Gotham Awards Cop Out and Declare a Tie Between ‘Beginners’ and ‘Tree of Life’ for Best Feature

By Brad Brevet
ON

I hate ties when it comes to handing out awards, especially if you’re going to hold an actual awards show. What’s the point in declaring the best of something if you can’t determine what the best is? That said, I guess it can be looked at as something of a surprise when the 21st annual Gotham Independent Awards hand Best Feature to The Tree of Life and Beginners considering I think most felt The Descendants had it in the bag. And yet, that’s not the end of the surprises.

Beginners also scored Best Ensemble over the likes of The Descendants and Margin Call, both of which have been praised for their ensemble performances. The buzz this generates for Beginners should certainly help it on its way through Oscar season, hopefully keeping Christopher Plummer‘s supporting performance a front-runner for Best Supporting Actor at the Oscars.

Breakthrough Actor is a bit of a surprise for me as they hand it to Felicity Jones for Like Crazy, bypassing both Elizabeth Olsen in Martha Marcy May Marlene and Shailene Woodley in The Descendants. The Gotham Awards certainly weren’t a good sign for either of those Fox Searchlight pics if you’re looking for some sort of sign of things to come.

I do like the winner for Breakthrough Director as I watched Dee Rees‘s Pariah this weekend and loved what she put together, but I think that was a field of several worthy candidates including Evan Glodell for Bellflower and Sean Durkin for Martha Marcy May Marlene.

I have included the list of winners directly below and if you’d like to revisit the full list of nominees you can do that right here.

Best Feature

  • The Tree of Life and Beginners

Best Documentary

  • Better This World (directed by Katie Galloway and Kelly Duane de la Vega)

Best Ensemble

  • Beginners
    Ewan McGregor, Christopher Plummer, Mélanie Laurent, Goran Visnjic, Kai Lennox, Mary Page Keller, Keegan Boos

Breakthrough Actor

  • Felicity Jones (Like Crazy)

Breakthrough Director

  • Dee Rees (Pariah)

Audience Award

  • Girlfriend (directed by Justin Lerner)

Best Film Not Playing at a Theater Near You

  • Scenes of a Crime