The Hollywood Critics Association held their annual Midseason Awards over the weekend, and the indie darlingEverything Everywhere All At Onceswept the awards ceremony.
The Hollywood Critics Association is a major organization of film critics based in Los Angeles, California. Like other critics organizations, such as the St. Louis Film Critics Association, they present a film awards ceremony every year that serves as a bellwether for future Academy Award winners. The Hollywood Critics Association in particular presents their Midseason Awards, which award films halfway through the year.
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On July 1, the HCA held their 5th Annual Midseason Awards. The biggest takeaway was thatEverything Everywhere All At Onceutterly swept the awards ceremony. The film was nominated for 7 awards (out of 10 total) and won all 7, including Best Picture, Best Director (for the Daniels), Best Actress (for Michelle Yeoh), Best Supporting Actor (for Ke Huy Quan), Best Supporting Actress (for Stephanie Hsu), Best Screenplay (for the Daniels), and Best Indie Film. The only awards it didn’t win were ones it wasn’t eligible for: Best Horror, Most Anticipated Film, and Best Actor (since there was no male lead). Another major story wasAustin Butler securing Best Actorfor his electric performance inElvis. This is not a big surprise, as Butler’s performance has risen far above the rest of the competition and become one of the major actor performances of the year. Finally, Most Anticipated film went to Jordan Peele’s upcomingNopeand Best Horror went toFresh, the directorial debut of Mimi Cave.
The HCA also listed their runners-up for each award, and the most notable of these was India’s revolutionary-era blockbusterRRRreceiving runner-up for Best Picture. Although a foreign film,RRRhas become a cult hit since its release on Netflix, and this is a major, likely unexpected, result for the film. Although the film is certainly an underdog, this result indicates thatRRRmay show up again at the Academy Awards, at the very least in the Best International Feature Film category and possibly in other categories such as Best Original Score or Best Original Song.
Ke Huy Quan’s win for Best Supporting Actor inEverything Everywhere All At Onceis especially poignant and much deserved. Quan, best known for playing Short Round at 13 years old inIndiana Jones and the Temple of Doom(1984), struggled for years with the lack of roles for Asian actors and eventually left acting to become a fight choreographer instead. After seeing the success ofCrazy Rich Asians(2018) in the United States, he decided to try acting once again.Everything Everywhere All At Onceis Quan’s first role in 20 years, but you would never guess it from the breathtaking and devastating quality of his performance.
Because of recency bias, the Academy Awards tends to nominate films from later in the year. As a result, Hollywood builds its entire release schedule around this. Tilms expected to have Oscar potential are almost always released late in the year to increase their odds.Everything Everywhere All At Once, released in March 2022, will need to stay strong in critics’ minds for a full year if it hopes to win the Oscar. If any movie can do it, though, it might be this one.Everything Everywhere All at Once’s gargantuan critical momentumis not yet slowing down.
