Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA): ‘The Zone of Interest’ Named Best Picture, Director; Women Win All Acting Awards
The Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA) have named Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest the best film of 2023, plus Best Director, Best Actress (a dual win for Sandra Hüller) and Best Sound.
Anatomy of a Fall named Best Film Not in the English Language (and picked up an Editing win) after nearly an hour of voting to decide how Best Picture was going to shake out. LAFCA doesn’t allow a film to win both Non-English Language, Animated or Documentary as well as Best Picture.
2023 marked the second year for dual winner, gender-neutral acting categories by the group, who this year awarded Sandra Hüller for both Anatomy of a Fall and The Zone of Interest and Emma Stone for Poor Things in lead performance. Andrew Scott (All of Us Strangers) and Jeffrey Wright (American Fiction) were the runners-up. For supporting performances they went with two women again – Rachel McAdams for Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. and Da’Vine Joy Randolph for The Holdovers (her second win today). Runners-up there were Ryan Gosling in Barbie and most interestingly, Lily Gladstone for Killers of the Flower Moon. Gladstone is officially being campaigned in lead by Apple and has already won two high profile Best Actress awards, from the National Board of Review (NBR) and New York Film Critics Circle (NYFCC). Three out of the four acting winners last year received Oscar nominations: Bill Nighy (Living), Cate Blanchett (TÁR) and Ke Huy Quan (EEAAO), with only Dolly DeLeon in Triangle of Sadness failing to make the cut. Two of the group’s four runners-up were also nominated: Michelle Yeoh (who went on to win the Oscar for EEAAO) in lead and Brian Tyree Henry (Causeway) in supporting.
Andrew Haigh’s All of Us Strangers won Best Screenplay for his adaptation of the 1987 novel Strangers by Taichi Yamada. Only four of LAFCA’s 48 screenplay winners have ever missed an Oscar nomination (Nashville, Return of the Secaucus 7, Drugstore Cowboy, and About Schmidt).
Last year, LAFCA had two films tied for its top prize. Todd Field’s psychological drama TÁR and the eventual Oscar Best Picture-winning sci-fi dramedy Everything Everywhere All at Once from the Daniels.
Since 2000, only four of LAFCA’s best picture winners have failed to garner an Oscar nod for best picture: About Schmidt (2002), American Splendor (2003), WALL-E (2008) and Small Axe (2020). In the same timeframe, five films have gone on to win the Best Picture Oscar: The Hurt Locker (2009), Spotlight (2015), Moonlight (2016), Parasite (2019) and last year’s Everything Everywhere.
“I couldn’t be more thrilled by this stellar group of winners, considering how incredible the year was for creative, bold, and emotional stories of all sizes,” said LAFCA President Robert Abele. “We’re really excited to honor these extraordinary films and filmmakers at our banquet on January 13, 2024, returning to the Millennium Biltmore Los Angeles, which has a storied cinematic history.”
See full list of winners below.
Best Picture: The Zone of Interest
Runner-up: Oppenheimer
Best Director: Jonathan Glazer for The Zone of Interest
Runner-up: Yorgos Lanthimos for Poor Things
Leading Performances: Sandra Hüller in Anatomy of a Fall and The Zone of Interest, and Emma Stone in Poor Things
Runners-up: Andrew Scott in All of Us Strangers, and Jeffrey Wright in American Fiction
Supporting Performances: Rachel McAdams in Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret., and Da’Vine Joy Randolph in The Holdovers
Runners-up: Lily Gladstone in Killers of the Flower Moon, and Ryan Gosling in Barbie
Best Screenplay: Andrew Haigh for All of Us Strangers
Runner-up: Samy Burch for May December
Best Cinematography: Robbie Ryan for Poor Things
Runner-up: Rodrigo Prieto for Barbie and Killers of the Flower Moon
Best Editing: Laurent Sénéchal for Anatomy of a Fall
Runner-up: Jonathan Alberts for All of Us Strangers
Best Production Design: Sarah Greenwood for Barbie
Runner-up: Shona Heath and James Price for Poor Things
Best Music/Score: Mica Levi for The Zone of Interest, with special recognition of the contribution of sound designer Johnnie Burn
Runner-up: Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt for Barbie
Best Film Not in the English Language: Anatomy of a Fall
Runner-up: Tótem
Best Documentary/Non-Fiction Film: Menus-Plaisirs — Les Troisgros
Runner-up: The Eternal Memory
Best Animation: The Boy and the Heron
Runner-up: Robot Dreams
New Generation Award: Celine Song – Past Lives
Career Achievement Award: Agnieszka Holland
Douglas Edwards Experimental Film Prize: Wang Bing – Youth (Spring)
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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