Now that all the dust has settled from the cavalcade of 2015 Top 10 lists that film critics around the world wrote, it’s quite clear that plenty of people really loved Spotlight. Tom McCarthy’s dramatic ode to investigative journalism featured prominently in many of these lists, suggesting that it would be right up there come awards season. And now further proof that it will be the frontrunner for the Academy Award Best Picture accolade has emerged after Spotlight won the National Society Of Film Critics’ Best Picture gong.
The National Society Of Film Critics were the last major critics group to the 2015 party, as they were the final posse of journalists to contribute their top films of the last 12 months. Their 53 active members met on Sunday at New York City’s Film Society Of Lincoln Center to right this wrong.
Soon after they announced that Spotlight had won their Best Picture award, while the film’s screenwriters, Josh Singer and Tom McCarthy, were also rewarded with the top screenplay accolade, too.
Spotlight is based on the 2003 Pulitzer Prize For Public Service winning work of The Boston Globe’s journalistic team, which, unsurprisingly, was called Spotlight. They launched an investigation into the widespread child sex abuse cases in the Boston area, and little did they realise just how much of an epidemic it had been. They were also disgusted and ashamed to learn just how deep the cover-up went.
It’s truly a stunning piece of filmmaking, and akin to the likes of All The President’s Men and Good Night, And Good Luck in its meticulous but patient depiction of journalism. Its success is made all the more remarkable by the fact that Tom McCarthy released the truly obscene The Cobbler, starring Adam Sandler, in the same year too.
Spotlight won’t just be vying for the Best Picture accolade at the Oscars come next month. Tom McCarthy will also be in contention for writing and directing gongs, while Stanley Tucci, Rachel McAdams, Mark Ruffalo, and Michael Keaton each deserve to be in the Best Supporting and Best Actor categories. In fact, I have a cheeky hunch that Keaton could land the Best Actor gong that he so greatly deserved last year for his performance in Birdman. Sorry Eddie.
It wasn’t just Spotlight that was celebrating at the National Society Of Film Critics awards on Sunday though. Carol’s Todd Haynes won Best Director, Michael B. Jordan was rightly rewarded for his Creed performance as he picked up Best Actor, Charlotte Rampling took home the Best Actress gong for 45 Years, while Kristen Stewart and Mark Rylance were given the Best Supporting Actress and Actor awards for their performances in Clouds of Sils Maria and Bridge Of Spies, respectively, too.
