The Toronto Film Critics Association has named RaMell Ross’s narrative debut Nickel Boys as its best movie of 2024, adding to the film’s award season prominence.
In voting on Sunday, Toronto film reviewers also gave the drama about a friendship between two young African American men navigating a reform school in Jim Crow-era Florida the best director prize for Ross, who also shared the best adapted screenplay honor with Joslyn Barnes.
The best picture runner-ups were Sean Baker’s Anora and Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist. Nickel Boys, an adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s 2019 novel, debuted at Telluride and stars Ethan Herisse, Brandon Wilson, Hamish Linklater, Fred Hechinger, Daveed Diggs and Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor.
In the acting categories, the best lead performance crown was shared by Marianne Jean-Baptiste for her role in Mike Leigh’s Hard Truths and Mikey Madison for Anora. And the best supporting performance honor was split between Yura Borisov for Anora and Kieran Culkin in Jesse Eisenberg’s A Real Pain.
In addition, Toronto critics gave the breakthrough performance prize to Clarence Maclin for his role in Sing Sing, while Félix-Antoine Duval was honored for best performance in a Canadian film for his role in Shepherds.
Elsewhere, the best original screenplay prize went to Payal Kapadia for the Mumbai-set drama All We Imagine as Light, which also earned the best international feature recognition. And the best animated feature honor went to director Gints Zilbalodis’s Flow, while Mati Diop’s Dahomey was named best documentary of 2024.
The best first feature prize went to Woman of the Hour, Anna Kendrick’s directorial debut.
