Indie Spirit Award nomination leader “Everything Everywhere All at Once” won seven awards on Saturday afternoon in Santa Monica, including Best Feature, Best Lead Performance (Michelle Yes), Best Supporting Performance (Ke Hui Quan). Best Director, Best Screenplay (awarded to each directing duo The Daniels), Best Film Editing, and Best Breakthrough Performance for Stephanie Hsu.
The film won in every single category it was nominated for. Kwan was competing with his co-star Jamie Lee Curtis in the race for Best Supporting Performance, giving the film a margin of seven wins despite eight nominations. And seven Indie Spirit Awards is the most wins ever for a single film. Barry Jenkins’ 2016 “Moonlight” (distributed like “Everything Everywhere,” by A24) was the previous record holder, winning five competitive awards in addition to the honorary Robert Atman Award, which recognized the film’s ensemble cast.
This year, the Robert Altman Award went to “Women Talking,” Best Picture Oscar nominee, which was acknowledged by director Sarah Polley, her casting directors and the nearly all-female cast.
The show was hosted by Hasan Minhaj, who appeared on the show’s former network IFC — it was streamed on YouTube and IMDb this year — and opened the afternoon with The Curse of Clickbait Journalism.
In other film categories, “Aftersun” filmmaker Charlotte Wells won best first feature for her semi-autobiographical film starring Oscar-nominee Paul Mescal. ‘All the Beauty and the Bloodshed’ won the award for Best Documentary. Pakistani film ‘Joyland’ won the best international film award. Todd Field’s “Tar” took home the award for Best Cinematography, which Field accepted on behalf of cameraman Florian Hofmeister.
In the television categories, all dedicated to shows premiering in 2022, Hulu’s “The Bear” took home the award for best new scripted series. Quinta Brunson of “Abbot Elementary” (ABC) took home the award for Best Lead Performance and Ayo Adebiri of “The Bear” took home the award for Best Supporting Performance. The winner in the Best Non-Fiction Series category was HBO’s “The Rehearsal”.
For the first time, the acting categories of the Spirit Awards were gender-neutral, with 10 nominees instead of five in the lead and supporting categories. In those categories, women slightly outnumbered men, with the biggest disparity in the main film category, with eight women (including Cate Blanchett and Michelle Yeoh) as the only male nominees were Paul Meskal and Jeremy Pope.
For most of its 38-year existence, the Spirit Awards have been the indie alternative to the Oscars, with only 1986’s “Platoon” winning the top prize at both shows for the first 26 years of Spirits’ existence. Beginning with “The Artist” in 2011, the Spirit Awards had a six-year streak in which five of its winners were named Best Picture at the Oscars. Since then, “Nomadland” has been the only match, although Spirit Award voters tend to vote for Oscar nominees and potential Oscar winners whenever they are on the ballot.
And fittingly, other than Best International Film (which didn’t garner a single Oscar nod), the current Oscar nominees dominated every Oscar-equivalent category at the Indie Spirit Awards.
Here is the list of the nominees with the winners shown * the winner,
film categories
best feature
“Bones and All”
“Everything Together Everywhere” *WINNER
“O our father, Satan”
“Tar”
“Talking Women”
best first feature
“Aftersun” *WINNER
“Emily the Criminal”
“Test”
“Murina”
“Palm Trees and Power Lines”
best director
Todd Field, “The Wire”
Kogonada, “After Yang”
Daniel Kwan & Daniel Scheinert, “Everything Everywhere All at Once” *WINNER
Sarah Polley, “Women Talking”
Halina Rijn, “Bodies Bodies Bodies”
best screenplay
Lena Dunham, “Catherine Called Birdy”
Todd Field, “The Wire” Kogonada, “After Yang”
Daniel Kwan & Daniel Scheinert, “Everything Everywhere All at Once” *WINNER
Sarah Polley, “Women Talking”
Best First Screenplay
Joel Kim Booster, “Fire Island”
Jamie Dack, Audrey Findlay, The Story of Jamie Dack, “Palm Trees and Power Lines”
KD Davila, “Emergency”
Story by Sarah DeLappe, Kristen Roupenian, “Bodies Bodies Bodies”
John Patton Ford, “Emily the Criminal” *WINNER
best lead performance
Cate Blanchett, “The Wire”
Dale Dickey, “A Love Song”
Mia Goth, “Pearl”
Regina Hall, “Respect for Jesus. Save Your Soul”
Paul Meskal, “Aftersun”
Aubrey Plaza, “Emily the Criminal”
Jeremy Pope, “Inspection”
Andrea Riseborough, “To Leslie”
Taylor Russell, “Bones and All”
Michelle Yeoh, “Everything Everywhere All at Once” *WINNER
Best Supporting Performance
Jamie Lee Curtis, “Everything Everywhere at Once”
Brian Tyree Henry, “Causeway”
Nina Hose, “The Wire”
Brian D’Arcy James, “Cathedral”
Ke Hui Quan, “Everything Together Everywhere” *WINNER
Trevante Rhodes, “Bruiser”
Theo Rossi, “Emily the Criminal”
Mark Rylance, “Bones and All”
Jonathan Tucker, “Palm Trees and Power Lines”
Gabrielle Union, “Inspection”
Best Breakthrough Performance
Frankie Corio, “Aftersun”
Gracie Filipovic, “Murina”
Stephanie Hsu, “Everything Everywhere at Once” *WINNER
Lily McInerney, “Palm Trees and Power Lines”
Daniel Zolghadri, “Funny Pages”
Best Cinematography
Florian Hofmeister, “The Wire” *WINNER
Helen Louvaart, “Murina”
Gregory Oakes, “Aftersun”
Eliot Rockett, “Pearl”
Anissia Uzeman, “Neptune Frost”
excellent editing
Ricky D’Ambrose, “Cathedral”
Dean Fleischer Camp, Nick Paley, “Marcel the Shell with Shoes On”
Blair McClendon, “Aftersun”
Paul Rodgers, “Everything Everywhere at Once” *WINNER
Monica Wiley, “The Wire”
John Cassavetes Award
Awarded to Best Feature Made Under $1,000,000 (Award Awarded to Writer, Director, and Producer)
“African Desperate”
“a love song”
“Cathedral” *WINNER
“Holy Amy”
“Something in the Dirt”
Robert Altman Award
given to the director, casting director and ensemble cast of a film
“Women Talking” *WINNER
Director: Sarah Polley
Casting Directors: John Buchan, Jason Knight
Ensemble: Shayla Brown, Jessie Buckley, Claire Foy, Kira Gulloen, Kate Hallett, Judith Ivey, Rooney Mara, Sheila McCarthy, Frances McDormand, Michelle McLeod, Liv McNeil, Ben Whishaw, August Winter
best documentary
“All That Breathes”
“All the Beauty and the Bloodshed” *WINNER
“house made of splinters”
“midwives”
“Wroytsville, USA”
best international film
“courses”
“Joyland” *WINNER
“Leonor Will Never Die”
“Return to Seoul”
“St. Omer”
producer award
Honoring emerging producers who demonstrate the creativity, tenacity and vision required to produce quality independent films, despite extremely limited resources.
Liz Cardenas
Tory Lenosky *WINNER
David Grove Churchill Viste
someone to watch award
Recognizes a talented filmmaker of singular vision who has yet to receive due recognition.
Adama Ebo, “Respect for Jesus. Save Your Soul”
Nikyatu Jusu, “Naini” *WINNER
Araceli Lemos, “Holy Amy”
Truer Than Fiction Award
Presented to a rising director of non-fiction features who have yet to receive critical recognition.
Isabel Castro, “Mija”
Reed Davenport, “I Didn’t See You There” *WINNER
Rebecca Hunt, “Beba”
television series
Best New Non-Scripted or Documentary Series
“Children of the Underground”
“Mind Over Murder”
“Pepsi, where’s my jet?”
“The Rehearsal” *WINNER
“We Need to Talk About Cosby”
Best New Scripted Series
“Bear” *WINNER
“Pachinko”
“Coolie”
“severance”
“Station Eleven”
Best Lead Performance in a New Scripted Series
Amal Amin, “The Porter”
Mohammad Amer, “Mo”
Quinta Brunson, “Abbott Elementary” *WINNER
Bridget Everett, “Somebody Somewhere”
Kamilian, “Rap Sh!t”
Melanie Lynskey, “Yellowjacket”
Himesh Patel, “Station Eleven”
Sue Ann Pien, “As We See It”
Adam Scott, “Severance”
Ben Whishaw, “It’s Gonna Hurt”
Best Supporting Performance in a Newly Scripted Series
Danielle Deadweiler, “Station Eleven”
Ayo Adebiri, “Bear” *WINNER
Jeff Hiller, “Somebody Somewhere”
Gebemisola Ikumelo, “A League of Their Own”
Janelle James, “Abbott Elementary”
Ebon Moss-Bachrach, “Bear”
Frankie Quinones, “This Fool”
Sherrill Lee Ralph, “Abbott Elementary”
Molly Shannon, “I Love That For You”
Tramell Tillman, “Severance”
Best Ensemble in a Newly Scripted Series
“Pachinko” *WINNER
Ensemble Cast: Soji Arai, Jin Ha, Inji Jeong, Minha Kim, Kaho Minami, Lee Minho, Steve Sanghyun Noh, Anna Sawai, Jimmi Simpson, Yuh-jung Yoon