Nashville-based critics' group the Music City Film Critics’ Association announced the winners of its seventh annual awards on Friday, honoring the best in film for the 2024 calendar year.
After earning the highest nomination count, Denis Villeneuve’s sci-fi epic Dune: Part Two also claimed the most wins with four, including the organization’s top two prizes, Best Picture and Best Director.
‘Dune: Part Two’ leads the way with 10 nominations
Horror films made a major impression on local film critics this year, as Robert Eggers’ grotesque remake of genre classic Nosferatu won a trio of awards and Coralie Fargeat’s satirical gross-out The Substance won Best Actress (Demi Moore) and Best Supporting Actress (Margaret Qualley).
Nashville resident Maisy Stella also received an honor, winning Best Young Actress for her performance in My Old Ass.
The association’s annual Jim Ridley Award, named after late Scene editor-in-chief and film critic Jim Ridley, went to the micro-budgeted slapstick action-comedy Hundreds of Beavers. A group of six films was nominated by a panel of MCFCA members who knew and worked with Ridley.
“Among our nominees, all of which we felt Jim would have celebrated with gusto and glee, Beavers, a gut-crunching cavalcade of silent-era hijinks with the existential absurdity of a Wile E. Coyote reel, delivered one of the must-see communal moviegoing experiences of the year,” says Sam Smith, member of the MCFCA and part of the Jim Ridley Award Jury. “With this award, we remember Jim and his supportive spirit, and hope to lift up the delightful films that he would have championed.”
Stay tuned for the Scene's own annual Jim Ridley Film Poll, which publishes at the end of January.
The MCFCA includes 40 professional film critics working in or near Nashville, including myself and several other Scene critics. See the full slate of winners below.
BEST PICTURE – Dune: Part Two
BEST DIRECTOR – Denis Villeneuve, Dune: Part Two
BEST ACTRESS – Demi Moore, The Substance
BEST ACTOR – Timothée Chalamet, A Complete Unknown
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS – Margaret Qualley, The Substance
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR – Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain
BEST YOUNG ACTRESS – Maisy Stella, My Old Ass
BEST YOUNG ACTOR – Izaac Wang, Dìdi
BEST ACTING ENSEMBLE – Saturday Night
BEST ANIMATED FILM – The Wild Robot
BEST DOCUMENTARY – Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story
BEST INTERNATIONAL FILM – Flow
BEST SCREENPLAY – Anora
BEST ORIGINAL SONG – “Kiss the Sky” – The Wild Robot
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE – Challengers
BEST SOUND – Dune: Part Two
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY – Nosferatu
BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN – Nosferatu
BEST EDITING – Challengers
BEST STUNT WORK – The Fall Guy
BEST COMEDY FILM – Hundreds of Beavers
BEST HORROR FILM – Nosferatu
BEST ACTION FILM – Dune: Part Two
BEST MUSIC FILM – Wicked
THE JIM RIDLEY AWARD – Hundreds of Beavers
