The rain stayed away from Santa Monica Beach on Sunday (February 25) as Past Lives was named best film and Celine Song best director at the 39th annual Spirit Awards.
While the legacy studio and streamer contenders have dominated much of the big-ticket awards shows this season like Saturday night’s SAG Awards, last weekend’s Baftas, the Golden Globes and Critics Choice Awards, this was a good opportunity for the Oscar-nominated A24 romance and Song to earn gongs for a film which has done well among critics groups since its world premiere at Sundance just over one year ago.
Jeffrey Wright won best lead performance for Orion Pictures/Amazon MGM Studios’ satire American Fiction and Da’Vine Joy Randolph took best supporting performance for Focus Features’ comedy drama The Holdovers in the gender-neutral acting stakes.
American Fiction also won screenplay honours for Cord Jefferson in that film’s second award, while wins for Dominic Sessa in the breakthrough performance and Eigil Bryld in the cinematography categories resulted in three for Focus Features’ The Holdovers, the most for any individual film on the afternoon.
Justine Triet’s Anatomy Of A Fall at Neon was named best international film, A.V. Rockwell’s A Thousand And One at Focus Features was named best first feature, and Samy Burch won best first screenplay for Netflix’s May December.
Kelly Reichardt’s Showing Up took the Robert Altman Award presented to a film’s director, casting director and ensemble cast.
FILM NOMINATIONS
Best Feature (award given to the producer)
Past Lives
Producers: David Hinojosa, Pamela Koffler, Christine Vachon
Best director
Celine Song, Past Lives
Best screenplay
Cord Jefferson, American Fiction
Best documentary
Four Daughters
Best first feature
A Thousand And One
Best lead performance
Jeffrey Wright, American Fiction
Best supporting performance
Da’Vine Joy Randolph, The Holdovers
Best international film (award given to the director)
Anatomy Of A Fall
Director: Justine Triet
Best cinematography
Eigil Bryld, The Holdovers
Best editing
Daniel Garber, How To Blow Up A Pipeline
Best First Screenplay
Samy Burch, Story by Samy Burch, Alex Mechanik, May December
Best breakthrough performance in film
Dominic Sessa, The Holdovers
John Cassavetes Award
Given to the best feature made for under $1,000,000 (award given to the writer, director and producer)
Fremont
Director/Writer: Babak Jalali
Writer: Carolina Cavalli
Producers: Rachael Fung, Chris Martin, Marjaneh Moghimi, George Rush, Sudnya Shroff, Laura Wagner
Robert Altman Award
Given to one film’s director, casting director and ensemble cast
Showing Up
Director: Kelly Reichardt
Casting director: Gayle Keller
Ensemble cast: André Benjamin, Hong Chau, Judd Hirsch, Heather Lawless, James Le Gros, John Magaro, Matt Malloy, Amanda Plummer, Maryann Plunkett, Denzel Rodriguez, Michelle Williams
Producers Award
Honours emerging producers who, despite highly limited resources, demonstrate the creativity, tenacity and vision required to produce quality independent films.
Monique Walton
Someone To Watch Award
Recognises a talented filmmaker of singular vision who has not yet received appropriate recognition.
Monica Sorelle
Director of Mountains
Truer Than Fiction Award
Presented to an emerging director of non-fiction features who has not yet received significant recognition.
Set Hernandez
Director of unseen.
TV NOMINATIONS
Best new non-scripted or documentary series (award given to the creator, eecutive producer, co-executive producer)
Dear Mama
Executive producers: Lasse Järvi, Quincy ‘QD3’ Jones III, Staci Robinson, Nelson George, Charles D. King, Peter Nelson, Adel ‘Future’ Nur, Jamal Joseph, Ted Skillman, Allen Hughes, Steve Berman, Marc Cimino, Jody Gerson, John Janick, Nicholas Ferrall, Nigel Sinclair
Best new scripted series (award given to the creator, eecutive producer, co-executive producer)
Beef
Creator/executive producer: Lee Sung Jin
Executive producers: Steven Yeun, Ali Wong, Jake Schreier, Ravi Nandan, Alli Reich
Co-executive producers: Alice Ju, Carrie Kemper
Best lead performance in a new scripted series
Ali Wong, Beef
Best supporting performance in a new scripted series
Nick Offerman, The Last Of Us
Best breakthrough performance in a new scripted series
Keivonn Montreal Woodard, The Last Of Us
Best ensemble cast in a new scripted series
Jury Duty
Ensemble cast: Alan Barinholtz, Susan Berger, Cassandra Blair, David Brown, Kirk Fox, Ross Kimball, Pramode Kumar, Trisha LaFache, Mekki Leeper, James Marsden, Edy Modica, Kerry O’Neill, Rashida Olayiwola, Whitney Rice, Maria Russell, Ishmel Sahid, Ben Seaward, Ron Song, Evan William.
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