“The Queen” reigned as the only multiple award-winning movie at the LAFCA dinner this year. Deservedly so for doing such a wonderful job of humanizing Elizabeth II and Prime Minister Tony Blair. But the sensitive artists who made it, it turns out, are really just a bunch of jesters.
Take director Stephen Freaers, who accepted for supporting actor winner Michael Sheen, who was stuck doing a play back in Britain and couldn’t be honored for his portrayal of Blair in person.
“I’m sorry,” Freaers started, “Michael is in what he calls rainswept Wales, which means he’s probably a lot warmer than I’ve been this weekend in L.A. He sent me a speech but I’ll edit it, because he’s Welsh and he goes on a bit.
” ‘Thanks so much to the critics of Los Angeles for this great honor, for showing such taste and sophistication. I’m so sorry I can’t be with you, I’m running the country. Many thanks to the wonderful producers [names listed, we won’t bore you] and distributors [ditto], Dylan Thomas, Richard Burton, Anthony Hopkins . . .’
“. . . And then there’s ‘arch druids’,” Frears sniffed.
Not to be outdone, best actress winner Helen Mirren concluded her thank yous with a heartfelt shout-out to her spouse, “Ray” director Taylor Hackford: “Last of all, thank you to my husband for still wanting to sleep with me even though he’s seen me dressed as the queen . . . Or, maybe, because!”
And best screenwriter Peter Morgan, who also adapted “Last King of Scotland,” noted that “In an industry that seems obsessed by sequels, I’m somewhat depressed that nobody’s approached me for ‘Idi Amin and The Queen.’ They met on a number of occasions . . . you can imagine.
“He started writing letters to her, and it’s probably one of the great letter-exchanging romances of history. If any producers are noticing, this is a pitch.”

Favorite line in a critic’s speech at the LAFCA awards dinner:
“If I ever have to live in hell, I want it to be shot by this man.”
– John Powers, presenting the cinematography award to “Children of Men’s” Emmanuel Lubezki.

Got to sit with Sacha Baron Cohen and his fiancee, “Wedding Crashers'” Isla Fisher, at the Los Angeles Film Critics Association’s awards dinner. A very fun, thoughtful and sweet couple – she was open and chatty from the get-go, he warmed up after he realized that I was the guy who kept asking off-the-wall questions at his Borat press conference a couple of months ago (seems he liked the idea of having someone to play off of at that highly pre-scripted affair, so I guess I can proudly say I was part of a spontaneous Borat routine).
Cordial table conversation was an off-the-record deal (nothing juicy said anyway). But of course, Baron’s acceptance speech – he shared LAFCA’s best actor award with “Last King of Scotland’s” Forest Whitaker – was a scream.
Choice excerpt:
“I would say it is an incredible honor receiving this award,” Cambridge-educated Englishman Cohen said in his rarely heard natural voice. “Various actors who’ve received this in the past have shown incredible commitment to their roles. De Niro put on, I think, 40 pounds for ‘Raging Bull.’ Other actors have pretended to be blind, other actors have shed weight. Tom Cruise even pretended to have sex with Nicole Kidman.
“However, none of them have had to sit under a 300-pound naked man. It was during that time that I thought to myself: I’d better bloody win an award for this!”

Favorite image from Sunday night’s Los Angeles Film Critics Association awards dinner: Clint Eastwood’s wife Dina shooting him making his “Letters from Iwo Jima” best picture acceptance speech with a slick little cameraphone, like he was a kid in his first high school play.

So Ang Lee was rolling along at the Los Angeles Film Critics Association dinner Tuesday in Century City, making what must have been his 587th or so award acceptance speech this year for directing “Brokeback Mountain.” He thanked these writers, those producers, the studio executives who kept the faith in his gay cowboy movie, yadda yadda yadda. But then, suddenly . . .
Continue reading “LAFCA: Can’t quit the big green guy” »

German director Werner Herzog, in accepting his award for the documentary “Grizzly Man” at the Los Angeles Film Critics Association dinner Tuesday night, shrugged off the fact that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences failed to include his widely acclaimed film on its short list of nominees for this year’s documentary Oscar.
Continue reading “LAFCA: Oscar’s loss” »

Those who follow such things know that the Los Angeles Film Critics Association gave their best actress award to little-known Vera Farmiga for the seen-by-12-people drug addict drama “Down to the Bone.”
Well, the actress was so thrilled about the recognition that when she accepted her plaque at Tuesday night’s awards dinner in Century City, she promised . . .

Continue reading “LAFCA: It’s a girl!” »

That’s the question everyone’s asking after the Los Angeles Film Critics Assn. gave her the best actress award for her haunting performance in the drug-addiction drama “Down To the Bone.”
It’s a legitimate question since “Down To the Bone” played for only two weeks in Los Angeles after opening Thanksgiving weekend.

It’s a question I doubt too many people will be asking a year from now since Farmiga has the lead actress role in Martin Scorsese’s next movie, “The Departed” and will also be prominently featured in Anthony Minghella’s heist drama “Breaking and Entering.”

For “Down to the Bone,” Farmiga won a Special Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival in 2004 (that’s how long it has taken this stark, truthful film to find distribution). She was also nominated for a lead actress Independent Spirit Award in 2005.
Those accolades stick in your mind. So when “Down To the Bone” finally made it to L.A., almost two years after its Sundance triumphs, members of LAFCA made sure to clear some time and give it a look.

If you want to do the same, “Down To the Bone” will more than likely reopen in Los Angeles on Friday at the Laemmle Monica in Santa Monica. (The uncertainty is over whether a print can be struck in time … no one from the distributor counted on Farmiga’s win. Now they see a way to rightfully capitalize on the attention.)

The movie also opens Friday in San Fransico and will play in the nation’s top 20 markets early next year. And it is continuing to do good business in New York, where it has now played for four weeks.

For those obsessed with the Oscars, the Los Angeles Film Critics vote carries some (small) meaning. Will Vera Farmiga’s best actress win result in an Oscar nod? Of course not. Will Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s LAFCA win for Capote result in an Oscar nod? He was going to get one anyway.

Continue reading “Brokeback: First LAFCA, next the world?” »

Some awards groups — the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. and HFPA wannabe Broadcast Film Critics Assn. (now there’s an oxymoron if ever there was) take some pleasure in proclaiming themselves Oscar barometers. As if that’s a good thing.
Continue reading “LAFCA: Why we vote” »