In what should presage a spectacular comeback for filmmaker Paul Schrader during the coming awards season, First Reformed collected three of the Vancouver Film Critics Circle’s top international prizes, announced today (December 17). Schrader himself took the award for best director and best screenplay, with Ethan Hawke beating out Christian Bale (Vice) and Viggo Mortensen (Green Book) to collect a well-deserved best actor (male) honour for his role as a priest seriously embattled by issues of faith and health. 

Schrader’s storied career hit rock bottom with 2013’s The Canyons, in which Lindsay Lohan was stunt cast alongside porn star James Deen in a work reasonably described as one of the worst films ever made by a major director. First Reformed returns the filmmaker to his natural turf. In her review for the Georgia Straight, VFCC member Janet Smith points out the thematic similarities to Schrader’s screenplay for Taxi Driver, while praising the film as a triumph of composition and formal reserve.

The award for best international film, meanwhile—and perhaps not surprisingly—went to Alfonso Cuaron’s Roma, otherwise known as the Netflix production that definitively upturned any arguments about the equivalence between big and small screens. (And which continues its run at the Vancity Theatre until January 3). Roma was also named Best Foreign Language Film.

If the sharing of those five major awards reflects a certain sort of diplomacy among the VFCC’s members, the race for best female actor was so tight that it forced a three-way split between Melissa McCarthy (Can You Ever Forgive Me?), Olivia Coleman (The Favourite), and Regina Hall (Support the Girls). Opening in Vancouver on Friday (December 21), Yorgos Lanthimos’s The Favourite also scored a best supporting actor (female) nod for Rachel Weisz. Richard E. Grant was named best supporting actor (male) for Can You Ever Forgive Me?, described by the Straight’s Ken Eisner in his review as one of the thesp’s meatiest performance since Withnail and I.

Finally, Minding the Gap—a portrait of three skateboarding friends shot over several years in Rockford, Illionis—was named best documentary. As ever, the VFCC is holding back the winners of its Canadian awards for its ceremony on January 7, when Edge of the Knife, Fausto, and Roads in February duke it out for the best picture nod.

Chaired by Georgia Straight contributor Josh Cabrita, the Vancouver Film Critics Circle was founded in 2000 by critic David Spaner and the Straight’s late, great Ian Caddell.