2022 New York Film Critics Circle (NYFCC) winners: ‘TÁR’ takes Best Film, Actress; A24 has a big day

The New York Film Critics Circle, the first of the top tier trifecta of critics’ groups that includes Los Angeles and the National Society of Film Critics, have chosen Todd Field’s TÁR as the Best Film of 2022 and its star, Cate Blanchett, as Best Actress.

NYFCC’s winner for Best Film has typically had a strong correlation with the Best Picture Oscar and since the era of the expanded nominees in 2009, only Carol (2015) and First Cow (2020) have missed there. The latter was the first film in NYFCC history to win Best Film and fail to earn a single Oscar nomination. Field had previously won Best First Film for 2001’s In the Bedroom and with today’s Best Film win he becomes to first filmmaker to accomplish that jump with the NYFCC. This was Blanchett’s second win from the NYFCC. She previously won for 2013’s Blue Jasmine, on her way to the Oscar.

Colin Farrell was awarded Best Actor for two of his lead films this year, After Yang and The Banshees of Inisherin. The rarely awarded actor also had acclaimed supporting turns in The Batman, where he co-starred as The Penguin, and Thirteen Lives, as a diver trying to save young boys on a Thai soccer team from a perilous labyrinth of flooding caves.

Ke Huy Quan (Everything Everywhere All At Once) followed up his Gotham win last week with a Best Supporting Actor win today in what could be the beginning of a major sweep. There was a good 40 minutes to get to a winner in supporting actress, where the group ultimately landed on Keke Palmer for Nope. Likely it was either highly competitive and/or there was debate on her being lead vs supporting. Palmer is officially being campaigned in supporting by Universal Pictures. Since 2010, NYFCC and Oscar has matched up four times: Melissa Leo for The Fighter, Patricia Arquette for Boyhood, Regina King for If Beale Street Could Talk and Laura Dern for Marriage Story.

In another inspired win, S. S. Rajamouli won the Best Director prize for RRR, the worldwide smash hit about two legendary revolutionaries and their journey away from home before they started fighting for their country in the 1920s. The film found second life on Netflix and has become one of the biggest audience hits of the year.

In the last 21 years only two NYFCC Animated Feature winners have missed the Oscar lineup, Waking Life and The LEGO Movie, making the chances for the winner here, Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, greatly improved.

It was a good day for donkeys, who factored heavily into Martin McDonaugh’s The Banshees of Inisherin and Jerzy Skolimowski’s EO, the respective screenplay and international film winners. It was also a good day for A24, who scooped up four wins with After Yang, Aftersun (Best First Film), Marcel the Shell with Shoes On and Everything Everywhere All At Once.

Special Awards were given to Jake Perlin, curator, distributor, publisher, in recognition of his indispensable contributions to film culture; dGenerate Films, for their invaluable work bringing independent films from China to a wider audience and Jafar Panahi, for his dogged bravery as an artist, and for the humanity and beauty of a body of work created under the most oppressive circumstances.

The NYFCC also awarded cash prizes to two students focusing on film criticism/journalism attending college in the region. This year’s winners were Nico Pedrero-Setzer, Undergraduate and Greg Nussen, Graduate.

Here is the full list of winners:

• BEST FILM: TÁR
• BEST DIRECTOR: S. S. Rajamouli, RRR
• BEST ACTRESS: Cate Blanchett, TÁR
• BEST ACTOR: Colin Farrell, After Yang and The Banshees of Inisherin
• BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Keke Palmer, Nope
• BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: Ke Huy Quan, Everything Everywhere All At Once
• BEST SCREENPLAY: Martin McDonagh, The Banshees of Inisherin
• BEST FIRST FILM: Aftersun (Charlotte Wells)
• BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY: Claudio Miranda, Top Gun: Maverick
• BEST INTERNATIONAL FILM: EO (Jerzy Skolimowski)
• BEST ANIMATED FEATURE: Marcel the Shell with Shoes On (Dean Fleischer)
• BEST NON-FICTION FILM: All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Laura Poitras)
• SPECIAL AWARD 1: Jake Perlin, curator, distributor, publisher, in recognition of his indispensable contributions to film culture.
• SPECIAL AWARD 2: dGenerate Films, For their invaluable work bringing independent films from China to a wider audience
• SPECIAL AWARD 3: Jafar Panahi, for his dogged bravery as an artist, and for the humanity and beauty of a body of work created under the most oppressive circumstances.