The National Board of Review, one of the earliest groups to hand out end-of-the-year film awards and also one of the most unpredictable, announced their winners today, with Slumdog Millionaire taking the top prize for Best Film. A group known for their bizarre if sometimes stodgy taste-- they put The Bucket List on their top ten last year, for Christ's stake-- the NBR had even bigger surprises than awarding the big prize to a movie about slum kids in India.
They picked Clint Eastwood for Best Actor in Gran Torino, which may very well catapult him into the Oscar race as some have predicted. Anne Hathaway won Best Actress for Rachel Getting Married, leapfrogging over bigger contenders like Kate Winslet and Meryl Streep. Josh Brolin (Milk) and Penelope Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona) won the supporting categories, which is less surprising, but then David Fincher won Best Director-- not Danny Boyle, the director of Slumdog.
And the top ten list is even more bizarre. Burn After Reading is on there! Both of Clint Eastwood's movies this year, Changeling and Gran Torino, are on the list. And Ed Zwick's thoroughly uninspiring Defiance made the list, leaving no space for powerhouses like Revolutionary Road or Doubt (which, weirdly, won Best Ensemble cast-- even though there are only four actors in the damn thing). But hey, they did include the two honest-to-God best movies of the year-- Wall-E and The Dark Knight. So that counts for something.
It's hard to say you're shocked by any NBR awards, since they're so damn unpredictable, but these awards are surprising both in that they don't seem to love any one film more than the other, and that they love Slumdog at all. I definitely would have pegged Benjamin Button or Revolutionary Road from these guys. It's just another little pebble to toss into the great pond of Oscar predicting-- and it'll probably take more than a few days for us all to figure out what it means. Below is the full list of nominations, for your perusal, debate and frustration.
Best Film
SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE
Top Ten Films
(In alphabetical order) BURN AFTER READING, CHANGELING, THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON, THE DARK KNIGHT, DEFIANCE, FROST/NIXON, GRAN TORINO, MILK, WALL-E, THE WRESTLER
Best Foreign Language Film
MONGOL
Top Five Foreign Films
(In alphabetical order) THE EDGE OF HEAVEN, LET THE RIGHT ONE IN, ROMAN DE GARE, A SECRET, WALTZ WITH BASHIR
Best Documentary
MAN ON WIRE
Top Five Documentaries
(In alphabetical order) AMERICAN TEEN, THE BETRAYAL (NERAKHOON), DEAR ZACHARY, ENCOUNTERS AT THE END OF THE WORLD, ROMAN POLANSKI: WANTED AND DESIRED
Top Independent Films
(In alphabetical order) FROZEN RIVER, IN BRUGES, IN SEARCH OF A MIDNIGHT KISS, MR. FOE, RACHEL GETTING MARRIED, SNOW ANGELS, SON OF RAMBOW, WENDY AND LUCY, VICKY CRISTINA BARCELONA, THE VISITOR
Best Actor
CLINT EASTWOOD, Gran Torino
Best Actress ANNE HATHAWAY, Rachel Getting Married
Best Supporting Actor
JOSH BROLIN, Milk
Best Supporting Actress
PENELOPE CRUZ, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Best Ensemble Cast
DOUBT
Breakthrough Performance by an Actor
DEV PATEL, Slumdog Millionaire
Breakthrough Performance by an Actress
VIOLA DAVIS, Doubt
Best Director
DAVID FINCHER, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Best Directorial Debut
COURTNEY HUNT, Frozen River
Best Adapted Screenplay
SIMON BEAUFOY, Slumdog Millionaire and ERIC ROTH, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Spotlight Award
MELISSA LEO, Frozen River and RICHARD JENKINS, The Visitor
Best Original Screenplay
NICK SCHENK, Gran Torino
Best Animated Feature
WALL-E
William K. Everson Award For Film History
MOLLY HASKELL and ANDREW SARRIS
The BVLGARI Award for NBR Freedom of Expression
TRUMBO
