Awards Season 2018: Independent Spirit Awards Winners

This is the first of two (possibly three?) posts today about awards season, as it all comes to the grand finale tonight with the 90th Academy Awards. They can be viewed on a dedicated Sky Movies channel in the UK and on ABC in the US.

But before I get on to post my Oscar predictions, there's one more awards body to get out of the way first. 

Yesterday- Saturday 3rd March- saw the handing out of the 33rd Film Independent Spirit Awards, in a ceremony hosted by Nick Kroll (Loving, Sing, Vacation) and John Mulaney (Mayne Street, Saturday Night Live) for the second year running.

As you no doubt know by now, the Independent Spirit Awards honour films made (partly or wholly) outside the major film studio system. Some of the winners are below.

Best Feature: Get Out

Best Female Lead: Frances McDormand (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri)

Best Male Lead: Timothee Chalamet (Call Me By Your Name)

Best Supporting Female: Allison Janney (I, Tonya)

Best Supporting Male: Sam Rockwell (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri)

Best Director: Jordan Peele (Get Out)

Best Screenplay: Greta Gerwig (Lady Bird)

Best First Screenplay: Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani (The Big Sick)

Best Cinematography: Call Me By Your Name

Best First Feature: Ingrid Goes West

Best International Film: A Fantastic Woman

Best Documentary: Faces Places

John Cassavetes Award: Life And Nothing More

The John Cassavetes Award is given to the creative team of a film budgeted at less than $500,000. The full list of winners can be found here.

A fairly even spread of awards, with no one film totally dominating. Get Out, Call Me By Your Name, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, and I, Tonya all came away with two awards each. 

With wins here, McDormand, Janney, and Rockwell surely cement their positions for winning the Oscars (but more on that later). I'm really pleased with both of Call Me By Your Name's wins- Timothee Chalamet's central performance is just superb and Sayombhu Mukdeeprom's cinematography is utterly gorgeous. 

Get Out is a very worthy winner of Best Picture and of Best Director, but it may struggle to replicate that success at the Oscars, due to it being up against more mainstream fare. However, in a hotly contested Original Screenplay category, it could be taking at least one statuette home. 

So, with that done, this just leaves the main event: the Oscars tonight. As promised, my predictions for the big winners will be coming later today.