‘Everything Everywhere All at Once’ Leads Critics Choice Nominations – But ‘RRR’ Crashes the Party, Too

S.S. Rajamouli’s uproarious Indian film is nominated for Best Picture alongside “The Fabelmans,” “Babylon,” “Avatar,” “Top Gun” and more

Everything Everywhere All at Once - RRR
"Everything Everywhere All at Once" (A24), "RRR" (DVV Entertainment)

“Everything Everywhere All at Once” led all films in nominations for the 28th annual Critics Choice Awards, the Critics Choice Association announced Wednesday.

The freewheeling multiverse comedy from directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert picked up 14 nominations in the 21 film categories, followed by Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans” with 11 and Damien Chazelle’s “Babylon” and Martin McDonagh’s “The Banshees of Inisherin” with nine.

Those four films were nominated in the Best Picture category along with “Avatar: The Way of Water,” “Elvis,” “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery,” “Tár,” “Top Gun: Maverick,” “Women Talking” and, in the biggest surprise of the nominations, the uproarious Indian epic musical “RRR.”

That last film was nominated for five awards overall, with additional nods for director S.S. Rajamouli and for Best Foreign Language Film, Best Visual Effects and Best Song.

In recent years, the Critics Choice Awards has increased the number of nominees in most of its top categories, which makes it likelier to please as many studios as possible but less reliable as an Oscar predictor. This year, the Best Picture category had 11 nominees instead of 10 because of what the CCA said was “an exact tie.”

The Best Director category, which has recently been six or seven most years, was expanded to 10. The CCA did not give a reason for that expansion, which potentially prevented a repeat of the all-male directing category at the Golden Globes. The Critics Choice directing category included “Women Talking” director Sarah Polley as well as “The Woman King” director Gina Prince-Bythewood, whose film was not nominated for Best Picture.

With picture and director expanded and all the acting categories sporting six nominees, the results included almost all of the presumed top contenders this season. The most notable films missing from the best picture category, apart from “The Woman King,” included “She Said” and “The Whale,” while actors missing out on nominations included Olivia Colman for “Empire of Light,” Jennifer Lawrence for “Causeway,” Hugh Jackman for “The Son” and Claire Foy and Ben Whishaw for “Women Talking.”

The Critics Choice Association consists of more than 580 broadcast, radio and online critics and entertainment journalists, making it the largest critics group in the U.S. and Canada. (I am a voting member.)

The Critics Choice Awards will take place on Sunday, Jan. 15, 2023 at the Fairmont Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles. Television nominations were previously announced, as was the selection of Jeff Bridges to receive the Lifetime Achievement Award at the ceremony.

The full list of film nominations:

BEST PICTURE
Avatar: The Way of Water
Babylon
The Banshees of Inisherin
Elvis
Everything Everywhere All at Once
The Fabelmans
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery
RRR
Tár
Top Gun: Maverick
Women Talking

BEST ACTOR
Austin Butler – Elvis
Tom Cruise – Top Gun: Maverick
Colin Farrell – The Banshees of Inisherin
Brendan Fraser – The Whale
Paul Mescal – Aftersun
Bill Nighy – Living

BEST ACTRESS
Cate Blanchett – Tár
Viola Davis – The Woman King
Danielle Deadwyler – Till
Margot Robbie – Babylon
Michelle Williams – The Fabelmans
Michelle Yeoh – Everything Everywhere All at Once

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Paul Dano – The Fabelmans
Brendan Gleeson – The Banshees of Inisherin
Judd Hirsch – The Fabelmans
Barry Keoghan – The Banshees of Inisherin
Ke Huy Quan – Everything Everywhere All at Once
Brian Tyree Henry – Causeway

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Angela Bassett – Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Jessie Buckley – Women Talking
Kerry Condon – The Banshees of Inisherin
Jamie Lee Curtis – Everything Everywhere All at Once
Stephanie Hsu – Everything Everywhere All at Once
Janelle Monáe – Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery

BEST YOUNG ACTOR/ACTRESS
Frankie Corio – Aftersun
Jalyn Hall – Till
Gabriel LaBelle – The Fabelmans
Bella Ramsey – Catherine Called Birdy
Banks Repeta – Armageddon Time
Sadie Sink – The Whale

BEST ACTING ENSEMBLE
The Banshees of Inisherin
Everything Everywhere All at Once
The Fabelmans
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery
The Woman King
Women Talking

BEST DIRECTOR
James Cameron – Avatar: The Way of Water
Damien Chazelle – Babylon
Todd Field – Tár
Baz Luhrmann – Elvis
Daniel Kwan, Daniel Scheinert – Everything Everywhere All at Once
Martin McDonagh – The Banshees of Inisherin
Sarah Polley – Women Talking
Gina Prince-Bythewood – The Woman King
S. S. Rajamouli – RRR
Steven Spielberg – The Fabelmans

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Todd Field – Tár
Daniel Kwan, Daniel Scheinert – Everything Everywhere All at Once
Martin McDonagh – The Banshees of Inisherin
Steven Spielberg, Tony Kushner – The Fabelmans
Charlotte Wells – Aftersun

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Samuel D. Hunter – The Whale
Kazuo Ishiguro – Living
Rian Johnson – Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery
Rebecca Lenkiewicz – She Said
Sarah Polley – Women Talking

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Russell Carpenter – Avatar: The Way of Water
Roger Deakins – Empire of Light
Florian Hoffmeister – Tár
Janusz Kaminski – The Fabelmans
Claudio Miranda – Top Gun: Maverick
Linus Sandgren – Babylon

BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN
Hannah Beachler, Lisa K. Sessions – Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Rick Carter, Karen O’Hara – The Fabelmans
Dylan Cole, Ben Procter, Vanessa Cole – Avatar: The Way of Water
Jason Kisvarday, Kelsi Ephraim – Everything Everywhere All at Once
Catherine Martin, Karen Murphy, Bev Dunn – Elvis
Florencia Martin, Anthony Carlino – Babylon

BEST EDITING
Tom Cross – Babylo
Eddie Hamilton – Top Gun: Maverick
Stephen Rivkin, David Brenner, John Refoua, James Cameron – Avatar: The Way of Water
Paul Rogers – Everything Everywhere All at Once
Matt Villa, Jonathan Redmond – Elvis
Monika Willi – Tár

BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Ruth E. Carter – Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Jenny Eagan – Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery
Shirley Kurata – Everything Everywhere All at Once
Catherine Martin – Elvis
Gersha Phillips – The Woman King
Mary Zophres – Babylon

BEST HAIR AND MAKEUP
Babylon
The Batman
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Elvis
Everything Everywhere All at Once
The Whale

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Avatar: The Way of Water
The Batman
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Everything Everywhere All at Once
RRR
Top Gun: Maverick

BEST COMEDY
The Banshees of Inisherin
Bros
Everything Everywhere All at Once
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery
Triangle of Sadness
The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE
Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio
Marcel the Shell with Shoes On
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish
Turning Red
Wendell & Wild

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
All Quiet on the Western Front
Argentina, 1985
Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths
Close
Decision to Leave
RRR

BEST SONG
Carolina – Where the Crawdads Sing
Ciao Papa – Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio
Hold My Hand – Top Gun: Maverick
Lift Me Up – Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Naatu Naatu – RRR
New Body Rhumba – White Noise

BEST SCORE
Alexandre Desplat – Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio
Michael Giacchino – The Batman
Hildur Guðnadóttir – Tár
Hildur Guðnadóttir – Women Talking
Justin Hurwitz – Babylon
John Williams – The Fabelmans

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