'Hugo'

In a press release this morning, the Austin Film Critics Association announced it had voted Hugo as its best film of the year. The Martin Scorsese-directed picture, set in 1930s Paris, combined 3D family film with a heart-on-its-sleeve ode to cinema history.

Best Film: Hugo
Best Director: Nicolas Winding Refn, Drive
Best Actor: Michael Shannon, Take Shelter
Best Actress: Tilda Swinton, We Need to Talk About Kevin
Best Supporting Actor: Albert Brooks, Drive
Best Supporting Actress: Jessica Chastain, Take Shelter
Best Original Screenplay: Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris
Best Adapted Screenplay: Hossein Amini, Drive
Best Cinematography: Emmanuel Lubezki, The Tree of Life
Best Original Score: Steven Price, Attack the Block
Best Foreign Language Film: I Saw the Devil (D: Kim Jee-woon, South Korea)

Best Documentary: Senna (D: Asif Kapadia)

Best Animated Feature: Rango (D: Gore Verbinski)

Robert R. “Bobby” McCurdy Memorial Breakthrough Artist Award: Jessica Chastain for her work in Take Shelter, The Tree of Life, The Help, The Debt, Coriolanus, and Texas Killing Fields
Best First Film: Attack the Block (D: Joe Cornish)

Austin Film Award: Take Shelter (D: Jeff Nichols)

Top 10 Films:

1. Hugo
2. Drive
3. Take Shelter
4. Midnight in Paris
5. Attack the Block
6. The Artist
7. Martha Marcy May Marlene
8. I Saw the Devil
9. 13 Assassins
10. Melancholia

The membership of the Austin Film Critics Association includes Marjorie Baumgarten (The Austin Chronicle), Jenn Brown (Slackerwood), Dave Campbell (Smells Like Screen Spirit), C. Robert “Massawyrm” Cargill (Film.com, Ain’t It Cool News), Laurie Coker (Hill Country News), Korey Coleman (Spill), Chris Cox (Spill), Cole Dabney (INsite Magazine), Victor Diaz (YNN Austin: Your News Now), Charles Ealy (Austin American-Statesman), John Gholson (Movies.com), William Goss (MSN Movies, Film.com, Orlando Weekly), Peter S. Hall (Hollywood.com, Horror’s Not Dead, and Movies.com), Kimberley Jones (The Austin Chronicle), Jette Kernion (Slackerwood), Harry Knowles (Ain’t It Cool News), Neil Miller (Film School Rejects), Brian Salisbury (Fandango, Movies.com, Hollywood.com, Horror’s Not Dead), Marc Savlov (The Austin Chronicle), Robert Sims (KOOP Radio), Martin Thomas (Spill), Eric “Quint” Vespe (Ain’t It Cool News), Scott Weinberg (Twitch, FEARnet, Fandango), and Chase Whale (GordonAndTheWhale.com). For more info, visit www.austinfilmcritics.org.

This article appears in December 23 • 2011.

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A graduate of the Michener Center for Writers at the University of Texas, Kimberley has written about film, books, and pop culture for The Austin Chronicle since 2000. She was named Editor of the Chronicle in 2016; she previously served as the paper’s Managing Editor, Screens Editor, Books Editor, and proofreader. Her work has been awarded by the Association of Alternative Newsmedia for excellence in arts criticism, team reporting, and special section (Best of Austin). The Austin Alliance for Women...