Critics groups go for 'No Country,' 'Blood'

The movie critics awards have been coming fast and furious over the last 24 hours, with no fewer than five groups announcing their winners. Far and away the big winner has been No Country for Old Men, which followed last week's National Board of Review victory with Best Picture honors from three more associations: the New York, Boston, and Washington D.C. societies. The only dissenting voice was the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, which named There Will Be Blood Best Picture, and the New York Film Critics Online, which split its prize between Blood and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.

In the lead-acting races, Blood's Daniel Day-Lewis scooped up three Best Actor awards (from New York, L.A., and New York Online), while Away From Her's Julie Christie added three more Best Actress prizes to her arsenal. And the supporting categories now have two bona fide frontrunners, as No Country's Javier Bardem (pictured) and Gone Baby Gone's Amy Ryan each won four of the five just-announced awards. Including her NBR win last week, Ryan has now won five Best Supporting Actress honors, losing only the New York Online prize to I'm Not There's Cate Blanchett.

Speaking of I'm Not There, Todd Haynes' take on Bob Dylan is one critical fave that seems to be underperforming in the early awards lists, landing only on the New York Online top 10. And both American Gangster and Charlie Wilson's War have been virtually MIA from all the awards action so far. The next few days bring nominations from the Broadcast Film Critics Association and the Golden Globes: Those two big-ticket films will need to pick up multiple nods to stay in the Oscar race.

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Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood came up big with the Los Angeles Film Critics Association on Sunday (Dec. 9), taking awards for best picture, best director, best actor (Daniel Day-Lewis), and best production design (Jack Fisk). The epic, 158-minute Paramount Vantage film opens on Dec. 26. The Julian Schnabel-directed The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, about Jean-Dominique Bauby, the French magazine editor who communicates by blinking his left eye after a stroke leaves him paralyzed, was named best picture runner-up. Also doing well was Romanian import and Cannes Palme d'Or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days, which won foreign-language film and supporting actor for Vlad Ivanov's performance as an illegal abortionist. Marion Cotillard won best actress for her role as French chanteuse Edith Piaf in Picturehouse's biopic La Vie en rose, and Amy Ryan took best supporting actress for her work in two crime dramas: Gone Baby Gone and Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. No End in Sight, Charles Ferguson's critique of the Bush administration's handling of the aftermath of the Iraq War, was named top documentary, while Disney/Pixar/s Ratatouille tied with Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud's French-language Persepolis for the animation award. The L.A. Film Critics Association Awards will be presented on Jan. 12 at the Hotel Intercontinental in Century City.

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