Four More Critic Award Groups: Houston, Toronto, Phoenix and Dallas-Fort Worth

December 17, 2008

By Brad Brevet

Well, last time it was St. Louis, San Diego, San Francisco and Southeastern Critics weighing in and today I have four more critic award lists to preview for you as critics from Houston, Toronto, Phoenix and Dallas-Fort Worth have all released their winners and for the most part it’s a Slumdog Millionaire day with it taking two of the four Best Picture slots while Benjamin Button scores one and the folks in Toronto toss up a surprise win for Mongrel’s Wendy and Lucy.

Sean Penn (Milk) continues to clean up the Best Actor nods while Toronto was the odd duck again awarding Mickey Rourke for The Wrestler. The Best Actress category saw a pair of wins for Anne Hathaway (Rachel Getting Married) while Michelle Williams (Wendy and Lucy) and Meryl Streep (Doubt) also took home honors.

Heath Ledger (The Dark Knight) was named Best Supporting Actor on all four lists while Viola Davis (Doubt) won for Best Supporting Actress on two lists with Rosemarie Dewitt (Rachel Getting Married) and Marisa Tomei (The Wrestler) split the other two.

Best Director was Danny Boyle (Slumdog Millionaire) all the way except for the Toronto crix who refuse to play nice and award Jonathan Demme (Rachel Getting Married).

Meanwhile, WALL•E has pretty much proven at this point it will be winning Best Animated Feature at the Oscars while Man On Wire owns the Best Documentary category as all four lists once again award those two.

All four lists as featured on the next four pages and you can always keep up on the lists in RopeofSilicon’s “The Contenders” section.

Houston Film Critics