2010 Film Independent Spirit Awards Winners

Winners are in *BLUE. Was fun to follow it in twitter as many of my "friends" were twitting, some tweets were very funny. Still it's a true shame that was not streamed live, they and so many others need to CHANGE with times and use the net to promote awards shows and movies. It's a true shame that things change so slowly... sigh.

Use link at bottom of post to check winners in all categories at official site that will be posted later on.

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11/30/10
With not many surprises and what we have already imagined after the Gotham awards, the Spirit nominations were just a few minutes announced and here they are.

Best Feature
127 Hours, Danny Boyle
*Black Swan, Darren Aronofsky
Greenberg, Noah Baumbach
Kids Are All Right, Lisa Cholodenko
Winter’s Bone, Debra Granik

Best Director
*Darren Aronofsky for Black Swan
Danny Boyle for 127 Hours
Lisa Cholodenko for The Kids Are All Right
Debra Granik for Winter’s Bone
John Cameron Mitchell for Rabbit Hole

Best First Feature
Everything Strange and New, Frazer Bradshaw
*Get Low, Aaron Schneider
The Last Exorcism, Daniel Stamm (USA and France…hmm)
Night Catches Us, Tanya Hamilton
Tiny Furniture, Lena Dunham

Best Female Lead
Nicole Kidman in Rabbit Hole
Annette Bening in The Kids Are All Right
Greta Gerwig in Greenberg
Jennifer Lawrence in Winter’s Bone
*Natalie Portman in Black Swan
Michelle Williams in Blue Valentine

Best Supporting Female
Ashley Bell in The Last Exorcism
*Dale Dickey in Winter’s Bone
Allison Janney in Life During Wartime
Daphne Rubin-Vega in Jack Goes Boating
Naomi Watts in Mother and Child

Best Male Lead
Ronald Bronstein in Daddy Longlegs
Aaron Eckhart in Rabbit Hole
*James Franco in 127 Hours
John C. Reilly in Cyrus
Ben Stiller in Greenberg

Best Supporting Male
*John Hawkes in Winter’s Bone
Samuel L. Jackson in Mother and Child
Bill Murray in Get Low
John Ortiz in Jack Goes Boating
Mark Ruffalo in The Kids Are All Right

John Cassavetes Award
*Daddy Longlegs (aka Go Get Some Rosemary), Ben and Joshua Safdie, USA and France, 2009
The Exploding Girl, Bradley Rust Gray, USA
LBS., Matthew Bonifacio, USA, 2004
Lovers of Hate, Bryan Poyser, USA, 2010
Obselidia, Diane Bell, USA, 2010

Best Cinematograhy
Adam Kimmel for Never Let Me Go
*Matthew Libatique for Black Swan
Jody Lee Lipes for Tiny Furniture
Michael McDonough for Winter’s Bone
Harris Savides for Greenberg

Best Screenplay
*Lisa Cholodenko and Stuart Blumberg for The Kids Are All Right
Debra Granik and Anne Rosellini for Winter’s Bone
Nicole Holofcener for Please Give
David Lindsay-Abaire for Rabbit Hole
Todd Solondz for Life During Wartime

Best First Screenplay
Diane Bell for Obselidia
*Lena Dunham for Tiny Furniture
Nik Fackler for Love, Still
Robert Glaudini for Jack Goes Boating
Dana Adam Shapiro and Evan M. Wiener for Monogamy

Best Foreign Film
The King’s Speech, Tom Hooper, UK and Australia, 2010
Kisses, Lance Daly, Ireland, 2008
Mademoiselle Chambon, Stéphane Brizé, France, 2009
Des Hommes et des Dieux (Of Gods and Men), Xavier Beauvois, France, 2010
Loong Boonmee raleuk chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand, UK, France, Germany, Spain, and Netherlands, 2010

Best Documentary
*Exit Through the Gift Shop, Bansky
Marwencol, Jeff Malmberg
Restrepo, Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington
Sweetgrass, Ilisa Barbash and Lucien Castaining-Taylor
Thunder Soul, Mark Landsman

To check information for each film as well as nominees in other categories go here. Awards ceremony will be on Saturday, February 26th, 2011 at 10pm ET; will be broadcasted on IFC and probably also have a live stream at the awards site.

Was reading a Variety article about the difference between the Gotham and the Spirit awards; the best phrase is that they are as different as New York and Los Angeles and you can tell by the inclusion of some films like Greenberg (?!) or The Last Exorcism that will not watch it even when I learned that is an USA and France co production. But there are some films that last night saw clips that will probably watch if I can find them. Why is so hard to find indie films?

Winter’s Bone got seven (7) nominations and I believe is the film that has the most nods at these awards too. In the best foreign film category there is a film from 2008 that has to be very hard to watch and think will skip, Kisses; but obviously the other four are must be seen for me and just wonder why other great films got snubbed in favor of this movie. My only question regarding this category: When am I going to be able to watch the 2010 Cannes winner? The wait has become excruciating.

With these nominations I’m sure that three films head to the Oscars, Winter’s Bone, Black Swan and The Kids Are All Right. Will they make it to Best Film category? Not sure, but know they will be honored in one or more other categories.

As noted in a previous post this year there are many excellent roles for actresses so it’s no real surprise that there are six actresses nominated; the surprise is to find an actress from Greenberg! Maybe I should watch this film.