Top Gun: Maverick dominated the box office not only this summer but throughout the whole 2022 film schedule, and now it's on track to potentially dominate the Awards season too after winning a prestigious award from the National Board of Review.
When it was announced that the blockbuster had taken home the award for Best Film, the NBR president Annie Schulhof said in a statement (via THR):
Top Gun: Maverick is a thrilling crowd-pleaser that is expertly crafted on every level. Tom Cruise, Joseph Kosinski and the entire filmmaking team have succeeded in making an incredibly popular film that brought audiences back to theaters, while at the same time being a full-on cinematic achievement.
She's right, the film really does everything, it's not only crowd-pleasing, it's also groundbreaking, which is why it's being recognized for such prestigious awards. This point was also validated when Claudio Miranda also took home Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography for his work on the Top Gun sequel.
As for the other winners: Steven Spielberg won Best Director for his semi-autobiographical film The Fabelmans, while Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson won acting awards for The Banshees of Inisherin along with their writer and director Martin McDonagh who won Best Original Screenplay. The other two big awards went to Michelle Yeoh, who took home Best Actress for her performance in Everything Everywhere All At Once, and Janelle Monáe who won Best Supporting Actress for Glass Onion.
Other films recognized included Aftersun, Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, Women Talking and Robert Downey Jr.’s documentary about his father called Sr.
All the films mentioned have been in the conversation for the 2023 Oscars. Based on the winners it’ll be interesting to see if these actors and artists go on to bring home an Academy Award.
While this could be a big step forward in Top Gun: Maverick’s campaign for Best Picture, the past TBR Best Film winners tend to go on to get nominated for the big award but haven’t won. Last year Paul Thomas Anderson’s Licorice Pizza took home the award, and landed a Best Picture nomination, while CODA took home the Academy Award. Other Best Film winners at the NBR awards include Green Book (which did win Best Picture), as well as The Post, Manchester by the Sea and Mad Max: Fury Road (all three of which received Best Picture nominations).
We’ll have to wait and see if Top Gun will be able to add Best Picture to its list of accolades, which includes bypassing Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End and Titanic at the box office, and an incredibly positive critical response. While it’s a long shot, don’t count Top Gun: Maverick out, because it’s managed to surpass what seems like every record and expectation put in front of it.
If you are interested in watching the long-awaited high-flying sequel in theaters, it is currently in a limited theatrical run until December 15, and you’ll be able to stream it with a Paramount+ subscription on December 22.
