Two somewhat curious acting awards have happened today. First the Boston Society of Film Critics give their Best Supporting Actress award to Juliette Lewis, and now the Los Angeles Film Critics Association has given its Best Supporting Actor to Niels Arestrup, the scowling, white-haired, chain-smoking prison boss in Jacques Audiard‘s A Prophet.
Niels Arestrup, winner of LAFCA’s Best Supporting Actor award for his work in A Prophet, is the snarly old buzzard on the right; A Prophet costar Tahar Rahim is on the left.
Again — nobody in my realm pre-approved this in any way, shape or form. Secondly, Arestrup is quite effective in the film, but his performance is not what anyone would call “oh, wow!” stupendous. He plays a French criminal-class guy in typical French-criminal-class fashion. He’s gruff and blustery — an aging barking dog who’s trying to hide the fact that he’s terrified of losing his hold on power. And always with the cigarettes, the cigarettes, the fucking cigarettes. It’s a very oddball call.
What happened to Christian Bale in The Fighter? What happened to one of the Social Network guys, Andrew Garfield or Justin Timberlake? What happened to Bill Murray in Get Low? The King’s Speech costar Geoffrey Rush was the runner-up.
Niels Arestrup?
HE approves of Animal Kingdom‘s Jacki Weaver winning for Best Supporting Actress, and would have also high-fived the runner-up, Ghost Writer costar Olivia Williams, if she had prevailed. LAFCA’s Best Screenplay award went to Aaron Sorkin for “The Social Network. The Best Documentary Award went to Last Train Home, which I never even saw. The Best Doc runner-up, Exit Through the Gift Shop, should have taken it.
The Best Cinematography award went to Black Swan‘s Matthew (i.e., “Matty” if you’re talking to HitFix‘s Drew McWeeny) Libatique, with True Grit‘s Roger Deakins coming in second.
The Best Music Score award was split between Ghost Writer‘s Alexandre Desplat and The Social Network‘s Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. The Best Production Design award went to Inception‘s Guy Hendrix Dyas with Eve Stewart coming in second for her work on The King’s Speech.
