‘Past Lives’ Wins Best Film Award from National Society of Film Critics

Celine Song’s “Past Lives” landed a major victory on Saturday, being crowned the National Society of Film Critics’ Best Picture in a strongly competitive film awards year. Writer-director Song also placed as a first runner-up in the Best Screenplay category.

The A24 release was also named Best Picture by the Gotham Awards and was a Top 10 Films choice by the National Board of Review this season and the Best First Film selection by New York Film Critics Circle. With Oscar nominations voting beginning on Jan. 11, the NSFC win gives a healthy boon to the indie darling at a time when Oscar and guild voters are deciding which films to watch.

Following very closely behind “Past Lives” were Jonathan Glazer’s “The Zone of Interest” and Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer.” Glazer won the Best Director prize, and his film was also runner-up to to “Fallen Leaves” in the Best Film Not in the English Language category and to “Killers of the Flower Moon” in the cinematography category.

“Oppenheimer” did not claim the top prize in any category, but it remained a critical favorite by landing in the top three five times. It finished in third place in the picture, director, lead actor (Cillian Murphy) and cinematography categories, with its costar Robert Downey Jr. tying for second in the supporting actor category with Ryan Gosling for “Barbie.”

Recent TheWrap cover subject Sandra Hüller was recognized for both of her 2023 performances in the Best Actress category, in Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall” and “The Zone of Interest. “Poor Things” star Emma Stone finished second to Hüller by only five points under a system that allotted three points for first-place votes, two points for second-place votes and one point for third-place votes.

Andrew Scott continues his surprising spike in awards popularity for his Best Actor prize for Andrew Haigh’s “All of Us Strangers,” enjoying a 13-point win over first runner-up Jeffrey Wright in Cord Jefferson’s “American Fiction.” This will likely be the one of the most competitive Oscar categories, and Scott will have to crash a crowded category that has formidable contenders in Wright, Murphy, Leonardo DiCaprio, Paul Giamatti, Bradley Cooper and Colman Domingo.

Da’Vine Joy Randolph continued her awards steamroll for her performance in Alexander Payne’s “The Holdovers,” handily winning Best Supporting Actress. Randolph has now won New York Film Critics Circle, Los Angeles Film Critics Association and National Board of Review (not a critics’ organization, but considered a precursor barometer.)

Hers is the rare performance to sweep all four of those awards in one season. Others who have accomplished that grand slam in the last 20 years are Oscar nominees Willem Dafoe in “The Florida Project,” Forest Whitaker in “The Last King of Scotland,” Regina King for “If Beale Street Could Talk” and Helen Mirren in “The Queen” the latter three of whom went on to win the Academy Award.

In the first major appearance for Michael Mann’s “Ferrari” in acting awards this season, Penélope Cruz took first runner-up honors for her fiery turn in the period drama in the Supporting Actress category.

After a surprising BAFTA longlist category snub this week where he did not appear in the supporting categories but costar Julianne Moore did, Charles Melton rallied with a win for his performance in Todd Haynes’ “May December.” He has already picked up New York Film Critics and Gotham prizes for the film.

The National Society of Film Critics consists of more than 60 critics from the United States. It has been giving out awards since 1966, and in that time its choice for the year’s best movie has gone on to win the Best Picture Oscar only nine times. But the two groups have agreed more often in recent years: “Spotlight,” “Moonlight,” “Parasite” and “Nomadland” all won both awards within a six-year stretch between 2015 and 2020.

Last year’s winner, Todd Field’s “Tár,” was nominated for Best Picture but did not win. Of the other NSFC honorees, only supporting actor winner Ke Huy Quan (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”) repeated his victory at the Oscars.

The winners and runners-up (with point totals):

BEST PICTURE
1. “Past Lives” (51 points)
2. “The Zone of Interest” (49 points)
3. “Oppenheimer” (44 points)

BEST DIRECTOR
1. Jonathan Glazer, “The Zone of Interest” (65 points)
2. Todd Haynes, “May December” (42 points)
3. Christopher Nolan, “Oppenheimer” (41 points)

BEST ACTOR
1. Andrew Scott, “All of Us Strangers” (52 points)
2. Jeffrey Wright, “American Fiction” (39 points)
3. Cillian Murphy, “Oppenheimer” (29 points)

BEST ACTRESS
1. Sandra Hüller, “Anatomy of a Fall” and “The Zone of Interest” (61 points)
2. Emma Stone, “Poor Things” (56 points)
3. Lily Gladstone, “Killers of the Flower Moon” (44 points)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
1. Charles Melton, “May December” (51 points)
2. Robert Downey Jr., “Oppenheimer,” and Ryan Gosling, “Barbie” (tie) (31 points)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
1. Da’Vine Joy Randolph, “The Holdovers” (58 points)
2. Penélope Cruz, “Ferrari” (32 points)
3. Rachel McAdams, “Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret.” (23 points)

BEST SCREENPLAY
1. Samy Burch, “May December” (53 points)
2. Celine Song, “Past Lives” (50 points)
3. David Hemingson, “The Holdovers” (36 points)

BEST FILM NOT IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE
1. “Fallen Leaves” (65 points)
2. “The Zone of Interest” (51 points)
3. “Anatomy of a Fall” (44 points)

BEST NONFICTION FILM
1. “Menus-Plaisirs—Les Troisgros” (65 points)
2. “20 Days in Mariupol” (25 points)
3. “Kokomo City” (19 points)

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
1. Rodrigo Prieto, “Killers of the Flower Moon” (55 points)
2. Łukasz Żal, “The Zone of Interest” (45 points)
3. Hoyte van Hoytema, “Oppenheimer” (44 points)

BEST EXPERIMENTAL FILM
“Trailer of a Film That Will Never Exist: Phony Wars” (Jean-Luc Godard)

SPECIAL CITATION OF A FILM AWAITING U.S. DISTRIBUTION
“Close Your Eyes” (Victor Erice)

FILM HERITAGE AWARDS
Criterion Channel, for an adventurous, wide-ranging, finely curated selection of films, ranging from American independents to world cinema to short films to classic Hollywood, making readily available the kind of repertory cinema that every city should have, and Facets, Kim’s Video, Scarecrow Video and Vidiots, for maintaining wide-reaching libraries of films on disc and tape and making those libraries available to the general public.

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