Online Film Critics Society chooses 12 Years a Slave
Monday, December 16, 2013 at 2:30PM 
Tim here - I won't keep you very long, since it's just another damn critics' award, but the OFCS has announced its winners this morning, with 12 Years a Slave winning five times, including only the second award that Michael Fassbender has received from any group to date. The asterisk here is that Her wasn't made widely available to the membership at large before the conclusion of voting, and it's the kind of film that tends to do well with OFCS.
The full list:
Best Picture: 12 Years a Slave
Best Animated Feature: The Wind Rises
Best Film Not in the English Language: Blue Is the Warmest Color
Best Documentary: The Act of Killing
Best Director: Alfonso Cuaron – Gravity
Best Actor: Chiwetel Ejiofor – 12 Years a Slave
Best Actress: Cate Blanchett – Blue Jasmine
Best Supporting Actor: Michael Fassbender – 12 Years a Slave
Best Supporting Actress: Lupita Nyong’o – 12 Years a Slave
Best Original Screenplay: Her
Best Adapted Screenplay: 12 Years a Slave
Best Editing: Gravity
Best Cinematography: Gravity
Special Awards:
Best Sound Design and Best Visual Effects to Gravity
To Roger Ebert, for inspiring so many of our members
Top Ten films Without a U.S. Release:
Closed Curtain
Gloria
Like Father, Like Son
Our Sunhi
R100
The Rocket
Stranger By the Lake
We Are the Best!
Le Week-End
Why Don’t You Play in Hell?
Reader Comments (10)
Fassbender has been doing amazing work for the last few years, yet it takes an Oscar-y movie like "12 Years a Slave" (which I love) to get him this type of awards traction despite being one of his weakest performances. I find that quite peculiar, though I know it's not without precedent.
Is it safe to call Ejiofor the front runner now?
No comment.
This is fine. Quite fine.
And I personally thought Fassbender was great. Much layered and interesting than his work in Shame, but that's just one opinion.
Kurt -- now i'm curious which part of this is prompting your no comment ;)
troy -- totallly agree on Fassbender except the "weakest performance" part. I think this is pretty consistently on par with how brilliant he often is. but even if it is his one of his weakest major roles, when you're talking about Shame and Hunger and Prometheus and Fish Tank and all of that, being weakest is no great shame ;)
I don't think it's bad work by any stretch, nor do I dislike it, but I do think it reads much to much like The Villain for me to appreciate it in the way I would have liked to.
On another note, did I miss something with "Gravity"? I surely feel like it's a marvel of technical achievement that kept me on edge, but calling it the best directed movie of the year is a reach as far as I'm concerned.
Lovely to see We Are the Best, one of the funniest films I've seen all year long, get a shout. I hope it gets released sometime soon.
Also nice to see Closed Curtain, which is firmly in my top ten of the year.
The race for BSA is so much tighter than last year. Paulson, who was incredible, can't get one citation!
I personally loved Fassbender. But I always do. I m happy Leto is getting some competition. I think Fassy may win this in the end. They both did a fantastic job and in my opinion out-acted their leads which was no easy feat. I love lupita and all but Seydoux is my supporting actress of the year, also out-acting her lead. Blanchett is on point. I can't wait until the acrual ceremonies start and the internet is full of her pictures as opposed to celebrities who have no reason to be famous at all.
I m watching Her this weekend. My current best actor of the year will probably change but we'll see. I have grown to love Joaquin Phoenix very very much.
Ejiofor and Exarchopoulos were out-acted? No, that's confusing subtlety and nuance as being weaker than the showier performance. For what the parts called for, I really cannot get what people were looking for.
I'll just say that, while I'm a proud OFCS member, most of my top picks didn't come out victorious here.