69th Annual DGA Awards Winners

The winners of the Directors Guild of America Outstanding Directorial Achievement Awards for the current edition were announced last night during the 69th Annual ceremony.  As expected, Damien Chazelle won the cinema top award for La La Land and what I believe is a well-deserved honor as his movie is a magnificent achievement, Garth Davis won First-Time Feature Film for directing Lion.

Ezra Edelman won the Documentary award for directing O.J.: Made in America and increases film chances to win the doc category at next Academy Awards; the same happens to Chazelle in the director category and yes, also La La Land in the Best Film category.  Believe Chazelle deserves the Academy award but also believe that Whiplash was a superior work in every cinematic sense, so wouldn't mind him being honored for the directing Oscar but wished another film had better chances to win top Oscar, sigh.

To check winners in all categories go official site here.  Winners are in *BLUE.

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1/12/17
Directors Guild of America President Paris Barclay today announced the five nominees for the DGA Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Feature Film for 2016.

“These phenomenal filmmakers have captured our hearts and minds, breathing life into stories rarely told and revealing worlds rarely seen,” said Barclay. “What makes this recognition truly special is the knowledge that these five directors have made a lasting impression on their peers – directors and members of the director’s team who intimately understand the blood, sweat and tears necessary to create a feature film.”

Nominees for First-Time Feature Film Director category were also announced and is in this category where we find an earlier strong contender that disappeared from the awards season to make a comeback among the directors guild.  Yes, talking about Nate Parker and his film, The Birth of a Nation.

There are no surprises in the main category as the five honored directors are the ones with high buzz, especially front-runners Damien Chazelle and Barry Jenkins.  What it's surprising is that this is Chazelle's first DGA Award nomination, as he deserved multiple honors with his outstanding Whiplash; but then consider that all five are first timers with only Garth Davis having a previous DGA nomination in Commercials category, which is incredible as to name only one, Denis Villeneuve is one of my very favorite contemporary directors and it's hard for me to understand why his outstanding Canadian films were not honored before, sigh.

But most amazing is the double-nomination to Garth Davis as he is honored in the main category as well as in the second category. Congratulations for a very unusual achievement.

Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Feature Film
*Damien Chazelle for La La Land
Garth Davis for Lion
Barry Jenkins for Moonlight
Kenneth Lonergan for Manchester by the Sea
Denis Villeneuve for Arrival

Outstanding Directorial Achievement of a First-Time Feature Film
*Garth Davis for Lion
Kelly Fremon Craig for The Edge of Seventeen
Tim Miller for Deadpool
Nate Parker for The Birth of a Nation
Dan Trachtenberg for 10 Cloverfield Lane

Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Documentary
Otto Bell for The Eagle Huntress
*Ezra Edelman for O.J.: Made in America
Josh Kriegman and Elyse Steinberg for Weiner
Raoul Peck for I Am Not Your Negro
Roger Ross Williams for Life, Animated

To check nominations in other categories go official site here.  Awards ceremony will be on February 4 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.