The lists. 2003. 12/15.

Via Movie City News again, a whole new batch. They're actually awards, not lists, but what the hell. The American Film Institute has unveiled its top ten, but if you want to probe the "jury rationales" for the choices, you have to download a PDF file. Odd. Oh, and: No surprises.

Lost in Translation sweeps the NYFCO awards. NYFCO, you ask? That's the New York Film Critics Online, "23 top critics, most exclusively online" - and in New York, too, evidently. There are some fine names here, actually, David Edelstein, Amy Taubin and more, and if you need any of their email addresses, there they are.

The Boston Film Critics have split their awards nice and evenly between Translation and Mystic River, naming the latter as Best Picture and Ensemble, but going with the first for Director, Actor and Actress.

Meantime, the Guardian's Peter Bradshaw looks back over the year in film, from Michael Moore at the Oscars to French shockers, from Cannes to Michael Winterbottom's win in Berlin. Because he's in the UK, of course, he gets to claim last year's Far From Heaven as the best non-British film of this year, a luxury others might wish for as well. Bradshaw wraps by listing "10 films to see in 2004."

IndieWIRE's Eugene Hernandez and Wendy Mitchell list and annotate the "Breakthroughs of the Year; The Films, People, and Trends That Defined 2003." Topical, in alphabetical order, with the biggest surprise probably being "The Turkish Invasion."

And finally for now, kamera.co.uk "is inviting its readers to nominate their best (and worst) films of 2003." Deadline? You won't believe this. They're actually waiting until the end of the year, December 31.

Posted by dwhudson at December 15, 2003 8:45 AM