67th Annual Directors Guild of America Awards Winners

Thanks to film critics' clear selection, the favorite to win the guild award was Richard Linklater but last night winner tells us that among those that actually made movies, what they like is quite different from what those that only watch movies like (including many of us viewers). Sigh.

But what has become clear is that the industry love movies about themselves. Just was recalling the year when The Artist swept the industry awards and well, it seems could happen the same as last night winner, Alejandro González Iñárritu for Birdman, has already won honors from the Producers Guild of America and Screen Actors Guild, which makes film and director the frontrunner's to win Oscars.

Over the 66 years in which the DGA Award has been presented, the winner went to win the best director Oscar on all BUT seven occasions and the honored director's film went to win best picture in all but 13 occasions. But more interesting over the 21 years the PGA, SAG and DGA awards were all presented, only ONE film that claimed the top prizes of each of those guilds did not go on to win best picture Oscar.

I know that those three guilds have too many voting Academy members so if you wish to predict Oscar winners from all this data, go ahead as probably you will guess correctly.  Still, let's wait for tonight when we will learn what happens in BAFTA.  Not many voting Academy members are also British Academy members (several hundreds) but my guess is that BAFTA will honor more local films (The Imitation Game or The Theory of Everything) while Oscar will go to honor its local films.  In just a few hours we will see what happens and IF Birdman gets top honors, then you can bet in your office pool that the movie will win big in Oscars.

So we can conclude that the Oscar race for top awards has to be between the two "B" movies (Birdman and Boyhood) and surprises still could come BUT in my mind this B movies race has not stimulated my interest in playing the Oscar guessing game or even watching the Oscars show.  Sigh.

On a positive note is worth mention that most notable of all is that four (4) female directors were honored with prizes.  Lesli Linka Glatter for Homeland "From A to B and Back Again", Jill Soloway for Transparent "Best New Girl", Lisa Cholodenko for Olive Kitteridge, and Laura Poitras for Citizenfour.

Winners are in *BLUE. To check winners in all categories go here.

Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Feature Film
Wes Anderson for The Grand Budapest Hotel
Clint Eastwood for American Sniper
*Alejandro González Iñárritu for Birdman
Richard Linklater for Boyhood
Morten Tyldum for The Imitation Game

Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Documentary
Dan Krauss for The Kill Team
John Maloof and Charlie Siskel for Finding Vivian Maier
Jesse Moos for The Overnighters
*Laura Poitras for Citizenfour
Orlando von Einsiedel for Virunga

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1/13/15
The Directors Guild of America President, Paris Barclay, announced today the five nominees for the current edition of the award that honors Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Feature Films. There are some surprises as many -including me- were expecting at least one female director with a nomination BUT no, there is no women directors nominated, only men.

“In a year full of excellent films, DGA members have nominated a stellar group of passionate filmmakers,” said Barclay. “Inspiring and artistic, these five directors made films that left an indelible impact not only on their fellow directors and members of the director’s team, but on audiences around the world. Congratulations to all of the nominees for their terrific work.”

But the surprises continue with unexpected Eastwood and Tyldum that now have increased their chances to get an Oscar nomination next Thursday; but in my mind -and I truly believe is well-deserved- Linklater will win the DGA Award and also the Oscar in this category. Just remember that Richard Linklater already has been honored at a top film festival where he won the 2014 Berlinale Silver Bear for Best Director. I'm with the few that believe his film is good but not outstanding, what it is remarkably outstanding is his work directing the film.

The winner will be named at the 67th Annual DGA Awards Dinner on Saturday, February 7, 2015 at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza in Los Angeles.

If you wish to read announcement at the guild's official site go here.