The New York critics have decided. The Los Angeles critics have decided. And now the Dublin Film Critics Circle has awards its prizes for the year. Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk was a fairly comfortable winner for best film. Released back in July, the picture appeals across all sorts of sensibilities. It's a big box-office bonanza. It also works as cinema of effect. It is always interesting to note which finishers would, 12 months ago, have seemed like unlikely competitors in such polls. Jordan Peele's Get Out, a singular satirical horror on the theme of race, didn't sound much like an awards picture, but it looks set for an Oscar nomination and it came a healthy second in the DFCC's poll.
Best Irish film also went to an eccentric piece. Len Collins's Sanctuary edged ahead of Yorgos Lanthimos's Killing of a Sacred Deer to take that prize. Lanthimos and his team have a best screenplay gong from Cannes as consolation. Made in collaboration with The Blue Teapot company, Sanctuary concerns two young people with Down syndrome who bond when on a trip to Galway.
The DFCC awarded Barry Keoghan, so impressive as a sinister young stalker in Sacred Deer, a best breakthrough prize. Barry also did good work with period knitwear in Dunkirk. He will surely reappear in future years.
Another much admired Irish film, Emer Reynolds' The Farthest, beat all international comers in the poll for best documentary. That film on the Voyager programme has been charming festival-goers and TV viewers since its premiere a year ago. It is sure to become a classic of its form. Raoul Peck's I am Not Your Negro, which used the writings of James Baldwin to investigate the wider black experience, was a worthy runner up.
James Franco proved a strong finisher by winning best actor for The Disaster Artist just a few weeks after that odd biopic arrived in cinemas. Will the performance be too eccentric for an Oscar nomination? We will find out in a months time.
As ever in such polls, we are reminded that the previous awards season drags into the early part of this year for audiences outside the US. Two of this year's Oscar nominees, Natalie Portman in Jackie and Isabelle Huppert in Elle, tied for best actress. The excellent Sally Hawkins, a possible Oscar winner for the upcoming The Shape of Water, was just behind Huppert and Portman for her performance in another film: Aisling Walsh's touching Maudie.
First convened 11 years ago, the Dublin Film Critics Circle, whose president is Tara Brady of this newspaper, polls full-time critics from across the capital. Previous winners of best film have included Inside Out, Boyhood and Gravity.
THE 2017 DUBLIN FILM CRITICS CIRCLE AWARDS
BEST FILM -
1. Dunkirk
2. Get Out
3. Moonlight
4. Blade Runner 2049
5. Manchester By The Sea
6. Wind River
7. The Florida Project / Call Me by Your Name
8. La La Land
9. Logan / God’s Own Country
10. Jackie / Lady Macbeth
Runners up: The Handmaiden, Aquarius, Paddington 2
BEST DIRECTOR -
1. Christopher Nolan, Dunkirk
2. Denis Villeneuve, Blade Runner 2049
3. Jordan Peele, Get Out
4. Damien Chazelle, La La Land
5. Kenneth Lonergan, Manchester by the Sea
6. Julia Ducournau, Raw/ Emer Reynolds, The Farthest
7. Yorgos Lanthimos, The KIlling of a Sacred Deer / Paul Verhoeven, Elle
8. Pablo Larraín, Jackie
9. Sean Baker, The Florida Project
10. James Mangold, Logan
Runners up: Pat Collins, Song of Granite; James Franco, The Disaster Artist; Patty Jenkins, Wonder Woman
BEST IRISH FEATURE FILM -
1. Sanctuary
2. The Killing of a Sacred Deer
3. Cardboard Gangsters / Handsome Devil
4. Song of Granite
5. Pilgrimage
6. Twice Shy
7. Maze
8. The Drummer and the Keeper
9. In View
10. Halal Daddy
Runners up: Property of the State, The Man Who Invented Christmas, A Dark Song
BEST DOCUMENTARY
1. The Farthest
2. I Am Not Your Negro
3. It’s Not Yet Dark
4. Condemned to Remember
5. Whitney: Can I Be Me
6. Meetings with Ivor
7. Kedi / An Inconvenient Sequel
8. City of Ghosts
9. Dancer / Kevin Roche: The Quiet Architect
10. The Work / Cameraperson / The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson
Runners up: Casting JonBenet, Jane, Nobody Speak: Trials of the Free Press, The Prince of Nothingwood
BEST ACTOR
1. James Franco, The Disaster Artist
2. Barry Keoghan, The Killing of a Sacred Deer
3. Robert Pattinson, Good Time
4. Timothée Chalamet, Call Me by Your Name
5. Denzel Washington, Fences / James McAvoy, Split
6. Armie Hammer, Call Me by Your Name
7. Daniel Kaluuya, Get Out
8. Willem Dafoe, The Florida Project
9. Hugh Jackman, Logan
10. Mahershala Ali, Moonlight / John Connors, Cardboard Gangsters
Runners up: Ryan Gosling, Blade Runner 2049; Andy Serkis, War for the Planet of the Apes; Sherwan Haji, The Other Side of Hope; Adrian Titieni, Graduation
BEST ACTRESS
1. Natalie Portman, Jackie / Isabelle Huppert, Elle
2. Sally Hawkins, Maudie
3. Florence Pugh, Lady Macbeth
4. Sonia Braga, Aquarius
5. Viola Davis, Fences / Emma Stone, La La Land
6. Garance Miller, Raw
7. Kristen Stewart, Personal Shopper
8. Ruth Negga, Loving
9. Emma Stone, Battle of the Sexes
10. Cynthia Nixon, A Quiet Passion / Anne Hathaway, Colossal
Runners up: Annette Bening, Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool; Zoe Kazan, The Big Sick; Jessica Chastain, Miss Sloane
BEST SCREENPLAY
1. Jordan Peele, Get Out
2. Taylor Sheridan, Wind River / Barry Jenkins, Moonlight
3. Kenneth Lonergan, Manchester By The Sea
4. Emily V. Gordon, Kumail Nanjiani, The Big Sick
5. Park Chan-wook, Chung Seo-kyung, The Handmaiden
6. Yorgos Lanthimos, Efthymis Filippou, The Killing of a Sacred Deer
7. Christopher Nolan, Dunkirk
8. Rebecca Blunt, Logan Lucky / Armando Iannucci, The Death of Stalin
9. Damien Chazelle, La La Land / Makoto Shinkai, Your Name
10. Terence Davies, A Quiet Passion
Runners up: Hampton Fancher, Michael Green, Blade Runner 2049, James Gray, The Lost City of Z; Sean Baker, Chris Bergoch, The Florida Project
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
1. Roger Deakins, Blade Runner 2049
2. Hoyte Van Hoytema, Dunkirk
3. Chung Chung-hoon, The Handmaiden
4. Linus Sandgren, La La Land
5. M. David Mullen, The Love Witch
6. Alexis Zabe, The Florida Project
7. Kate McCullough, The Farthest
8. Richard Kendrick, Song of Granite
9. Ben Richardson, Wind River / Stéphane Fontaine, Jackie
10. Thimios Bakatakis, The Killing of a Sacred Deer / Philippe Le Sourd, The Beguiled
Runners up: James Laxton, Moonlight; Michael Seresin, War for the Planet of the Apes; Sayombhu Mukdeeprom, Call Me by Your Name
BREAKTHROUGH ARTIST OF THE YEAR: SHORTLIST
Barry Keoghan, The Killing of a Sacred Deer, Dunkirk
