2013’s ‘Frozen’ dominated the animation world the first half of THIS year, what 2014 film will catch LAFCA’s attention?
‘The Tale of Princess Kaguya’ wins Best Animation. ‘The Lego Movie’ was runner-up
Best supporting actress next. A tough category, I think, given the possible candidates.
Best Supporting Actress is Agata Kulesza in ‘Ida’
Runner up is Rene Russo in ‘Nightcrawler’
They’re really spreading the awards around so far. Nothing has gotten more than one win.
Winner for the Douglas Edwards best experimental/independent film/video award goes to Walter Reuben and ‘The David Whiting Story’
Winner for the Douglas Edwards Award for best experimental/independent film/video goes to Walter Reuben and ‘The David Whiting Story’
On to Best Cinematography
Emmanuel Lubezki wins Best Cinematography for his swooping, darting work on ‘Birdman.’ He won Oscar for ‘Gravity’ last year.
Runner up is Dick Pope in ‘Mr. Turner’
That’s the ninth different film to win something today so far.
LAFCA critics are now taking a lunch break, so we’ll be on hold for a bit, it looks. Journalists like to eat, and arguing about your favorite movies can be hungry work.
And the LAFCA lunchers are back at it, talking docs and non-fiction film
Laura Poitras’ ‘Citizenfour,’ about NSA leaker Edward Snowden, wins best documentary/nonfiction film.
Next category to be hashed out: Best Actress
Patricia Arquette wins best actress for ‘Boyhood.’ Julianne Moore is runner up for ‘Still Alice.’
Now they’re on to screenplay.
Arquette’s win means ‘Boyhood’ is the only multiple winner so far today in voting, but given previous critics polls (including Boston today), it has to be considered a favorite for best picture, screenplay and director.
“Birdman” screenplay team gets runner-up. That’s Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Nicolas Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris Jr. and Armando Bo.
Wes Anderson wins Best Screenplay for ‘The Grand Budapest Hotel’
That’s the second win for ‘Budapest,’ making it second film of the day to get more than one award.
‘Budapest’ was, by a long, long way, the year’s biggest specialty release. All told, it has grossed $ 172.7 million worldwide.
They’re considering the “New Generation” award winner now.
Ava DuVernay wins the “New Generation” award for ‘Selma.’ She left her career as a publicist four years ago to direct.
Ava DuVernay wins the “New Generation” award for ‘Selma.’ She left her career as a publicist four years ago to direct. That’s worked out pretty well so far.
Best foreign-language film is next up….
‘Ida’ wins best foreign-language film. ‘Winter Sleep’ is runner up.
‘Winter Sleep,’ directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan, won two prizes at the Cannes Film Festival, including the Palme D’Or.
‘Ida,’ whose co-star already won supporting actor from LAFCA, is the third film today with two awards.
Now they’re pondering Best Director. Should be one of the last three or so picks (best film and actor still not done).
Richard Linklater wins Best Director for ‘Boyhood’
Runner up is Wes Anderson, for ‘The Grand Budapest Hotel.’
Best Actor is next. Lots of possible nominees, so this might take a little while.
Best Actor runner up is Michael Keaton in ‘Birdman’
And another surprise, Tom Hardy as the man in the car in ‘Locke’ wins Best Actor
And on to Best Picture.
Hardy’s performance in that film is indeed bravura. It’s basically him in a car for most of an hour and half, in a series of cellphone conversations as his life falls apart.
‘The Grand Budapest Hotel’ is runner up for Best Picture
‘Boyhood’ wins best picture from LAFCA, its fourth prize of the day.
It also won for best director, actor and editing
David Bloom
No surprise: LAFCA critics taking a bit of time to get organized as they sit down. But they sent out a reminder that Gena Rowlands already named Career Achievement winner.