28/11/2017 - Luca Guadagnino kicks off a very promising US awards season with the Award for Best Feature at IFP’s ceremony in New York

Luca Guadagnino (centre) and the cast and crew of Call Me by Your Name with the Gotham Award for Best Feature

It's not every year that the main frontrunner in the eagerly awaited, high-profile US awards season is a European majority co-production. The Old Continent’s film industry can therefore rejoice in the fact that the Italian-French-Brazilian-US title Call Me by Your Name [+see also:
trailer
Q&A: Luca Guadagnino
film profile], directed by Italy’s Luca Guadagnino, has managed to achieve that feat in the current one.

The first major event of this race, the Gotham Awards ceremony, organised by Independent Filmmaker Project (IFP), was held last night in New York – and Call Me by Your Name took home the Best Feature Award. “Above all, Call Me by Your Name is a movie about compassion and transmission of knowledge, becoming better people by meeting other people, so for me this award is a testament to that,” said Guadagnino when collecting the award. “I'm not used to winning; I just get nominated,” said veteran British writer-director James Ivory, the screenwriter of the film, who was also present at the ceremony. It is, in fact, the first time that a European film has won this award.

The young lead of the movie, Timothée Chalamet, also won the Award for Breakthrough Actor. As per usual, the rest of the awards were scooped by US independent productions - although it is worth noting that the award for Best Documentary was won by the US-Danish co-production Strong Island [+see also:
trailer
film profile], directed by New York-born Yance Ford.

Guadagnino's movie has also seen success at the US box office: after being released on 24 November in just four cinemas in Los Angeles and New York, Call Me by Your Name grossed $404,000 at the weekend, with an excellent per-theatre average of $101,000, thus placing it in 13th position. Sony, which is in charge of the US release, intends to gradually distribute it in more theatres during the awards season.

Here is the list of award winners in the film categories:

Best Feature
Call Me by Your Name [+see also:
trailer
Q&A: Luca Guadagnino
film profile] - Luca Guadagnino (Italy/France/Brazil/USA)

Best Documentary
Strong Island [+see also:
trailer
film profile] - Yance Ford (USA/Denmark)

Audience Award
Get Out - Jordan Peele

Bingham Ray Breakthrough Director Award
Jordan Peele - Get Out

Best Screenplay
Jordan Peele - Get Out

Best Actor
James Franco - The Disaster Artist

Best Actress
Saoirse Ronan - Lady Bird

Breakthrough Actor
Timothée Chalamet - Call Me by Your Name

Special Jury Award For Ensemble Performance
Carey Mulligan, Garrett Hedlund, Jason Clarke, Jason Mitchell, Mary J Blige, Rob Morgan, Jonathan Banks – Mudbound

Made in NY Honoree
Michael K Williams