Women Film Critics Circle 2007 Awards
Sarah Polley’s Away from Her and Kasi Lemmons’ Talk to Me
By way of Alison Flynn, via Awards Daily and courtesy of Movie City News (gotta love the internet!), I bring you another round of crtical praise, this time from the Women Film Critics Circle.
In their own words, “The Women Film Critics Circle is an association of 40 women film critics and scholars from around the country, who are involved in print, radio, online and TV broadcast media. We have come together to form the first women critics organization in the country, in the belief that women’s perspectives and voices in film criticism need to be recognized fully.”
Because their choices are drawn along gender lines, it’s impossible to match up their picks with the larger critical body we’ve been following, but frankly that’s all the more reason these awards deserve the spotlight.
Results after the jump…
Features
- Picture by a Woman: [Tie] Away From Her, Sarah Polley and Talk To Me, Kasi Lemmons
- Picture About Women: Juno, Jason Reitman
- Woman Storyteller [Screenwriting Award]: Juno, Diablo Cody
- Actress: Laura Linney, The Savages
- Comedic Performance: Amy Adams, Enchanted
- Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis, There Will Be Blood
- Young Actress: Saoirse Ronan, Atonement
- Female Images in a Movie: [tie] Hairspray and Life Support
- Foreign Film: [tie] La Vie En Rose and Persepolis
- Music: Hairspray, Nikki Blonsky and Queen Latifah
- Theatrically Unreleased Movie by or About Women: Life Support
- Lifetime Achievement Award: Judi Dench
- Acting and Activism: Angelina Jolie
- Best Equality of the Sexes: [tie] Away From Her and Becoming Jane
- Best Animated Female: Elle, Enchanted
- Best Family Film: Enchanted
*Adrienne Shelly Award: Redacted
(For a film that most passionately opposes violence against women)
**Josephine Baker Award: The Great Debaters
(For best expressing the woman of color experience in America)
***Karen Morley Award: A Mighty Heart
(For best exemplifying a woman’s place in history or society, and a courageous search for identity)
****Special Mention for a Female’s Right to Male Roles in Movies: Cate Blanchett, I’m Not There
Documentaries
- Above and Beyond: Redacted
- Groundbreaker: Strange Culture: Lynn Hershman-Leeson
- Courage in Filmmaking: Meeting Resistance: Molly Bingham, co-director
Most Offensive Male Characters
- Crazy Love [Burt Pugach] *Winning Loser
- Norbit [Rasputia] *Winning Loser
- Good Luck Chuck
- The Heartbreak Kid
- Knocked Up
- Revolver
- Superbad
- Who’s Your Caddy?
WFCC Top Ten Hall of Shame
- Black Snake Moan *Winning Loser
- Exterminating Angels *Winning Loser
- Goya’s Ghost *Winning Loser
- Atonement
- Captivity
- Gone Baby, Gone
- Hairspray/Edna [John Travolta]
- Lust, Caution
- Norbit/Rasputia [Eddie Murphy]
- Red Road
*Adrienne Shelly Award: Adrienne Shelly was a promising actress and filmmaker who was brutally strangled in her apartment in 2006 at the age of forty by a construction worker in the building, after she complained about noise. Her killer tried to cover up his crime by hanging her from a shower rack in her bathroom, to make it look like a suicide. He later confessed that he was having a “bad day.” Shelly, who left behind a baby daughter, had just completed her film Waitress, which she also starred in, and which was honored at Sundance after her death.
**Josephine Baker Award: The daughter of a laundress and a musician, Baker overcame being born black, female and poor, and marriage at age fifteen, to become an internationally acclaimed legendary performer, starring in the films Princess Tam Tam, Moulin Rouge and Zou Zou. She also survived the race riots in East St. Louis, Illinois as a child, and later expatriated to France to escape US racism. After participating heroically in the underground French Resistance during WWII, Baker returned to the US where she was a crusader for racial equality. Her activism led to attacks against her by reporter Walter Winchell who denounced her as a communist, leading her to wage a battle against him. Baker was instrumental in ending segregation in many theaters and clubs, where she refused to perform unless integration was implemented.
***Karen Morely Award: Karen Morley was a promising Hollywood star in the 1930s, in such films as Mata Hari and Our Daily Bread. She was driven out of Hollywood for her political convictions by the Blacklist and for refusing to testify against other actors, while Robert Taylor and Sterling Hayden were informants against her. And also for daring to have a child and become a mother, unacceptable for female stars in those days. Morley maintained her outspoken political activism for the rest of her life, running for Lieutenant Governor on the American Labor Party ticket in 1954. She passed away in 2003, unrepentant to the end, at the age of 93.
****The Woman’s Right To Male Roles In Movies Award is intended to challenge that men have not only the most prominent roles in films, but also the most complex and fully drawn out characters. So when an actress can fight for access to such a role, and it may be rewritten for her, it is one of substance, and free of the usual shallow or demonized female stereotypes.
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Aw, thanks for the credit, Craig.
I was very happy about the people that got recognition. Daniel Day-Lewis kind of came out of left field, though I’m always happy to see him get acknowledgment.
Some of their categories are a little whacked (the Hall of Shame), and I know a lot of people have problems with it. But I say whatever. I’d still like to rejoice in the worthwhile praise that they doled out.
I would love to read an explanation for their Most Offensive and Hall of Shame categories, but I could find none. Some of them are obvious, but others are more mysterious.
I can see why they might have been troubled by Black Snake Moan, but I can’t help but think they’ve misjudged it. It’s probably not for me to say, however I’d still like to hear their reasons.
Day-Lewis was a surprise to me also. Clearly they were awarding the performance and not the character, which is good.
I can see why they might have been troubled by Black Snake Moan, but I can’t help but think they’ve misjudged it.
Yeah, Alison, it’s odd to see an acting award and a Hall of Shame entry both going to Atonement but that’s what happens when they have those sorts of categories. I could debate the subjectivity of it but it doesn’t really matter.
In an age where women continue to be marginalized in Hollywood and films marketed to and made for women tend to be more patronizing than thoughtful, it’s nice to see credit given where credit is due (on both accounts).
When I think of women being exploited in movies this year I can’t help thinking of Jessica Biel grabbing Adam Sandler’s hands and planting them on her chest in Chuck & Larry. Also because her character really serves no narrative function and is only in the movie for T&A.
I’m really conflicted about these kinds of awards. On the one hand I am a feminist, and I do sometimes look at films from a feminist perspective, but I don’t know if giving out these awards contributes anything to, well, anything…I mean, the hall of shame category, especially, seems to judge films solely on their sexist/feminist content, regardless of quality. It also seems they have a rather narrow view of what feminism entails, and of what is “acceptable” or not. I think if a film is good enough, it can “afford” to be sexist, in a way, but in the case of for instance “The Heartbreak Kid”, the sexism just adds insult to injury.
What WOULD be good for feminism and in general women is if there were more layered, complex, interesting women in films, and if they weren’t so often relegated to useless girlfriend/wife/mother roles. But it’s going to take a lot more than a couple of awards to change that.
Well said, Hedwig.
I agree Hedwig and I was torn over whether or not to post their picks. In the end, I think the benefits of calling attention to an overlooked segment of the film market outweigh the negatives of some of the group’s more shrill and politically slanted gripes.
Women continue to get the short end of the stick in Hollywood, as professionals and as members of the audience, and it bears repeating until it’s no longer true.
Agreed, Hedwig, sartre and Craig.
Unfortunately the Hall of Shame and Most Sexist Film categories eat away at this group’s credibility, and frankly, it’s reverse discrimination. But the reason I posted the link at Awards Daily is because of the legitimate categories, in which deserving people like Laura Linney and Diablo Cody received acknowledgment. Especially Laura Linney, who has been ignored by everyone except this group and the London Critics.
Women are still a marginalized group in Hollywood. How many female directors have won a Directing Oscar? We’ve been discussing Diablo Cody a lot on Awards Daily, as you all know, and about how she had to play the ‘former stripper’ card in order to get in the door for the big wigs to see her talent and intelligence.
As all of you pointed out, it’s too bad that this group has to taint the positive aspects of their awards with their gripes.
If you’d like to hear the WFCC discussion and rationale for choices, including the Hall Of Shame category, you can listen in to our WFCC Awards Ceremony, which aired on WBAI Radio on Thursday 12/13 at 11am. The show can be heard by visiting the Archives Section at wbai.org, It’s listed under The Largest Minority.
Thank you Prairie, I’ll check it out.