The New York Film Critics Circle on Friday named “Drive My Car,” an intimate three-hour epic by Ryusuke Hamaguchi adapted from a short story by Haruki Murakami, Best Picture of the Year.
Hamaguchi’s film, about a widowed actor played by Hidetoshi Nishijima, has been widely acclaimed since it debuted earlier this year at the Cannes Film Festival, where it won the best screenplay award. “Drive My Car,” which recently opened in limited theaters in the United States, is Japan’s representative at the Academy Awards.
This is only the second time in four decades that New York critics’ top honor has gone to a non-English language film. The other was “Roma” by Alfonso Cuarón three years ago.
Jane Campion’s gothic drama “The Power of the Dog,” set in Montana, received three awards: Best Director for Campion, Best Actor for Benedict Cumberbatch, and Best Supporting Actor for Kodi Smit-McPhee .
For the rest, the critics in New York shared their honors. The best actress award went to Lady Gaga for her portrayal of Patrizia Reggiani in Ridley Scott’s “House of Gucci”. Kathryn Hunter won for her role as a ghostly witch in Joel Coen’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s forthcoming “The Tragedy of Macbeth.” Paul Thomas Anderson took home the best screenplay award for his coming-of-age comedy “Licorice Pizza.”
The comedy about a family road trip during the robot apocalypse “The Mitchells vs. the Machines ”(“ The Mitchell family vs. the machines ”), by Michael Rianda, won the award for best animated film.
The award for best photography went to Janusz Kamisnki for the new version of “West Side Story” (“Love without barriers”), by Steven Spielberg. Maggie Gyllenhaal’s adaptation of Elena Ferrante’s “The Lost Daughter” won the award for best first feature.
The trophy for best documentary went to Jonas Poher Rasmussen’s animated refugee film “Flee”. And Joachim Trier’s “The Worst Person in the World”, a chronicle of youth and love in Oslo, Norway, won the award for best foreign language film.
The group also announced several special awards, to Maya Cade for creating the Black Film Archive, a catalog of black culture films made between 1915 and 1979 that are available online; for the late Diane Weyermann, a film executive who helped produce documentaries on social issues such as “An Inconvenient Truth” and “Citizenfour”; and for Marshall Fine, a film critic and CEO of the New York Film Critics Circle.
The New York Film Critics Circle, founded in 1935, will present its awards for the 89th time at a ceremony on January 10.
Last year, the group chose Kelly Reichardt’s “First Cow” for best picture. The previous one, “The Irishman” (“The Irishman”) by Martin Scorsese.
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