Critics Choice Awards Go Big For ‘Everything Everywhere All At Once’, But What Does It Mean For Oscar?

deadline.com:

With the lively, fun and star-packed Critics Choice Awards on Sunday night at the Fairmont Century Plaza ballroom (and accompanying viewing party upstairs that elegantly handled the 300 members and guests who lost the organization’s ticket lottery and couldn’t get a seat) now history, there is really nothing between it and the January 24 announcement of Oscar nominations.

With the nationally televised show airing 48 hours before Oscar balloting closes (Tuesday at 5 p.m. PT) though, its influence could be strong, especially for moving speeches from the likes of Brendan Fraser; an impressive sweep of top categories Best Picture, Director, Original Screenplay, Supporting Actor (Ke Huy Quan becoming the runaway train of acting winners thus far this season) for Everything Everywhere All At Once; and among other memorable moments, the great Guillermo del Toro looking to continue sweeping up every animated trophy in sight.

But as a group of critics spread across the country, and now even the globe with a ramped-up international membership as well, the formerly called Broadcast Critics Association has since its inception 28 years ago gained a strong reputation for uncannily presaging the Oscar Best Picture winners and nominees — particularly for a critics group and not a guild like PGA, SAG, and DGA with membership that overlaps with the Academy’s.

In fact, in the first 10 years of this century, CCA and Oscar Best Picture winners matched eight times, only differing in 2004-2005 when CCA chose Sideways and Brokeback Mountain over Oscar winners Million Dollar Baby and Crash (two movies that built their AMPAS momentum late, while CCA is snapshot in time a bit earlier in the season).