‘Lady Bird’ Tops National Society of Film Critics Winners

Erik Anderson January 6, 2018

The National Society of Film Critics has chosen, in a very close vote, Lady Bird as the Best Picture of 2017. The win lined up with the New York Film Critics Circle, where there are many crossover members. Since the NSFC releases their vote totals (which every awards body should do), we know it won by just two points over Get Out. It was an even closer race in Director where Greta Gerwig won over Jordan Peele (Get Out) and Paul Thomas Anderson (Phantom Thread) and Screenplay where Lady Bird triumphed over Get Out but by just one point. The first, and last, female to win Best Director from the NSFC was Kathryn Bigelow for 2009’s The Hurt Locker. She went on to become the first, (and last) female Best Director Oscar winner.

Daniel Kaluuya (Get Out) bested LAFCA and NYFCC winner Timothée Chalamet (Call Me By Your Name) for the Best Actor crown, earning him his 5th critics win of the season. This is Sally Hawkins’ 2nd Best Actress win from the National Society of Film Critics. She also won for 2008’s Happy-Go-Lucky.

While some races were close (like Best Actress), others were a virtual landslide. Laurie Metcalf’s Supporting Actress win for Lady Bird came in with 74 votes with 36 for her closest competitor (Phantom Thread‘s Lesley Manville). Willem Dafoe (The Florida Project) also blew through his competition, making him the only trifecta acting winner of the 2017-2018 critics’ award season. He’s won LAFCA, NYFCC and now NSFC.

While earning a few runner-up mentions, critical hits Phantom Thread and Call Me By Your Name went home empty-handed today.

The battle for Best Cinematography took over 40 minutes and three ballots to come the nail-biting conclusion: Blade Runner 2049 besting Dunkirk by a single point.

This year’s National Society of Film Critics awards are dedicated to the legendary film critic and historian Richard Schickel, author of 37 books and director of 37 documentaries, and a founding member of the Society.

44 of the group’s 59 members voted today: 17 at their meeting in New York, 4 via the satellite meeting in Los Angeles, 7 in other cities nationwide, and 16 by proxy. The proxy votes are admissible on the first ballot only.

Here is the full list of winners and runners-up, with vote totals.

Best Picture
LADY BIRD (41)
Runners-up: GET OUT (39) PHANTOM THREAD (28)

Best Director
Greta Gerwig, LADY BIRD (37)
Runners-up (tie): Paul Thomas Anderson, PHANTOM THREAD, and Jordan Peele, GET OUT (36)

Best Screenplay
Greta Gerwig, LADY BIRD (50)
Runners-up: Jordan Peele, GET OUT (49) Paul Thomas Anderson, PHANTOM THREAD (31)

Best Actor
Daniel Kaluuya, GET OUT (44)
Runners-up: Daniel Day-Lewis, PHANTOM THREAD (34) Timothée Chalamet, CALL ME BY YOUR NAME (24)

Best Actress
Sally Hawkins, THE SHAPE OF WATER and MAUDIE (49)
Runners-up: Saoirse Ronan, LADY BIRD (44) Cynthia Nixon, A QUIET PASSION, and Frances McDormand, THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI (24)

Best Supporting Actor
Willem Dafoe, THE FLORIDA PROJECT (62)
Runners-up: Michael Stuhlbarg, CALL ME BY YOUR NAME, THE SHAPE OF WATER and THE POST (25) Sam Rockwell, THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI (23)

Best Supporting Actress
Laurie Metcalf, LADY BIRD (74)
Runners-up: Lesley Manville, PHANTOM THREAD (36) Allison Janney, I, TONYA (24)

Best Foreign-Language Film
GRADUATION (35)
Runners-up: FACES PLACES (30) BPM (BEATS PER MINUTE) (29)

Best Non-Fiction Film
FACES PLACES (70)
Runners-up: EX LIBRIS: THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY (34) DAWSON CITY: FROZEN TIME (32)

Best Cinematography
Roger Deakins, BLADE RUNNER 2049 (40)
Runners-up: 2. Hoyte van Hoytema, DUNKIRK (39) 3. Alexis Zabe, THE FLORIDA PROJECT (36)

About the NSFC
The National Society of Film Critics counts among its members many of the country’s leading film critics. Its purpose is to promote the mutual interests of film criticism and filmmaking. Founded in l966, the Society differs from other critical associations in a number of significant ways. In the first place, it is truly national. Secondly, membership is by election. The 59 members include the critics from major papers and outlets in Los Angeles, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago. Its members also include critics not just of The Wall St. Journal, The L.A. Times and The New Yorker, but also of The Village Voice, The Christian Science Monitor and NPR.

The National Film Critics Society represents movie criticism in the United States by supplying the official critic delegate to the National Film Registration Board of the Library of Congress and abroad as the official American representative in FIPRESCI, the international federation of members of the film press.

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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.