Bradley Cooper wins Best Director honor for "A Star is Born"
The National Board of Review (NBR) named Green Book the Best Film of the Year, additionally honoring it with Best Actor distinction for Viggo Mortensen.
Copping the most honors was A Star is Born with three: Best Director for Bradley Cooper, Best Actress for Lady Gaga, and Best Supporting Actor for Sam Elliott.
Like Green Book, If Beale Street Could Talk scored a pair of honors: director Barry Jenkins for penning the Best Adapted Screenplay (from novelist James Baldwin’s seminal work), and Regina King as Best Supporting Actress.
Taking Best Original Screenplay was Paul Schrader for First Reformed.
Best Directorial Debut was Bo Burnham for Eighth Grade.
Crazy Rich Asians won for Best Ensemble.
Incredibles 2 earned the Best Animated Feature mantle while Best Documentary went to RBG, and Best Foreign Language Film distinction was bestowed upon Cold War.
The honorees will be feted at the NBR Awards Gala, hosted by Willie Geist, on Tuesday, January 8, 2019 at Cipriani 42nd Street.
Here’s a full rundown of NBR 2018 award recipients:
Best Film: GREEN BOOK
Best Director: Bradley Cooper, A STAR IS BORN
Best Actor: Viggo Mortensen, GREEN BOOK
Best Actress: Lady Gaga, A STAR IS BORN
Best Supporting Actor: Sam Elliott, A STAR IS BORN
Best Supporting Actress: Regina King, IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK
Best Original Screenplay: Paul Schrader, FIRST REFORMED
Best Adapted Screenplay: Barry Jenkins, IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK
Best Animated Feature: INCREDIBLES 2
Breakthrough Performance: Thomasin McKenzie, LEAVE NO TRACE
Best Directorial Debut: Bo Burnham, EIGHTH GRADE
Best Foreign Language Film: COLD WAR
Best Documentary: RBG
Best Ensemble: CRAZY RICH ASIANS
William K. Everson Film History Award: THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND and THEY’LL LOVE ME WHEN I’M DEAD
NBR Freedom of Expression Award: 22 JULY
NBR Freedom of Expression Award: ON HER SHOULDERS
Top Films (in alphabetical order)
- The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
- Black Panther
- Can You Ever Forgive Me?
- Eighth Grade
- First Reformed
- If Beale Street Could Talk
- Mary Poppins Returns
- A Quiet Place
- Roma
- A Star Is Born
Top 5 Foreign Language Films (in alphabetical order)
- Burning
- Custody
- The Guilty
- Happy as Lazzaro
- Shoplifters
Top 5 Documentaries (in alphabetical order)
- Crime + Punishment
- Free Solo
- Minding the Gap
- Three Identical Strangers
- Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
Top 10 Independent Films (in alphabetical order)
- The Death of Stalin
- Lean on Pete
- Leave No Trace
- Mid90s
- The Old Man & the Gun
- The Rider
- Searching
- Sorry to Bother You
- We the Animals
- You Were Never Really Here
Rom-Com Mainstay Hugh Grant Shifts To The Dark Side and He’s Never Been Happier
After some difficulties connecting to a Zoom, Hugh Grant eventually opts to just phone instead.
"Sorry about that," he apologizes. "Tech hell." Grant is no lover of technology. Smart phones, for example, he calls the "devil's tinderbox."
"I think they're killing us. I hate them," he says. "I go on long holidays from them, three or four days at at time. Marvelous."
Hell, and our proximity to it, is a not unrelated topic to Grant's new film, "Heretic." In it, two young Mormon missionaries (Chloe East, Sophie Thatcher) come knocking on a door they'll soon regret visiting. They're welcomed in by Mr. Reed (Grant), an initially charming man who tests their faith in theological debate, and then, in much worse things.
After decades in romantic comedies, Grant has spent the last few years playing narcissists, weirdos and murders, often to the greatest acclaim of his career. But in "Heretic," a horror thriller from A24, Grant's turn to the dark side reaches a new extreme. The actor who once charmingly stammered in "Four Weddings and a Funeral" and who danced to the Pointer Sisters in "Love Actually" is now doing heinous things to young people in a basement.
"It was a challenge," Grant says. "I think human beings need challenges. It makes your beer taste better in the evening if you've climbed a mountain. He was just so wonderfully (expletive)-up."
"Heretic," which opens in theaters Friday, is directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, co-writers of "A Quiet Place." In Grant's hands, Mr. Reed is a divinely good baddie — a scholarly creep whose wry monologues pull from a wide range of references, including, fittingly, Radiohead's "Creep."
In an interview, Grant spoke about these and other facets of his character, his journey... Read More