First Quarter Awards | The Spring Recap

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The Spring Movie Season is drawing to a close and before the onslaught of the big-budget event movies, also known as the Summer Movie season begins, its time to recap the Best and Worst of first quarter of 2013.

Traditionally a slow period for major studio releases, the Spring movie season boasted some impressive offerings littered among the usual early-season fare. Four films (Oz the Great and Powerful, The Croods, Identity Thief and G.I. Joe: Retaliation) were the only films to cross the $100 million threshold.

After screening nearly 100 films this quarter, it’s time to acknowledge the movies and performances that roared like cinematic lions as well as the ones that were weak as sacrificial lambs; here are the winners and losers in our Spring Recap.

Best Film

The Place Beyond the Pines
Trance
Mud

The Iceman
The Company You Keep

the bullet vanishesBest Foreign Film

The Bullet Vanishes
In the Shadow
Quartet
Starbuck
Better Mus’ Come

The-Story-of-Lovers-RockBest Documentary Film

Free Angela and All Political Prisoners
The Story of Lover’s Rock
Stories We Tell
Venus and Serena
Harvest of Empire

upside-down-movie-image-01Best Cinematography

 Upside Down
To the Wonder
The Place Beyond the Pines
Love is All You Need
The Bullet Vanishes

AMF_3574 (140 of 194).NEFBest Performance, Male

Ryan Gosling & Bradley Cooper| The Place Beyond the Pines
Michael Shannon | The Iceman
James Franco | Spring Breakers
Matthew McConaughey | Mud
Chadwick Boseman | 42

Love_Is_all_you_need_3

Best Performance, Female

Maggie Smith | Quartet
Rosario Dawson | Trance
Eva Mendes | The Place Beyond the Pines
Trine Dyrholm | Love Is All You Need
Paula Patton | Disconnect

diehardcb11Most Forgettable Films

A Good Day to Die Hard
Gangster Squad
Broken City
Temptation: The Confessions of a Marriage Counselor
21 & Over

DEAD-MAN-DOWN-Terrence-Howard-Image-01James Brown Award (Hardest Working Actor)

James Franco | Oz the Great and Powerful & Spring Breakers
Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson | Snitch & G.I. Joe: Retaliation
Terrence Howard | Dead Man Down & The Company You Keep
Olga Kurylenko | To the Wonder & Oblivion
Chadwick Boseman | The Kill Hole & 42