Film Independent on Friday announced the nominees for the 2019 Independent Spirit Awards.
The nominees were revealed at a press conference co-hosted by Gemma Chan and Molly Shannon at Los Angeles' W Hotel.
We the Animals, documentary filmmaker Jeremiah Zagar's narrative debut about a mixed-race family with three young sons in upstate New York and based on Justin Torres' 2011 debut novel of the same name, scored the most mentions with five. Eighth Grade, First Reformed and You Were Never Really Here landed four apiece.
Eighth Grade, First Reformed and You Were Never Really Here were nominated for the best feature award, where they will face off against If Beale Street Could Talk and Leave No Trace.
Beale Street and Leave No Trace each received three noms, as did Private Life, Socrates, The Tale and Wildlife.
Films recognized twice include A Bread Factory; Can You Ever Forgive Me?; Hale County This Morning, This Evening; Hereditary; Madeline's Madeline; Minding the Gap; Nancy; On Her Shoulders; Sorry to Bother You; and Suspiria.
Suspiria will receive the Robert Altman Award, given to a film's director, casting director and ensemble cast. Additionally, Luca Guadagnino's Dakota Johnson starrer is up for best cinematography.
Related Stories
Best director nominees include Leave No Trace's Debra Granik, Beale Street's Barry Jenkins, Private Life's Tamara Jenkins, You Were Never Really Here's Lynne Ramsay and First Reformed's Paul Schrader.
Best first feature nominees include Hereditary, Sorry to Bother You, The Tale, We the Animals and Wildlife.
Schrader and Jenkins are also up for best screenplay alongside the writers of Colette, Can You Ever Forgive Me? and Sorry to Bother You.
Meanwhile, Eighth Grade screenwriter Bo Burnham will vie for best first screenplay, along with the writers of Nancy, Thoroughbreds, The Tale and Blame.
Best female lead nominees are Glenn Close (The Wife), Toni Collette (Hereditary), Elsie Fisher (Eighth Grade), Regina Hall (Support the Girls), Helena Howard (Madeline's Madeline) and Carey Mulligan (Wildlife).
In the category of best male lead, First Reformed's Ethan Hawke and You Were Never Really Here's Joaquin Phoenix will compete against Searching's John Cho, Blindspotting's Daveed Diggs and Socrates' Christian Malheiros.
In the best supporting female category, the nominees are Kayli Carter (Private Life), Tyne Daly (A Bread Factory), Regina King (Beale Street), Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie (Leave No Trace) and J. Smith-Cameron (Nancy).
Best supporting male nominees are Raul Castillo (We the Animals), Adam Driver (BlacKkKlansman), Richard E. Grant (Can You Ever Forgive Me?), Josh Hamilton (Eighth Grade) and John David Washington (Monsters and Men).
This summer's hit Fred Rogers documentary Won't You Be My Neighbor? is up for best documentary alongside Hale County, Minding the Gap, Of Fathers and Sons, On Her Shoulders and Shirkers.
Related Stories
Two of this year's high-profile awards contenders were recognized with best international film nominations: Roma (representing Mexico) and The Favourite (U.K.). Other nominees in the category include South Korea's Burning, Italy's Happy as Lazzaro and Japan's Shoplifters.
The 34th Spirit Awards will air live Feb. 23 at 2 p.m. PT on IFC. The ceremony will, as usual, be held on the beach in Santa Monica.
In terms of distributor breakdown, A24 scored 12 noms, followed by Amazon Studios, Netflix and The Orchard with six each and Annapurna Pictures with five.
A full list of this year's nominees follows.
