For Immediate Release

LADY BIRD LEADS VANCOUVER FILM CRITICS CIRCLE INTERNATIONAL NOMINATIONS LIST WITH FIVE NODS

Vancouver, B.C. (December 15, 2017) – Greta Gerwig’s solo directorial debut Lady Bird leads all films in the Vancouver Film Critics Circle’s international section with five nominations.

Gerwig’s wise and perceptive coming-of-age comedy shares the Best Film category with Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk, a time-bending WWII epic, and Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread, a resplendent melodrama with a prickly and poisonous aftertaste; Gerwig, Nolan, and Anderson assume their respective places in the Best Director category.

Phantom Thread received other nods in Best Actor (Daniel Day-Lewis) and Best Supporting Actress (Lesley Manville). Darkest Hour’s Gary Oldman and Call Me by Your Name’s Timothée Chalamet are also up for Best Actor, while I, Tonya’s Allison Janney and Lady Bird‘s Laurie Metcalf compete for Best Supporting Actress.

Armie Hammer garnered Call Me by Your Name’s only other nomination in Best Supporting Actor along with The Florida Project’s Willem Dafoe and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri’s Sam Rockwell. Jordan Peele’s horror-satire Get Out has a single nomination for Best Screenplay, a category he occupies with Martin McDonagh of Three Billboards and Greta Gerwig of Lady Bird.

BPM, The Square, and A Fantastic Woman are up for Best Foreign Language Film, while Ex Libris: The New York Public Library, Faces Places, and Jane are nominated for Best Documentary.

Winners in the international categories will be announced on Monday, December 18. A full list of International nominees follows.

Best Film
Dunkirk
Lady Bird
Phantom Thread

Best Actor
Timothée Chalamet, Call Me by Your Name
Daniel Day-Lewis, Phantom Thread
Gary Oldman, Darkest Hour

Best Actress
Sally Hawkins, The Shape of Water
Frances McDormand, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Saoirse Ronan, Lady Bird

Best Supporting Actor
Willem Dafoe, The Florida Project
Armie Hammer, Call Me By Your Name
Sam Rockwell, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Best Supporting Actress
Allison Janney, I, Tonya
Lesley Manville, Phantom Thread
Laurie Metcalf, Lady Bird

Best Director
Paul Thomas Anderson, Phantom Thread
Greta Gerwig, Lady Bird
Christopher Nolan, Dunkirk

Best Screenplay
Greta Gerwig, Lady Bird
Martin McDonagh, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Jordan Peele, Get Out

Best Foreign Language Film
BPM
A Fantastic Woman
The Square

Best Documentary
Ex-Libris: The New York Public Library
Faces Places
Jane

THREE DEBUT FEATURES NOMINATED FOR BEST CANADIAN FILM; GREGOIRE LEADS CANADIAN SECTION WITH SIX NODS

Cody Bown’s Gregoire leads all films in the Vancouver Film Critics’ Circles’ Canadian section with six nominations.

Kathleen Hepburn’s Never Steady, Never Still, a meditative portrait of a mother’s battle with Parkinson’s while her son comes to terms with his identity, is nominated for Best Canadian Film along with two other exceptional first features: Cory Bowles’ Black Cop, a timely satire about an African-Canadian police officer who fights back against entitled white citizens, and Antoine Bourges’ Fail to Appear, a quiet and precise study of institutional systems of support available for those on parole.

The Vancouver Film Critics Circle has replaced Best First Film with One to Watch, which recognizes emerging filmmakers who haven’t received significant amounts of exposure, be it festival play or press coverage. The inaugural nominees are Cody Bown for Gregoire, Seth A. Smith for The Crescent, and Winston DeGiobbi for Mass for Shut-Ins. A cash prize will be provided for this award by Telefilm.

A Skin So Soft and Maison du bonheur are nominated for Best Documentary, and their directors Sofia Bohdanowicz (Maison) and Denis Côté (Skin) are also represented in Best Director. Kathleen Hepburn rounds out that category, and Jacquelyn Mills’ In the Waves and Charles Officer’s Unarmed Verses are the other Best Documentary nominees.

Two portraits of Canadian life in small communities–Gregoire and Never Steady, Never Still—are nominated for Best BC Film along with two formally experimental documentary hybrids about indigenous subjects: The Road Forward and Luk’Luk’I. A cash prize sponsored by the Canadian Media Production Association-BC Producers’ Branch will be presented to the producer of the winning film in this category, while a second cash prize sponsored by the Directors Guild of Canada-BC Council will go to the film’s director.

Fake Tattoos garnered two nominations, one for Rose-Marie Perreault in Best Actress and the other for her co-lead Anthony Therrien in Best Actor. Deragh Campbell (Fail to Appear) and Shirley Henderson (Never Steady, Never Still) are the other Best Actress nominees, while Jared Abrahamson (Gregoire) and Ronnie Rowe (Black Cop) round out the Best Actor category.

Joe Buffalo is nominated for Luk’Luk’I in Best Supporting Actor with Ben Cotton of Gregoire and Nathan Roder of Fail to Appear. Grace Glowicki receives the only nomination for Cardinals in Best Supporting Actress, which she shares with Yaité Ruiz of All You Can Eat Buddha and Morgan Taylor Campbell of Gregoire. The Union of BC Performers provides a cash prize for an acting award winner of the VFCC’s choosing.

Winners of the Canadian awards will be announced at the VFCC’s awards ceremony on Monday January 8, 2018. A full list of nominees in the Canadian categories follows

Best Picture
Black Cop
Fail to Appear
Never Steady, Never Still

Best Director
Sofia Bohdanowicz, Maison du bonheur
Denis Côté, A Skin So Soft
Kathleen Hepburn, Never Steady, Never Still

One to Watch
Cody Bown, Gregoire
Winston DeGiobbi, Mass for Shut-Ins
Seth A. Smith, The Crescent

Best Screenplay
Cody Bown, Gregoire
Kathleen Hepburn, Never Steady, Never Still
Pascal Plante, Fake Tattoos

Best Actor
Jared Abrahamson, Gregoire
Ronnie Rowe, Black Cop
Anthony Therrien, Fake Tattoos

Best Actress
Deragh Campbell, Fail to Appear
Shirley Henderson, Never Steady, Never Still
Rose-Marie Perreault, Fake Tattoos

Best Supporting Actor
Joe Buffalo, Luk’Luk’I
Ben Cotton, Gregoire
Nathan Roder, Fail to Appear

Best Supporting Actress
Morgan Taylor Campbell, Gregoire
Grace Glowicki, Cardinals
Yaité Ruiz, All You Can Eat Buddha

Best Canadian Documentary
In the Waves
Maison du bonheur
A Skin so Soft
Unarmed Verses

Best BC Film
Gregoire
Never Steady, Never Still
The Road Forward
Luk’Luk’I