Every year the fine film critics of our nation’s capital gather together to proclaim the best of the year’s films, directors, performances, and breakthrough’s. 2014 will be remembered for a slate of fine films being with Oscar winner 12 Years A Slave in January and running right up to Peter Jackson’s fitting conclusion to The Hobbit saga.
The Dublin Film Critics Circle has bestowed their top honours upon Richard Linklater and his 12-years-in-the-making odyssey Boyhood as Best Director and Best Film respectively. Marion Cotillard took Best Actress for the Dardenne’s Two Days, One Night, with Jake Gyllenhall’s superb turn in Nightcrawler seeing him win Best Actor. Jack O’Connell’s extraordinary year, which included star turns in the Northern Irish set ’71 and the hard-hitting prison drama Starred Up, was an almost unanimous choice for Breakthrough of 2014.
On the domestic front Lenny Abrahamson’s Frank won Best Irish Film, while the brilliant One Million Dubliners had to settle for second place behind Finding Vivian Maier as Best Documentary.
The lists encompass all films released in Irish cinemas in the calendar year 2014. For the first year Scannain had a representatives on the Dublin Film Critics Circle, and we stand behind the choices made by this eclectic hive-mind.
TOP TEN FILMS
1. Boyhood
2. Under the Skin
3. Ida
4. The Lego Movie
5. 12 Years a Slave
6. Grand Budapest Hotel
7. Two Days, One Night
8 (Tie). Her
8 (Tie). Leviathan
10. Wolf of Wall Street
11 (Tie). Blue Ruin
11 (Tie). The Lunch Box
BEST DIRECTOR
1. Richard Linklater – Boyhood
2. Jonathan Glazer – Under the Skin
3. Pawel Pawlikowski – Ida
4. Spike Jonze – Her
5. Wes Anderson – The Grand Budapest Hotel
6. Andrey Zvyagintsev – Leviathan
7. Steve Mc Queen – 12 Years a Slave
8. Yann Demange – ’71
9 (Tie). Phil Lord and Chris Miller – The Lego Movie
9 (Tie). Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne – Two Days, One Night
11. Jennifer Kent – The Babadook
BEST ACTRESS
1. Marion Cotillard – Two Days, One Night
2. Scarlett Johnasson – Under the Skin
3. Essie Davis – The Babadook
4. Julianne Moore – Maps to the Stars
5. Patricia Arquette – Boyhood
6. Rosamund Pike – Gone Girl
7. Kristen Wiig – The Skeleton Twins
8. Agata Kulesza – Ida
9 (Tie). Agata Trzebuckowska – Ida
9 (Tie). Mia Wasikowska – Tracks
11 (Tie). Jennifer Lawrence – American Hustle
11 (Tie). Emmanuelle Devos – Violette
BEST ACTOR
1. Jake Gyllenhall – Nightcrawler
2. Ralph Fiennes – The Grand Budapest Hotel
3. Jack O’ Connell – ’71
4. Jack O’Connell – Starred Up
5. Phillip Seymour Hoffman – A Most Wanted Man
6. Benedict Cumberbatch – The Imitation Game
7 (Tie). Chadwick Boseman – Get On Up
7 (Tie). Timothy Spall – Mr Turner
9. Michael Fassbender – Frank
10. Irrfan Khan – The Lunchbox
11 (Tie). Tom Hardy – Locke
11 (Tie). Chiwetel Ejiofor – 12 Years A Slave
11 (Tie). Joaquim Phoenix – Her
11 (Tie). Bill Hader – The Skelton Twins
BEST IRISH FILM
1. Frank
2. Living in a Coded Land
3. Out of Here
4. Calvary
5. Run & Jump
6. One Million Dubliners
7. Gold
8. Standby
9. Noble
10. Unbreakable
BEST DOCUMENTARY
1. Finding Vivian Maier
2. One Million Dubliners
3. Citizenfour
4. Concerning Violence
5. 20 feet from Stardom
6. The Known Unknown
7 (Tie). Night Will Fall
7 (Tie). All this Mayhem
9 (Tie). Life Itself
9 (Tie). Dinosaur 13
11 (Tie). 20,000 Days on Earth
11 (Tie). Next Goal Wins
11 (Tie). Living in a Coded Land
14 (Tie). The Missing Picture
14 (Tie). The Overnighters
14 (Tie). The Case Against 8
14 (Tie). Showrunners
BREAKTHROUGH
Jack O’Connell