The African American Film Critics Association has announced the winners of its 13th Annual AAFCA Awards.
The Harder They Fall won Best Picture, Best Director (Jaymes Samuel), Best Ensemble and Best Music (Samuel, Kid Cudi and Jay-Z), while King Richard also won four awards, including Best Actor (Will Smith), Best Supporting Actress (Aunjanue Ellis), as well as Breakout Actor (Saniyya Sidney) and Emerging Director (Reinaldo Marcus Green).
Jennifer Hudson (Respect) and Corey Hawkins (The Tragedy of Macbeth) also took top acting honors in their respective categories. Elsewhere, Questlove‘s documentary Summer of Soul also earned some love from the AAFCA, which voted Adam McKay‘s script for Don’t Look Up as Best Screenplay.
“It’s been a fantastic year for film,” said AAFCA president and co-founder Gil Robertson. “Just having passed the two-year mark of a global pandemic, great entertainment means more to all of us than ever before. This year’s AAFCA winners not only entertained us, but educated and inspired us and we’re looking forward to celebrating them at the AAFCA Awards.”
Winners are voted on by AAFCA’s 90+ members and will be celebrated on March 2 at the 13th Annual AAFCA Awards ceremony at the SLS Hotel in Los Angeles, where there will be a limited capacity audience and other health and safety protocols in place.
The full list of AAFCA winners is below:
Best Picture: The Harder They Fall
Best Director: Jeymes Samuel, The Harder They Fall
Best Screenplay: Adam McKay, Don’t Look Up
Best Actor: Will Smith, King Richard
Best Actress: Jennifer Hudson, Respect
Best Supporting Actor: Corey Hawkins, The Tragedy of Macbeth
Best Supporting Actress: Aunjanue Ellis, King Richard
Breakout Actor: Saniyya Sidney, King Richard
Best Ensemble: The Harder They Fall
Emerging Director: Reinaldo Marcus Green, King Richard
Best Music: The Harder They Fall (Jeymes Samuel, Kid Cudi, Jay-Z)
Best Documentary: Summer of Soul
Best Independent Feature: Who We Are
The AAFCA will announce several special achievement awards in the coming weeks, including the Cinema Vanguard Award, the ICON Award, AAFCA’s Stanley & Karen Kramer Award for Social Justice, the Building Change Award presented by Lowes, and the Innovator Award presented by Nissan. The sponsors for this year’s AAFCA Awards are Nissan, Lowes, Morgan Stanley, Facebook, and Diageo.
Established in 2003, AAFCA is the premiere body of Black film critics in the world, actively reviewing film and television, with a particular emphasis on entertainment that includes the Black experience and storytellers from the African Diaspora. The organization’s primary mission is to cultivate understanding, appreciation and advancement of the contributions of African descended talent to cinematic and television culture — from the artistic and technical legends of the past to the still unimagined breakthroughs of future generations. AAFCA members are a geographically diverse cross-section of journalists, covering all genres of the cinematic arts, while representing multiple mediums – including print, TV, radio broadcast and online. Collectively, they reach a worldwide audience in excess of 100 million. As a non-profit organization, AAFCA is committed to numerous educational and philanthropic efforts, particularly those that foster and celebrate diversity and inclusion. For more information on AAFCA and its programs visit AAFCA.com.
