Somebody forgot to explain the drill to the San Francisco Film Critics Circle. It’s Inglourious Basterds‘ milk-drinking Nazi Christoph Waltz for Best Supporting Actor, dummies, and not Christian McKay for his bellowing genius performance in Me and Orson Welles. Scores of obsequious critics in cities across the country have voted for Waltz over the last three or four days, so how could there have been a misunderstanding?

And what’s with the SFFCC giving Wes Anderson and Noah Baumbach their Best Adapted Screemplay award for Fantastic Mr. Fox?

Otherwise the SFFCC fell into the ranks. Hurt Locker for Best Picture, Kathryn Bigelow for Best Director, Colin Firth‘s Single Man performance for Best Actor, Quentin Tarantino‘s Inglourious Basterds for Best Original Screenplay, Meryl Streep‘s Julie & Julia performance for Best Actress, etc.

I’m sickened by the coast-to-coast toadying shown to Streep over a lightweight “bit” performance. I enjoyed her as well but this is Carey Mulligan‘s year…obviously!

“You’ve been promoting Mulligan since Labor Day,” a critic friend wrote this morning, “but speaking as someone who voted in two critics groups this week (NYFCC and NYFCO), I can tell you that she barely registered. The big showdown in best actress in each group was between Streep and Tilda Swinton (Julia), with Streep squeaking out the win by only a vote or two in both cases.

“And Swinton, who gives one of the ballsiest performances of the year, isn’t even a Golden Globe nominee — and probably won’t register w/the Academy either because each, in their own way, are the province of the lame, the halt and the feebleminded.”