‘L.A. Confidential’ Voted Best Film By L.A. Critics Movie Also Receives Best Director Nod

“L.A. Confidential,” a sprawling, multicharacter yarn about cops, corruption and murder in 1950s Los Angeles, has emerged as the front-runner for the annual awards season in Hollywood. The Los Angeles Film Critics Association selected the Curtis Hanson film for four honors Saturday, including best picture and director.

That vote followed best film and director nods for “L.A. Confidential” from both the New York Film Critics Circle and the National Board of Review last week.

It is believed this marks the first time that all three groups have awarded a single movie with their best picture and director honors.

Hanson was chosen by L.A. critics as best director and writer for adapting James Ellroy’s novel, the latter an award he shared with his writing partner, Brian Helgeland. The critics also voted best cinematography honors to the film’s Dante Spinotti.

The runner-up in three of these categories was Atom Egoyan’s “The Sweet Hereafter,” based on a Russell Banks novel about a small town coping with a spirit-numbing tragedy. That film was runner-up for best picture, director and cinematography. Kevin Smith’s comedy of sexual ambivalence, “Chasing Amy,” finished second in the screenplay competition.

Robert Duvall was named best actor for his role as an itinerant fundamentalist preacher in “The Apostle,” a film he wrote and directed. Jack Nicholson’s performance as a compulsive-obsessive novelist in James L. Brooks “As Good As It Gets” was runner-up.

Helena Bonham Carter was named best actress for her performance as a conspiring young woman in turn-of-the-century England in “The Wings of a Dove.” Helen Hunt, again from Brooks’ “As Good As It Gets,” finished second in the voting.

Paul Thomas Anderson’s epic look at the porno industry, “Boogie Nights,” took three honors. Burt Reynolds’ delineation of a porn producer and Julianne Moore’s portrayal of his leading lady were voted best supporting actor and actress, respectively. Anderson, the film’s writer-director who previously made “Hard 8,” won the New Generation Award, a special honor saluting a newcomer to cinema.

Runner-up in the best supporting actor category was Kevin Spacey for “L.A. Confidential.” Gloria Stuart, an 87-year-old actress whose career reaches back to the 1930s, was runner-up as best supporting actress for her portrayal of an aging survivor of disaster in “Titanic.”