Kansas City Film Critics Circle (KCFCC) winners: ‘Nomadland’ and ‘Promising Young Woman’ tie for Best Film

The Kansas City Film Critics Circle (KCFCC), established in 1996 and the second oldest film critics’ group in the United States, announced its winners and runners-up for the best in film for 2020 on Sunday and for the sixth time in the org’s 55-year history, there was a tie for Best Film: Nomadland and Promising Young Woman. In 2018, The Favourite and Roma tied for Best Film.

Promising Young Woman had a good day elsewhere in Kansas, winning Best Actress for Carey Mulligan and Best Original Screenplay for its director, Emerald Fennell. Same goes for Nomadland, which picked up more wins for Chloé Zhao in Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay. Leslie Odom, Jr. (One Night in Miami) racked up another Best Supporting Actor win, as did Riz Ahmed (Sound of Metal) in Best Actor and Youn Yuh-jung (Minari) in Best Supporting Actress.

Aaron Sorkin played second fiddle, twice, with two runners-up mentions for The Trial of the Chicago 7, for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay. The Dissident, Bryan Fogel’s gripping film about the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, won the group’s Best Documentary award.

Special awards were given to The Invisible Man (The Vince Koehler Award for Best Science Fiction, Fantasy or Horror Film) and Kajillionaire (The Tom Poe Award for Best LGBT Film).

Here is the full list of winners and runners-up from the 55th Kansas City Film Critics Circle awards.

Best Film
Nomadland and Promising Young Woman (tie)

Robert Altman Award for Best Director
Chloé Zhao – Nomadland
Runner-up: Aaron Sorkin – The Trial of the Chicago 7

Best Actor
Riz Ahmed – Sound of Metal
Runner-up: Chadwick Boseman – Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom

Best Actress
Carey Mulligan – Promising Young Woman
Runner-up: Frances McDormand – Nomadland

Best Supporting Actor
Leslie Odom, Jr. – One Night in Miami
Runner-up: Paul Race – Sound of Metal

Best Supporting Actress
Youn Yuh-jung – Minari
Runner-up: Maria Bakalova – Borat Subsequent Moviefilm

Best Adapted Screenplay
Nomadland (Chloé Zhao)
Runner-up: I’m Thinking of Ending Things (Charlie Kaufman)

Best Original Screenplay
Promising Young Woman (Emerald Fennell)
Runner-up: The Trial of the Chicago 7 (Aaron Sorkin)

Best Cinematography
The Vast of Night
Runner-up: Mank

Best Animated Feature
Wolfwalkers
Runner-up: Soul

Best International Feature
Another Round
Runner-up: 76 Days, Bacurau and The Life Ahead

Best Documentary
The Dissident
Runner-up: Crip Camp

Tom Poe LGBTQ+ Award
Kajillionaire
Runner-up: The Prom

Vince Kohler Award for Best Horror/Science-Fiction Film
The Invisible Man
Runner-up: The Vast of Night

Images courtesy of Searchlight Pictures and Focus Features

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Hollywood Critics Association (HCA) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.

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