Kevin Hart and Ellen DeGeneres. (Screenshot via YouTube)
Ellen DeGeneres is facing backlash for supporting Kevin Hart and actively campaigning to have Hart host the Oscars.
Hart was tapped to host this year’s Oscars but stepped down after old homophobic jokes and tweets resurfaced. DeGeneres invited Hart on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” to talk about the fall out with the episode scheduled to air on Monday. However, DeGeneres and her producers was apparently so impressed by the interview that the episode aired on Friday instead.
In the interview, Hart explains that he has repeatedly apologized for the jokes, which were made 10 years ago, and viewed the situation as an attack on his character and an attempt to ruin his career. DeGeneres let Hart know that she fully supports him and even called the Academy on his behalf.
“I called them, I said, ‘Kevin’s on, I have no idea if he wants to come back and host, but what are your thoughts?’ And they were like, ‘Oh my God, we want him to host! We feel like that maybe he misunderstood or it was handled wrong. Maybe we said the wrong thing but we want him to host. Whatever we can do we would be thrilled. And he should host the Oscars,’” DeGeneres says.
She continued to explain that she thinks Hart has learned from his mistakes and deserves to come back as host.
“As a gay person, I am sensitive to all of that. You’ve already expressed that it’s not being educated on the subject, not realizing how dangerous those words are, not realizing how many kids are killed for being gay or beaten up every day,” DeGeneres says. “You have grown, you have apologized, you are apologizing again right now. You’ve done it. Don’t let those people win — host the Oscars.”
Some people criticized DeGeneres for labeling people who took issue with the jokes “haters” and “trolls.” There were also people who didn’t believe Hart was being genuine with his apology.
DeGeneres appeared to notice the backlash as she tweeted, “However you feel about this, the only positive way through it is to talk about it. Thank you for being here, @KevinHart4real. “
Calendar/Singer/Songwriter Music: Friday January 18 @ 7 pm. Occidental Center for the Arts is pleased to present: ‘Words and Music’ with Laurie Lewis, Don Henry, Claudia Russell and Nina Gerber. Join us for a night of outstanding music when three celebrated, award-winning singer/songwriters trade favorite tunes in a Nashville-style song circle, accompanied by virtuoso guitarist Nina Gerber! Don’t miss this special collaboration of talent at Sonoma County’s acoustic ’sweet spot’ OCA! $25 Advance/$30 at the door. Reservations advised. Fine refreshments available. Wheelchair accessible . Art gallery open for viewing. www.occidentalcenterforthearts.org. 707-874-9392. 3850 Doris Murphy Ct. Occidental, CA. 95465
We are living in a golden age of lyric, hybrid forms. Following in the queer lineage of Maggie Nelson’sBluets, Dionne Brand’s The Blue Clerk is a fascinating collections of prose poems and hybrid poetry.
The Blue Clerk is a timely book. Self-identified as an “Ars Poetica in 59 Versos,” The Blue Clerk follows the narrative arc of a speaker/poet and an omniscient clerk—who may be the poet/speaker’s archivist, confidant, guide, or Maker, depending on where one finds themselves in the story. Captivating us with a similarly rich landscape of hues (including the fascination with indigos/blues found in Nelson’s book), this collection interweaves the personal with global in a world that feels simultaneously familiar, dissimilar, futuristic, and as old as time.
Starting at something that could perhaps be a shipyard, or Ellis Island, or a stormy dock anywhere in the world, we as readers traverse through a lush landscape similar to the worlds of Gabriel Garcia Marquez (who is referenced), Jorge Luis Borges (who is also referenced), and Andrea Barrett (who is not referenced, but seems to exist in the same canon). And then, when we’ve gotten comfortable with a land of bygone days, we are startlingly drawn to an aching present—
In this city, you fall in love at Chester subway, it’s not a beautiful subway so your love makes it so. But its ugliness may doom your love, and you know it by you love anyway.
This is a tender, present moment, but also timeless. In fact, one of the most remarkable components of this manuscript may be that Brand has managed to make an entire gamut of time itself “timeless,” portraying moments as precious and beautiful, while also as hard as flint. Which is not only challenging to do well, but also intuitive to the way we emotionally function as people. While there are queer themes in the book, I would argue that the queerest thing about The Blue Clerk is exactly that: the skewed, nonlinear spectrum of time.
It takes a truly gifted writer to not only write about the queer experience as identity, but to also skillfully and astutely motion to the entire concept of temporal universality. The Blue Clerk may be one of the best collections of prose poems I’ve read in a long while.
An archivist is a professional obsessive with an impossible task: to collect, preserve and organize everything within one’s chosen bounds. Julietta Singh is not an archivist in the typical sense: on the contrary, she says, she has “a long history of becoming discomfortingly overwhelmed in spaces that contain masses of information.” Instead, the obsession that propels No Archive Will Restore You is the idea of the archive itself, and what it might mean to behold one’s own body—in this case, a queer, multiracial one marked by experiences ranging from bulimia to childbirth—as an archive worthy of passionate study.
Her starting point is a quote lifted blithely out of context from the Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci, who maintained that the first step in developing a coherent philosophy was to assess oneself as “a product of the historical process to date which has deposited in you an infinity of traces,” which must be inventoried to achieve self-knowledge. Singh is somewhat more interested in the deposits left by her personal history than by Gramsci’s great river of world history, but she dips into broader forces as well: the body can be shaped by many things, not all of them strictly physical. She speaks with rare candor about the material conditions of her labor as an academic within a system that churns out legions of “underpaid adjunct laborers without access to healthcare, facing our mid-30s without a clear sense of what it had all been for.” There is a riff on the politics of vegetarianism, and a thread tracing how the wellness industry and medical establishment converge to steer women toward natural remedies and psychological explanations for life-threatening conditions.
This is not even a quarter of the ground Singh wanders across—impressive in a book that barely crests the hundred-page mark. (At times I did wish she’d dwell longer in one spot, sometimes with the desire to forestall the occasional lapses into theory-as-poetry but generally because even her briefest asides are compelling.) One obvious predecessor for the book’s digressive form is Maggie Nelson’sThe Argonauts, which No Archive both references and closely follows in its blend of the academic and the couldn’t-be-more-personal. Which is not to say confessional. No Archive moves so briskly between subjects that the larger narrative of Singh’s life emerges only in flashes, and even major events can blur at this speed. Undescribed family trauma and an unexplained injury, for instance, haunt these pages like a kind of muscle memory.
If Singh glances away from such details, it may be to avoid framing No Archive as solely a catalog of damage. Early on she rejects the idea of focusing on the bodily “imperfections” that women in particular “see magnified so acutely that when we look at ourselves we see not body but flaw… I do not want to gather a body archive strictly in order to convert culturally produced deficiency into historical value; to begin to love in other words, what I have been trained to perceive as a flaw.” She’s after something messier: a portrait of the body as not so much vulnerable as permeable, continuously exchanging signals and material with the world around it.
That exchange produces joy as well as pain. Singh describes finding both inspiration and animal satisfaction in the birth and parenting of her daughter, produced and raised in partnership with a queer best friend. The book is dedicated to Singh’s romantic partner, the trans filmmaker Silas Howard, who shows up here as the object of a rapturous new love forced by distance to progress largely via text message. (Singh amusingly dissects the “biochemical desire” for an iPhone’s chime to supply a fix of attention, and “the private drama that unfolds in me each time I send a text message and receive an emoji response.”)
It’s perhaps a measure of Singh’s commitment to the instability of our embodied selves that she ends a long section on her blissful relationship by fast-forwarding to its end so she can address her partner’s next partner: “I want to articulate to her my devastation in advance. But also, and crucially, to welcome her lovingly into this genealogy of womanliness to which she will belong.” What might happen to our various relationships should we adopt Singh’s view of the body as unbounded and bountiful archive? Maybe something like this remarkable renunciation of ownership, this invitation to discover novel forms of community among our shifting selves.
Jeanne Winer’s second novel, Her Kind of Case, is an authoritative, grounded, and deeply human legal thriller. Crime fiction in part stems from the 19th century social novel, so it’s always a treat to read a contemporary novel that sheds light on a contemporary social issue: in this case, the complicated origins of homophobic violence and how our legal system handles teenagers involvement in such violence.
Winer’s Lee Isaacs is a 59-year-old criminal defense lawyer in Boulder, Colorado. She’s seasoned, savvy, and winding down a stellar career. She’s also a loner, still grieving the death of her husband. A difficult case falls in her lap: a sixteen-year-old skinhead, Jeremy, has confessed to participating in the horrible beating death, a “boot party,” of a young gay man. His earnest aunt believes that he’s innocent, that he was incapable of such violence, but nearly all the evidence, most of all the confession, point to a different conclusion. Furthermore, Jeremy seems uninterested in defending himself. An enthusiastic practitioner of Tae Kwon Do, Isaacs thrives on competition, always pushing herself physically and mentally. She’s intrigued by the case, because it seems impossible to win. Once she meets Jeremy, though, she senses there’s more to him than the evidence suggests; ultimately she defends him because she wants to understand him.
An attorney with thirty-five years of experience in criminal defense,Winer portrays lawyers and the machinery of the court system in precise detail, but never bogs down the momentum of the story with unnecessary exposition. She has a good instinct for when to dramatize courtroom scenes and when to offer summary, a key skill for legal thriller writers. She creates tension by fleshing out all the complex personalities of all the primary players, from to Jeremy to Carla Romano, the lead investigator, to Mark and Bobby, a gay couple and her best friends, who object to her defending a violent homophobe, to Dan Andrews, the DA, her legal opponent. Her relationship with Dan, in particular, is a blend of mutual respect and sparring, an echo of her Tao Kwon Do matches. As result, it’s one of the most compelling relationships in the book.
In a less compelling version of this story, Winer would’ve made Lee a young, hot twenty-something lawyer with something to prove, the DA would’ve been cocky and despicable, the defendant a pawn, and the plot run-of-the-mill. Writing Lee as a seasoned professional woman was a refreshing and dynamic choice. She’s equal parts wise, passionate, intense, and compassionate. (Please, writers and publishers, more characters like this, please!) Her relationship with Jeremy in particular is touching, not purely because she connects with him, but because he plays a role in her healing from the lost of her husband. In the most unlikeliest of ways, they need each other. As I was reading, I was reminded that the legal profession and justice system, however imperfect, is about people.
When Jared (LUCAS HEDGES) is outed as gay to his parents by a desperate new college friend, he is just as shocked as they are. Whilst he is aware of having feelings for other boys Jared is genuinely unsure of his sexuality and this is the reason he calmly acquiesces to his parents demand that he leave college to attend Love In Action that specialises in gay conversion therapy.
His father (RUSSELL CROWE) is the part time Pastor of a large church and also the owner of a successful car dealership in Arkansas and has reached his decision that this is the right course of action after consulting with two rather conservative Church elders. His mother (NICOLE KIDMAN) quietly goes along with this, and she is the one who accompanies Jared to the Center, and moves into a nearby hotel, where she and Jared will live whilst he goes to his daily ‘lessons’.
The story is based on GARRARD CONEY’S 2016 memoir so we assume that the methods that the school undertook to indoctrinate the ‘pupils’ was reasonably accurate. Adapted by JOEL EDGERTON who also directed and starred as the School’s Principal, he trod a careful path not to make the movie become one big anti-conversion rant.
Jared tries hard to come to terms with what his own sexuality may be and reconciling that with his faith, in an environment that comes over literally like a prison . It is as he and the other ‘pupils’ are verbally bullied by the school establishment, that the quiet introspective Jared finally finds his voice to speak out. It is however when he awakens his mother as to what is actually going on every day when he is dropped off at ‘school’, that she finally takes his side and calls the principal out for being the charlatan that he is.
Boy Erased comes on the heels of The Miseducation of Cameron Post the award winning movie that ridiculed gay conversion therapy. which really appealed to teenagers. With 39 US States still legally allowing such centers to operate this compelling new movie seems to be aimed more at parents who are not aware of the inequities of the system and long-term harm they can cause young people.
Hedges puts in a finally nuanced performance as Jared which is already attracting the attention in this awards season. However it is Kidman’s turn as the protective mother that really grabs your attention whilst you are reaching for the tissues.
Boy Erased somehow lacks the power of Cameron Post and doesnt have you reeling quite so much, but in this current political climate any attempt to spread the news and truth about these places is sorely welcomed.
In my review of Queer Games Studies, I approached the idea of queer games studies as a chance overlap of queer theory and games studies. With a breadth of scope, the lens of queer theory could obviously be applied to many mediums, (board, card, and video) games included. In the introduction to Queerness In Play, the editors present the idea that queer theory and games studies are both studies in the negotiation of spaces and situations, elaborating:
In both queerness and games, the idea of boundless freedom is a mirage, but also for both, there is meaning in exploring the possibilities that occur within the boundaries, especially when that exploration allows to us to see the ways in which those boundaries can be tested, expanded or reconfigured.
It makes sense to examine the rules of one world, to see the expansion of possibility in another.
Where Queer Games Studies, a prior collection of studies and essays taking a snapshot of the field, was something of a hub or a showcase of the many different areas to explore within the young but growing field, this collection has a slightly tighter focus. As the title Queerness In Play implies, the studies and essays presented are interested in both sides of the screen and the interaction between the two. Even when taking a close look at characters in virtual spaces, authors are also shedding light on players’ actions with and towards them inside games and reactions to and conversations around them outside of the games.
Sorted into four parts, “Queer Foundations,” “Representing Queerness,” “Un-gendering Assemblages,” and “No Fear of a Queer Planet: Gaming and Social Futures,” the book examines present, past and potential states of play, players and player avatars.
The first section includes two examinations of games studies itself. Sarah Evans, in “Queer(ing) Game Studies: Reviewing Research on Digital Play and Non-normativity,” presents research into the amount of work regarding queerness in games studies has been published, and in “Envisioning Queer Game Studies: Ludology and the Study of Queer Game Content,” Evan W. Lauteria makes a case for the importance of applications of queer theory in game studies.
“Representing Queerness” examines both characters that players can control and those they encounter and interact with, ranging from those that explicitly identify/are identified to be within the LGBTQ assemblage to those that provide space to examine queer themes. In the former category, there is a look at the portrayal of two characters, Ellie and Bill, from The Last Of Us, a discussion of the lack of same-sex romantic relationship options in the life-simulation game Tomodachi Life, and an examination of how androgyny is ‘allowed’ in protagonists while, in contrast, gender-variance is portrayed in a villainous light. As for queer subtext, there is a survey of gender performance of the various heroes of the Final Fantasy series, an analysis of the reveal of Samus’ appearance underneath the armor in Metroid in relation to similar ‘revelation’ narratives in other media, and a discussion of the discussion surrounding Zelda’s gender identity as Shiek in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time(and other appearances).
The latter half of the book focuses on the players and the act of play as well as the changing environments for play. Where “Un-gendering Assemblages” takes a look at individual roles and play, “No Fear of a Queer Planet: Gaming and Social Futures” considers gaming communities, small and large.
“Cues for Queer Play: Carving a Possibility Space for LGBTQ Role-Play” looks at the various paths and hurdles for queer roles and queer players in table-top, video game (offline and online), and real-life roleplaying games. Nathan Thompson looks at the gay MMORPG ‘mod’ scene in “‘Sexified’ Male Characters: Video Game Erotic Modding for Pleasure and Power” and how it provides a digital mirror to real-life politics of desire. “Let’s Come Out! On Gender and Sexuality, Encouraging Dialogue, and Acceptance,” presents a case study using a board game, Let’s Come Out!, which requires players to roleplay certain identities, to encourage discussion and self-reflection about assumptions and actions.
“The Abject Scapegoat: Boundary Erosion and Maintenance in League of Legends” examines the gender policing of an e-sports player amongst the game’s players and media. “Outside the Lanes: Supporting a Non-normative League of LegendsCommunity” looks a how members of an LBGTQ friendly e-sports club at a college attempt to create an inclusive space and time. “Out on Proudmoore: Climate Issues on an MMO” discusses the creation and social maintenance of the titular LGBT-friendly server in the massively popular game, World of Warcraft.
This collection does a lot to make it recommendable for those interested both queer and game studies. It provides various angles to understanding queerness using the stories and characters presented in games. It showcases an impressive effort of in-depth research as well an appropriate familiarity with the medium. And, it situates its discussion within appropriate contexts, often in the form of player discussion.
However, I must note the reliance on using or examining popular series, something which arguably leads to a slightly inaccurate picture of queer representation in games. It makes sense to use popular series and games to write about: authors are limited by both publishers’ and readers’ varying levels of knowledge regarding video games. Additionally, more popular games reach wider audiences which in turn provide more things to analyze. However, in a time when indie games can sometimes take up equal mindshare as mainstream “triple A” games, it seems odd that those made by smaller studios, like Undertale or Dream Daddy, aren’t discussed alongside other games.
Media is often a mirror for audiences, presenting a version of the world on screen, on canvas or on the page. Unlike most other media, however, games allow for (increased) interaction with the creation. In addition to the work itself and the reaction to it, another facet to be studied are the actions one can take in relation to it. And, in the case of online gaming, the media is less a separated reflection, but an extension of the tangible world.
As the games industry continues to grow and the field of queer games studies continues to widen, solid foundational texts are needed. Queerness In Play is a deeply researched guidebook whose authors deftly navigate multiple contexts and whose editors understand that game studies is not just an examination of other worlds but our own as well. And while it can only cover so much ground, it also does an effective job of inspiring future work.
Queerness In Play
Edited by Todd Harper, Meghan Blythe Adams, and Nicholas Taylor
Palgrave Macmillan
Paperback, 9783319905419, 300 pp.
October 2018
When the movie opens Lee (MELISSA MCCARTHY) is seen as a bitter and mean spirited alcoholic who has just been fired from her latest job and is in her squalid unkempt Manhattan apartment with just her cat for company. Totally broke and not having paid her rent for months , she has exhausted anyone who has tried to help her in the past and her only solace now is drinking alone in a bar spending her last few dollars.
It’s there she meets Jack (RICHARD E GRANT) a flamboyant gay man also destitute and seemingly homeless too, but who proves to be a worthy companion to wallow with.
Life had been better for Lee in the past and she had published three successful biographies but now she has writers block trying to finish her 4th, a memoir on Fanny Brice the vaudeville star. She insists on pursuing it even though her Agent tells her that it is unsaleable. It is however whilst she is in the Library doing research on Brice that she has a lucky break. There secreted between the pages of a book are two letters written by Brice, which Lee quickly slips into her bag.
When she sells the first letter to a book store which specialises in collectable memorabilia , Lee is pleasantly surprised by how much money it fetches, and even more pleased when she embellishes the second letter with some of her own wit, and this sells for even more.
Once she realises that she has inadvertently stumbled on a potential lucrative income, she carefully starts forging letters from the likes of Noel Coward and Dorothy Parker. As she sells them on to a whole network of dealers, Lee is not only suddenly making enough money to pay off her debts and live, but she is also finally finding an outlet for her writing (albeit in other people’s names)
With Jack roped in to help her sell some of the letters, life suddenly seems better for this odd couple of drunks, until alarm bells sound when they flood the market with just too many letters.
The movie is based on Lee Israel’s own life story and her memoir which ironically turned out to be her best selling book. The script written by NICOLE HOLOFCENER and JEFF WHITTY has a great deal of sympathy for Lee which perfect suits McCarthy who gives a career best performance as the sullen unhappy writer. Her interpretation on this woman seemingly incapable of any meaningful social intercourse or relationship is absolutely pitch perfect, and she is a sheer joy to watch.
So too is Grant as the hapless gay man who would love to grab any opportunity of a relationship, but failing that is happy to have alcohol as an alternative.
Can You Ever Forgive Me has the unusual distinction of having both of its two main characters as gay yet it escapes all the usual norms that one associates with an LGBT movie. Their sexuality is treated as unimportant to the main strands of the plot but undeniable is the fact that this is very definitely a queer story. And an excellent one at that.
Mexican Men is comprised of five shorts exploring the lives, loves and sex lives of super hot man-loving Mexicans. All are directed by Julian Hernandez or Robert Fiesco.
Pictured above the trailer is a sizzling subject of the short ‘Tremulo’. Meanwhile, one of the shorts is named ‘Young Man at the Bar Masturbating with Rage and Nerve’ which pretty much says it all.
Berlin isn’t just the German capital – it’s also the sex capital of, well, the world. Probably. As such, the land of experimental sexuality and underground sex clubs provides the perfect backdrop for this surreal drama.
Based on a true story, Yony Leyser’s second film looks at the fateful collision of American writer Ezra and Russian escort Sasha, and the unlocking of their sexual inner selves.
We’ve all been here. The 10 Year Plan looks at Myles and Brody – two cute West Hollywood-residing gay BFFs – who make a pact to marry if they haven’t found Mr Right within a decade.
Now, the two leads (Jack Turner and Michael Adam Hamilton) may look like boyfriend twins, but that doesn’t mean their characters are meant to be together. Indeed, while the lovelorn Myles is looking for a life partner, Brody wants to screw around forevermore. Yeah, we’ve definitely been here. An accessible drama with a glossy finish.
A spiritual and artistic relative of the French movie Stranger By the Lake (also released in 2013), Everlasting is a beautiful, and beautifully eerie, portrait of woodland cruising.
In it, strapping, greying language teacher Carlos hooks up with a hooded youth in a lush forest outside Barcelona. However, he isn’t just any teen – he’s one of Carlos’ students. Yikes. Things go downhill from there.
Two half-brothers form an overly close relationship as children, and grow up to cross boundaries as adults in this uncomfortable drama that will undoubtedly be too much for some viewers. That said, it obviously has its fans. It’s scored a respectable 6.7/10 on IMDB.
And while it might sound exploitative, some will argue it handles its controversial subject matter with sensitivity and tact. Also, much of the movie was filmed in Rio de Janeiro, and the stunning natural beauty is undeniable.
Novelist Dennis Cooper is known for his surreal, provocative depictions of queer sex and violence in his books. He brought his favorite subject matters to the big screen for the first time with this shocker, directed by his friend Zach Farley.
The second movie on this list split into separate stories, Like Cattle Towards Glow shows 13 characters’ experiences of explicit sex (but as Cooper has insisted it’s ‘not a porn movie‘) and in some cases, disturbing violence. Not one for date night.
Think Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, but between two surly male cadets in a military high school. Yes, really. And this one isn’t a porn film either!
In fact, while the guys in it are certainly visually compelling as in any porno, this is one of the most daringly artistic films on this list. Oh, and it’s full of the English literary master’s beguiling dialogue. An intriguing idea.
While most of these films are modern, this hidden classic dates back 30 year to 1986, and boasts a fantastically intimate, gentle tone and rhythm akin to My Beautiful Laundrette, a style made-over in the recent TV series Looking.
It follows New Yorkers Michael and Robert as they navigate a strained but loving gay relationship during the AIDS crisis, as Michael’s ex Nick – for whom he still holds a torch – battles the disease. Tragically, director Bill Sherwood died of AIDS-related complications himself in 1990.
OK, OK, we know. Every gay and their grandmother has seen this one. But like American Pie (the mainstream cult teen film it’s based on), Another Gay Movie gets funnier with each viewing.
This frothy comedy follows four gay high schoolers who make a pact to lose their virginities by the end of summer. The stereotypical humor and campy tone won’t be for everyone, but isn’t that every US comedy? Besides, we’ll always have a soft spot for AGM – these guys’ disastrous sexcapades are simply too relatable.
Baby-faced Joseph Gordon-Levitt alert! (Although he was actually 22 when this came out!) The Looper star appears in a supporting role in this rom-com, playing Paul, the missionary partner of Latter-day Saint Aaron, who is less than impressed when Aaron starts to fall for the perma-tanned gay party boy next door.
Like Another Gay Movie, some of the characters are knowingly, amusingly stereotypical. Wes Ramsey is a walking, talking Ken doll as Christian, while Steve Sandvoss as Aaron sends up Mormon cliches long before a certain blockbuster musical did.
Our final series of erotic vignettes – this time six – focusing on the moment man-on-man passion boils over into something physical.
From two straight guys more interested in each other than the woman they’re meant to be penetrating, to a guy aroused by tattooist’s needle, this promises an unapologetically intense insight into man-on-man desire.
Dekkoo.com (pronounced ‘DECK-koo) is the premiere subscription-based streaming service dedicated to gay men. It provides the largest streaming collection of gay-centric entertainment available boasting a larger selection than Netflix or Amazon Video. Dekkoo is available via iTunes, Google Play, AppleTV and Roku and now also via the new Amazon Dekkoo Channel.
The San Francisco Film Critics Circle (SFFCC) announced today the winners in all categories for their 2018 Award recipients. The circle, comprised of critics from across the Bay Area and Northern California, met in San Francisco to decide the winners. Roma, BlacKkLlansman lead with three wins each.Marlon Riggs award for “courage and innovation in the Bay Area film community”: Bay Area musician/activist/filmmaker Boots Riley, who released his debut movie Sorry to Bother You this year.
Special Citation Award: The Endless (a genre-bending story of emotionally estranged brothers starring and directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead)
Best Actor: Ethan Hawke, First Reformed (searing performance as a tortured priest confronting oblivion)
Best Actress: Melissa McCarthy, Can You Ever Forgive Me? (change-of-pace turn as real-life writer Lee Israel)
Best Supporting Actor: Michael B. Jordan, Black Panther (complex villain Erik Killmonger)
Best Supporting Actress: Regina King, If Beale Street Could Talk (the quietly strong maternal figure of this James Baldwin adaptation)
Best Original Screenplay: First Reformed (Paul Schrader’s career-culminating story of environmental and existential despair)
Best Adapted Screenplay: BlacKkKlansman (Charlie Wachtel, David Rabinowitz, Kevin Willmott and Spike Lee’s electrifying adaptation of the Ron Stallworth book)
Best Cinematography: Roma (director/DP Alfonso Cuarón’s black-and-white evocation of his childhood in Mexico)
Best Score: BlacKkKlansman (majestic jazz score by Terence Blanchard)
Best Production Design: Black Panther (Hannah Beachler, Marvel meets afro-futurism)
Best Editing: The Other Side of the Wind (Bob Murawski and Orson Welles’ classic-saving cut of the lost Welles masterpiece)
Best Animated Feature: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse (directed by Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman)
Best Foreign Language Film: Roma (director/DP Alfonso Cuarón’s black-and-white evocation of his childhood in Mexico)
Best Documentary Feature: Won’t You Be My Neighbor? (Morgan Neville’s heart-tugging documentary about children’s television pioneer Fred Rogers)
Best Director: Spike Lee, BlacKkKlansman (electrifying adaptation of the Ron Stallworth book)
Best Picture: Roma (director/DP Alfonso Cuarón’s black-and-white evocation of his childhood in Mexico)
The full list of winners for the 2018 San Francisco Film Critics Circle Awards:
Best Picture Roma
Best Director
Spike Lee – BlacKkKlansman
Best Actor
Ethan Hawke, First Reformed
Best Actress
Melissa McCarthy, Can You Ever Forgive Me?
Best Supporting Actor
Michael B. Jordan, Black Panther
Best Supporting Actress
Regina King, If Beale Street Could Talk
Best Foreign Language Film Roma
Best Animated Feature
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse
Best Documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
Best Cinematography Roma – Alfonso Cuarón
Best Production design Black Panther – Hannah Beachler
Best Editing The Other Side of the Wind – Bob Murawski and Orson Welles
Best Screenplay (original) First Reformed – Paul Schrader
Best Screenplay (adapted) BlacKkKlansman – Charlie Wachtel, David Rabinowitz, Kevin Willmott and Spike Lee
Best Original Score BlacKkKlansman – Terence Blanchard
Special Citation (for that underappreciated indie gem) The Endless
About the San Francisco Film Critics Circle (SFFCC)
Founded in 2002, the San Francisco Film Critics Circle is comprised of critics from around the Greater Bay Area. Its members include film journalists from the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Jose Mercury News, the East Bay Times, SF Weekly, the East Bay Express, the San Jose Metro, Palo Alto Weekly, the San Francisco Examiner, Variety, KCBS, KGO, KSJS, Radio Sausalito, Slate and more.
