The National Society of Film Critics chose Inside Llewyn Davis as Best Picture of the Year 2013.
The Society, made up of the country’s most distinguished movie critics, held its 48th annual awards voting meeting, using a weighted ballot system, at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Center as guests of the Film Society of Lincoln Center. Scrolls will be sent to the winners.
Fifty-six members are eligible to vote, though a few disqualify themselves if they haven’t seen every film. Any film that opened in the U.S. during the year 2013 was eligible for consideration. There is no nomination process; members meet, vote (using a weighted ballot), and announce all on January 4th. There is no awards party; scrolls are sent to the winners.
Founded in 1966, the Society differs from other critical associations in a number of significant ways. In the first place, it is truly national. Secondly, membership is by election. The 56 members include the principal critics from major papers and outlets in Los Angeles, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Minneapolis. They write not just for The Wall St. Journal, The L.A. Times, Time, and The New Yorker, but also for The Village Voice, The Christian Science Monitor and NPR.
The Society represents movie criticism in the US by supplying the official critic delegate to the National Film Preservation Board of the Library of Congress and abroad as the official American representative to FIPRESCI, the international federation of members of the film press.
Besides responding to specific issues, such as colorization, film preservation, or the ratings system, the Society regularly meets early in January to vote for its annual awards for the finest film achievements of the year.
The Society has published ten anthologies on specific subjects and for its first six years brought out volumes of annual reviews.
BEST PICTURE
*1. Inside Llewyn Davis – 23
2. American Hustle – 17
3. 12 Years a Slave – 16
BEST DIRECTOR
*1. Joel and Ethan Coen (Inside Llewyn Davis) – 25
2. Alfonso Cuarón (Gravity) – 18
3. Steve McQueen (12 Years a Slave) – 15
BEST FOREIGN-LANGUAGE FILM
*1. Blue Is the Warmest Color – 27
2. A Touch of Sin – 21
3. The Great Beauty – 15
BEST NON-FICTION FILM
*1. The Act of Killing (Joshua Oppenheimer) – 20
*1. At Berkeley (Frederick Wiseman) – 20
3. Leviathan (Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Véréna Paravel) – 18
BEST SCREENPLAY
*1. Before Midnight (Richard Linklater, Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke) – 29
2. Inside Llewyn Davis (Joel and Ethan Coen) – 26
3. American Hustle (Eric Singer and David O. Russell) – 18
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
*1. Inside Llewyn Davis (Bruno Delbonnel) -28
2.Gravity (Emmanuel Lubezki) – 26
3. Nebraska (Phedon Papamichael) – 19
BEST ACTOR
*1. Oscar Isaac (Inside Llewyn Davis) – 28
2. Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a Slave) – 19
3. Robert Redford (All Is Lost) – 12
BEST ACTRESS
*1. Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine) – 57
2. Adèle Exarchopoulos (Blue Is the Warmest Color) – 36
3. Julie Delpy (Before Midnight) – 26
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
*1. James Franco (Spring Breakers) – 24
2. Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club) – 20
3. Barkhad Abdi (Captain Phillips) – 14
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
*1. Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle) – 54
2. Lupita Nyong’o (12 Years a Slave) – 38
3. Sally Hawkins (Blue Jasmine) – 18
3. Léa Seydoux (Blue Is the Warmest Color) – 18
EXPERIMENTAL FILM
Leviathan (Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Véréna Paravel), a nonfiction film
FILM HERITAGE AWARD
- To the Museum of Modern Art, for its wide-ranging retrospective of the films of Allan Dwan.
- “Too Much Johnson”: the surviving reels from Orson Welles’s first professional film. Discovered by Cinemazero (Pordenone) and Cineteca del Friuli; funded by the National Film Preservation Foundation; and restored by the George Eastman House.
- British Film Institute for restorations of Alfred Hitchcock’s nine silent features.
- To the DVD “American Treasures from the New Zealand Film Archive.”
BEST FILM STILL AWAITING AMERICAN DISTRIBUTION
- Stray Dogs (Tsai Ming-liang)
- Hide Your Smiling Faces (Daniel Patrick Carbone)
DEDICATION: The meeting was dedicated to the memory of two distinguished members of the Society who died in 2013: Roger Ebert and Stanley Kauffmann.
