Boyhood sweeps Houston Film Critics Society Awards

The Houston Film Critics Society (of which I am a member) announced its annual awards for cinematic achievement Saturday at H-Town's Sundance Cinemas. And, not entirely unexpectedly, home-town boy Richard Linklater's Boyhood picked up a passel of prizes -- including the Texas Independent Film Award for outstanding indie shot in the Lone Star State. (Other nominees in that category: Above All Else, Hellion, Joe, No No: A Dockumentary and Stop the Pounding Heart.)

Other winners:

PICTURE - Boyhood
DIRECTOR - Richard Linklater, Boyhood
ACTOR - Jake Gyllenhaal, Nightcrawler
ACTRESS - Julianne Moore, Still Alive
SUPPORTING ACTOR - JK Simmons, Whiplash
SUPPORTING ACTRESS - Patricia Arquette, Boyhood
SCREENPLAY - Richard Linklater, Boyhood
ANIMATED FILM - The Lego Movie
DOCUMENTARY - Citizenfour
FOREIGN FILM - Force Majeure
SONG - "Everything is Awesome," The Lego Movie
SCORE - Alexandre Desplat, The Grand Budapest Hotel
POSTER - Annie Atkins, The Grand Budapest Hotel
TECHNICAL ACHIEVEMENT - Boyhood 
WORST FILM - The Identical

(I know HFCS president Joshua Starnes has kittens whenever a member publicly questions any of our awards -- but, really, I saw The Identical, and it wasn't that bad. Trouble is, I don't think many of my fellow HFCSers saw Premature, Best Night Ever or Jinn.)

The Houston Film Commission was given a special award for Outstanding Contribution to Cinema. And it was my pleasure and privilege to introduce a Lifetime Achievement award for Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and Oscar-winning screenwriter Larry McMurtry.

Unfortunately, due to technical problems, the exceptionally inventive montage of 2014 movies prepared for the event by HFCS member Travis Leamons... well, couldn't actually be played at the event. But you, dear reader, can feast your eyes upon it here.

Coming soon: Game Change

Some folks have pre-emptively complained that the upcoming HBO-produced adaptation of Game Change -- John Heilemann and Mark Halperin's best-selling and eye-opening account of the 2008 Presidential race -- mostly ignores the Obama/Clinton primary battles to concentrate on John McCain (played by Ed Harris)and Sarah Palin (Julianne Moore). But this newly released trailer suggests that, hey, the made-for-cable movie will be must-see TV anyway. Premiere date is March 10.

The Special Relationship

Dennis Quaid as Bill Clinton? Julianne Moore as Hillary Clinton? Damn. If I weren't already an HBO subscriber, I would become one for this made-for-cable flick.

Tom Hanks on horseback

Next on Tom Hanks' to-do list: Boone's Lick, his very first Western. Co-scripted by Oscar-winning Brokeback Mountain scribes Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana -- and based on McMurtry's novel -- the film will co-star Julianne Moore as "a headstrong woman...who drags her family on a rickety wagon from Boone's Lick, Mo., to the Wyoming fort where her husband lives. Her brother-in-law (Hanks) escorts her on the dangerous journey and along the way falls in love with her." Guess that will complicate things, you think?